Kim Ji-won's 'Doctor X' premiere tops 11.4% ratings

Genius surgeon takes on the powerful and dominates television

SBS's Friday-Saturday drama 'Doctor X: The Era of the White Mafia', starring Kim Ji-won in her first medical drama, has set off a runaway ratings surge from its opening week.

According to Nielsen Korea, the ratings research firm, the first episode of 'Doctor X', which premiered the previous day, posted a nationwide rating of '11.4%' and immediately claimed the top spot in its time slot. The strong public anticipation that built before the premiere was borne out by the show's commanding 'double-digit' rating.

The episode focused on the intense first encounter between Gye Su-jeong (played by Kim Ji-won), a 'mercenary doctor' assigned to Gu-seo University Hospital amid a severe staffing shortage, and the hospital's entrenched power cartel. On her first day at work, Gye Su-jeong delivered a 'blunt rebuke' to the hospital director, who was forcing an elderly patient to undergo an unnecessary open surgery out of concern that his reputation would suffer, telling him, "Your hunger for power has gone too far." The moment gave viewers a powerful sense of catharsis.

The tension peaked in the operating room. During the surgery, the hospital director suddenly collapsed from shock, triggering an unprecedented crisis as irresponsible doctors abandoned the patient and fled. Gye Su-jeong correctly identified the allergic reactions affecting the patient and the hospital director, then burst into the operating room and used flawless surgical technique to avert the crisis. But after regaining consciousness, the hospital director intensified the conflict by notifying her of her 'unfair dismissal' in an effort to cover up his own disgrace.

At the end of the broadcast, Boo Seung-kwon (played by Son Hyun-joo) appeared at the new pinnacle of power, using the hospital director's fatal corruption as a steppingstone to upend the balance of power. He offered Gye Su-jeong reemployment on 'unprecedented terms,' foreshadowing the two characters' precarious alliance and confrontation to come.

Based on TV Asahi's megahit 'Doctor-X: Surgeon Michiko Daimon', the series has been praised for successfully localizing the story by deftly blending Korea's medical realities with a power struggle inside the hospital. Kim Ji-won's boundless transformation as an actress, wearing a doctor's coat for the first time since her debut, is further elevating the drama's overall quality.