Controversy Continues Even After “Lovely Runner” Explained The Plot Reminding Of Late Jonghyun
“Lovely Runner” team recently explained the suspicions over the drama exploiting SHINee Jonghyun’s story but fans continued to argue
Earlier on April 8th, controversy arose as some people pointed out that the plot of tvN’s new Mon-Tue drama “Lovely Runner” reminded them of the life story of the late SHINee’s Jonghyun.
Based on the web novel “Tomorrow’s Best”, “Lovely Runner” tells about Im Sol (Kim Hye-yoon), going back to 2008 to save her favorite singer Ryu Sun-jae (Byun Woo-seok), who let go of his will to live, and change his life.
The plot of the drama became controversial as netizens in online communities pointed out that ti reminded them of a specific idol. In particular, a drama fan pointed out that the date of the first episode broadcast was the birthday of the late SHINee member Jonghyun, adding that 2008, the year to which the female lead goes back in the drama, was the same as SHINee’s debut year.
As such, protesting posts poured out on social media, such as “It’s so rude to use the deep pain of SHINee fans as a drama material and ignore our opinions”. According to fans’ complaints, they even sent e-mails to the broadcaster a month before the drama premiere.
In response to fans’ protest, “Lovely Runner” production team explained, “We judged that the setting of six years in the past according to the original work was not suitable to portray the young days of the two main characters or show the difference of the times clearly. Therefore, we set the time to 2008, 15 years in the past, so that it clearly contrasts with the current time of 2023 in the drama.”
Despite the explanation, fans are still protesting. Some fans expressed frustration, saying “Even if it was unintentional, it is so inconsiderate of the team to chose a timeline different from that of the original work and create a story reminiscent of a real-life figure”.
However, some argued that fans’ claims were merely speculations. The band in the original work has five members but it became a four-member band in the drama adaptation. They also changed the narrative of a trainee to a swimmer-turned-singer, seemingly to avoid such controversies. In addition, several fans also expressed discomfort over the late Jonghyun being mentioned in a negative controversy.
