I finished Take Charge of My Heart (나를 충전해줘) on Netflix this week, and I’ll admit I went in with some doubts. Kim Young-kwang and Chae Soo-bin are both well-known actors, but they’re not the names I think of first when I think of big rom-com leads. I wanted to see if they could pull it off.
Short version: it’s a cute, very typical Korean rom-com, and if that’s exactly what you’re in the mood for, it delivers. Here’s my spoiler-free take, how it stacks up against another fantasy rom-com I’ve reviewed, and then, further down, my thoughts on the ending.
What it’s about
Baek Ho-rang (Kim Young-kwang) is a third-generation chaebol heir at TS Group with a serious heart condition. He lives with an artificial heart device, and its battery is running low until his next surgery. Na Bo-bae (Chae Soo-bin) is a middle-class TV drama writer who was struck by lightning as a kid and has produced electricity ever since. Nobody can touch her bare-handed without getting shocked, which means she’s never dated.
Then she meets the one man her electricity doesn’t hurt, and it turns out that being near her actually recharges his heart. He offers her a three-month contract to keep him going until surgery, and she needs his help too, because she has to write a convincing romance script and has zero experience to draw from. The Korean promo material has fun with it, calling him a “human rubber glove” and her a “human power bank.” The whole show runs on one simple rule: when they’re apart, his battery drains, and when they’re together, it recharges. That rule is what keeps throwing them into the same room, the same car, and eventually the same house.
The series is based on the Naver web novel of the same name by Hae Beon, first published in 2020. It’s directed by Park Soo-won, whose earlier work includes Birthcare Center and Work Later, Drink Now, with the screenplay by Song Yoo-chae. All 10 episodes dropped on Netflix at once on October 9, 2026, so it’s an easy binge, and you can realistically finish it over a weekend. It went live at 5 p.m. Korea time, which was 4 a.m. here on the East Coast.
Behind the show
The source material is the web novel 나를 충전해줘, which roughly translates to “Charge Me Up.” The English title, Take Charge of My Heart, keeps the pun, since his heart quite literally needs her charge. Hae Beon started publishing it on Naver in November 2020, and like a lot of recent K-dramas, it went from web fiction to a Netflix series. Production was handled by New Point and Why Not Media, and filming started in the summer of 2025.
Director Park Soo-won is better known for comedies about women’s lives than for classic romance. Birthcare Center (2020) was a sharp, funny look at new motherhood, and Work Later, Drink Now (2021) followed three friends who bond over drinking. Take Charge of My Heart is her first full rom-com, and at the press conference in Seoul, she was open about the approach. She said she didn’t want to force something new just for the sake of it, and summed it up with a line I liked: “The flavor you already know is the most addicting.”
That explains a lot about the show. It isn’t trying to reinvent the genre, it’s trying to do the familiar version well. Kim Young-kwang described it at the same event as a heart-fluttering, dreamlike story where comic-book fantasy comes to life, and Chae Soo-bin called it effortless and delightful, the kind of show that leaves you with a warm sense of comfort. Having watched all of it, that’s a pretty fair description of what they were going for.
The cast, and my doubts going in
Kim Young-kwang started as a model and has done his share of romance, including The Secret Life of My Secretary, Lovestruck in the City, and Call It Love, plus the 2018 movie On Your Wedding Day with Park Bo-young. Chae Soo-bin is probably best known lately for When the Phone Rings (2024), the thriller-romance with Yoo Yeon-seok, and earlier for I’m Not a Robot and A Piece of Your Mind. So neither is new to the genre, but I’ll be honest, I questioned the pairing before I pressed play.
