K-drama land is filled with different kinds of eommas — some we love and some we hate. There’s the rich, overbearing, tiger moms (Hello, Sky Castle), the moms who reminded us of our friendly neighborhood (hello, the barkada mom from Reply 1988), the single moms who made us empathize with their struggles (When the Camelia Blooms, Marriage Contract), and the scary moms we hope we never encounter in real life (It’s Okay Not to Be Okay). But for this list, allow us to share a few moms who may not be as famous as the others mentioned, but still managed to steal our hearts by showing their own kind of motherly love.
Fair warning, this list is filled with spoilers—a lot of them.
The Supportive Mom from Record of Youth
(Han Ae Sook played by Ha Hee Ra)
Apart from being a story of chasing a dream, achieving it, and facing the harsh reality of that realized dream, Record of Youth also gives us a glimpse of how Sa Hye Joon’s (Park Bogum) family was affected by his journey to becoming an actor.
From the onset, we empathized with Hye Joon’s pain from a father who constantly belittled his dream while endlessly being compared with his brother. Alongside this, there was a mother who stood by his decisions and gave comfort after every quarrel that occurred at the dining table. She not only stood as a mediator between the father and child, but she was a great sense of support to Hye Joon as he faced constant rejection both in his career and family life.
Hye Joon’s mom taught us the importance of giving children the chance to pave their own paths while chasing their own dreams. At the end of the day, we’re all just kids wishing we had the unconditional support of a mother while we face life’s ups and downs. Sa Hye Joon’s mom felt like a warm hug to all of us struggling with our own dreams.
Watch it on Netflix
The Relatable Mom from Go Back Couple
(Ma Jin Joo played by Jang Na Ra)
Often unnoticed, this hidden gem opens our eyes to the realities of marriage. The plot seems simple—a married couple on the brink of divorce travels back in time to their youthful days. However, this drama will trigger your emotions as you witness the untold perspectives of the wife and husband that led to misunderstandings. This show taught us that marriage isn’t about living happily ever after because it entails hard work and lots of communication.
At the forefront of this story is Ma Jin Joo who perfectly portrayed the tired mom. She’s lost, unmotivated, and envious of the life she could have had if she did not marry at an early age. What makes us love her is how she reflects the sad reality of motherhood for some women—how motherhood shifts a person’s priorities, how you lose parts of yourself to make way for this new life, and how lonely it can sometimes be in this journey. This made us appreciate our mothers more.
We also want to mention Jin Joo’s mom (Kim Mi Kyung). Aside from being a caring mom, what makes her role essential is how she made us realize that our mothers are also humans who grow old, weak, and might inevitably leave us first in the future. Jin Joo’s scenes with her mother made our hearts feel heavy and made us value the time we have with our own mothers.
Watch it on Netflix and Viu
The Kind Stepmom from Hi, Bye, Mama
(Oh Min Jung played by Go Bo Gyeol)
Hi, Bye, Mama tells the fictional story of a mother’s second shot at life after an early death. Right off the bat, we shamelessly declare that this drama is loaded with way too many memorable mothers.
There’s Cha Yu Ri (Kim Tae Hee), the lead mother who died and stayed by her daughter’s side as a ghost for years, and there’s Yu Ri’s mother (Kim Mi Kyung) who prayed for her daughter’s soul daily. However, for this list, we want to put the spotlight on the stepmother who proved to us all that a blood relationship isn’t the sole basis of being a good mother.
Despite stepping into a family struggling to move on from the unexpected death of their mother, Oh Min Jung willingly raised a child she didn’t bring to this world while nursing a brokenhearted husband, even going far as quitting her job as a nurse to take in this new role. That by itself is something we admire.
Though we can easily paint her as the antagonist of the story for taking a role that was Yu Ri’s in the first place, we ended up loving Min Jung for showing her honest confusion about where she should stand in their family after realizing she could not fill the hole that Yu Ri left behind.
We’re ultimately happy that she decided to cancel her thoughts of divorce, and thankfully, this drama ended with Cha Yu Ri deciding to leave after fulfilling her dream of holding her child and happily trusting her family in the good hands of Oh Min Jung.
Watch it on Netflix
The Moms of our Youth from Twenty-Five Twenty-One
(played by Seo Jae Hee, Kim So Hyun, So Hee Jung)
The recently concluded Twenty-five Twenty-one is a drama that made us laugh, cry, and reminisce about our own youth as the character’s stories unfolded. It touched on the usual woes of adolescence that were all too familiar—our first loves, chasing dreams, school blues, and friendship. We also can’t forget how this drama opened our eyes to various forms of family relationships while introducing us to a lot of mothers we can’t forget.
At the top of the list is Na Hee Do’s mom (Seo Jae Hee), the newscaster who suddenly became a single parent. She was not a likable parent at the start since the show took Hee Do’s point of view, but eventually, we learn to understand that some parents may appear harsh but they really just have a silent way of expressing their love.
Na Hee Do (Kim So Hyun) as a 40-year-old mom was also worth noticing. While Hee Do’s daughter faced a dark period on her path to becoming a ballerina, her mother was always there, patiently guiding her and saying the right words based on her own experience as an athlete.
Finally, who can forget Seung Wan’s feisty mom (So Hee Jung)? We remember the scene all too well, how the top student Seung Wan heartbreakingly decided to drop out of the school because she couldn’t tolerate the cruelty of their abusive teacher, and how her mother showed up at school the next day to reprimand the school in her daughter’s place. We can’t forget these eommas not only because of their various ways of expressing love but also because they remind us of the qualities of our very own moms or mother figures in real life.
Watch it on Netflix
The Accepting Adoptive Mother from Thirty-Nine
(Cha Mi Jo’s Mom played by Lee Kan Hee)
Everyone knows about adoption, but we’re rarely given a glimpse of how the people involved are affected by it. Thirty-Nine is one of the dramas that tackled this issue with such depth—from showing us the reluctance of the adopted child, Cha Mi Jo (Son Ye Jin), to the adjustment involved in becoming part of a new family, to her insecurity growing up, and even to the usual and uncomfortable journey of finding the truth behind her biological parent.
Amidst all these traumatic experiences, there existed a mother who quietly gave her warmth and acceptance to a child who could have gone array without the proper environment. From the way she connected with the younger Mi Jo through classical music, to how she quietly faced the abusive biological mother, we adore this mom for saying the right words at the right moments to ensure that her child will feel comfortable with every new discovery and emotion she faced in her journey as an adopted child.
The fact that we felt like Mi Jo was never treated as an outsider in their loving home was enough to convince us about how lucky Mi Jo was to have her as an adoptive mother.
Watch it on Netflix