Falhon Cyril

https://news.mydramalist.com/article/jung-jun-won-opens-up-about-career-struggles-amid-attitude-controversy#comment-27088900

https://news.mydramalist.com/article/jung-jun-won-opens-up-about-career-struggles-amid-attitude-controversy#comment-27088900

Follow-up: Why Are We Suddenly Talking About His Face?

I honestly did not expect Jung Jun-won’s appearance to become such a big subject in the comments under this article, because that was not what the article was about. Lily Alice was talking about his behavior on Hangout with Yoo, his nervousness, and his career struggles. My comment was correcting the timeline and adding context. Neither of us was discussing whether the man was handsome. Yet somehow the conversation moved from “Was he too passive on a variety show?” to “Well, people think he is ugly.” And I have to wonder why. Do we really need to shake the same bag of shit until we manage to create another controversy on top of the first one?

To be fair, the appearance discussion did not start here. There were already comments when Resident Playbook aired because Jung Jun-won was paired romantically with Go Youn-jung. Some Korean viewers said their “drawing styles” did not match, basically questioning whether somebody who looks like Go Youn-jung would realistically fall for his character. Jung Jun-won himself later admitted that he had expected those reactions and that they still hurt when he actually read them. But this part of the story is often conveniently forgotten: as the drama continued, the reaction changed. Viewers became attached to Gu Do-won, the couple became popular, and Korean coverage itself noted that the initial concerns were overturned as people fell for the character. So even the first so-called “appearance controversy” did not end with Korea collectively deciding that Jung Jun-won was ugly. https://www.starnewskorea.com/broadcast-drama/2025/05/20/2025051914562288896

Then A Bona Fide Killer created another argument, but again, the original discussion was more specific than “he is ugly.” Kwon Tae-sung is described in the webtoon as an exceptionally handsome man, and his looks are actually part of the character because Yu Bo-na is physically attracted to him. Some readers therefore thought Jung Jun-won did not match the image they had of the character. I have no problem with that opinion. If you read a webtoon for years and imagine a character one way, you can think an actor is miscast. But “he doesn't look like the man I imagined” and “this actor is ugly” are not the same sentence. Even the Korean article reporting the controversy included completely opposite reactions from viewers saying they found him handsome, that his softer appearance actually suited the character, and that his acting was more important anyway. https://sports.khan.co.kr/article/202607091103003

MBC’s own description of Kwon Tae-sung even calls the character tall and good-looking, while the production still chose Jung Jun-won for the role. So clearly the people actually making the drama did not share this idea that casting him as an attractive husband was somehow absurd. https://enews.imbc.com/News/RetrieveNewsInfo/508375

What I find more interesting is why all of this suddenly gets dragged back into a completely unrelated controversy. If somebody thought he did badly on Hangout with Yoo, then talk about that. If somebody thinks he was miscast in A Bona Fide Killer, talk about the casting. Why does his face suddenly become additional evidence against him? Once people dislike somebody, there seems to be this strange need to collect every possible negative thing that has ever been said about them and pile it all together. A nervous appearance becomes a “bad attitude,” then somebody remembers an old casting discussion, and suddenly we are debating whether his face deserves to be on television.

And since his face has now somehow become part of the subject, I am also going to say something about the photograph chosen for this article. I am not accusing Lily Alice of deliberately choosing an unflattering picture, because I have absolutely no way of knowing her intention and I am not going to invent one. But pictures matter too. The portrait used is a very plain, tightly framed photograph with almost no styling and a neutral expression. There are countless recent photographs of Jung Jun-won where he looks considerably better, including professional editorials and his own social media. Maybe MDL had licensing reasons for using that specific photograph; publications cannot simply grab whatever Instagram picture they want. But when half the discussion underneath somehow becomes about his appearance, it is difficult not to notice that the image introducing readers to the article is hardly the most flattering representation available.

And no, I personally do not understand calling this man ugly. You do not have to find him attractive. Attraction is subjective and everybody has a type. But there is a huge difference between “he doesn't do anything for me” and behaving as though “Jung Jun-won is ugly” is some objective fact established by Korean society.

I have actually been to Korea, and one thing travelling teaches you very quickly is that television is not real life. If most of the Koreans you see are K-pop idols, actors, models and people in advertisements, your idea of what an ordinary Korean person looks like becomes completely distorted. Television selects unusually photogenic people, then adds professional hair, makeup, styling, lighting, lenses, editing and sometimes cosmetic procedures on top of that. When you actually walk around Korea, you see normal human beings. Of course you do. They are not all walking around Gangnam looking like Cha Eun-woo or Go Youn-jung.

