4 min readHyderabadMar 6, 2026 04:41 PM IST
Boyfriend on Demand, a 2026 South Korean romantic comedy series written by Namgung Do-young and directed by Kim Jung-sik, premiered on Netflix today. It is one of the most anticipated K-drama releases of the year, and not just because of its cast or concept. For a large part of its global audience, the series marks the moment BLACKPINK’s Jisoo officially steps into leading lady territory on one of the world’s biggest streaming platforms.
Mi-rae (Jisoo) is a webtoon producer whose exhausting routine pushes her toward an unusual escape: a paid virtual dating service that builds personalised romantic scenarios around whatever its user considers their ideal partner. The show takes its name directly from that in-story platform, using it as both the premise and the lens through which Mi-rae’s real and imagined love lives begin to collide.
Set against the backdrop of office life, Boyfriend on Demand uses the virtual boyfriend concept to explore the widening gap between the relationships people idealise and the ones they actually have, a theme that has found considerable resonance with younger Korean drama audiences in recent years.
The trailer gives viewers a clearer sense of how the show balances the ordinariness of Mi-rae’s daily life with the romantic fantasy the simulation offers her as an escape from it. She is swept into one virtual date after another, while in reality she keeps crossing paths with Kyeong-nam, played by Seo In-guk, the two gradually becoming what the show describes as “overtime work buddies,” with the slow-burn connection between them building alongside her increasingly complicated relationship with the simulation.
The virtual boyfriend lineup alone generated considerable pre-release buzz. Seo Kang-joon, Lee Soo-hyuk, Lee Jae-wook, Lee Sang-yi, Lee Hyun-wook, Ong Seong-wu, Kim Young-dae, and Jay Park each appear as different simulated partners within the app, every one bringing a distinct flavour of romance to Mi-rae’s digital love life. Yoo In-na plays the dating manager responsible for matching Mi-rae with her ideal scenarios, and Gong Min-jeung returns to screens after giving birth.
Boyfriend on Demand was originally developed for broadcast on MBC before Netflix acquired it as an original production, a shift that expanded its potential reach considerably. All ten episodes dropped simultaneously on March 6, meaning viewers did not have to wait week by week for new instalments, a format that has increasingly become the expectation for binge-friendly romantic comedies on the platform.
For Jisoo personally, the series represents her most substantial acting commitment since Snowdrop in 2021. Speaking about balancing music and acting, Jisoo said she does not draw a hard line between the two disciplines. “Music and acting could be seen as two very different things, but I do think they are similar in many ways. I try to put the same amount of energy into everything I do,” she said in one of her many interviews. On the romance at the heart of the show, she was equally direct about why she felt audiences would connect with it. “I think most love is a slow burn. Not a lot of people just directly confess their feelings and kickstart everything. It is usually taken very slow, step by step,” she said.
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She also revealed that her BLACKPINK bandmates had already been watching closely. “When the main trailer was released, they would tease me, saying: ‘Oh my God, you did this,’” she shared with a laugh.
Fan reaction in the lead-up to the release had been consistently warm, with audiences particularly excited about the pairing of Jisoo and Seo In-guk, a combination few had seen coming. Comments on fan forums described the drama as a potential romcom revival, with viewers noting that watching both leads together in a single series was something they had not expected to see.
