While You Were Sleeping (2017)

While You Were Sleeping (Korean: 당신이 잠든 사이에; RR: Dangsini jamdeun saie) is a 2017 South Korean television series starring Lee Jong-suk, Bae Suzy, Lee Sang-yeob, Jung Hae-in, and Ko Sung-hee. Consisting of sixteen chapters distributed over 16 episodes, this legal drama-fantasy television series centers on the lives of three young adults—a field reporter, a prosecutor, and a police officer—who have acquired the ability to foresee future events through their dreams, after saving each other many years ago.

The series is directed by Oh Chung-hwan and written by Park Hye-ryun. It aired on SBS from September 27 to November 16, 2017, on Wednesdays and Thursdays at 22:00 (KST). The drama completed filming and editing before airing the pilot episode. The drama is available on online streaming services such as Netflix, Viki, KOCOWA and Viu. iQIYI also broadcasts the drama.

Synopsis

While You Were Sleeping is a combination of the romance, legal drama and fantasy genres, focusing on the tale of three young adults who have acquired the ability to see the future through their dreams: field reporter Nam Hong-joo (Bae Suzy), rookie prosecutor Jung Jae-chan (Lee Jong-suk), and police officer Han Woo-tak (Jung Hae-in). Some of these dreams show crimes that Jae-chan has to investigate and others show disastrous events that one or more of them will have to endure. Conflicted by these dreams, the trio collaborate with each other to prevent their ominous dreams from turning into reality and to defeat their archenemy, the corrupt lawyer Lee Yoo-beom (Lee Sang-yeob).

Cast

Main

Lee Jong-suk as Jung Jae-chan 정재찬

Nam Da-reum as young Jung Jae-chan

A 29-year-old rookie prosecutor. Jae-chan was the son of Jung Il-seung, a police chief officer who was murdered by the same runaway soldier who killed Hong-joo's father. Back in his adolescent years, he was a carefree boy with no worries about his studies. After reconciling with his father, he became a changed teenager and aimed to work as a prosecutor. It was also at this age that he acquired from Hong-joo the ability to see the future through dreams, when Hong-joo saved him from drowning in a lake while preventing police officer Choi Dam-dong, the runaway soldier's older brother, from committing suicide.

Despite appearing cold and lacking a sense of humor, Jae-chan is still foolish and funny in some aspects. Since the first appearance of his future-seeing dreams, he will do everything he can to prevent them from coming true. He falls in love with Hong-joo after days of going out with each other, without knowing or recognising that she was "Bamtori", his childhood acquaintance who also lost her father to the runaway soldier (his lack of recognition was due to him remembering Hong-joo as a boy from her tomboyish mannerisms and short, boy-like haircut). He was born in April 1988, and his blood type is B. Despite all the chaos he somehow managed to fall for Nam Hong-joo and is very protective towards her.

Bae Suzy as Nam Hong-joo 남홍주 (a.k.a. Bamtori)

Shin Yi-joon as young Nam Hong-joo

Born in 1988, Hong-joo is a 29-year-old journalist and field reporter who has the power of precognition (the ability to see events in the future), which takes effect while dreaming. She was once a tomboyish girl nicknamed "Bamtori" (밤톨이; lit. 'Chestnut') who aspires to become a baseball player. Since she was a child, Hong-joo has been haunted by seeing the deaths of other people in her dreams, one of which is the untimely death of her father, Nam Chul-doo, at the hands of a runaway soldier who also killed Jae-chan's father. She first met Jae-chan when both their fathers' funerals were jointly conducted on the same date in the same funeral hall. By saving Jae-chan from drowning, she had inadvertently made Jae-chan acquire the same ability that she has. Due to her short haircut and tomboyish characteristics, many people, including the reporters of the runaway soldier case and Jae-chan mistook her as a boy.

Now that she is fatherless, Hong-joo began dreaming of the impending deaths of her mother, Yoon Moon-sun, and herself: the former happening due to an accident she gets into and the latter due to her occupation as a field reporter. Like all the other dreams, she does not know when the deaths will happen; she can only guess. In her attempt to stop her dreams from becoming reality, she leaves her job and helps her mother in running a samgyeopsal restaurant. Nevertheless, she regains her resolve in doing her job as a field reporter with Jae-chan to support her in preventing their dreams from coming true. She later in the series falls in love with Jae-chan and begins dating him.