I had my own version of that culture shock when I first went to the United States. I knew obesity was more common there than in Europe, but television had absolutely not prepared me for how many very overweight people I would actually encounter in everyday life. It was simply another reminder that the population you see through entertainment is not a representative sample of the people living in a country. Korea is no different. K-dramas are not a census.

Jung Jun-won actually has something that I personally find much more interesting than the manufactured “perfect visual” look. He looks natural. He can look like somebody you might realistically meet, while still being a very attractive man. Allure Korea literally built a whole June 2025 editorial around him called “ORDINARY MAN,” photographing him in McQueen, Maison Margiela, Sacai, Moschino and other fashion pieces. That is hardly an industry treating somebody as visually unacceptable. https://www.allurekorea.com/2025/06/24/ordinary-man-%EC%A0%95%EC%A4%80%EC%9B%90/

There is an even better example because it is not just a fashion magazine choosing him for photographs. In August 2025, SSCL, an official Porsche dealer in Korea, launched its new “SSCL Friends” ambassador program and selected Jung Jun-won as its very first ambassador. SSCL specifically said that his “intellectual and refined image” matched the premium lifestyle the brand wanted to represent. Again, being chosen by Porsche does not scientifically prove that somebody is handsome, because there is no scientific measurement for beauty. But it does make the idea that the Korean entertainment and advertising industries somehow regard him as an ugly man rather difficult to take seriously. https://m.etnews.com/20250820000102

What bothers me more is that Jung Jun-won is exactly the kind of person this sort of attack can hurt. We already know that appearance comments affected him during Resident Playbook. He has never presented himself as some arrogant man convinced that he is gorgeous. Quite the opposite. In interviews, he tends to describe himself as ordinary, shy and lucky to have finally received these opportunities after years of struggling. That does not make him responsible for people attacking him, and I would not say that all of this would disappear if he were simply “stronger.” The people doing it are responsible for what they write. But when somebody has already admitted that a particular insecurity hurts him, repeatedly aiming at exactly that insecurity becomes particularly nasty.

And this is where I think jealousy sometimes enters the conversation. When there is nothing meaningful left to criticize about somebody’s work, appearance is the easiest weapon because there is no argument to win. You can always say someone is ugly, too old, too fat, too thin, too short, has the wrong nose, wrong eyes, wrong skin, whatever. There is no evidence required. It is playground bullying dressed up as an opinion.

There are actors far less conventionally attractive than Jung Jun-won who have had successful careers without anybody creating an “ugly controversy” around them. That alone should tell us how manufactured these things can be. Jung Jun-won happened to become the romantic partner of one of Korea’s most famous beauties, then got cast as a webtoon character explicitly described as extremely handsome, and then had an unrelated variety-show controversy just as his career was exploding. Those three completely separate things are now being mashed together until people talk as if “Jung Jun-won is ugly” were an established fact everybody in Korea agrees on.

It isn't. Some people do not find him attractive. Some webtoon readers wanted somebody else as Kwon Tae-sung. Some viewers initially thought he and Go Youn-jung were visually mismatched. Other people thought he was handsome, loved him with Go Youn-jung, bought out his fan meetings, watched his dramas, and apparently Porsche thought his image was refined enough to represent their brand. Those are the actual facts.

Nobody has to be attracted to Jung Jun-won. But if an article is about a man becoming so nervous on a variety show that he reportedly threw up after filming, and our response somehow becomes “also, his face is ugly,” maybe the problem we should be examining is no longer Jung Jun-won.

Exactly. That is the part I find disturbing too. We are talking about a few awkward minutes from one recording, yet people immediately started making conclusions about his entire personality, work ethic and even whether he deserved to be an actor. Being a celebrity does not mean every uncomfortable moment has to become evidence of some moral failure. We can dislike a performance, a variety appearance or even someone's public personality without turning it into a campaign against the person. And in this case, once people who were actually there explained how nervous he was, that should at least have been enough for everyone to reconsider some of the harsher assumptions.

I wanted to add the full timeline here because the article is mostly accurate about what happened after Hangout with Yoo, but there are two important things that need correcting or clarifying. First, the way the article connects Jung Jun-won talking about almost giving up acting with the current “attitude controversy” is misleading. The Ha Ji-young video was uploaded on August 5, after the August 1 broadcast, but I cannot find a reliable source giving the actual recording date, so I am not going to pretend we know whether it was filmed before or after the controversy. What we can prove, however, is that these were absolutely not new comments suddenly made to gain sympathy after being criticized. Jung Jun-won had already been talking publicly about exactly the same career struggles more than a year earlier.

