Extraordinary Attorney Woo Ratings Spike Following Netflix Global Success

July 2024 · 4 minute read

Legal drama “Extraordinary Attorney Woo” is living up to its name following its international success on Netflix.

Domestic Korean audiences for the series have spiked, in line with its streaming growth.

The drama stars Park Eun Bin as a young female lawyer with Asperger’s syndrome who, thanks to her powerhouse 164 IQ, exceptional memory and creative thinking processes, graduates top of her class. When she joins a major law firm, she uses her particular skills to deliver results that others would not be able to achieve. But she still struggles with social interactions.

Already the top non-English-language series globally on Netflix for the past two weeks, the show claimed a 13.1% share of the Korean TV audience last Thursday, halfway through its 16-episode run. That was a nationwide audience of 3.4 million viewers, according to data from Nielsen Korea, cited by Content Asia. The season’s production budget is reported to be in the region of KRW20 billion ($15 million).

Related Stories

The YouTube logo wrapped inbetween the Netflix logo VIP+

How YouTube and Netflix Copied Each Other’s Homework

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 04: Zach Bryan attends the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images for The Recording Academy)

Zach Bryan Is Absent From 2025 Grammy Ballot, as He Joins the Superstar Ranks of Drake and the Weeknd in Declining to Submit

Between July 11-17, the series ranked No. 1 on Netflix for the second consecutive week, logging 45.58 million hours of viewing worldwide. The total was almost double the viewing time of the second most popular non-English show on the platform, Season 1 of “The Longest Night” (24.2 million hours).

Popular on Variety

“Extraordinary Attorney Woo” has scored particularly well in East Asia: Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.

In Korea, the show plays on Skylife’s ENA, a drama and general entertainment channel that was previously called Skydrama. Episodes are released in primetime on Wednesdays and Thursdays, and continue until Aug. 18.

Audiences have grown strongly and steadily from the show’s modest debut, on June 29, when the rating agency calculated just 400,000 viewers and a 0.95% share. The second episode almost doubled those numbers with a 1.81% share.

The third episode, six days later, was the highest-scoring show of the evening, with a reported nationwide rating of 4.03%. According to local media, the 13%-plus score achieved on Thursday is ENA’s highest-ever rating.

Production company AStory is reported to have received at least one offer for a U.S. remake. Given the obvious parallel with “The Good Doctor,” a 2013 Korean Broadcasting System drama about a junior hospital doctor with autism, which is now in its sixth season in the U.S. on ABC (and Netflix in some markets), that seems like an obvious outcome.

Read More About:

Jump to Comments

More from Variety

Most Popular

Must Read

Sign Up for Variety Newsletters

By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. // This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Variety Confidential

A Variety and iHeartRadio Podcast

ncG1vNJzZmiukae2psDYZ5qopV9nfXN%2Bjq2taJmjnq5wsdetqZqnopm2r63RsmSarKSkv6%2Bx2GauqKddoLyzscBmqZqsmaO0tHnNnqufpJmtenJ%2Bkm5qa21ka31w