Lim Ji-yeon

Lim Ji-yeon (Korean: 임지연; born June 23, 1990) is a South Korean actress whose career moved from independent and feature films into prominent television roles. She studied acting at the Korea National University of Arts, and her early screen work included short films and the 2011 film Dear Catastrophe. Her first major commercial film role came in Kim Dae-woo's 2014 erotic period drama Obsessed, set in 1969. She played Jong-ga, the wife of a military officer, opposite Song Seung-heon's Colonel Kim Jin-pyeong. The performance earned her major newcomer recognition, including a Blue Dragon Film Award for Best New Actress. She continued in cinema with the 2015 romantic comedy Love Forecast, the thriller The Treacherous, and the film noir The Shameless. In 2015, she played Lee Ji-yi in television drama High Society, a supermarket employee and friend of chaebol heiress Jang Yoon-ha, romantically involved with Yu Chang-soo in its subplot. Her subsequent television credits include MBC's 2016–2017 weekend drama Blow Breeze, in which she played a North Korean defector, and the 2020 fantasy romantic comedy Welcome, where she appeared as illustrator Kim Sol-ah. Lim reached a far wider international audience through Netflix's The Glory, written by Kim Eun-sook and released in two parts between December 2022 and March 2023. She played Park Yeon-jin, the affluent former school bully whose violence helped drive Moon Dong-eun's long-planned revenge. Rather than serving as a peripheral antagonist, Yeon-jin is central to the drama's examination of school violence, class protection, and adult complicity. Lim's work won the Best Supporting Actress award in television at the 59th Baeksang Arts Awards in 2023. Her post-The Glory projects have included the 2023 suspense drama Lies Hidden in My Garden. In that series, adapted from Kim Jin-young's novel, she played Chu Sang-eun, a financially desperate woman whose life intersects with Joo Ran, played by Kim Tae-hee, after a suspicious smell emerges from a garden. Her performance in the series paired an outwardly poised character with the economic insecurity and fear governing Sang-eun's choices. The same year, she joined the ensemble of SBS's thriller The Killing Vote as police officer Joo Hyun. In 2024, she took one of the leading roles in JTBC's historical drama The Tale of Lady Ok, playing a woman who assumes another identity in Joseon society. Across these roles, Lim has repeatedly shifted between romance, melodrama, thriller, historical drama, and sharply drawn antagonistic or morally pressured characters onscreen.