30 K-Drama Thrillers That Will Have You Hooked

Summary

• Thriller K-dramas are just as popular as romantic ones, with gripping narratives and twisty plots.
• Doctor Prisoner is a revenge-driven tale of a framed doctor seeking justice in prison, with meticulous planning.
• K-dramas like Stranger and Signal explore themes of justice, time travel, and unintended consequences.

While romantic K-dramas definitely create more vocal online fandoms, the best thrillerK-dramas are equally popular. Besides the popular romantic K-dramas and melodramas, South Korea also creates thriller series that will have audiences on the edge of their seats. K-dramas continue to dominate streaming platforms, just like the gripping family drama Little Women and the nail-biting revenge show My Name. The genre is also known to feature a variety of thrilling narratives and stories, from cat and mouse stories involving serial killers to shows with creepy cults.

Thanks to platforms like Netflix and Rakuten Viki, viewers can easily binge thriller K-drama with riveting plots. What makes Korean drama series so interesting is they usually aren’t bound by the same confines as their American counterparts. Many of the best K-dramas contain supernatural or fantasy elements, while others are beautiful period pieces, and K-drama thrillers are no different. K-dramas are usually more aesthetically pleasing than American programs, with attention to the smallest details, and there is no shortage of enthralling K-drama thrillers.

30 Doctor Prisoner (2019)

A Doctor Is Wrongly Imprisoned

One of the big themes in K-dramas is romance, but Doctor Prisoner features no romance. Instead, the focus is on revenge. Revenge and justice, unsurprisingly, are common themes in thrillers, and that’s the case for K-dramas that are thrillers as well.

Here, an emergency room doctor ends up in prison after being forced to quit his job when he is framed for malpractice and people he cares about are being put in danger left and right. He isn’t exactly serving a prison sentence but acts as a prison doctor while meticulously planning his revenge against those responsible for his misfortune. He forms numerous connections within the prison to make his plans come to fruition.

The series captured the attention of audiences and critics, winning Best Drama at the Seoul International Drama Awards and getting a slew of nominations at the KBS Drama Awards.

29 Signal (2016-)

Two Investigators In Different Times Connect Over An Old Radio

• Available to stream on Paramount+

Inspired by the 2000 movie Frequency and actual criminal cases in South Korea, Signal takes the idea of two people across time working to solve the same cases and allows them to actually contact one another with the use of a very special radio.

The modern storyline takes place in 2015 as one detective finds an old radio on which someone he doesn’t know starts talking to him like they’re old friends. The voice on the other end helps him solve a case, and he ends up being placed in a cold case unit. The voice is actually an investigator in the 1990s, working the cases on their end as well.

While the investigations are fascinating, just as fascinating is that their interactions cause ripples through time that create unintended consequences. Signal has been so successful that Japanese, Chinese, Thai, and Indian remakes of the series have been made.

Years later, a second season of the South Korean series is in development.

28 Stranger (2017-2020)

A Prosecutor And Police Officer Team Up

• Available to stream on Netflix

In one of the few thriller K-dramas to get multiple seasons, Stranger crafted a compelling story in its first season and then explored the consequences of it in the second.

The first season sees a prosecutor and a police lieutenant investigate a murder together. While they chase down leads, however, they find themselves thwarted at nearly every turn by people in charge of their offices as well as some of the chaebol families. They slowly uncover a conspiracy. In the second season, they team up again as each of their offices wants to lead their own version of an investigation with no cooperation. The conflicts mean that no progress is actually being made, making them believe working together is the best option to actually get justice.

Stranger became one of the highest-rated cable dramas in South Korea during its run. It also nabbed the Grand Prize at both the Seoul Awards and the Baeksang Arts Awards.

27 The King of Pigs (2022)

A Story Of Violence Spans Two Decades

• Currently unavailable to stream

This South Korean web series has mostly flown under the international radar. Adapted from an animated series, the story traverses 20 years with an investigation in the present and school violence in the past.

Two people in the present day are still affected by the bullying and violence committed in high school 20 years earlier. The story is told through the eyes of a killer and the eyes of the detective trying to solve the crimes. Throughout the series, however, the story flashes back to the high school days and then to the present to give the audience a full picture of how traumatic events of the past can affect the present.

With only 12 episodes, no episode of this series is filler. It’s a nail-biting way to provide social commentary on how teenagers treat one another and the lasting effects that treatment can have.

26 A Bloody Lucky Day (2023)

A Taxi Driver Experiences A Terrifying Fare

• Available to stream on Paramount+

A Bloody Lucky Day is inspired by a webtoon published by Naver. The series was so anticipated, it premiered the first two episodes at the Busan International Film Festival before it began airing on television. A global distribution deal was also made for the show throughout Paramount, ensuring that it could be broadcast or streamed outside of South Korea fairly quickly.

