Reborn Rookie has many classic K-drama elements: body swaps, chaebol in-fighting, corporate intrigue, and a hunger for cathartic revenge. The Viki drama is based on a web novel from San Kyung, who also wrote Reborn Rich, which was turned into a hit drama about a chaebol employee who is murdered and wakes up in the body of the chaebol heir. Unlike Reborn Rich, Reborn Rookie is a comedy, finding a fair amount of fun in the story of a CEO who accidentally swaps bodies with a young soccer player, and uses the opportunity to get revenge on his selfish children.
Reborn Rookie’s set-up
At the start of Reborn Rookie, soccer player Hwang Jun-hyeon (Melo Movie’s Lee Jun-young) has just had his longtime wish granted. He has earned a spot on the roster for soccer club FC Choiseong, and will be a professional soccer player. It is the goal he has been working towards for most of his life. For Jun-hyeon, the hard-won opportunity doesn’t only mean glory and money; it means that he’ll bring joy to his grandmother, who lives with dementia and only remembers her grandson when he is in his soccer uniform.
Meanwhile, Choiseong Group CEO Kang Yong-ho (The Good Detective’s Son Hyun-joo) is frustrated. The 72-year-old is looking to retire, but can’t decide which of his greedy, elder children—Kang Jae-gyeong (Jeon Hye-jin) or Kang Jae-seong (Jin Goo)—he should leave as CEO to his beloved company. When Jae-gyeong and Jae-seong take his fancy sports car for a ride and hit Jun-hyeon, leaving the young man unable to play soccer, he vows to leave it to neither potential heir. However, before Yong-ho can make the announcement, he falls down the Choiseong Group stairs, and bonks heads with a grieving and furious Jun-hyeon. They switch bodies, and Yong-ho wakes up in the body of twenty-something Jun-hyeon.
With Jun-hyeon trapped in a coma inside of Yong-ho’s older body, Yong-ho goes about seeking revenge on his good-for-nothing children, and ensuring the future of the Choiseong Group. He gets a little help from Kang Bang-geul (Lee Joo-myung), his youngest child whom he sent to America as a teenager. Bang-geul was bullied by her older half-siblings, who looked down on their younger sister because of her mom’s former status as a domestic employee. Desperate to get her own revenge, Bang-geul has been secretly working as an intern at Choiseong Group, slowly gathering information that could take the corporation down.
Yong-ho and Jun-hyeon swap back
Heading into the series finale, the Choiseong Group has bigger problems than familial succession. Taeha Energy, a rival conglomerate under the leadership of Chairman Na (Jung Jae-sung) and daughter Na Eun-se (Lee Seo-an), who is Jae-seong’s wife, are staging a hostile takeover. Chairman Na attempts to kill both Yong-ho and Jun-hyeon, but fails. In the process, the two switch back to their original bodies.
When Yong-ho wakes up in his 72-year-old body, he knows that Jun-hyeon’s life is at risk. He rushes to save the soccer star from Chairman Na’s clutches. When the two meet again face-to-face, Yong-ho gives Jun-hyeon a proper apology. He finally takes responsibility for the role he played in the end of Jun-hyeon’s career, and agrees to help him hold Jae-gyeong and Jae-seong accountable for the hit-and-run.
Jun-hyeon, who has stayed updated about Yong-ho’s actions in his body through Bang-geul’s bedside visits to her father at the hospital, agrees to help Yong-ho finish what he started. The two end up making a pretty good team: Yong-ho has the smarts, and Jun-hyeon has the honesty. “I raised my kids to sell out even their dead father,” Yong-ho muses aloud to Jun-hyeon when they discuss the mess Yong-ho has gotten himself in. “Not all your kids are like that,” Jun-hyeon notes, adding that Bang-geul is a good person.
Reborn Rookie’s ending, explained
The Reborn Rookie finale is a story of accountability—those who embrace it, and are rewarded for it, and those who don’t, and who are punished for it. Chairman Na is betrayed by his daughter Eun-se, who reveals her dad’s crimes in an effort to save herself.
Jae-seong, finally seeing the error of his ways, decides to turn himself in for the hit-and-run, which gives Yong-ho and Jun-hyeon the ammunition to properly take Jae-geong down. Grasping til the last, Jae-geong is taken away in handcuffs from Choiseong Group’s headquarters, at last exposed for trying to kill her own father, funnelling corporate funds into a private equity company, and helping her brother hide the hit-and-run.
Before she can be put into the police car, Jae-geong makes a run for it—straight into the path of a vengeful Eun-se’s car. Yong-ho, who loves his daughter despite everything she has done and also understands it was partially his emotionally withholding parenting that led to her selfishness, jumps in front of the car first. He survives the incident, but loses a leg. Driven mad by the incident, Jae-geong is admitted into a mental health facility. She forgets her own identity, but remembers her husband, who continues to visit her years later.
Two years after the body-swapping shenanigans, most of our characters are happy. Jun-hyeon is a soccer coach, and is dating Bang-geul. Bang-geul has been promoted within Choiseong Group, and is in charge of investigating and negotiating corporate deals. Sang-jae (Kim Jong-tae), Yong-ho’s longtime and loyal righthand man, is now CEO. The company has decided to do away with familial succession, instead giving the job to the most qualified candidate, regardless of background. The company is now worker-owned, with employees earning shares rather than traditional bonuses.
Meanwhile, Jae-seong is living in the U.S., taking care of both his son and Jae-gyeong’s son. They are seemingly happy, and plan to visit South Korea again soon, according to a phone call Jae-seong has with his stepmom Sun-hui (Yun Yu-sun). Sun-hui is back at the home she shares with husband Yong-ho, and has become a cooking star on YouTube. Jun-hyeon’s grandmother has better medical care, and remembers her grandson outside of his soccer uniform these days.
Reborn Rookie’s ITZY cameo
In the series’ silly final scene, Yong-ho discovers that Jun-hyeon and Bang-geul are dating. After witnessing some PDA, he angrily charges at the lovers. In the commotion, Jun-hyeon manages to bonk heads with real-life K-pop star Ryujin of ITZY, who happens to be walking by with her team. The idol swaps bodies with Jun-hyeon, who can’t believe this is happening again. The show ends with Ryujin in Jun-hyeon’s body, jumping towards Jun-hyeon in Ryujin’s body. Presumably, the two are quickly restored to their rightful bodies. Otherwise, Season 2 of Reborn Rookie is going to see Jun-hyeon bringing ITZY’s performance quality way down.