Real history behind Netflix’s Bon Appétit, Your Majesty: A reimagining of the brutal Joseon-era king

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The show, while not based on a manhwa, is a direct adaptation of the book by Guk Jae. In the novel, the king is Yeonsangun, a real figure from the Joseon dynasty. But, for the Netflix version, they changed the real name to a fictional version, King Lee Heon. And that was nowhere near a random choice but the director’s attempt to distance themselves from any kind of controversy, since Yeonsangun is remembered as one of the most brutal rulers in Korean history.

The real history behind  Bon Appétit, Your Majesty 

In South Korea’s history, Yeonsangun ruled from 1494 to 1506. Since childhood, he was forced to face the dark, violent side of life. His biological mother, Queen Yun, was exiled and later poisoned to death. For most of his life, Yeonsangun believed Queen Jeonghyeon, his father’s third wife, was his mother, until he discovered the truth. Early in his reign, when he learned his real mother was his father’s second wife, the revelation broke him. He went after anyone he thought had a hand in her execution. He tried to restore her title and, above all, the respect she deserved, but was met with fierce resistance. That’s when he took matters into his own hands. People were executed, and some accounts even say he killed with his own hands.

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Since then, his cruelty only started becoming bigger. Yeonsangun went against access to education and banned free speech. He shut down the royal universities and turned it into a personal playground. He outlawed Hangul, Korea’s language, after it was used to criticise him in public posters. It is widely known that the king gave orders for mass kidnapping of hundreds of girls and women across the peninsula who were brought to him to entertain and dance. In the first episode’s starting scene, one can find the reference to this through the way the women were lined up systematically. Yeonsangun’s havoc spread across the nation, at one point he even tried to remove Buddhism in Joseon, closing the temple Wongaksa. After attempting to demolish the system of monasteries, he killed not only ordinary protesters but also wiped out groups of educated and influential people who stood against him. After 12 years of rule, he was overthrown and exiled, and died just two months later. His half-brother then became the king.

The Netflix drama doesn’t shy away from touching on some of these elements but largely distances itself from going overboard. At its core, the show isn’t about a retelling Yeonsangun’s life. That’s why they gave the king a fictional name, Lee Heon, to calm down the historical baggage and make the love story between him and Ji Yeong work as a historical rom-com. 

Over the years, the South Korean entertainment industry has made several movies on the life of Yeonsangun. Some examples include Prince Yeonsan (1961), The King and the Clown (2005), and The Treacherous (2015). But in Bon Appétit, Your Majesty, the character is only used as a fictional backdrop, reimagining the empire in a new light where time travel, food, and romance collide.