In the series, a taxi driver thinks he’s getting the best break of his life when a passenger offers him a huge payment to take him somewhere. What he realizes throughout the course of the journey, however, is that his passenger might actually be a serial killer, and he has to find a way to survive the experience.

The nail-biter hasn’t been a big name among Korean award shows, but it did snag nominations for the actors at the Bakesang Arts Festival.

25 Mask Girl (2023)

An Insecure Office Worker Becomes A Masked Internet Personality

• Available to stream on Netflix

Mask Girl examines three different moments in the life of an insecure office worker (played by three different actors throughout the series — Lee Han-byeol, Nana, and Go Hyun-jung). She longs for everyone to love her, and she needs adulation so badly that she develops the internet personality of “Mask Girl”. However, her life spirals out of control due to a series of events surrounding her fame.

It’s an incredibly dark thriller of a K-drama, more graphic than many television viewers might expect.

These include crime, murder, and even her own child having to suffer the consequences of the actions that she causes. It’s an incredibly dark thriller of a K-drama, more graphic than many television viewers might expect. It was also creatively set up, with each episode following a specific character in the story. Based on the Naver webtoon of the same name by Mae-mi and Hee-se, the series took place over just one season with seven episodes. Ahn Jae-hong won Best Supporting Actor at the Baeksang Arts Awards for his performance as Joo Oh-nam.

24 My Name (2021)

A Woman Joins A Gang To Avenge Her Dather’s Death

When a young woman’s father dies suddenly, she works her way up in a crime syndicate to find a way to gain revenge against those responsible for his death. Part of her work, however, involves going undercover for the criminal group inside the police force. She has to play a double agent for both sides and has a hard time figuring out where her loyalty should lie as she becomes close to both criminals and investigators.

The thriller K-drama is one that keeps up the mystery as well as whether a person is really a monster for wanting revenge. The series debuted three episodes at the 26th Busan International Film Festival and then launched on Netflix in October 2021. The series has a total of eight episodes, each checking in at just under an hour in length. Ahn Bo-hyun went on to win the Excellence Award, Actor in a OTT at the APAN Star Awards and Han So-hee was nominated for Best Actress at the Baeksang Arts Awards.

23 Beyond Evil (2021)

Two Detectives Try To Stop A Serial Killer

• Available to stream on Viki Rakuten

Another thriller K-drama that asks questions about monstrous humans is Beyond Evil. In the crime drama, the series sees two different detectives struggling to catch a serial killer. In order to get criminals off the streets, the detectives decide that they are willing to do anything to catch them, including breaking the law themselves. The darkness that they delve into makes them question who the real monster is — the serial killer or the ones searching for them.

The series is not based on a true story and is completely fictional, but there are comparisons to the real-life Hwaseong serial murder case. That comparison comes from the fact that the show was inspired by Memoirs of Murder, a movie by Bong Joon-ho, which was based on those murders. Beyond Evil was a huge success and scored eight nominations at the Baeksang Arts Awards in 2021. It won three of those awards, including Best Drama, Best Screenplay – Television, and Best Actor – Television for Shin Ha-kyun.

22 Dark Hole (2021)

A Detective Is Called Into A Town Whose Residents Have Mutated

• Available to stream on Rakuten Viki

One of the best K-drama thrillers is Dark Hole, which will have viewers on the edge of their seats with a mystery, thriller, and dark fantasy story. Lee Hwa-Sun is a detective in Seoul whose life is turned upside down when she’s called by her husband’s murderer. She’s told to go to Mujishi, but there’s a problem. The residents of the town are closed off as many have transformed into heinous mutants after breathing in mysterious dark smoke from a sinkhole.

With a dire need to catch Lee Hwa-Sun’s (played by Kim Ok-vin of the hidden gem The Villainess) husband’s killer, she ventures to Mujishi and joins forces with a former cop-turned driver. This was the fifth installment of the “Dramatic Cinema” project by OCN, which combined the elements of film and drama. The season had 12 total episodes, and it originally aired in 2021. What started out as a strong K-drama horror series soon ventured into sci-fi territory while keeping the mystery strong until the end.

21 Possessed (2019)

A Cop Who Can See Ghosts Meets A Woman Who Can Read Minds

Among the best Netflix K-drama thrillers for supernatural mystery is Possessed. Sometimes ghosts and the paranormal world make for a more interesting storyline and series. In Possessed, two unlikely individuals meet and team up to solve crimes, leading to some nail-biting sequences. Kang Pil-Sung (Song Sae-Byeok) is a good detective but is somewhat crude and can be a bit lazy. He meets Hong Seo-Jung (Koh Joon-Hee), a woman who hides her psychic abilities from others.

