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Four Episodes Drop Simultaneously on October 15 at 6 PM
TVING’s original drama Make Me Shudder premieres Thursday, October 15 at 6 PM, dropping its first four episodes all at once. Nam Ji-hyun stars as Gong Yeon-soo, a marketer with traditional values, opposite Kim Jae-young as Dokgo Dal, a free-spirited startup CEO. After meeting on a blind date set up by their grandparents, the two unexpectedly cross paths again as business associates, setting the stage for their contrasting worldviews to clash in both romance and the workplace.
TVING’s official page confirms the October 15 launch and the 6 PM Thursday time slot, while pre-release announcements highlight the four-episode premiere. This bingeable start gives viewers the chance to see not just the couple’s awkward first encounter, but the full groundwork of how their relationship pivots into a professional entanglement.
Penned by writer Ahn Sae-bom and directed by Kim Ye-ji, the show goes beyond the usual opposites-attract setup. What drives the romance is the inescapable nature of their dynamic: while they could easily avoid each other in private, their professional duties force them to understand one another.
A Traditional Marketer Meets an Unconventional Entrepreneur
Nam Ji-hyun’s character, Gong Yeon-soo, is a marketer grounded in conservative values. As a marketer, her job is connecting products with consumers. But while she sticks to familiar, traditional principles in her personal life, her career demands a grasp of new markets and different perspectives. She’s caught between her own rigid standards and the fluid demands of her profession.
On the flip side, Kim Jae-young plays Dokgo Dal, an open-minded startup CEO. His startup is built around scaling new business models, and that world shapes how he sees things. While Yeon-soo carefully draws boundaries, Dal approaches relationships with breezy flexibility. Their fundamental differences mean they process and react to the exact same situations in entirely different, often conflicting, ways.
Their contrast isn’t meant as a stand-in for conservative versus open-minded Korea as a whole. The show is simply following two people who operate by different rulebooks. For international viewers, the point isn’t that all Koreans share one approach to dating. Rather, the pull comes from watching how family expectations, like a date arranged by grandparents, run up against personal choice in a modern relationship.
From a Family-Arranged Blind Date to a Professional Reunion
Their initial encounter is a mat-seon, a formal blind date arranged by their grandparents. Traditionally, these dates are set up by family members or matchmakers with marriage as a serious endgame. While this certainly isn’t how everyone in Korea finds a partner today, the drama uses this setup as a narrative tool, letting outside family forces ignite the relationship.
Yeon-soo and Dal later cross paths in the workplace. The show’s premise, as described by Wikitree, has the two reuniting not as coworkers, but as marketer and client. This dynamic forces them past their disastrous personal first impressions to get the job done. Whether they actually like each other suddenly becomes a separate question from whether they can work together.
This structure keeps their clash from ending after one awkward meeting. It lets the show explore how the ideological differences that ruined their blind date bleed into their professional lives. Forced to professionally accommodate ideas they personally disagree with, both characters are pushed to re-evaluate each other.
Translating Romantic Friction into Workplace Collaboration
This setup moves a family-arranged connection into a high-stakes workplace environment. At first, the conflict is purely about mismatched romantic ideals and dating criteria. But once they reunite, the focus shifts to communication and collaboration. They can’t just acknowledge their differences and walk away; the pressure is on to navigate those differences and deliver results.
We can’t predict exactly how they’ll resolve these tensions based on pre-release teasers alone. There’s no indication that the traditional character will unilaterally change, or that the free spirit holds all the right answers. Their contrasting personalities are just the starting line; the true evolution of their relationship will unfold through the dialogue and actions in the episodes to come.
The simultaneous release of the first four episodes lets viewers see this dynamic unfold from the start. Watching Yeon-soo and Dal move from reluctant dates to begrudging business partners is the key to understanding their early relationship. Make Me Shudder is slated to premiere on TVING on October 15 at 6 PM.
Sources: TVING official program guide, accessed October 12, 2026 (https://www.tving.com/contents/P001791920); Wikitree, October 1, 2026 (https://www.wikitree.co.kr/articles/1163194).