In a May 26, 2025 interview with Maeil Business Newspaper, after Resident Playbook, Jung Jun-won described the drama as something almost miraculous after ten years of struggling as an actor. He talked about the uncertainty of a profession where there is no fixed path and where an actor ultimately has to be selected by somebody else. He also said that he did not know how long his new popularity would last and that what he really wanted was simply to remain a useful actor who could continue working. This was published more than fourteen months before the Hangout with Yoo controversy, so his August 2026 comments about luck, being chosen and questioning whether he could continue acting are completely consistent with things he had already been saying publicly. Source: https://www.mk.co.kr/news/entertain/11326084

He was even more explicit a month later. On June 26, 2025, during his Allure Korea interview, he said that Resident Playbook had “pulled me back up when I was at the edge of a cliff.” Then, on June 29, 2025, while appearing on Uhm Jung-hwa’s YouTube channel, he explained that he had desperately wanted more people to see his acting but could not simply create opportunities for himself because actors have to be chosen. He said the number of productions had fallen as the industry became more difficult, that his stress had reached its limit around the tenth year of his career, and that before Resident Playbook he felt as though he had nowhere else to go and was standing at the edge of a cliff. Again, all of this was said in June 2025, not in response to anything that happened in August 2026. Sources: https://enews.imbc.com/News/RetrieveNewsInfo/466479 and https://www.xportsnews.com/article/2020617

There is also a lot of discussion saying that an actor with eleven years of experience cannot suddenly use “being shy” as an explanation. The problem is that he did not suddenly start saying this either. On May 19, 2025, Jung Jun-won personally wrote in his fan café that although he had joined it some time earlier, he was “very shy” and had only then gathered enough courage to write to the fans. That was around fifteen months before this controversy. It was reported by several Korean outlets at the time. So people are free to dislike how he behaved on Hangout with Yoo, but the claim that shyness or nervousness was invented afterwards as damage control is contradicted by his own public comments from 2025. Source: https://isplus.com/article/view/isp202505190365

There is actually another factual mistake in the MDL article. It says that his August 1 appearance on Hangout with Yoo was his “first variety-show appearance.” It was not. Jung Jun-won had already been one of the four regular cast members of MBC’s Vacation by Part-Time Job (알바로 바캉스), alongside Lee Soo-ji, Kang You-seok and Kim Ah-young. The program aired for four episodes from November 19 to December 10, 2025. This is not something coming from a fan page or a database: MBC’s own official program page confirms the broadcast dates and cast. iMBC also explicitly described the program at the time as Jung Jun-won’s first variety challenge. Sources: https://program.imbc.com/Concept/1006848100000100000 and https://enews.imbc.com/News/RetrieveNewsInfo/484567

That earlier variety appearance is particularly relevant because we can actually compare his behavior instead of guessing about his personality from one difficult recording. On Vacation by Part-Time Job, he spent several days in Tanzania with the same small group, cooking, working, travelling and interacting with local people. MBC later reported that despite it being his first regular variety show, he showed natural reactions, improvised comedy and looked after the other cast members, including carrying Kim Ah-young after she injured her foot. At the end of the program Jung Jun-won himself said that he had been very nervous because it was his first variety show but had been able to enjoy it thanks to the other members. In other words, there is already documented evidence from before this controversy that he becomes nervous in unscripted entertainment, but can become much more relaxed when he has time to adapt to the people and environment around him. Source: https://enews.imbc.com/News/RetrieveNewsInfo/486947

This also puts HaHa and Gong Hyo-jin’s defense into better context. The article correctly reports that HaHa, who was actually there during the recording, described Jung Jun-won as lovable, cute and funny on set and asked viewers to remember that he is an actor rather than an experienced variety entertainer. Gong Hyo-jin, who was also there, went even further and revealed that he actually vomited after the recording because he had been so nervous. Those people did not watch an edited clip online and diagnose his personality from it. They were physically present during the filming. People can still think his performance on that episode was awkward or frustrating; that is a perfectly legitimate opinion. What the available evidence does not establish is that he was arrogant, disrespectful, lazy or deliberately “insincere.”

