Buy King: Lee Jun Ho and Ju Ji-hoon to Face Off in Netflix's Chaebol Succession War

Netflix is moving ahead with Buy King (바이 킹), an upcoming Korean drama that pits 2PM member and King the Land star Lee Jun Ho (이준호) against Kingdom actor Ju Ji-hoon (주지훈) in a corporate succession battle spanning billions of won. According to Soompi, citing South Korean outlet OSEN, Lee Jun Ho is actively reviewing an offer from his acting agency O3 Collective to play Han Ji Yeol, the third-generation heir to a powerful Korean family-run conglomerate who specializes in corporate risk analysis. Ju Ji-hoon, whose acclaimed Netflix zombie thriller Kingdom made him a defining face of Korean prestige content globally, is in talks to portray Han Tae Joon, the scheming uncle positioned as the drama's primary antagonist. Director Jo Sung-hee, who helmed Space Sweepers, Netflix's first Korean sci-fi blockbuster, is attached to direct. Filming is scheduled to begin in April 2026.

A Succession War With No Good Guys

Buy King centers on the fractures inside a Korean family conglomerate, a sprawling empire worth tens of billions of won, as a succession crisis tears it apart. Han Ji Yeol is the third-generation heir, cold, precise, and trained in corporate risk. He is the kind of character Lee Jun Ho has been quietly building toward since The Red Sleeve (2021): emotionally restrained on the surface, quietly dangerous underneath. Standing against him is Han Tae Joon, his uncle: a man willing to burn down the entire dynasty if it means sitting at the head of the table, per the drama character breakdown reported by OSEN. The nephew-versus-uncle structure is not subtle, but the best chaebol dramas rarely need to be. What they need is two actors capable of making that war feel personal. This casting suggests they have exactly that.

Two Actors at the Top of Their Range

Casting Ju Ji-hoon opposite Lee Jun Ho is a deliberate escalation. Ju Ji-hoon spent years building his reputation in Korean prestige content, including his role as Crown Prince Chang in Kingdom, Netflix's Korean zombie historical thriller that ran two full seasons. His most recent major project was The Trauma Code: Heroes on Call (2025), a Netflix medical action drama. In Buy King, he is taking on a full-villain lead, a shift that K-drama fans have been anticipating for some time. Lee Jun Ho, a member of the veteran K-pop group 2PM, broke through as a leading man with The Red Sleeve (2021) and cemented his standing with King the Land (2023), a Netflix original that trended globally across dozens of markets. His agency O3 Collective confirmed he is positively reviewing the offer. No official signature yet, but the April 2026 filming schedule suggests a formal announcement is close.

The Director Who Thinks in Scale

Jo Sung-hee is not a television director by background. His 2021 film Space Sweepers was the first Korean-language sci-fi blockbuster produced directly for Netflix, drawing international attention to Korean genre filmmaking at a moment before the mainstream wave. As reported by What's on Netflix, Buy King will be his first Korean television series. Space Sweepers featured a cast built around Song Joong-ki, Kim Tae-ri, and Ma Dong-seok, mixing Korean-language storytelling with production scope typically associated with Hollywood studio work, demonstrating Jo Sung-hee's ability to manage scale across a large ensemble. That kind of film-to-drama crossover has become a marker of quality in the Korean industry: when a director with theatrical credentials takes on a series, the production values and visual pacing tend to reflect it. For a chaebol succession drama pitched at Netflix's global audience, those instincts matter considerably.

Production Begins April 2026

Filming starts in April 2026. No premiere date or episode count has been confirmed. Once Lee Jun Ho and Ju Ji-hoon formally sign, expect an official announcement from Netflix Korea. Buy King was previously developed under the working title Viking. Lee Junho is also in preparation for Veteran 3, the third installment of the Veteran film franchise, per Soompi's February 2026 reporting, making his 2026 and 2027 slate among the most loaded in K-entertainment. This is one of the most anticipated K-drama castings of the year. On paper, before a single frame has been shot, the pairing of these two actors with this director already looks like one of Netflix Korea's stronger bets for the cycle.