# Hymn of Death (2018)

> A married stage writer and Korea's first professional soprano fall in love in 1920s Tokyo, and their doomed romance becomes the first Korean pop song.

Canonical page: https://ember.film/tv/71413

## Facts

- Seasons: 1
- Episodes: 6
- Episode runtime: 30 min
- Status: Ended
- Genres: drama, romance, history
- Network: SBS
- Cast: Lee Jong-suk, Shin Hae-sun, Park Sun-im, Lee Ji-hoon, Kim Kang-hyun, Kim Myung-soo, Kim Won-hae, Hwang Young-hee
- TMDB rating: 7.6/10
- IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8160064/

## Ember's analysis

- Pacing: measured
- Intensity: strong
- Complexity: simple
- Violence: none
- Tone: melancholic, lyrical, restrained, tragic

## What critics say

Audiences rated the single season positively, praising its melancholic romance and historical reconstruction of 1920s Korea and Japan.

## Synopsis

Hymn of Death (2018) is a South Korean period romance miniseries created for SBS, a six-episode limited series of thirty-minute episodes based on a true story. Lee Jong-suk plays Kim Woo-jin, a married stage drama writer, and Shin Hae-sun plays Yoon Sim-duk, Korea's first professional soprano, whose paths cross while both are studying at Tokyo University. Their attraction is an unspoken engine: every step toward each other runs into the marriage Kim is bound to, the expectations of the families around them, and the rigid social codes of the era. Park Sun-im and Lee Ji-hoon round out the principal cast as figures tied to the couple's artistic and personal worlds. The story moves through the performance halls and private spaces of 1920s Tokyo and Korea, with the songwriting and recording of Death Song giving the drama its emotional center. The tone is melancholic, lyrical and restrained, with each episode building toward a sense of inevitable loss. Fans of Mr. Sunshine and Blood and Sand will find resonance in its blend of historical texture, music and doomed romance.

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