There is another piece of context worth mentioning because his career has changed very quickly. Jung Jun-won spent roughly a decade mostly in supporting roles before Resident Playbook suddenly made him widely recognizable in 2025. His first Seoul fan meeting in July 2025 sold out, and his profile rose sharply afterwards. Then, on July 20, 2026, only twelve days before this Hangout with Yoo episode aired, Company On officially announced that it had signed him to an exclusive contract and said it would fully support his future activities. Company On is the management company founded by Lee Je-hoon and also represents actors including Lee Dong-hwi and Kim Sung-kyu. So this controversy happened right in the middle of a very recent transition from long-time supporting actor to leading actor and much greater public exposure, not after eleven years of living as an experienced television celebrity. Source: https://companyon.co.kr/bbs/?so_table=news and https://www.newspim.com/news/view/20260720000760

So I think the factual distinction is important here. Jung Jun-won did receive criticism following Hangout with Yoo, and nobody has to enjoy his variety-show personality. But his comments about almost giving up acting were not a new explanation for this controversy; the same story was publicly documented throughout 2025. His description of himself as very shy also predates the controversy by well over a year. And Hangout with Yoo was not actually his first variety program, as this article states. The evidence we have from people who were at the recording, from his own statements long before the backlash, and even from his previous MBC variety program points much more strongly toward someone who was extremely nervous during a particular recording than toward the much more serious character judgments that have since been attached to a few awkward television clips.

Every time one allegation falls apart, another one appears. Now you're saying Kim Soo Hyun made Kim Sae Ron drink and drive. Where is the evidence for that? The DUI was investigated in 2022, and no such allegation was made then. It only appeared years later, after the controversy had already started.

The same applies to Gold Medalist. Kim Soo Hyun admitted one thing: that he denied their adult relationship to protect Queen of Tears, his colleagues and his career. He did not admit grooming, underage dating, making her drink, causing the DUI, threatening her personally, or causing her death. Those are completely separate claims that still require evidence.

You also say she "helped establish Gold Medalist." She was one of the first artists signed after its creation, but being an early artist is not the same as founding or building the company. If you believe she had a legal ownership interest or was promised compensation beyond her contract, where is the evidence?

I've already spent weeks reconstructing the entire chronology of this case—both careers, filming schedules, military service, filming locations, agency changes, Gold Medalist's creation, Kim Sae Ron's family finances, the DUI timeline and the later debt dispute. The more I researched, the less the grooming narrative fit the documented timeline. Rather than repeating everything here, you can read it: https://news.mydramalist.com/article/kim-soo-hyun-officially-resumes-activities-a-year-after-late-kim-sae-ron-controversy#comment-26929672

If you find factual errors in that reconstruction, point them out. But adding new allegations every time the previous ones are challenged isn't evidence. It's moving the goalposts.

Fair enough, and I understand your point now. The article placed Kyungsoo at the centre of an agency-wide statement, so it encouraged readers to believe that he personally initiated the campaign. In that sense, his name and image were used as the public face of a much broader story.

He did reshare the statement, so it may still have personal relevance to him, but the article should have clearly explained that Blitzway’s legal action concerns all its artists. I appreciate you acknowledging that your original reaction was based on a misleading presentation.

You are right about one point: Kyungsoo did share the notice on his Instagram Story. I had not seen that information, so I will correct my wording. I should have said that no specific incident involving him was officially identified—not that nothing related to him could possibly have happened.

But you are wrong about what the repost proves. It shows that the notice mattered to him and may concern harassment he has experienced. It does not magically change the agency’s statement from “our artists” into “Doh Kyungsoo only.” Blitzway named nobody, described no specific case and issued the notice for its entire roster. The fact that other artists did not repost it does not remove them from the statement.

So the accurate conclusion is this: Kyungsoo’s repost makes it reasonable to believe the issue is personally relevant to him, but saying that the agency officially announced legal action specifically for him is still an assumption, not a confirmed fact. I am happy to correct myself when new evidence appears. That is the difference between fact-checking and simply writing “lol” after a conclusion that the evidence does not fully prove.

Thank you, I really appreciate that. I understand why you think I should stop replying, but I cannot stay silent when I see bullying, even when I am not the target.

I defend Kim Soo-hyun in exactly the same way, not because I blindly take someone’s side, but because I care about facts. I will always put truth above fandom, rumours or popularity. I do not choose a camp; I check what is true, correct what is false and speak up when someone is being treated unfairly.

