A Comprehensive Look at Walking on Thin Ice 2025
Dive Into the Illegal World of 'Walking on Thin Ice'
Explore every aspect of ‘Walking on Thin Ice’ in this comprehensive review. Dive into character insights, strengths, and weaknesses. If you haven’t seen the drama yet and are looking for a spoiler-free review, check out the link below.
Spoiler Alert
Please be advised that this review contains significant spoilers about the plot and characters of ‘Walking on Thin Ice’. If you have not yet watched the drama, we recommend viewing it first to avoid any spoilers.
Series Details
General Information
Air Dates: September 20 – October 21, 2025
Episodes: 12
Where to Watch: Kocowa
Genre: Crime Thriller
Starring: Lee Young Ae and Kim Young Kwang
The Story
A devoted housewife finds millions of won worth of illegal drugs hiding on her balcony and sees a way to pay for her husband’s medical bills. She seeks out a local dealer and proposes a partnership with him. But as the police close in on their operation, they will find themselves chased by corrupt detectives and the drug dealers who lost the bag in the first place. And as threats pile up on all sides, she will be forced to make some difficult decisions about what is really important to her and how far she is willing to go to protect those things.
Meeting the stars: Lee Young Ae and Kim Young Kwang
Lee Young Ae as Kang Eun Su
Kang Eun Su is a devoted wife and mother who has never desired more than a simple, happy life with her family. But her world is rocked when she finds out her husband has cancer and requires extremely expensive medical treatment. So, when she finds a bag of drugs hidden on her balcony and realizes how much money she can make by selling them, she feels like she has a way to save her husband’s life. She is shocked when she makes a connection with a local drug dealer, only to learn that he is her daughter’s art teacher, Lee Gyeong. But she makes a deal with him anyway and they become partners.
At first, everything seems great. The money starts rolling in and she starts her husband’s medical treatment. But the “owners” of her stolen drugs aren’t willing to just give up that money, and they soon start to figure out that it is Eun Soo who took them. And when she finds out that Jang Tae Gu, a corrupt detective on the case, is actually feeding information to the other dealers, she realizes that she and Gyeong are both in serious danger. But giving up now could cost her husband his life.
Kang Eun Su is strong and resilient. She has worked hard her whole life to help support her family. She is more concerned with her family’s health and well-being than about her own life. But this devotion leads her down a path that requires her to throw her own morality out the window. Lee Young Ae has been acting for a long time and I enjoyed seeing her in such a tough, gritty role. I thought her cold, calculated style made this character feel realistic.
Kim Young Kwang as Lee Gyeong
As a teenager, Lee Gyeong is framed for the death of his best friend. After serving his time for a crime he didn’t commit, Gyeong is obsessed with the need for revenge. So he becomes a local drug dealer, making huge amounts of money and making sure that Kang Hwi Rim, the boy who was actually responsible for his friend’s death, is ruining his life with the drugs Gyeong sells him. During the day, Gyeong pursues his first love, teaching art for an after-school program.
But when Eun Soo, the mother of one of his best students approaches him about a partnership helping her sell the drugs she can supply, he can’t help but agree. And as their operation becomes more dangerous, he finds himself caring more about her safety and the safety of her family than his own plans. But keeping them all alive will take patient planning and nerves of steel.
Lee Gyeong seems cool and distant on the surface, but as he opens up to Eun Soo, we see a softer, more caring side. He carries the scars of being falsely accused and having his own family turn their backs on him. I absolutely love Kim Young Kwang! He can go from smooth criminal to charming hero in the blink of an eye, and I enjoy him in both kinds of roles. He was excellent in this drama, and I really felt for his character.
Supporting characters
Park Yong Woo as Jang Tae Gu
Jang Tae Gu is a veteran detective, assigned to the case of the missing drugs. But we soon find out that he is corrupt and has been making money on the side, helping the drug dealers. He is determined to arrest Eun Soo and Gyeong and get back the drugs that Eun Soo took.
Kim Shi Ah as Park Su A
Park Su A is Eun Soo’s daughter. She is a high school student who takes after-school art lessons with Gyeong. When she sees the financial stress her dad’s illness has put on their family, she mistakenly gets involved, delivering drugs, without knowing what is actually in the packages.
Do Sang Woo as Kang Hwi Rim
Kang Hwi Rim is the one responsible for buying the bad drugs that killed Gyeong’s best friend. But his wealthy family was able to shift the blame onto Gyeong. Now Hwi Rim is an adult, working for the family corporation. But he is also one of Gyeong’s best clients, with a severe drug addiction.
