Secretly, Greatly (์๋ฐํ๊ฒ ์๋ํ๊ฒ) by HUN, whose real name is Choi Jong-hoon, ran on Daum Manhwa Soksesang, now Kakao Webtoon, from July 5, 2010 to April 28, 2011. Won Ryu-hwan, an agent of North Koreaโs elite Unit 5446, is sent south and goes to ground in a hillside slum in Seoul. His cover is Bang Dong-gu, the village idiot. Two years in, Rhee Hae-rang from the same unit moves into the neighborhood posing as an aspiring singer, followed by the minder Rhee Hae-jin posing as a high school student. Three elite operatives living as an idiot, a wannabe singer, and a schoolboy is where the comedy comes from, and the self-termination order that comes down from the North is what tears that life apart.
The year after it finished, in 2011, it won the Ministerโs Prize in the comics category at the Korea Content Awards. A sequel followed the filmโs success: season two, Secretly, Greatly, Uniquely, began on the same platform on November 14, 2013.
The film opened on June 5, 2013. Jang Cheol-soo directed, with Kim Soo-hyun as Won Ryu-hwan (Bang Dong-gu), Park Ki-woong as Rhee Hae-rang, Lee Hyun-woo as Rhee Hae-jin, and Son Hyun-joo as their commanding officer Kim Tae-won. It sold 498,282 tickets on opening day, a record opening for a Korean film at the time, passed one million in thirty-six hours, and reached four million in eight days, the fastest ever. Final admissions were 6,953,800. Kim Soo-hyun won Best New Actor at the 50th Grand Bell Awards and Best New Actor plus Most Popular Actor at the 50th Baeksang Arts Awards for the role. In Japan the film opened in October 2014 under the title Secret Mission.
Where the story was being talked about again in 2026 was the theater. The musical Secretly, Greatly, which premiered in 2016, has been seen by 110,000 people across forty regions over ten years, and the tenth-anniversary production Secretly, Greatly: THE LAST ran from January 30 to April 26, 2026 at the 1,000-seat NOL Theatre Daehakro main hall in Seoul. It was the first season staged at large-theater scale. Won Ryu-hwan was shared by Kim Dong-jun, Kim Chan-ho, Baek In-tae, and Oh Jong-hyuk, and Rhee Hae-rang by Niel, Seo Dong-jin, and Yoo Tae-yul, among others, with Choo Jung-hwa directing, music by Heo Soo-hyun, and production by Juda Culture. As of August 2026 there has been no confirmed announcement of a drama or a new film.
The original is on Kakao Webtoon and KakaoPage, and the English edition is on Lalatoon. What the film compresses into two hours, the webtoon unfolds slowly, giving each of the neighbors their own time. Comparing how the film and the original end is part of the fun of reading it. (As of August 21, 2026)