Bullies only win when everyone decides it is easier to look away. I may stop when the discussion becomes completely pointless, but I will never accept lies or cruelty just because the target is famous.

You say, “Let the lawyers handle it.” That is exactly what Blitzway is doing. They collected evidence, hired lawyers and asked the courts to decide. So we agree there. 🙂

But you are still calling it Kyungsoo’s “bruised feelings” when he did not make this statement. It was a general notice protecting every Blitzway artist. The article put his name in the headline for clicks, and you created an imaginary crying Kyungsoo from that misleading headline.

Satire is humour. Slander is spreading damaging falsehoods. They are not the same thing. Freedom of speech protects criticism, but it does not mean freedom from consequences when you falsely accuse, sexually harass or invade someone’s privacy. “I should be allowed to lie because he is famous” is not a human-rights argument. It is entitlement wearing glasses. 🤓

And “grin and bear it” is always very convenient advice when someone else is being targeted. Your solution asks nothing from the harassers and demands silence from their victims. That is not courage. It is simply making life easier for bullies.

So yes: let the lawyers handle it. They are. The only person publicly whining about Kyungsoo’s imaginary feelings is still you. 🙂

Then I misunderstood what you meant, so I apologize. I read “it seems targeted” more literally than you intended and focused too much on correcting that point, even though you had already acknowledged that the controversies came from completely different sources. I understand what you mean now: not that anyone is actually coordinating anything against him, but that the ridiculous succession of unrelated controversies creates that feeling, especially when you already feel sympathy for the person being hit by all of them. “Empathetic hilariousness” actually describes it quite well: it is absurd enough to laugh at, while still feeling genuinely sorry for him.

Since you specifically demanded Korean tax law, let’s use the actual Korean statutes rather than whatever version appears when you type “FACTS” in capital letters. Article 55(1) of South Korea’s Framework Act on National Taxes says that a person whose rights or interests are infringed by an unlawful or unreasonable tax disposition may request its cancellation, modification or another necessary disposition through the statutory appeal system. Article 68 gives the taxpayer 90 days to file a Tax Tribunal petition. That is exactly what Cha Eun-woo did. He did not “reopen a can of worms,” sue the NTS or ask fans to decide his case. He used the legal remedy created by Korean law specifically for taxpayers who dispute an NTS assessment. https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsInfoP.do?lsiSeq=286425

Article 57 of the same Act says that filing an objection, review request or Tax Tribunal petition does not normally suspend enforcement of the tax disposition. In very simple terms: appealing does not automatically freeze the bill. That is why paying approximately ₩13 billion and then challenging the assessment are perfectly compatible actions. He has already paid. Nobody is suggesting that poor Koreans should pay instead, nobody is fundraising for him, and nobody is claiming that wealth exempts him from taxation. You invented that argument because answering the real one would require admitting that Korean law allows a taxpayer to pay an assessment and still appeal it. https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsInfoP.do?lsiSeq=286425 and https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260802017000005

Now let’s deal with your sudden claim that you “have not argued about his innocence or guilt.” You previously wrote that he was “caught lying about tax shelters,” was “trying to evade paying tax,” and had established “dummy companies and structures to evade tax.” Those are not neutral summaries of an unfinished assessment. They are direct claims that he intentionally committed tax evasion. You cannot repeatedly announce the conclusion, then hide behind “IF he avoided tax” after someone asks you to prove it. Your disclaimer arrived several comments after your verdict.

The National Tax Service reportedly concluded that the disputed company lacked sufficient substance and reassessed income to Cha Eun-woo personally. That is the NTS position being challenged. An administrative assessment is legally significant, but it is not magically immune from review, which is why Articles 55 and 68 exist. The Tax Tribunal may uphold the assessment, reduce it or cancel it. Until that happens, “the NTS reached this conclusion” is a fact; “he was caught lying and deliberately created companies to evade tax” is your own conclusion dressed up as press reporting.

