Final Verdict: KeyEast Ji Soo Lawsuit Ends with 880 Million Won Damages
The long-standing, multi-million dollar legal battle surrounding the fallout of actor Ji Soo’s school bullying controversy has officially reached a final conclusion. On July 6, legal sources confirmed that KeyEast, the actor’s former management agency, submitted a formal withdrawal of its final appeal to the Third Division of the Supreme Court on June 24.
With this sudden legal withdrawal, the second-instance court verdict has been fully finalized, legally ordering KeyEast to pay approximately 880 million won ($635,000) along with accumulated interest for delayed payments to the drama’s production company.
The Disastrous Fallout and Emergency Recasting of the Lead Role
The high-stakes KeyEast Ji Soo lawsuit originally began in March 2021, when the actor was hit with widespread school violence and bullying allegations online. At the exact time the controversy exploded, Ji Soo was starring as the main male protagonist, On Dal, in the high-budget KBS 2TV flagship historical drama series River Where the Moon Rises, which had already successfully aired its first six episodes.
As public backlash intensified across domestic media, the actor acknowledged parts of the online revelations and voluntarily dropped out of the ongoing television production. At that point, the production team had already finished filming 18 out of the total 20 episodes.
To save the high-budget project from complete cancellation, the production company, Canvas N (formerly known as Victory Contents), made the urgent move to recruit rising actor Na In-woo as the immediate replacement. Na began appearing as the main lead starting from Episode 7. Furthermore, to stabilize the series and provide seamless streaming access, Na In-woo brilliantly re-filmed all of Ji Soo’s previous scenes from Episodes 1 to 6, allowing the broadcaster to completely replace the original VOD services.
Tracing the Legal Battle and the Final Compensation Amount
Following the broadcast emergency, Victory Contents filed a massive compensation lawsuit against KeyEast, initially demanding a staggering 3 billion won ($2.1 million) in damages to fully recoup the immense additional production expenses incurred from the extensive reshoots.
The legal battle went through multiple intense structural shifts. In the first instance trial, the court sided heavily with the production company, ordering KeyEast to pay a substantial 1.42 billion won in compensation. However, after the case was escalated to the high courts through an appellate process, the final damages were strategically adjusted and reduced to the finalized amount of 880 million won.
The successful finalization of the KeyEast Ji Soo lawsuit sets a monumental precedent in the South Korean entertainment industry regarding the legal and financial accountability that management agencies hold when their exclusive artists cause critical disruptions to active broadcast productions.
