Last year, veteran actress Kim Nam-joo made her big comeback in the successful melodramatic comedy, MBC’s “My Wife is a Superwoman.” The series was a hit, bringing in high ratings for its Monday and Tuesday night slot.
Kim, who was returning to the small screen after an eight-year hiatus, drew laughs as a former prom queen-turned-dowdy housewife struggling to get her socially inept husband (played by “The Slave Hunters” hottie Oh Ji-ho) a proper job.

Co-star Yoon Sang-hyun garnered himself a gaggle of female fans as the dashing but unsuccessful courter of Kim’s heroine.

Now, Kim is back for a second season.

“My Wife is a Superwoman” scriptwriter Park Ji-eun is also returning to paint a compelling picture of married life, one Park said “viewers who have experienced married life or who have had a job will really be able to relate to.”

Titled “Queen of Reversal,” the upcoming series is, in fact, not a second season or even a spin-off of the original. The only remaining cast member is Kim. Furthermore, not only have the rest of the cast and the director changed, so have all the characters.

“It does seem like a completely different story with completely different characters but it does harbor some similarities to ‘My Wife is a Superwoman,’” Kim explained at the drama’s press conference on Monday.

“To be honest, doing a second season is stressful for everyone,” she admitted. “I was very torn over whether or not to do this project or to do something different.”

Kim pointed to scriptwriter Park’s ability to write realistic lines as one of the biggest reasons why she decided to do “Queen of Reversal.”

“As the only remaining original cast member, the weight on my shoulders is even heavier,” the 39-year-old actress said.

“Queen of Reversal” co-stars Jung Joon-ho and Park Si-hoo, however, promise to lighten Kim’s load as rivals for her character’s affections.

Jung, who starred opposite the late Choi Jin-sil in MBC’s memorable “Last Scandal,” will be playing the heroine’s unsuccessful husband, a role that seems to mirror Oh Ji-ho’s “My Wife is a Superwoman” character in many ways.

“Jung is great at his role,” said Kim, adding that he is particularly riotous when his character brags and bluffs.

Jung’s Bong Joon-soo will face some competition in Park Si-hoo’s younger and well-to-do character, Koo Yong-shik, the son of a chaebol.

A newly minted Hallyu star, thanks in part to his stint as a dark knight in shining armor in SBS’ “Prosecutor Princess,” Park is a good fit for the heroine’s suitor. The role, however, will surely earn him comparisons to “My Wife is a Superwoman” star Yoon Sang-hyun.

“I only watched about the first three episodes,” Park said. “I was interested in Yoon Sang-hyun’s character but he didn’t come out early on in the drama. It was fun to watch, and I really thought about watching it till the end, but I deliberately didn’t watch the rest so that I could develop my own Yong-shik-style character.”

His own character, Park revealed, is something of a playful yet prickly Daddy Long Legs to Kim’s heroine, who is a strong-willed, ruthless career woman that sheds her role as housewife to return to the workplace.

“She is a housewife who dreams of turning the tables,” Kim explained. “So she goes back to work.”

Whether or not “Queen of Reversal” will be able to beat out fellow Monday and Tuesday night rivals “Giant” and “Sungkyunkwan Scandal” and fill in the shoes of its relatively successful predecessor, “Dong Yi,” remains to be seen.

The first episode of“Queen of Reversal” airs on Oct. 18 at 9:55 p.m. on MBC.

By Jean Oh (oh_jean@heraldcorp.com)