You also keep saying that “the court” will decide, while confidently accusing everyone else of knowing nothing about Korean law. There is no court deciding this at present. The confirmed proceeding is before the Tax Tribunal, an administrative adjudicative body. Yonhap reported that he submitted the petition in July and that Fantagio described it as a request for a legal determination under the procedure established by law. A court could become involved later through administrative litigation, but that is not the current stage. Even the official Tax Tribunal website explains how individuals and companies submit these petitions and supporting evidence. https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260802017000005 and https://www.tt.go.kr/mUser/pleading/judgeReq.do

And since you repeatedly use the words “tax evasion” as though an additional assessment automatically proves a crime, Article 3 of Korea’s Punishment of Tax Offenses Act would be useful reading. Criminal tax evasion requires evasion through “fraud or other unlawful acts.” Paragraph 6 defines those as active conduct making tax assessment or collection impossible or significantly difficult, such as false books, fabricated documents, destruction of records, concealment or manipulation of income and transactions. You have provided no criminal judgment establishing those elements against him. A disputed reassessment is not, by itself, a conviction under Article 3. https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsSideInfoP.do?docCls=jo&joBrNo=00&joNo=0003&lsiSeq=224875&urlMode=lsScJoRltInfoR

So stop shouting “IT’S NOT FOR YOU TO DECIDE” immediately after deciding for yourself that he lied, created dummy companies and intentionally evaded tax. I have never declared him legally innocent. I have said that the assessment is being challenged, the appeal is lawful, the tax has already been paid and your allegations of proven intentional evasion go beyond the publicly established facts. That is not parasocial defence. It is basic legal accuracy. Calling everyone a fan does not repair your contradictions, and capital letters do not turn your opinion into Korean law.

You are right about the main point: there is currently no reason to believe Lee Yi-kyung was personally targeted, and several entertainers with one-person companies have come under scrutiny. I also agree that describing every additional tax assessment as a huge “scandal” before the actual findings are public has become ridiculous.

However, the explanation about the government changing the tax law, giving celebrities a final date to sort out their taxes and then launching a crackdown is mixing two separate issues. The December 31, 2025 deadline was a Ministry of Culture registration grace period for entertainment agencies that had failed to register under the Popular Culture and Arts Industry Development Act. It was not a tax deadline and had nothing to do with celebrities being given one last chance to correct their tax returns.

The tax cases concern a different question: whether income earned through a celebrity’s personal activities genuinely belonged to their company, and whether the expenses claimed by that company qualified as corporate expenses. Those rules were not suddenly created specifically for entertainers. What has changed is the level of attention the tax authorities are giving these one-person corporations.

Cha Eun-woo, Kim Seon-ho, Lee Hanee and Lee Yi-kyung should not be treated as one identical case either. Their companies, transactions, assessed amounts, explanations and stages of review are different. In Lee Yi-kyung’s case, we only know that an audit produced an additional assessment, that his agency denied intentional concealment or fraudulent evasion, and that it said the amount would be paid. The amount and detailed findings remain undisclosed, and no criminal charge or court ruling has been reported.

So yes, the wider scrutiny probably explains the timing better than a theory that Lee was personally targeted. However, saying all of these stories resulted from one new tax law and one tax deadline simplifies the situation too much. It is also exactly why the media can place several very different cases under the same dramatic “tax scandal” label and allow readers to assume they are all guilty of the same thing.

I understand why it feels targeted when several controversies arrive one after another, especially when the previous one already created so much noise around him. However, there is currently no evidence that this tax audit was connected to that controversy, or that anyone deliberately moved on to another accusation because the first one failed. The tax issue came from the National Tax Service and appears to be part of wider scrutiny of celebrities using one-person corporations, so it is probably a coincidence rather than a coordinated attack. What I do agree with is that the accumulation itself can seriously damage someone’s image, because many people only remember the headlines and never return to check whether the original accusations were proven, corrected or exaggerated. In this case, Lee Yi-kyung received an additional tax assessment, but there has been no reported criminal charge or court finding of intentional tax evasion. So feeling sorry for him is understandable, but I would be careful about calling it targeted without evidence.

I wanted to add the full factual context because this article is so short that it makes the situation sound much more settled than it actually is. Lee Yi-kyung’s agency did confirm on May 13 that a tax audit resulted in an additional tax assessment connected to a corporation established for his activities. It also said that the amount would be paid without delay. However, the amount was never disclosed, the audited tax years were never disclosed, the assessment notice was never published, and there is no public breakdown showing which income, expenses, penalties or interest were included. The agency said that Lee submitted the requested documents transparently, that the disagreement concerned the standards used to recognise corporate expenses, and that there was no intentional omission of income or tax evasion through fraudulent means. The full Korean statement can be read here: https://www.ytn.co.kr/_ln/0117_202605140912439787 and Yonhap’s report confirming that the amount was not disclosed is here: https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260513149500005