In the supernatural K-drama, they partner up and take on a difficult case involving the ghost of a murderer from 20 years ago. While Kang has started learning that he can now see ghosts, he has to figure out what this means when he works with Hong, who shares the same ability, but can also read minds and sometimes control people. The series has 16 total episodes, and while it has an overall mystery they have to solve, it’s also set up as a procedural, as the two work together to solve crimes.

20 Rugal (2020)

A Team Of Superhuman Secret Agents Fight Crime

• Available to stream on Netflix

A sci-fi entry to the mix of K-drama thrillers is available on Netflix, as Rugal is a thriller about artificial intelligence. An elite detective’s world crumbles when he comes home to find his wife murdered by a group of men from a criminal organization. As it turns out, the detective got too close to investigating a group called Argos, and as a form of retaliation, Argos sends masked men to gouge out his eyes and then framed for his wife’s murder.

In a sci-fi twist, Kang gets equipped with artificial eyes by a group called NIS. Like most common storylines, the detective Kang Gi-beom (Choi Jin-hyuk) then becomes part of a special team called Rugal (whose members have superhuman abilities thanks to biotechnology) that seeks to take down Argos and other organized crime organizations. The action-sci-fi series streamed on Netflix in the United States and has 16 episodes. It aired in 2020 and there are no plans for another season.

19 Tell Me What You Saw (2020)

A Retired Profiler Comes Out Of Retirement To Stop A Killer

• Available to stream on Rakuten Viki

In Tell Me What You Saw, Oh Hyun-Jae (Jang Hyuk) was once highly regarded as a criminal profiler known for solving uncrackable cold cases. His world is shattered when his fiancée is killed in an explosion set by a serial killer. Unable to deal with the grief, he isolates himself, until a new serial killer emerges with the same MO. While another detective is on the case, he meets Cha Soo-Young (Choi Soo-Young), a detective with a photographic memory.

She teams up with Hyun-Jae to seek retribution for his fiancée and stop the killer. With the two expert profilers working together, the series provided a fun and exciting K-drama thriller for fans of police drams. A good serial killer storyline is always intriguing to watch, which is probably why Tell Me What You Saw has such a strong following. The series has 16 episodes, each one hour in length.

18 Watcher (2019)

A Young Man Becomes A Police Officer & Investigates His Mother’s Murder

• Available to stream on Rakuten Viki

Watcher is a crime series and one of the most interesting K-drama thrillers from 2019. The storyline is based on a crime that was committed 15 years prior, in which Kim Yeong-Goon’s (Seo Kang-Joon) mother was heinously murdered, and the police suspect his father of the crime. Following one of the best K-Drama tropes, his father is eventually convicted, but 15 years later, Yeong-goon is now an officer, and along with the original detective and lawyer of the case, they meet again. The two band together to uncover what really happened all those years ago.

Thanks to its many cliffhangers and binge-able nature, Watcher is still widely discussed years after its release. Star Seo Kang-joon is very different from what most K-drama fans might be used to, as he has normally taken on romance roles, but here he proves himself in the thriller genre and delivers a nuanced and brilliant performance that shows he can do it all. The series, which debuted on OCN, has 16 episodes.

17 Awaken (2020)

An FBI Agent Teams With The Seoul Police To Investigate A Murder

• Currently unavailable to stream

Secrets from the past reappear in one of the best K-drama thrillers, Awaken. In the series, a task force created by the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency including the special team leader, Do Jung-Woo (Namkoong Min) and Gong Hye-Won (Kim Seol-Hyun), are joined by FBI Agent Jamie Leighton (Kwon Ye-Eun) as they try to figure out who is behind a string of murders. Containing some great female-led K-drama moments, the group begins to learn that the murders are tied to an event from 28 years ago.

The K-drama features a thrilling game of mental chess between the task force and the villains that will keep viewers on the edge of their seats. The series has 16 episodes and initially aired in 2020. What makes Awkaen stand out is that it is set up like a regular South Korean police thriller but soon it veers into science fiction territory thanks to several technological devices used to solve crimes. Even then, the series was well shot and it remains a solid thriller K-drama.

16 Tunnel (2017)

A Time Travel K-Drama Thriller

• Available to stream on Roku

Aside from being one of the best thriller K-dramas, Tunnel also employs time travel as a narrative device. In 1986, Detective Park Gwan-Ho (Choi Jin-Hyuk) goes through a tunnel to hunt down a serial killer. When he emerges on the other side of the tunnel, he finds himself in the year 2016 ⁠— and the serial killer is still on the loose in the time-traveling K-drama. While the show did have an overarching storyline, Tunnel also kept viewers tuned in for every episode as it focused on a different case as it progressed.

Tunnel
was so well received it prompted an Indonesian remake starring Donny Alamsyah and Hana Malasan.