Their chemistry ended up being not bad at all. It just took a while. I wasn’t really pulled in until around episode 7, when they finally start having feelings for each other. Before that, it felt like the show was setting up pieces more than letting the two of them click.
| Actor | Character | Who they are |
|---|---|---|
| Kim Young-kwang | Baek Ho-rang | TS Group heir with an artificial heart |
| Chae Soo-bin | Na Bo-bae | TV drama writer who produces electricity |
| Cha Woo-min | Ji Eun-ho | Supporting role |
| Kim Mi-kyung | Kong Man-seol | Ho-rang’s grandmother |
| Jung Jae-kwang | Choi Do-yoon | Ho-rang’s cousin, the family troublemaker |
| Shin Do-hyun | Han Seol-hee | Heiress from another conglomerate |
The supporting cast fills out the world around them. Cha Woo-min plays Ji Eun-ho, Jung Jae-kwang plays Choi Do-yoon, Ho-rang’s cousin and the troublemaker of the TS Group family, and Shin Do-hyun plays Han Seol-hee, an heiress from another conglomerate. Veteran actress Kim Mi-kyung plays Ho-rang’s grandmother, the family elder Bo-bae has to win over.
What worked for me
The romance, once it actually gets going. The first kiss, in a botanical garden, was genuinely cute, and every lovey-dovey scene after that was cute too. Once the show stops explaining its premise and just lets the two of them be a couple, it’s a lot of fun to watch.
The ending also worked for me, and I’ll get into why in the spoiler section. If you’re someone who needs a happy ending to feel good about the hours you put in, you’re in safe hands here.
What didn’t
The big set-pieces of the premise didn’t sell me, unfortunately. The heart charging whenever he’s near her, and him asking her to move in with him so he can survive until his next surgery, are classic Korean drama setups, and they just didn’t land for me the way they’re meant to.
It also dragged a bit for me watching Kim Young-kwang play cute. It’s the first time I’ve seen him do it, and I could kind of see right through it to what he’s probably like in real life, which made it harder to buy.
And then there’s my usual K-drama complaint. Just when the two leads fall for each other and try to have their happily ever after, another unfortunate event comes along, and then another. Korean dramas love that emotional rollercoaster, but I’m not a huge fan. Let them have a smooth love line!
How it compares to My Demon
Korean dramas have a long tradition of mixing a supernatural twist with romance, from Strong Woman Do Bong-soon in 2017 to My Demon in 2023, so Take Charge of My Heart is walking a well-worn path. The comparison with My Demon in particular is hard to avoid. Both have a chaebol, a contract arrangement, and a supernatural twist that forces the two leads to stay close. My Demon wins for me, and not only because of Song Kang (although, yes, partly because of Song Kang). Its storyline is tighter, and I felt the acting was more advanced overall.
If you’ve already seen My Demon and loved that formula, Take Charge of My Heart will feel familiar in a comfortable way. If you haven’t seen either and you can only pick one, I’d go with My Demon first. For what it’s worth, My Demon came in last in my Song Kang dramas ranking, which tells you something about where this one lands for me.
Is it worth watching?
If you enjoy this type of storyline, yes. It’s cute and light, the kind of show you put on when you want something sweet and low-stakes after a long day. Ten episodes is a manageable commitment, and the payoff is a happy ending.
If you get frustrated by slow-burn starts, forced obstacles between the leads, or very familiar K-drama tropes, it might test your patience, especially in the first half. There’s nothing explicit here, it’s a pretty clean rom-com, so it’s an easy one to watch with anyone.
Watching it made me realize how much of what I want from a rom-com is just the simple stuff: two people who like each other, a little bit of sweetness, and an ending where they get to be happy. Take Charge of My Heart gets there. It just takes the scenic route.
⚠️ Spoilers below
The ending is the part I liked best. After all the back-and-forth, Ho-rang and Bo-bae get back together, and his grandmother, who’s been the hardest to win over, finally signals her approval after seeing Bo-bae’s humane, kind side for herself.
Bo-bae also becomes a successful writer, which felt earned since her script deadline is half the reason the contract started in the first place. The final picture is the two of them living together in the same house. A happy ending, just the way I like it.