TV shows we love: Coffee Prince
Coffee Prince (2007) occupies a singular place in K-drama history. Emerging during the first Korean Wave (Hallyu), it captures the mid-2000s zeitgeist of young urban professionals navigating love, work and societal expectations.
Some aspects, like low-budget visuals, simple editing and occasionally “cringy” dialogue, can feel dated compared to today’s high-gloss, fast-paced K-dramas. Yet despite this, Coffee Prince remains a landmark series, laying the groundwork for the romantic-comedy dramas that followed.
The narrative centres on Go Eun-chan, a tomboyish 24-year-old struggling to support her family after her father’s death, and Choi Han-gyeol, a wealthy slacker strong-armed into responsibility by his grandmother, Chairwoman Bang.
Things start to get complicated when Han-gyeol mistakes Eun-chan for a man and hires her to pose as his gay lover to fend off his grandmother’s relentless matchmaking schemes.
When the ruse begins to wear thin, Chairwoman Bang, fed up with Han-gyeol’s aimless lifestyle and continued refusal of blind dates, buys a rundown shop and forces him to revive it. He must triple its sales within months – or be cut off entirely.
As he takes up the challenge, Han-gyeol markets the café, Coffee Prince, around a “good-looking” all-male staff to attract female clientele. He offers Eun-chan a job which she accepts, not least because of her strained financial situation.
Daily interactions and late-night conversations draw Han-gyeol and Eun-chan closer, sparking both emotional and physical attraction. Convinced he is falling in love with a man, Han-gyeol spirals into avoidance, self-loathing and panic, weighed down by the potential repercussions of Korea’s deeply conservative society.
Eun-chan’s eventual reveal reframes the relationship as heterosexual, turning Han-gyeol’s emotional turmoil into a “misunderstanding,” a choice that has drawn criticism for queerbaiting.
But for many young viewers at the time, particularly queer ones, Han-gyeol’s confusion mirrored real anxiety around sexual identity, while Eun-chan’s tomboy defiance challenged rigid norms of femininity, offering a rare form of validation on early-2000s Korean TV and abroad.
Even within a heteronormative framework, the series boldly explores sexual identity, gender expression and societal constraints without vilifying non-straight desire.
By building on earlier gender-bending narratives and blending them with trendy tropes like the lazy-rich-heir-redeems-himself or fake-relationship-turns-to-love, Coffee Prince elevated these themes to Hallyu stardom, pioneering mainstream explorations of identity and emotional complexity.
Available on Netflix.