A successful entrepreneur with a seemingly perfect life sees everything fall apart after discovering her husband covering up a murder allegedly committed by their daughter. As the family scrambles to hide the truth, an anonymous blackmailer claims to have recorded everything, pulling them into a dangerous web of lies, secrets, and betrayal.
Latest episode: S1 E8 Second House (Sep 4, 2026)
A celebrity influencer couple built on a fake happy marriage, and their neighbours—a doctor couple locked in a brutal divorce—spiral into a chaotic chain reaction when they are bound by a secret so unmanageable that it makes affairs look trivial.
I’ve always been drawn to stories about secrets—not the kind that lurk in the shadows, but the ones that sit right out in the open, pulsing like a second heartbeat in a family’s daily routine. The Affair Was Just The Beginning is that kind of story, a dark comedy that treats its characters’ lies like a Jenga tower: every block pulled sends the whole structure wobbling, but no one dares stop playing. What makes it fascinating isn’t the affair itself, or even the murder that follows, but the way the family clings to the illusion of control long after the game is lost.
Lee Chang-hee, the director, has a knack for these kinds of pressure-cooker narratives. His previous work, like The Vanished (2018), thrived on the tension between outward respectability and inner chaos. Here, he takes that tension and cranks it up to a near-farcical degree, though the humor is so dry it could dehydrate you.
The series opens with Gyeong Hui (Kim Hye-soo), a successful entrepreneur and influencer, discovering her husband has covered up a murder—allegedly committed by their daughter. The revelation should shatter her world, but instead, the family’s response is almost bureaucratic in its efficiency: they’ll just handle it. The problem isn’t the crime; it’s the paperwork.
What’s striking is how quickly the series pivots from domestic drama to something resembling a corporate thriller. The blackmailer who emerges isn’t just a threat; he’s an auditor, demanding payment for the family’s sins with the cold precision of a tax collector. The metaphor isn’t subtle, but it doesn’t need to be.
Lee Chang-hee’s latest black-comedy thriller, The Affair Was Just The Beginning, has Seoul buzzing—not just for its razor-sharp script, but for the real-life drama simmering behind the scenes. Starring heavyweights Kim Hye-soo and Cho Yeo-jeong, the series promises to dissect infidelity, power, and the messy fallout of secrets. But as the cameras rolled, latestnetflix.com maintains, whispers about the cast’s off-screen chemistry and the show’s breakneck production schedule began to overshadow even its juiciest plot twists.
Kim Hye-soo, a veteran known for her commanding screen presence, leads the ensemble as Gyeong Hui, an influencer whose life unravels after an affair. Her on-screen rival, Cho Yeo-jeong—fresh off her global success in Parasite—plays a character whose own secrets threaten to explode the narrative 
. Sources suggest the two actresses, both celebrated for their intensity, clashed early in rehearsals over creative differences. A publicity event in July 2026, where the cast and director Lee Chang-hee faced reporters, was notably light on laughter between the two stars, fueling speculation .
Meanwhile, Kim Ji-hoon and Kim Jae-chul, playing the men caught in the crossfire, have kept a lower profile. But insiders hint that Kim Ji-hoon, a rising leading man, was initially hesitant to take the role, fearing it might typecast him in "cheating husband" tropes. His eventual signing was reportedly contingent on script revisions to deepen his character’s arc .
Produced by Coupang Play, South Korea’s answer to Netflix, The Affair Was Just The Beginning is part of the platform’s push into high-stakes original content. The series was greenlit in late 2025, with an aggressive eight-episode order and a premiere date locked for July 31, 2026—just months after filming wrapped . The tight timeline raised eyebrows in the industry, with rumors swirling that the production was plagued by last-minute rewrites. Director Lee Chang-hee, known for his meticulous pacing, allegedly clashed with writers Jung Eun-kyung and Park Soo-rin over the show’s tone, which oscillates between dark comedy and brutal crime thriller .
Adding to the chaos, Coupang Play’s marketing team leaned hard into the series’ scandalous premise, releasing not one but two trailers in quick succession—both packed with provocative imagery of the cast entangled in lies . The strategy paid off in clicks, but some critics argue it reduced the show to its salacious hook, overshadowing its layered character study.
With the premiere just days away, the cast is in full damage-control mode. Kim Hye-soo and Cho Yeo-jeong have been spotted at separate press events, carefully avoiding questions about their alleged rift. Meanwhile, Coupang Play has remained tight-lipped about viewership targets, though industry analysts predict the series could either become a breakout hit or a cautionary tale about rushed production.
One thing’s certain: The Affair Was Just The Beginning isn’t just about the secrets its characters keep. The real drama might be the one unfolding behind the camera.
Entertainment rumors and trivia aggregated from public reporting. Treat speculation as unverified unless a cited source confirms it.
