A TV producer jumps off a building to prove a man is not human. That is the hook of Tale of the Nine Tailed, and it is the moment the 2020 tvN series stops being a slow burn and becomes something worth the 16 episodes it asks for.
The show, created by Han Woo-ri, aired from October 7 to December 3, 2020, every Wednesday and Thursday at 22:30 KST. It stars Lee Dong-wook as Lee Yeon, Cho Bo-ah as Nam Ji-ah, and Kim Bum as Lee Rang. It runs one season, 16 episodes, and it carries a TMDB audience score of 8.4 out of 10 across 498 votes.
That score is right. Tale of the Nine Tailed is not a perfect show, but it is a confident one, and its best ideas are strong enough to carry the parts that sag.
Trailer, via Viu Singapore.
Lee Yeon, a Gumiho in the City
Lee Yeon is over 1,000 years old. He is a Gumiho, a nine-tailed fox, and the former guardian mountain spirit of Baekdu-daegan. Now he lives in the city. He works with Taluipa (Kim Jung-nan), an agent in the Afterlife Immigration Office and the protector of the Samdo River, to wipe out supernatural beings that threaten the mortal world.
His loyal subject is Gu Shin-ju (Hwang Hee), a veterinarian and fellow Gumiho. The arrangement is simple: Yeon hunts, Shin-ju patches up, Taluipa assigns the targets.
The premise gives the show its engine. Yeon is a former deity doing bureaucratic cleanup work in a modern city, and the gap between what he was and what he does now is the whole joke and the whole tragedy. Lee Dong-wook plays that gap well. He is dry where the script needs him dry and still where it needs him still.
Nam Ji-ah and the Fox With the Red Umbrella
Nam Ji-ah is a producer at TVC Station. The source describes her as smart, ferocious, and dauntless. She is also the reason the plot moves.
Yeon is on a mission to capture a fox that has killed and eaten the livers of many humans and is now marrying a man in the guise of a human woman. Ji-ah spots him leaving the venue. Later she sees him on camera, identified by his red, distinctly marked umbrella.
She finds where he lives. She suspects he is supernatural. Then she tests it by jumping off his flat with a memory chip containing video of Yeon fighting another fox with their powers. Yeon has to follow and save her. The test works because it forces his hand.
That sequence is the show’s best argument for itself. Ji-ah does not wait to be rescued into the plot. She drags herself into it and makes Yeon respond.
The Accident on Ji-ah’s Ninth Birthday
The backstory does the heavy lifting. On her ninth birthday, Ji-ah was in a road accident in which her parents were supposed to be dead. She is the only one who remembers that two other people, not human, posed as her parents. They were foxes trying to eat her. Lee Yeon saved her.
He compelled her to forget him. The magic did not work. Her parents’ bodies were never discovered. That is why she believes they are alive, and that is why she started looking into supernatural beings in the first place.
The show is careful here. Ji-ah’s search for her parents is not a side quest. It is the reason she is the kind of person who jumps off a building to test a theory.
Lee Rang and the Half-Brother Problem
Kim Bum plays Lee Rang, Yeon’s half-brother. He is the fox Yeon fights in the video Ji-ah captures. He is also the show’s most useful complication, because he turns a monster-of-the-week structure into a family argument.
The supporting cast fills out the world. Kim Yong-ji plays Ki Yu-ri, Lee Rang’s accomplice. Hwang Hee plays Gu Shin-ju. Kim Jung-nan plays Taluipa. Ahn Kil-kang plays Hyun Ui-ong. Kim Hee-jung plays Ji-a’s mother. Kim Kang-min plays Pyo Jae-hwan. Lee Tae-ri plays Imugi. Jung Yi-seo plays Kim Sae-rom. Uhm Hyo-seop plays TVC President Kwon Hae-ryong.
That is a lot of names for 16 episodes, and not all of them get the room they need.
The Midseason Break and the Spin-Off
On November 18, 2020, the series took a one-week break from airing to ensure better production for the remaining four episodes. It aired a behind-the-scenes special titled Tale of the Nine Tailed: A 600 Year Legend.
From November 18 to December 4, it also aired a three-part spin-off titled Tale of the Nine Tailed: An Unfinished Story, centering on Lee Rang and Ki Yu-ri.
The break is worth noting because it tells you where the show’s priorities were. Rather than push through, the production stopped to protect the final four episodes. The source does not say whether that decision helped the ending.
| Title | Format | Focus | Release |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tale of the Nine Tailed | TV series, 16 episodes | Lee Yeon and Nam Ji-ah | October 7 to December 3, 2020 |
| Tale of the Nine Tailed: A 600 Year Legend | Behind-the-scenes special | Production | November 18, 2020 |
| Tale of the Nine Tailed: An Unfinished Story | Three-part spin-off | Lee Rang and Ki Yu-ri | November 18 to December 4, 2020 |
| Tale of the Nine Tailed 1938 | Second season | Lee Dong-wook and Kim Bum return | Premiered May 6, 2023 |
| Tale of the Nine Tailed Tiger: The Beginning of a Lotus | Animated series | Studio Bazooka production | TVING, 2024 |
The table shows how fast the franchise grew. A single 16-episode season in 2020 became a spin-off, a second season, and an animated series.
What the Second Season Changed
Tale of the Nine Tailed 1938 premiered on May 6, 2023. Lee Dong-wook and Kim Bum reprise their roles. The female lead is played by Kim So-yeon, and the season added several new cast members, including Ryu Kyung-soo.
That is a meaningful shift. The first season built its central relationship around Lee Yeon and Nam Ji-ah. The second season moves to a different female lead and a different era, which suggests the franchise is more interested in Yeon as a constant than in any single pairing around him.
Whether that works is a question for the second season. For the first, the Ji-ah dynamic is the spine, and it holds.
The Animated Series and the Expanding Franchise
A South Korean animated series, Tale of the Nine Tailed Tiger: The Beginning of a Lotus, will be released on TVING in 2024. It is produced by Studio Bazooka. The Korean title is 구미호뎐: 연의 시작.
The franchise is now spread across live-action television, a spin-off, and animation. That is a lot of weight for a show that started as a Wednesday-Thursday drama about a fox with an umbrella.
The risk is dilution. The first season works because it is contained. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end, and the end is about two people and a debt that goes back a thousand years. Every expansion after that has to justify itself against a story that already closed.
The Verdict on Tale of the Nine Tailed
Tale of the Nine Tailed earns its 8.4. The show understands that its best asset is not the mythology but the mismatch between Yeon’s age and his circumstances. A former mountain god working for an afterlife immigration office is a good joke, and the show never forgets to play it.
The weaknesses are real. Some supporting characters get less room than their setups promise. The show is at its best when it is about Yeon, Ji-ah, and Lee Rang, and at its weakest when it wanders.
But the central idea holds. Ji-ah’s ninth birthday, the foxes posing as her parents, the compulsion that failed, the search that followed — that is a clean line from trauma to action. She is not a love interest who happens to be nearby. She is a person with a reason.
What matters most here is the containment. Tale of the Nine Tailed tells one story well. The spin-off, the second season, and the animated series are all extensions of a thing that already worked on its own. That is worth watching, and it is worth being skeptical about what comes next.
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