Lee Sang-yeob as Lee Yoo-beom 이유범

Yeo Hoe-hyun as young Lee Yoo-beom

A 34-year-old successful and famous prosecutor turned lawyer who does not hold any attachments. Yoo-beom was Jae-chan's private tutor when Jae-chan was in his adolescence. He coaxed Jae-chan into falsifying his report cards so that they could gain money from Jae-chan's father and buy a motorcycle. With Yoo-beom driving the new motorcycle, they get into an accident and he leaves Jae-chan behind to fend for himself, an incident which made Jae-chan dislike him.

As a former prosecutor, Yoo-beom dared to falsify evidence just to finish his cases. As a lawyer, he works in Haekwang Law Firm, taking on any case that brings him a lot of money and going to whatever lengths to achieve an outcome he desires, such as fabricating evidence or manipulating testimonies even if he knows if his clients are truly guilty or innocent. He even went as far as to murder Ha Joo-an, the true culprit of the IV drip serial murders to cover up the fact that he fabricated evidence that wrongly convicted a doctor for perpertuating the 19 killings. Yoo-beom was eventually found guilty of murder and fabrication of evidence and sentenced to incarceration for life.

He was Hong-joo's boyfriend because of a blind date. However, they broke up after Jae-chan saved her from the accident that night. Yoo-beom's birthday was November 20, 1983.

Jung Hae-in as Han Woo-tak 한우탁

A 29-year-old police officer who was the top placer in his class of aspiring policemen. Woo-tak is considered to be a handsome, intelligent, and able-bodied police officer. Although he exemplifies the ideal policeman, he keeps a secret that can jeopardize his career in the police: he is actually suffering from color blindness but an error in the assessment made his condition undetected.

Woo-tak was destined, without him knowing, to die in a car accident that Yoo-beom will cause on a snowy Valentine's Day after he delivered Yoon Moon-sun's cellphone which she left at her restaurant. Thanks to Jae-chan, who intercepted Hong-joo's car which Yoo-beom was driving, he was saved from his supposed death and acquired from him the ability to see future events through dreams. Together with Jae-chan and Hong-joo, they work together to keep their bad dreams from coming true. As the trio went on with their lives, Woo-tak began having an affection for Hong-joo, although he kept his feelings concealed, sensing that Hong-joo and Jae-chan are developing feelings for each other. His birthday was in September 1988, and his blood type is O.

Supporting

Others

Lee Yoo-joon as Oh Kyung-han

a police officer along with Han Woo-tak; he sensed that Woo-tak had color blindness but kept the secret to himself to prevent Woo-tak from getting discharged

Oh Eui-shik as Bong Du-hyun (SBC reporter; Hong-joo's senior)

Huh Jun-suk as Dong-kyun (SBC reporter)

Pyo Ye-jin as Cha Yeo-jung (Police officer who has a crush on Han Woo-tak)

Yoo In-soo as Seung-won's classmate

Special appearances

Episodes

Production

This is the second collaboration between singer-actress Bae Suzy and scriptwriter Park Hye-ryun after working together in the 2011 hit series Dream High. It is also the third time that Park and Lee Jong-suk have worked together after I Can Hear Your Voice and Pinocchio.

First script reading took place on January 20, 2017, in Mokdong, Seoul, South Korea.

While You Were Sleeping is a fully pre-produced TV series. Filming began in February 2017, while Lee Jong-suk joined filming on March 2. Filming wrapped up on July 27 at Wonbang set in Paju, after five months of filming.

This was the second drama where Shin Jae-ha and Kim So-hyun appeared together, after KBS's 3-episode Page Turner.

Original soundtrack

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

Part 11

Part 12

Part 13

Charted songs

Ratings

In the table below, the blue numbers represent the lowest ratings and the red numbers represent the highest ratings.

NR denotes that the drama did not rank in the top 20 daily programs on that date

Awards and nominations

Notes

References

External links

Official website (in Korean)

While You Were Sleeping at HanCinema

While You Were Sleeping at IMDb