Marry My Husband
私の夫と結婚して
Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
Murdered after finding her husband in bed with her best friend, she wakes ten years earlier and gives them to each other.
In 2023 Kang Ji-won is dying of stomach cancer. She has spent her marriage supporting a husband, Park Min-hwan, who quit his job to chase investments, and enduring a mother-in-law who bullies her; now Min-hwan will not even pay for her treatment. She finds him in bed with her best friend, Jeong Su-min, the two of them waiting for her to die. In the struggle that follows, Min-hwan shoves her away and she is killed. She wakes at her office desk in 2013, ten years earlier, when Min-hwan is still only her boyfriend.
Ji-won learns the rule of her second life: her misfortune cannot disappear, it can only pass to someone else. So she decides to hand her fate to the two people who took her life. She breaks up with Min-hwan and steers him, step by step, towards Su-min, who has always wanted whatever Ji-won had. At work she finds an ally in her manager, Yoo Ji-hyuk, secretly the grandson of the company's founder, who loved her in the first life, died in a car accident and has come back too. While Su-min wins Min-hwan and marries him, Ji-won builds the confidence, friendships and working life she never had, and falls in love with Ji-hyuk.
Then the other fates come due. Ji-won's colleague and friend Yang Ju-ran is diagnosed with the stomach cancer Ji-won had in her first life; it is caught early, and she survives. Ji-hyuk's former fiancée, Oh Yu-ra, draws Su-min and Min-hwan into a plan to kill Ji-won, and Min-hwan begins an affair with her. In the end Su-min kills Min-hwan, who dies in Ji-won's place, and then comes for Ji-won. Ji-won has been expecting her, has trained for it, and overpowers her in front of a hidden camera. Su-min goes to prison for murder and attempted murder. Yu-ra, facing prosecution, dies in a car crash as she tries to leave the country.
Ji-won and Ji-hyuk marry. Ju-ran divorces her idle husband and begins a relationship with Lee Suk-jun, the chairman's right-hand man. On 12 April 2023, the day Ji-won died the first time, the two of them mark ten years together. They have three children, and she runs a foundation that helps people in need.
Starring
Park Min-youngas Kang Ji-won
A worn-down office worker killed by her husband, who wakes ten years back and sets out to hand her fate to him and her best friend.
Kang Ji-won’s story
In her first life Ji-won gave everything to a husband who would not pay for her cancer treatment and to a friend who was sleeping with him. Back at her desk in 2013, she learns that misfortune can only be passed on, and decides to pass hers to them, steering Min-hwan towards Su-min. Along the way she learns to refuse, makes friends and falls in love with her manager, Ji-hyuk, who has come back too. The cost lands elsewhere: her friend Ju-ran develops the cancer she once had, caught early. When Su-min, having killed Min-hwan, comes for her, Ji-won is waiting, trained, with a camera running, and overpowers her. She proposes to Ji-hyuk. On 12 April 2023, the day she first died, they mark ten years together; they have three children, and she runs a foundation called Second Chance.
Na In-wooas Yoo Ji-hyuk
Ji-won's manager, secretly heir to the company's founder, who also returned from death and means to protect her.
Yoo Ji-hyuk’s story
Ji-hyuk fell in love with Ji-won in her first life, died in a car accident after her death, and woke, like her, in 2013, knowing Min-hwan was to blame. This time he stays close. Hiding at work that he is the founder's grandson, he helps her pass on her fate, and they fall in love, while his former fiancée, Yu-ra, turns on Ji-won. When Su-min comes for her, he lets Ji-won face Su-min herself, helps set up the camera and arrives with the police. Yu-ra dies in a car crash, and the heart-shaped mark on his chest, the sign of his second life, is gone. When Ji-won proposes, he produces the ring he has carried for a long time. Ten years on, with three children, they spend 12 April 2023 looking at a painting of cherry blossoms.
Lee Yi-kyungas Park Min-hwan
Ji-won's boyfriend and, in her first life, the husband who took her money, cheated on her and killed her.
Song Ha-yoonas Jeong Su-min
Ji-won's self-styled best friend since school, who has always wanted what Ji-won has, including her husband.
Jeong Su-min’s story
Su-min turned a classmate against Ji-won at school, and in Ji-won's first life slept with her husband while they waited for her to die. This time Ji-won lets her have Min-hwan, and Su-min wins him and marries him. Recruited with him by Yu-ra into a plan to kill Ji-won, she finds him having an affair with Yu-ra, and she kills him. On the run, she comes to Ji-won's flat and accuses her, in the very words of the first life, of thinking only of herself; Ji-won, who has been waiting, overpowers her in front of a hidden camera. Imprisoned for murder and attempted murder, still casting herself as the victim, Su-min dreams that Min-hwan visits her and wakes screaming about Ji-won.
Gong Min-jeungas Yang Ju-ran
Ji-won's colleague and friend, married to an idle husband, who inherits the cancer from Ji-won's first life.
Why it matters
Marry My Husband starts from a place many women fear: ill, short of money and alone, in a marriage where the husband will not pay for her treatment, the mother-in-law resents her and the best friend is in her bed. Its fantasy is not only revenge. Given ten years back, Ji-won spends them learning to refuse the boyfriend who lives on her money, the boss who is hard on her, the friend who has always wanted what she had. The series enjoys its villains getting what they are owed and wears the bright colours of a romantic comedy, but underneath is a precise picture of how an ordinary woman's life can be used up by the people closest to her. A Japanese remake followed in 2025, with Fuka Koshiba and Takeru Satoh. The question it leaves is harder than its revenge: whether escaping a fate means someone else has to carry it.