3 things i loved about ‘Walking on Thin Ice’
1.
Tone:
This drama sets a strong vibe with a cool, faded color palette, clipped dialogues and camera angles, and tight story telling. All of that exentuated the themes of moral ambiguity and the seedy world of the drug culture. Artistically, this series captured the perfect mood and setting to tell their story in, and I loved it for that.
2.
Leads’ Relationship:
I can’t say enough about how much I enjoyed the relationship between Eun Soo and Gyeong. Especially from Gyeong’s perspective, it is easy to see his growing affection and completely undefined feelings for Eun Soo. But regardless of the lack of labels, there is a connection there that was fascinating to watch as it developed.
3.
Detective Choi:
I liked Detective Choi’s character, and I was so happy to see all the detectives on their team were willing to believe him about Tae Gu. It would have been easy for them to side with Tae Gu, who they had all worked with for years. But in the end, justice and the truth prevailed, and the team will be stronger for it.
3 things i didn’t love about ‘Walking on Thin Ice’
1.
Best Friend:
Yeon Ah’s character as the jealous, obsessive best friend in this drama is a weird one. There wasn’t enough exploration of the storyline to make it feel like it fit. And then, in the end, Do Jin turns her down flat, so it doesn’t really even matter. She does get custody of Su A while Eun Soo is in prison, but I feel like a best friend would have done that anyway. I don’t know what her crush on Do Jin mattered to the story as a whole. It felt like a waste of screen time to me.
2.
Business Take-Over:
Gyeong’s revenge felt complete just by destroying Hwi Rim, and by extension, the family business. The whole take-over story felt underdeveloped and unnecessary. The concept felt too complex to be covered in a few short scenes. I think they should have left the business stuff out all together, and just focused on taking Hwi Rim down personally.
3.
Gyeong’s Family:
First of all, this whole family is a piece of work. They were obviously terrible to Gyeong. But I would have liked to see a bit more development into their family dynamic and what it was like both before and after Gyeong’s conviction. Their relationship is so pivotal to Gyeong’s plans, yet I didn’t feel like we knew enough about them.
The Conclusion of 'Walking on Thin Ice'
The Ending
‘Walking on Thin Ice’ gives us a heartbreaking, yet fitting, ending. First, Do Jin takes a bullet meant for Eun Soo and dies. Then Eun Soo and Gyeong have a final shoot-out with Detective Jang, but the police show up to end it all by firing on Tae Gu. He falls into the water and later his remains are discovered. Gyeong and Eun Soo are taken into custody and during questioning Gyeong takes all the blame, clearing Eun Soo as much as possible. The pair meet before they are imprisoned, and Gyeong gives Eun Soo all the money he got from their sales.
Both of them serve their time and are finally released. Su A has been living with Yeon Ah, and her relationship with her mom has been badly strained by everything that happened. Eun Soo is working odd jobs and watching Su A from afar, hoping to restore their relationship. In the end, we see Su A get a text and go running to see Eun Soo, so it seems like better days are ahead for them.
Gyeong manages to finally expose the truth about what happened to his best friend and Gwi Rim and his family’s part in the deception. And with his record finally clear, his family is willing to accept him back into the fold. But Gyeong accidently discovers proof that his father knew what happened all along, and let him take the blame for a crime he didn’t commit.
The ending scene shows Gyeong, emotionally broken from the betrayal of his family and the guilt of the life he has lived since then. He climbs to the roof of a building, throws the drugs off the top, and then appears to step off himself, ending his own life. Eun Soo, on the other hand, shows her redemption by finding the bag of left-over drugs and flushing them down the toilet. Ending any temptation and proving she is ready to move one, ending her own moral dilemma.
My Personal Thoughts and Ratings
‘Walking on Thin Ice’ is crime thriller about a housewife turned drug dealer. This classic style thriler has good, consistant pacing and avoids a lot of worthless filler and unnecessary side stories. Despite a 16 year age gap, the leads have great chemisty. And although this drama focuses on action, the character development is strong, as the leads wrestle with ideas of revenge and morality.
But this is an action drama about drugs, so there is some violence. Some fans found the vague moral ambiguity troubling. Also, some of the chase and investigation scenes can start to feel redundant toward the middle of the series. But I I enjoyed the exciting action scenes mixed with emotional melodrama. I give ‘Walking on Thin Ice’ a 9 out of 10 ramen.
🍜🍜🍜🍜🍜🍜🍜🍜🍜
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