This allowed the show to have a case of the week, as they investigated unsolved murders, all while trying to stop the serial killer from the past. Tunnel was so well received it prompted an Indonesian remake starring Donny Alamsyah and Hana Malasan. This K-drama was inspired by the Hwaseong serial murders, something that was also part of the 2003 movie Memories of Murder by future Oscar winner Bong Joon-ho (Parasite).

15 Save Me (2017)

A K-Drama About A Dangerous Religious Cult

Save Me is a must-watch K-drama for its spine-chilling thriller storyline. The show would give anyone the creeps and plays upon a common storyline fear: afamily moves to a suburban town after their business fails, and they soon meet the followers of a religious cult posing as a church, who hypnotize the parents. After the suicide of the family’s son, things spiral out of control, and the cult takes advantage. Years later, deeply rooted in the cult, the daughter wants out and gets the attention of four classmates she met on her first day in town.

Save Me was nominated for a Best New Actor award (Woo Do-hwan) at the 54th Baeksang Arts Awards, but unfortunately didn’t win. The series was based on the Daum webcomic Out of the World by Jo Geum-san, and the first season had 16 episodes, and was so popular that it spawned a second season based on the 2013 animated movie, The Fake. Save Me 2 also has 16 episodes and aired in 2019.

14 Happiness (2021)

People Are Sealed Off From The World Thanks To A Disease

• Available to stream on Rakuten Viki

Despite its title, the K-drama Happiness is anything but happy — it is, however, one of the best K-drama thrillers out there despite no happily ever after. The show was also very timely for when it was released, as Happiness focuses on the residents of a high-rise apartment who have been sealed off from the rest of the world as a disease breaks out. The dystopian high-rise drama showcases a microcosm inside the building as betrayal and distrust blossom among the survivors.

Viewers who want to see people’s humanities tested by a deadly crisis should definitely check out Happiness. In addition, the series was nominated for two awards at the 1st Blue Dragon Series Awards — Best Actress (for Han Hyo-joo) and Best Supporting Actress (for Bae Hae-sun) — but sadly didn’t win. The series had a total of 12 episodes and is labeled as an “apocalyptic thriller” K-drama.

13 Hell Is Other People (2019)

A Young Man Moves Into A Dorm Where The Residents Have A Dark Secret

• Available to stream on Roku

Hell Is Other People is also known by the name Strangers from Hell. The psychological thriller K-drama is based on a popular webtoon and even mimics certain scenes from the illustrated pages. One of the best K-drama thrillers, the show revolves around a young man in his twenties who moves to Seoul. Still struggling financially, he can only afford accommodations in a cheap dormitory called Eden Studio.

During his stay, he gets an eerie feeling that the tenants who reside there have a dark secret. Hell Is Other People sees characters spiraling into slight madness due to the bizarre occurrences that take place. The webtoon-inspired K-Ddama (based on the Naver webtoon by Kim Yong-ki) was incredibly well-received, even winning a Grand Prize at the Cable TV Broadcasting Awards. The series had a total of 10 episodes.

A Model High School Student Leads A Doube Life

Now available on Netflix and one of the best K-drama thrillers, Extracurricular revolves around making the wrong decision that leads to heinous consequences. The Netflix South Korean thriller is dark, eerie, and worth a watch. While the concept isn’t new, the way the show’s story is structured and how it escalates will catch audiences’ attention. A model high school student leads by good example. He has solid grades, is well-mannered, and liked by teachers — but he lives a double life of crime.

When a classmate takes an interest in his secret, things spiral beyond control. Thanks to its unique storyline, Extracurricular was nominated for three awards at the 57th Baeksang Arts Awards (Beat Drama, Best New Actor (TV), and Best New Actress (TV)) and ended up winning Best New Actress for Park Ju-hyun. The series received rave reviews and had a total of 10 episodes.

11 Mouse (2021)

Two Officers Track A Vicious Killer

• Available to stream on Prime Video

The intriguing part about most K-drama thrillers is that they don’t need a romantic element like most K-dramas to keep viewers’ attention. The 2021 drama Mouse is anything but flowers and sunshine as it revolves around a heinous serial killer with ties to one of Korea’s more infamous murderers. The rise of this new gruesome serial killer has a steadfast cop and police detective on the hunt for a suspect. As they follow the bloody path of the killer, they never expected an even greater evil to be lurking in the shadows.

Exploring whether a killer is born or created, along with many twists and turns, won Mouse the Grand Prize at the 2021 Asia Artist Awards. This thriller K-drama series was inspired by a real-life elementary school murder case from 2017 where a teen was sentenced to 20 years for the murder of an eight-year-old girl (via Korean JoongAng Daily), while her accomplice received a life sentence (the accomplice was over 18). Showrunner Choi Ran said he developed the series when the convicted murderer showed no remorse about the killings (via IB Times).