The Scandal Explained: Son Ye-jin & Ji Chang-wook's Netflix Joseon Remake of Untold Scandal

Son Ye-jin, who plays Lady Cho in Netflix's The Scandal

📷 Son Ye-jin leads The Scandal as Lady Cho. © 티비텐 TV10 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 3.0

Netflix just locked a date for one of its biggest 2026 K-dramas: The Scandal (스캔들) drops September 18, right in the middle of Chuseok. And if you only read the English headlines, you're missing the best part — which is hiding in a title Netflix quietly decided not to translate.

Short version: Son Ye-jin (yes, Crash Landing on You) plays a Joseon noblewoman. Ji Chang-wook plays the kingdom's most notorious playboy. They make a bet. It goes very, very wrong. Here's what this is, where it came from, and why Korean viewers reacted to the announcement completely differently than the global feed did.

What is The Scandal? The basics

The Scandal is an 8-episode Netflix original period romance premiering worldwide on September 18, 2026. It's directed by Jung Ji-woo — the filmmaker behind Somebody, A Muse, and Happy End — from a script by Lee Seung-young and Ahn Hye-song.

The setup: Lady Cho (Son Ye-jin), a woman whose talents are wasted inside the walls of a noble household, strikes a secret, dangerous wager with Cho Won (Ji Chang-wook), Joseon's greatest seducer. Their game pulls in Hui-yeon (Nana), a young widow who swore to stay chaste after her husband's death — and that's where a bet about desire turns into something nobody can control. It's rated 18+ in Korea, so the "steamy" tag is earned.

The part English coverage skips: 조선남녀상열지사

Here's the thing that made me want to write this whole post. The 2003 film this is based on wasn't just called "Scandal" in Korea. Its full title was 스캔들 — 조선남녀상열지사 (朝鮮男女相悅之詞).

That phrase, 남녀상열지사 (男女相悅之詞), literally means "songs of men and women delighting in one another." Sounds sweet, right? It wasn't. It was an insult. In the early Joseon era, Neo-Confucian scholars used 남녀상열지사 as a censorship label — a way to brand certain Goryeo-era love songs (think Manjeonchun, Ssanghwajeom) as too lewd to even write down. The earliest recorded complaint dates to 1488. Songs got dropped from the official record because of it.

So when the 2003 film slapped that exact phrase on its poster, it was a wink: a movie about forbidden Joseon desire, wearing the very label Joseon's morality police used to erase forbidden Joseon desire. That irony is baked into the Korean title. The 2026 Netflix version drops the subtitle entirely and just goes with "The Scandal" for the world. Cleaner for a global audience — but the joke's gone.

A 240-year-old scandal, retold three times

This story has been around the block:

1782 — France: Pierre Choderlos de Laclos publishes Les Liaisons dangereuses (Dangerous Liaisons), the novel about aristocrats weaponizing seduction.
2003 — Korea: Director E J-yong transplants it into late-Joseon Korea as Untold Scandal, with Bae Yong-joon, Jeon Do-yeon, and Lee Mi-sook. It pulled 3.52 million admissions — bold stuff for its time.
2026 — Netflix: Jung Ji-woo stretches it into 8 episodes with Son Ye-jin, Ji Chang-wook, and Nana.

Western viewers might also know this material from the 1988 Dangerous Liaisons or Cruel Intentions. Same DNA — Joseon silk instead of powdered wigs.

Why the casting is a big deal in Korea

Two things Korean fans clocked immediately. First: this is Son Ye-jin's first-ever streaming original. After Crash Landing on You made her a household name across Asia, she's stayed mostly with film and network TV. A Netflix lead — playing a scheming, sensual noblewoman, no less — is a genuine swing. Second: Ji Chang-wook is back on Netflix for the first time in four years (since The Sound of Magic), and "Joseon's greatest playboy" is exactly the role his fans have wanted. Nana, fresh off Mask Girl, rounds out the triangle as the widow caught in the middle.

🇰🇷 The Korean side vs. 🌍 the global side

🇰🇷 The Korean side: On Korean sites the conversation was less "ooh, steamy" and more "can Netflix actually pull off a proper sageuk?" There's real affection for the 2003 original, and some skepticism about stretching a tight two-hour film into eight hours. The other big talking point: Son Ye-jin picking this as her streaming debut.

🌍 The global side: International feeds latched onto the star power and the "Korean Dangerous Liaisons" pitch — lots of Son Ye-jin excitement, plus curiosity about how explicit that 18+ rating will get.

📊 The gap: Korea is arguing about faithfulness to a beloved film; the world is meeting the premise for the first time. Neither side is really talking about the title's censorship-era joke — which, honestly, is the most Korean thing about the whole project.

Why it matters

Netflix has leaned hard into sageuk in 2026, and a glossy, adult, star-led period piece landing on Chuseok weekend is a statement. If The Scandal connects, it's one more data point that Korean period romance travels globally — not just crime thrillers and zombies.

FAQ

Is this a remake of a movie? Yes — it's based on the 2003 Korean film Untold Scandal, which itself adapts the French novel Dangerous Liaisons.

Do I need to watch the 2003 film first? No. The series stands on its own. But if you want to feel where the tone comes from, the film is worth it.

Is it really 18+? The source material is famously sensual and the film carried an adult rating, so expect mature themes. Netflix is marketing it as "steamy."

When and where can I watch? September 18, 2026, worldwide, only on Netflix.

Key details

Title: The Scandal (스캔들)
Premiere: September 18, 2026 — Netflix, worldwide
Episodes: 8
Cast: Son Ye-jin, Ji Chang-wook, Nana, Han Sun-hwa
Director: Jung Ji-woo
Based on: the 2003 film Untold Scandal → the 1782 novel Dangerous Liaisons
Genre: Joseon period romance (18+)

💬 Jamie's Take

I'll be honest — the second I saw "조선남녀상열지사" I knew this was our kind of story. A show about forbidden desire, named after the phrase Joseon used to censor forbidden desire, now sanded down to one tidy English word for Netflix. Something gets lost in that translation, and I kind of love pointing it out. Son Ye-jin as a Joseon schemer is already must-watch for me. Just don't expect it to be soft — the original never was.

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