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[Beanie Recs] Legitimate business by day, something else by night


Ahoy, Beanies! It’s time to gather your collective genius for a recommendation series that features you and your drama knowledge. Each week we’ll drop a drama conundrum and leave it up to you to provide a drama rec, and the appropriate rationale behind it, be it long or short. Respond below!
 

Cafe Minamdang has this unique premise where the heroes run a cafe as a front to hide their scams and vigilante investigations. What are some other dramas that feature stories of legitimate businesses as a cover for clandestine activities?


Have a very particular drama itch that needs scratching? In need of a Beanie Rec? Email us at hello @ dramabeans.com and we’ll feature your topic in a future post.
 
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Taxi Driver 👀

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I feel like this thread is giving me free rein to shitpost about this show lol

Anyway basic premise:
Our gang of vigilantes run a taxi business as front but really are a revenge seeking service that infiltrates and kidnaps the big baddies of the world

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Ones that immediately come to mind -

1. Taxi Driver - Taxi company as a cover and a tool for a team of vigilantes
2. The Spies Who Loved Me - Book publishing company as a front for an espionage arm of Interpol!
Healer and City Hunter also had the MLs taking on everyday jobs as a cover but I guess they wouldn't fall in the legitimate business vs something else category.

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You forget to add the wedding dress designing shop that later join the book publishing company as a cover.

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I said that same thing down below, but I also just remembered that her husband has his car restoration business as a front for his contract spy work as well. Man, that show is loaded on this topic isn't it 😅🤣

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Sell Your Haunted House - they were real estate agents but also ghost hunters! And also the story in the Uncanny Counter where the group run a restaurant business but are also demon hunters. Hahaha, had to do some research on my previously watched dramas list!

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Mystic Pop-Up Bar.

Blade Man, perhaps? Not that I'd recommend it though, in spite of my love of Lee Dong Wook.

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Soooooo if we want to be a bit more liberal with our take of what is considered a business front and subsequent clandestine activities….

Remarriage & Desires
Our protagonist becomes a tutor to a son of some CEO to stop her nemesis from seducing said CEO (but really I think she was in love with her nemesis and only married the CEO because her nemesis wanted to)

Cruel/ Heartless City

Our Female Lead (after her sister’s unfortunate death) works with the police and becomes an escort to gain intel on some drug lord baddie ( forgive me for the lack of specific details since this drama aired waaaay back in 2013, but actor Jung Kyoung-ho was seriously HOT no?)

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Big fan of Heartless City. Still gutted that they edited out his gang tattoo!

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It's still my favourite role of Jung Kyung-Ho. He looked so great as Baksa's Son.

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@linarrick? Haven’t watched R&D but who is her nemesis and who was in love with whom? Is this a same sex love-line? Or are there two nemeses?😵‍💫

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@DancingEmma SadIy no, there was no same sex love line. I was being facetious. Still, while I wouldn’t describe the relationship between our protagonist (Seo Hye-seung) and her nemesis (Jin Yoo-hui) as romantic, I’d definitely say what they shared together was this all-encompassing obsession that ultimately led to the downfall of both of them

In terms of explaining all the relationships, this show is very makjang and it gets a little complicated…(Also you don’t have to read this, I just didn’t know how else to explain it
lol)

R&D SPOILERS:

In the present, Hye-seung our protagonist meets her nemesis Yoo-hui at a matchmaking agency for the one percent.

We find out that a year ago Yoo-hui framed Hye-seung’s husband for sexual assault, we also learn Hye-seung’s husband committed suicide as a result.

Seeing Yoo-hui again, a year later, unremorseful fills Hye-seung with incredible rage and she vows to get revenge. Hye-seung’s initial plan was to out Yoo-hui to the matchmaking agency but after that fails she proceeds to stalk Yoo-hui and warn away any potential suitors.

Yoo-hui, being the ambitious lady she is, sets her sight on the most eligible bachelor amongst the rich, Lee Hyung-ju (a divorced 40-something CEO with a kid).

Finding this out, Hye-seung tries to warn Lee Hyung-ju, but gaining access to him proves to be difficult since he is mister big-shot CEO and all. However, since the plot needs to keep moving an opportunity arises for Hye-seung to become the tutor of Lee Hyung-ju’s kid.

Yoo-hui and Hye-seung then battle it out to get Lee Hyung-ju’s attention. Hye-seung wins, sends Yoo-hui to jail and marries Lee Hyung-ju

A lot of dramatics happen in between, power trips, retaliation, bruised egos and whatnot but one thing remains clear, Hye-seung and Yoo-hui are obsessed with each other. There were plenty of moments when one of them could have backed off or retreated, but neither did. Even Hye-seung’s marriage to Lee Hyung-ju depended on her obsession with Yoo-hui

Aaaand I’m sorry this was so long winded but yeah that about explains the show’s main relationship dynamics

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@linarrick: Thank you for taking the time to explain it to me!😊 I avoid the makjang dramas but enjoyed your spiel!

