A powerhouse lineup of “trust-and-watch” actors—Shin Ha-kyun, Oh Jung-se, and Heo Sung-tae—finally unveiled their highly anticipated drama, instantly dominating the conversation.
MBC’s new Fri-Sat series Fifties Professionals, which premiered on the 22nd, hooked viewers with a gripping opening. According to Nielsen Korea on the 23rd, episode 1 of Fifties Professionals recorded a nationwide rating of 4.4%, signaling a strong start.
In the first episode, National Security Office chief Kwon Soon-bok (Ahn Nae-sang) and NIS anti-communism team leader Cho Sung-won (Kim Sang-ho) urgently pursued evidence that NIS Deputy Director Han Kyung-uk (Kim Sang-kyung) had colluded with a North Korean officer to smuggle drugs. Countering them, the NIS deployed its off-the-books black operative Jung Ho-myung (Shin Ha-kyun), while North Korean special agent “Bulgae” Bong Je-soon (Oh Jung-se) also moved into play, cranking up the tension. When the Hwaseonpa crime syndicate jumped in, a fierce three-way standoff erupted between South and North Korean intelligence and organized crime—but the operation ultimately failed, plunging the case into a massive labyrinth.
The story then jumped 10 years ahead. Living undercover as a Chinese-restaurant head chef, Jung Ho-myung continued a covert mission to track down the long-missing Bong Je-soon and a mysterious item. Suffering from amnesia, Bong fought to uncover his true past. Meanwhile, a new player—prosecutor Kang Young-ae (Kim Shin-rok)—entered the scene, adding fresh tension. While reinvestigating what had been ruled a suicide, Kang began to connect the dots to the decade-old case. Layer upon layer of mystery surrounding the “item that vanished 10 years ago” started to peel back, gradually exposing the truth behind a colossal conspiracy.
Right after the premiere, viewers raved: “Shin Ha-kyun and Oh Jung-se together can never be boring,” “The action scenes are movie-level—absolutely insane.”
Meanwhile, the hard-boiled pursuit thriller Fifties Professionals follows three men who look ordinary now but once ruled the streets, as they confront truths buried for a decade. It airs every Friday and Saturday at 9:50 p.m. KST on MBC and is also available on TVING and Wavve.