Our Sticky Love Just Hit #1 on Netflix in 26 Countries, Days After a Scandal Should Have Sunk It

Okay so I had a whole night planned that did not involve a K-drama about a boxing coach who lies about being someone’s boyfriend. Then Our Sticky Love showed up in Netflix’s No. 1 slot, I clicked “just one episode,” and four hours later I was googling “is Jung Hae-in single” at 1am like a totally normal person. The show is only half the story, though — the other half is a real identity-history scandal that broke mid-release and, weirdly, didn’t sink it. Here’s the timeline, because it’s wilder than the plot.

August 7: Our Sticky Love premieres, opens at a modest No. 5

Our Sticky Love dropped globally on August 7: 12 episodes, rom-com with a crime-thriller streak. Jung Hae-in plays a boxing coach who claims to be the boyfriend of an amnesiac prosecutor (newcomer Ha Young) who wakes up in a sleepy village with no memory. Familiar premise, but Jung Hae-in’s been Korea’s reigning rom-com heartthrob since Something in the Rain. In its debut week (Aug 3–9), the show pulled 3.2 million views and landed at No. 5 on Netflix’s global non-English chart — respectable, not spectacular.

Jung Hae-in at a Korean drama press event in 2024 — Photo: 티비텐, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

August 7–13: A variety-show flex turns into a colonial-history scandal

That same week, Ha Young went on KBS2’s “Problem Child in House” and mentioned her great-grandfather studied medicine in Japan and opened one of Korea’s early Western-style clinics. Cute humblebrag — until internet sleuths identified him as Dr. Ahn Sang-ho and dug up records showing he’d been a council member of the Daejeong Chinmokhoe, a group historians classify as pro-Japanese collaborationist, starting in 1916 during Japan’s colonial occupation of Korea (1910–1945).

If you’re not Korean, understand this isn’t a “well that’s awkward” scandal. Colonial collaboration (“chin-il,” 친일) carries moral weight comparable to Nazi-collaborator associations in parts of Europe, and it resurfaces every year in Korean politics and celebrity news alike — a fundamentally different shape of controversy than an old tweet resurfacing.

Ha Young at an event in January 2025 — Photo: SBS Radio 에라오, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

August 13–19: The apology, and the show climbs to No. 1 anyway

Ha Young’s agency first dismissed the accusations, then backtracked once records checked out; Ha Young posted a handwritten apology and canceled her remaining press. That’s usually where a show’s momentum dies. Instead, in its second tracking week, Our Sticky Love more than doubled to 7.5 million views — a 134% jump — and rose to No. 1 globally, per the Korea Times. It hit the Top 10 in 68 countries and No. 1 in 26 of them — South Korea, Brazil, Indonesia, Singapore — plus No. 3 in Mexico, No. 5 in Spain, No. 9 in Germany. Domestically, per allkpop, it also overtook “The East Palace” and “Agent Kim Reactivated” for the top domestic spot.

Bar chart showing Our Sticky Love's Netflix views rising from 3.2 million in week one to 7.5 million in week two — Data: Netflix weekly Top 10 report, via The Korea Times.

Why this actually matters

Scale-wise, it’s nowhere near Netflix’s real Korean giants — Squid Game Season 3 hit 106.3 million views in 10 days, and “When Life Gives You Tangerines” logged 35 million. A 7.5-million-view week is solid-hit territory, not culture-quake. But the real story is that a lead actress’s real, verified family scandal broke mid-release and the numbers went up, not down — a different pattern than the “scandal tanks the project” outcomes Korean entertainment sees plenty of (member exits, plagiarism claims that shelve entire dramas). It suggests Korea’s entertainment industry now runs on two audiences with very different trigger points: a domestic conversation that’s intensely historical and moral, and a global Netflix algorithm that doesn’t parse “colonial collaborator descendant” as a reason to stop watching.

Quick answers to what you’re probably wondering

Is Ha Young getting canceled? Not based on the numbers — she’s off press but still in the show, and global viewers clearly aren’t factoring the scandal into whether they hit play. Does this touch Jung Hae-in? No, it’s specific to Ha Young’s family history. Where can I watch it? Netflix, all 12 episodes are out now.

Jung Hae-in at a Bvlgari event in March 2025 — Photo: K-POPIT 케이팝잇, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Ha Young at a press event in April 2025 — Photo: K-POPIT 케이팝잇, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

I’m four episodes in, no idea if the amnesia plot holds up, and irrationally invested in whether the boxing coach is lying. Ten out of ten “watch it for the leads, stay for the discourse” experience. Check on me in three days.