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Cast members from the Korean drama “True Beauty” appear in a classroom scene. The series follows a high school student navigating identity and social pressure through her use of makeup.

Most adaptations lose something. A book turns into a movie and suddenly it feels rushed and watered down. Going into the show “True Beauty,” you’d expect the same thing: the original webtoon is way better than the adaptation. But somehow, the K-drama version of “True Beauty” ends up being the one that actually sticks. 

The original version, written by Yaongyi, is a webtoon, which is basically a digital comic meant to be read by scrolling on your phone. Spanning 223 episodes and an additional 33 spin offs, “True Beauty” stood out by being long and having many different arcs compared to most other webtoons. 

The story follows a high school girl, Jugyeong, who gets bullied for her appearance and teaches herself makeup through online tutorials. When she transfers schools, she completely reinvents herself, becoming one of the “pretty” girls overnight, while hiding what she really looks like underneath it all. That secret pulls her into a love triangle and forces her to deal with issues of identity and confidence, while learning to understand the importance of appearance. 

At first, the length of the webtoon sounds like a strength. More time should mean more depth and more development. But in reality, it does the opposite. Because the webtoon goes on for so long, it starts to lose focus on the main idea of the story. It begins to repeat conflicts, especially with the love triangle, and instead of developing characters in a deeper way, it just keeps adding more situations around them. You get more story, but not necessarily more meaning. 

The drama fixes that by cutting most of it out. 

Instead of trying to cover everything, the show narrows in on a smaller part of Jugyeong’s life, mainly on her high school experience, and actually builds it out more than the webtoon ever could. It spends time on moments that matter instead of constantly moving onto the next thing. Her insecurity feels more personal. The bullying feels more serious. The relationships actually develop instead of just continuing. 

In the webtoon, a lot of the characters feel like versions of tropes. Jugyeong is insecure but upbeat. Su Ho, the main male lead, is cold but secretly caring. Seojun, the second male lead, is the rebellious type. They’re interesting, but don’t always feel real. The drama takes those characters and adds layers to them. It’s not just the good acting and tone, but the more intentional writing the producers did to make them actually come to life rather than just be roles in a story. 

Even characters like Sujin are handled differently. In the webtoon, she mainly exists as Jugyeong’s competition, a flat “villian” meant to create conflict. In the show, she has clearer motives and more depth in her role. Her actions come from a mix of jealousy, insecurity, and pressure from her home life. She strives to maintain her image rather than just being “the mean girl.” For example, when she exposes Jugyeong’s bare face, it is not random cruelty. It comes after feeling threatened by Jugyeong’s growing confidence and her own fear of losing control over how others see her, especially Su Ho as she, like Jugyeong, has a crush on him. However, the show still shows moments where she genuinely cares about Jugyeong, which makes her feel more human. This adds a complexity to her character that the webtoon really didn’t. Her love and kinship towards Jugyeong while still acting on her own selfish desires makes their conflict feel less one sided and more deep. 

The relationship also hit harder because in the drama they’re given time to breathe. Conversations feel more natural and evenly paced. You actually see how characters change over time instead of just being told that they did. 

The webtoon jumps between arcs and keeps expanding, especially later on, which makes the webtoon feel a bit scattered. The drama simplifies everything into one main storyline with a clear emotional focus. It even changes certain plot points and outcomes, but those changes make the story flow better and feel more complete. 

That doesn’t mean the webtoon is pointless. It’s the foundation, and it offers a much larger world with more content for people who want to stay in it longer. But more content doesn’t automatically make a story better. 

The webtoon gives you everything. The drama chooses what actually matters. In this case, that’s exactly why the adaptation ends up being better than the original.