365: Repeat the Year

Lore & Background

The series centers on Ji Hyung-joo, a veteran detective who resets his life by one year after his partner is killed by a criminal. Shin Ga-hyun, a webtoon artist, resets after an accident leaves her in a wheelchair. Psychiatrist Lee Shin has experienced the reset multiple times to save her daughter. Other resetters include an ex-convict, a guilt-ridden woman, a security guard, a stockbroker, a pro-gamer, and a university student with Munchausen syndrome. Many of them are killed by Park Sun-ho, a police officer and serial killer, who is later arrested in the next reset. The mastermind behind the reset project is Hwang No-seop, a cafe owner and university professor, who experiments on the candidates.

Reader's Guide

365: Repeat the Year is a time-loop thriller that explores themes of fate, guilt, and redemption. The series gained attention for its tight plotting and the moral dilemmas faced by characters who try to alter their pasts. Its significance lies in its adaptation of a Japanese novel into a Korean drama, and its use of a reset mechanism to drive suspense. The show aired in 2020 on MBC TV and featured a cast including Lee Joon-hyuk and Nam Ji-hyun. The narrative structure, where multiple characters reset their lives and face deadly consequences, contributed to its appeal. The series also highlights the consequences of tampering with time, as most resetters are killed by a fellow detective. Its legacy includes being a notable entry in the Korean drama genre of science fiction and mystery.

Did You Know?

• Park Sun-ho, a police officer, is revealed as a serial killer who kills several resetters.
• Hwang No-seop, a cafe owner, is later revealed to be a university professor and the mastermind behind the reset project.

Adapting a Japanese Novel for Korean Television

The 2020 South Korean drama 365: Repeat the Year (Korean title: 365: 운명을 거스르는 1년) draws its narrative engine from a 2004 Japanese novel called Repeat, written by Kurumi Inui. The adaptation transplants the core premise—ten ordinary individuals are granted the chance to rewind their lives by exactly one year—into a Korean broadcast context. Once the temporal reset takes hold, however, strange and dangerous occurrences begin to unfold, turning what should be a second chance into something far more perilous. The series ran on MBC TV's Monday-and-Tuesday 20:55 KST slot from March 23 through April 28, 2020, giving it a compact two-month window to develop its mystery. By grounding a speculative time-loop concept in a Korean police procedural framework, the adaptation found a distinct tonal identity separate from its Japanese literary roots.

Three Leads, Three Desperate Reasons to Rewind

The drama anchors its emotional core in three protagonists, each triggered into the one-year reset by a devastating personal loss. Lee Joon-hyuk plays Ji Hyung-joo, a veteran detective who has served seven years at the National Police Agency. His partner, Park Sun-ho, is murdered by a criminal, and the grief of that loss drives Hyung-joo to demand a rewind so he can intervene before the killing happens. Nam Ji-hyun portrays Shin Ga-hyun, a webtoon artist who has spent three years producing the series "Hidden Killer." A traffic accident leaves her confined to a wheelchair, and the reset offers her a chance to prevent that catastrophe. Kim Ji-soo takes on Lee Shin, a psychiatrist whose situation is the most extreme: she has already experienced the reset at least six separate times, each cycle motivated by her desperate attempt to save her daughter. Together, these three characters represent different facets of regret—professional, physical, and parental—giving the ensemble structure a layered emotional foundation.

The Killer in the Uniform and the Architect of the Experiment

Beneath the surface of the ten-candidate reset lies a dual antagonistic structure. Park Sun-ho, played by Lee Sung-wook, is Ji Hyung-joo's police lieutenant partner at the National Police Agency. He is ultimately revealed to be a serial killer who began his killing spree after being promoted to lieutenant during his twelve-year service. His murders of several reset candidates—Seo Yeon-soo, Choi Kyung-man, Cha Jeung-seok, Go Jae-young, Kim Se-rin, and So Hye-in—are each staged to look like accidents, suicides, or unrelated crimes, making the pattern nearly impossible to detect. Meanwhile, Hwang No-seop, portrayed by Yoon Joo-sang, operates as the hidden architect. Presenting himself as a cafe owner, he is actually a hospital professor who designed the reset project itself. His stated purpose is to experiment on the nine other candidates and observe who survives. In the next reset cycle, Ji Hyung-joo manages to arrest both Sun-ho and No-seop, closing the loop on the conspiracy.

An Ensemble of Ten: Ordinary People with Extraordinary Motives

Beyond the three leads, the remaining reset candidates form a mosaic of Korean society, each with a specific, human reason for wanting to undo a year. Yang Dong-geun plays Bae Jung-tae, an ex-convict who seeks the reset purely to earn enough money for his sister. Lee Si-a appears as Seo Yeon-soo, consumed by guilt over causing the accident that put Shin Ga-hyun in a wheelchair. Im Ha-ryong is Choi Kyung-man, a security guard hoping to win the lottery for his wife. Jung Min-sung portrays Cha Jeung-seok, a stockbroker desperate to correct costly trading errors. Ahn Seung-gyun plays Go Jae-young, a professional gamer and son of a Minister of Education nominee, who wants to erase a past that could destroy his father's career. Lee Yoo-mi is Kim Se-rin, a university student with Munchausen syndrome who simply wants to reconcile with her boyfriend. Even So Hye-in, a florist who initially refused participation after learning she would not be pregnant, becomes part of the tragic tally. This breadth of motivation ensures the reset feels less like a superpower and more like a universal human wish.