The head chef in modern-day Seoul fell into a pool, hit his head and went into a comma. He wakes up in the body of a soon-to-be Joseon Queen right in the middle of the palace scheming dangerous plots and meets a king who hides dark secret.

Mr. Queen is poking fun at sageuks with good intentions, it's clearly coming from the love for the genre. Production-wise, everything looks nice, the costumes look nice. Fans of palace politics will find this to be refreshing as they'll probably get a kick out of many moments, while viewers like me who shy away from the heavy-politics will find this to be fun. The palace intrigue is not innovative in general, it deals with two powerful clans fighting over throne, but the pacing is fast, so it sets up its stage very well.

Mr. Queen is portrayed by the magnificent Shin Hye Sun. She's an actress but she's man spreading really well so I'll use 'He'. Even if he looks like a playboy, he's so kind towards his female servants. Their friendships are wholesome and provide a lot of comedy. The trio plays off of one another so well that both the parodies and serious plot real good.

I think the first 6 episodes have nailed the sweet spot. The comedy is landing for me, it's rare for me to appreciate funnies from a k drama that is intending to be funny since I'm leaning much more toward the comedy from quiet and situational moments. Also, the infusion of modern music is adding to the comedy as it fits our male lead's background as a modern-day man, so there is one scene where he's dancing to a Black Pink song and I thought that was just hilarious.

While the comedy really worked in the first 6 episodes when the stakes hadn't developed very much, as those stakes get higher and higher, the comedy starts to feel really misplaced. It feels like an intense story is being told and then it breaks into a funny scene suddenly, so it wasn't as natural for me who prefers fewer funnies that suit the situation. The way it's presented feels very rhythmic like they switch back to back between an intense scene and the next comedy. Well, this show is supposed to be a comedy so I can give it a pass, that's not that big of a deal.

(Spoiler part) The biggest issue that I had was the subliminal problematic messages in the drama.

I would have preferred Mr. Queen and the King to develop a friendship and mutual respect. As this is a story about a woman being possessed by a man's spirit, I didn't expect Mr. Queen to have romantic feelings towards the King because he isn't perceived as gay. My problem is that this show is showing that hormonal arousal determines your sexual orientation. It's jarring to see a man who never had any gay thoughts would be so influenced by female hormones to switch his sexual orientation.

I think the romance plot does not benefit the plot at all, it has very little consequence on the story, in a way if it is excluded, things would end up the same with our characters. When Mr. Queen goes back to his male body, he's happy that the King is fine and safe. But there's no indication that he's heartbroken or romantically lost something, pointing to the fact that the romance was really unnecessary. Although back in the past, the King mentions that he felt something is lost but he's still with his queen, he does not notice at all that the queen's personality has changed! It's like downplaying characters' personalities and identities over the body that they're born with being the most important thing in a romance and relationship. It kind of derailed the show for me and hence the ending left a sour aftertaste.