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Extreme Job - A group of cops hide their undercover activities by opening a chicken restaurant. (This is a movie, not a drama, but it's really fun. )

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The Uncanny Counter- Noodle restaurant employees who, you know, also hunt supernatural beings with their supernatural abilities. Everyone has to have a side hustle these days :p

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@xpressemu: I haven’t watched it but your “side hustle” closer made me laugh. Fun to imagine my favourite Laksa (just in case you don’t know - the most delicious Nyonya noodle soup in the universe if done right!) place workers as demon hunters. At least, they have a lot of chili peppers, sauces and pastes handy!

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1. Hwayugi A Korean Odyssey - There's an entertainment company, but everyone from the CEO Mawang (Bull Demon King) to the employees and artists are all some kind of immortal demons or monsters.
2.Vampire Prosecutor- the titular Vampire Prosecutor himself might fit the description a bit, but there's also a bar that after hours serves blood not just fancy drinks.

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Big fan of the concept, but don't seem to have many reccs for it. To be honest, overall, my recommendation list is not big anyway, as I'm pretty picky about what I genuinely can and want to recommend to people, especially if it's not a direct one on one recommendation.

Semantically, I don't think I have anything that fits the exact criteria- if it needs both legitimate business cover and clandestine operations behind the front (and it's a good recommendation).

For just the clandestine, and a cover of sorts at least for half the show then obviously Healer, hands down.

Mystic Pop Up Bar and Sell Your Haunted House are both normal business fronts as covers for supernatural businesses, but neither are clandestine in the illicit connotation.

Then we get into stuff that pushes the criteria even farther, but I would still recommend--
Extracurricular - High School Kid runs a security company for illegal prosititutes. If being a high schooler counts as a legitimate business front that is haha.
My Fellow Citizens - Con Man runs for National Assembly.
Tale of the Nine Tailed as a couple of Gumiho's running business fronts (one is a vet) from what I remember, but they also just hang out normally sometimes too lmao...

38 Task Force as a team of cops and conartists who work together (not necessarily legally) to catch tax evaders sort of counts?
Plenty of minor undercover roles in any thriller or cop show, come to mind, but they're not explicitly "business" fronts -E.g. Military Prosecutor has the FL pose as a vigilante on the side of her Military job, but it's minor and basically disappears in the back half- and we get into a too broad a criteria if we do that I think.

(I was gonna out My Love From the Stars here too but I can't remember what Do Min Joon's day job is...)

Aaand then stuff that is a bit harder for me to recc--
Kill It- an Assassin has a day job as a Vet.
I did like Kill It but it's not very good lol. Fits the criteria perfectly otherwise though 😂

And a bit harder again--
Spies Who Loved Me is fun but the story is terrible and also pointless and is only worthwhile for the amazing Female Lead, Yoo Inna as Areum.
The business front part of the Interpol agents is minor, but the FL runs a dressmaking company whilst conducting her investigations along side the spies, so. That's pretty cool. She also gets to stab some people with her dressmaking scissors. (Yoo Inna Spy Cinematic Universe Part 3 when)

My Name, Witch's Diner, From Now On: Showtime, Vincenzo, Taxi Driver, Snowdrop, Undercover, River Where the Moon Rises (Herbalist is a Silla Spy lmao, oh what that concept could've been, alas), all count but I do not recommend any of them.

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@sicarius: I dipped into MLFTS a few times but I remember his contemporary job was being an “academic”. It makes me laugh how many depictions of university teachers both in the western and KDramas are so one dimensional as to be laughable because the hard work underlying teaching, research and admin duties is hardly captivating, and believe me, afaiac, there are many more attractive women than men in academia.

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Lol Do Min Joon is a professor! But I forgot what topic he teaches.

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The enjoyable romp that was My Secret Terrius had bag shop PPL as a cover for an NIS operation (and the bad guys were using luxury hand bags for their evil schemes as well).
They even had a secret base behind the shop and the ongoing gag of the oblivious female lead insisting on being the best at selling handbags and drawing unwanted customers to the store.

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Not a demon or ghost hunter or vigilante in sight but I found it moving that in “Just between lovers”, Jeong Sookhee the loan shark, also operated an underground health clinic for poor people. Na Moonhee was so great in that role and I loved her rapport with Junho’s Kangdoo.

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