Beef Season 2 incorporates yet another star. The announcement was made one day after Beef was confirmed to return exclusively to Netflix for a second season with a whole new cast. The latest addition to the beefy cast is none other than Youn Yuh-jung, the Academy Award-winning Korean actor known for films like Minari and the Apple TV+ series Pachinko.
A few years ago, Youn won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in 2020’s Minari, the semi-autobiographical drama by Lee Isaac Chung. She was the first Korean actress to win awards from several organizations, and she would probably have won more if it hadn’t been for the eligibility inconsistencies that some of those organizations have. Per Deadline, the actor joins the stellar cast announced yesterday, which includes Oscar Isaac, Cailee Spaeny, Carey Mulligan, and Charles Melton.
Season 2 of Beef stars Youn as a Korean billionaire who owns a country club, where the dynamics of the elite are disrupted by a husband and wife fight that has a unique aftermath. No characters from Season 1 are set to return, although it’s still early to confirm. Yeun and Wong will return, but only as executive producers.
Showrunner Lee Sung Jin will return to the series produced by A24. Season 1 of Beef starred Steven Yeun (who co-starred in Minari with Youn) and Ali Wong as Danny and Amy, two very different members of society who come together in a road rage incident, and their lives take a weird and dark turn. The first season was acclaimed by critics, and it was recognized accordingly during the awards season.
The Meaning Behind Beef’s Comical Approach
In 2023, this relatively small show arrived on Netflix without much fanfare. Beef promised viewers a riveting tale of revenge carried out by two very opposite players: Danny, a handyman who’s going through a rough patch, and Amy, the housewife with a new business who lives in a huge mansion in California.
After the road rage incident in which they are involved, Amy and Danny go on a rampage against each other. It includes violence, adultery, and an unexpected conclusion that shows they have more in common than they thought. It started as a comedy, wonderfully led by Yeun and Wong, but it progresses towards something much more dramatic and realistic: The hardships of being an immigrant are what we see on the surface, but beyond that, the clash between Amy and Danny regards a more human element that’s only visible during their crisis.
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Even if you don’t identify with Danny or Amy’s journey, you feel compelled by their cause. Happiness is theoretical for them, regardless of what they each show to others, and their unfortunate accident feels like the wake-up call they need to find themselves amid the fake smiles, money, and the capitalist tropes that the American dream represents. It’s still too early to speculate about how Beef Season 2 will relate to Season 1, but it would be great to know what happened to Amy and Danny.