There are also two translation problems in the English reporting that make this sound worse than the Korean wording. The Korean expression “비정기 세무조사” means a non-periodic or non-routine tax audit. Translating it as an “irregular tax audit” may make English readers think there was something improper or unlawful about the audit itself, which is not what the Korean term means. The word “추징금” is also repeatedly translated as a “tax penalty,” but in this context it refers more broadly to an additional amount assessed and collected after an audit. It may include additional tax, interest or penalty components, but no breakdown has been released in Lee’s case. It is therefore more accurate to say that he received an additional tax assessment, not that he was given a criminal fine or convicted of tax evasion. SBS’s English report uses the clearer expression “additional tax payments”: https://news.sbs.co.kr/english/article.do?news_id=N1008560021

The article also presents the National Tax Service’s supposed conclusion as though an official audit report had been released. It had not. The original exclusive report said that the authorities were “believed” to have considered part of Lee’s personal income to have been recorded as corporate revenue, allowing the lower corporate tax rate to be applied. That claim was then repeated by other outlets. Lee’s agency gave a slightly different explanation, saying the dispute concerned the standards for processing corporate expenses. Both issues could have formed part of the same reassessment, but the public does not have the documents needed to know that. The National Tax Service cannot normally publish an individual taxpayer’s audit records because Article 81-13 of the Framework Act on National Taxes requires tax officials to keep taxpayer information confidential. The law can be checked here: https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsLinkCommonInfo.do?lsJoLnkSeq=1033525939

The legal issue behind these cases is the “substance over form” principle in Article 14 of the Framework Act on National Taxes. It allows the tax authority to look beyond the name or legal form of a transaction and tax the income according to its real economic owner. In other words, creating a corporation is not illegal, and using a company to manage contracts, staff, intellectual property, vehicles, offices and business risks is not automatically tax evasion. The problem arises when the authority decides that the company did not perform enough real business activity to justify receiving income generated primarily by the celebrity’s personal services. Article 14 can be read here: https://www.law.go.kr/lsLinkCommonInfo.do?lsJoLnkSeq=1029615893

There is obviously a tax difference involved. Korea’s highest personal income-tax rate is 45%, while the corporate rates applying to fiscal years beginning in 2026 range from 10% to 25%, before local taxes. The audited years in Lee’s case have not been disclosed, so nobody should pretend to know which exact rates or calculations were used. The current individual rates are in Article 55 of the Income Tax Act: https://law.go.kr/lsLinkCommonInfo.do?chrClsCd=010202&lsJoLnkSeq=1023583825 and the current corporate rates are in Article 55 of the Corporate Tax Act: https://www.law.go.kr/lsLinkCommonInfo.do?chrClsCd=010202&lsJoLnkSeq=1029619807

This still does not make every reassessment a criminal tax-evasion case. Article 3 of the Punishment of Tax Offenses Act requires tax to have been evaded through fraud or another improper act, such as false accounting records, fabricated evidence, destroyed records, hidden assets or deliberately manipulated transactions. Nothing currently public says that Lee Yi-kyung was referred for a tax crime, investigated as a criminal suspect, indicted or convicted under that law. His agency specifically denied intentional concealment and fraudulent conduct. Calling this proven “tax evasion” therefore goes further than the available evidence. The criminal provision can be read here: https://law.go.kr/LSW/lsLinkCommonInfo.do?lsJoLnkSeq=1032258071

It is also important not to confuse this with the government’s December 31, 2025 deadline for one-person entertainment agencies. That was not a new tax-law deadline allowing celebrities to correct their taxes before a crackdown. It was a Ministry of Culture guidance period for entertainment businesses that had failed to register under Article 26 of the Popular Culture and Arts Industry Development Act. Registration as an entertainment-planning business and the tax classification of income are two separate legal matters. The Ministry’s official announcement is here: https://www.mcst.go.kr/site/s_notice/press/pressView.jsp?pMenuCD=0302000000&pSeq=22006 and Article 26 is here: https://law.go.kr/lsLinkCommonInfo.do?lsJoLnkSeq=1021149115

There is, however, a genuine industry-wide dispute about how these corporations should be assessed. At a National Assembly policy meeting in February, representatives of the entertainment industry argued that legitimate one-person corporations were being too easily labelled as paper companies, while a National Tax Service official said that income from an artist’s non-transferable personal services should normally belong to the artist and that the same substance-over-form standard was being applied to one-person corporations in general, not only to entertainers. The participants agreed that clearer guidelines were needed. This does not automatically prove that Lee’s accounting was correct, but it does show why reducing every case to “celebrity caught evading taxes” is dishonest. The full report is here: https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20260227099700005

As of August 6, there is still no public Tax Tribunal ruling, administrative-court judgment or criminal judgment concerning Lee Yi-kyung’s assessment. His agency said it respected the audit findings and intended to pay, but that statement did not publish the assessment and did not expressly waive every possible appeal. Paying an assessed amount is not automatically an admission of criminal guilt and does not necessarily prevent a taxpayer from contesting the assessment afterward. Yoo Yeon-seok, for example, paid his reassessed tax and still filed a Tax Tribunal appeal, whose rejection only became public on August 5. Lee has not been reported as having filed an equivalent public appeal. Korean law normally allows a Tax Tribunal petition within 90 days of receiving the assessment notice, but Lee’s actual notice date is not public. Article 68 of the Framework Act on National Taxes is here: https://www.law.go.kr/LSW/lsSideInfoP.do?docCls=jo&joBrNo=00&joNo=0068&lsiSeq=286425&urlMode=lsScJoRltInfoR and the latest report about Yoo’s separate case is here: https://news.nate.com/view/20260805n14414

So the accurate version is much simpler. Lee Yi-kyung’s corporation received an additional tax assessment following a non-routine audit concerning the tax treatment of income and corporate expenses. His agency denied intentional income concealment or fraudulent evasion, said that Lee cooperated with the audit, and announced that the assessed amount would be paid. The amount and detailed findings have not been disclosed, and there is currently no public criminal charge, Tax Tribunal decision or court ruling against him. That does not prove the accounting was perfect, but it also does not justify presenting him as someone who has been found guilty of criminal tax evasion.

That explains the quality of your original four takes. Reading the facts would have required more effort than performing confidence.

You asked for a rebuttal with counterarguments, received one, and then announced that you would not read it. So the problem was never that nobody could answer you. The problem is that you only wanted the appearance of a debate, without the inconvenience of understanding the reply.

Thank you for confirming it so efficiently.

You almost reached the correct point, then immediately tripped over your own sentence. Yes, the law decides the outcome. Which means you do not get to write “dummy companies set up to evade tax” as though that has already been legally proven. That is the allegation being disputed, not the final result. Also, this is currently a tax appeal before the Tax Tribunal, not a criminal trial deciding whether he is “guilty,” and calling the payment “taxes and fines” does not magically make every part of your comment accurate. As for the “parasocial fans” line, that is just what people use when they have run out of facts but still want to sound superior. You are telling everyone else to wait for the law while confidently announcing the verdict yourself. That is not legal knowledge. That is gossip wearing reading glasses.

Let’s try this with blocks, since full sentences seem to be causing trouble. Block one: the NTS issued an assessment. Block two: he paid approximately ₩13 billion. Block three: he filed a legal appeal. There is no block saying he was “caught lying,” no block proving a “tax shelter,” and no public court, prosecutor or Tax Tribunal decision finding deliberate tax evasion. You added those pieces yourself and then called everyone else an idiot for not admiring your imaginary tower.

Appealing does not “open a can of worms.” It asks the Tax Tribunal to review whether the assessment was correct. And nobody needs to pay his tax for him, because—this part is especially easy—he already paid it. “Rich and pretty” is not a provision of Korean tax law, and “Korean citizens are unhappy” is not evidence. Telling other people they do not understand the law while replacing law with gossip, resentment and made-up conclusions is a remarkable level of confidence for someone who has not even understood the article.

He did not pay a parking ticket. He paid about ₩13 billion—roughly €7.8 million or US$9 million. If “a few months” means three, you are casually claiming he personally takes home around ₩52 billion a year—about €31 million or US$36 million—without offering a single figure to support it. Korean actors do not pocket the full value of every drama, advertisement and song; contract revenue is divided, expenses can be deducted, and taxes still apply. He paid because the assessment was enforceable, then appealed because he believes it was wrong. That is not “suing the tax service”; it is the normal Tax Tribunal procedure. Being successful does not turn nine million dollars into loose change or cancel his legal rights. Apparently, “he’s rich” is now a complete accounting method.

Great PR? Let’s make this preschool-simple. He paid because the tax bill had to be paid. He appealed because he believes the bill was wrong. He apologised for not checking everything carefully enough; he never said, “I did nothing wrong.” Paying, apologising and appealing are three different things, and adults are normally capable of understanding more than one thing at a time. Calling all of it “PR” is what happens when someone reads the headline, skips the article and still feels qualified to explain it. Good luck with the next paragraph lol.