Real mountains, real whinging: Netflix’s ‘Take a Hike!’ sends reluctant stars up Korea’s peaks

“Take a Hike!” may sound like an invitation — or a rude suggestion — in English, but the new Netflix show's Korean title translates more closely to “Why on earth would you hike?”

That's the question producer Nah Yung-suk posed when he assembled the cast for the reality travel series. But even after going to some of the most beautiful mountains in Korea, the four cast members — all novice hikers and, for the most part, newcomers to variety television — still don't quite understand the appeal.

And according to Nah, the hitmaker behind variety series including "Earth Arcade" (2022-25) and "New Journey to the West" (2015-20), that makes for some unusually unfiltered television meant to entertain a more cynical modern audience.

In many ways, the show is like a familiar old-school variety show. Nah said viewers might expect the usual arc: Gather “a ragtag group of people who are each a little lacking in some way,” send them up a mountain, then watch them complain, bond, shed tears at the summit and eventually become like family.

The idea partly came from Nah and co-head producer Park Hyun-yong’s own reluctant experiences with hiking. Neither was much of a fan, but after being dragged along by an enthusiast, they found themselves bonding over the shared ordeal — and talking afterward about everything from how hard the climb was to how good ramyeon (instant noodles) tasted on the mountain.

But the cast never quite played along.

“In the old days, if you saw a [mountain] sunrise on a variety show, you basically had to cry,” Nah said at a press conference for “Take a Hike!” in Seoul on Wednesday. “But these guys are saying they don’t even want to look at [the scenery] because they’re so exhausted from the hike.”

Even Car, the garden, the group’s oldest member, is “a leader with absolutely no leadership” who “only worries about himself,” Nah joked.

“I think those are very real reactions, and I think that’s the kind of humor that works now,” Nah said.

“Take a Hike!” sends singer Car, the garden; actor Lee Chae-min, star of “Bon Appétit, Your Majesty” (2025); DAY6 drummer Dowoon; and Tarzzan of K-pop group Allday Project up some of Korea’s notoriously rugged mountains, made even more grueling by the winter conditions.

Nah said he was particularly drawn to Lee and Dowoon, both with relatively little variety show experience, believing their unfamiliarity with the genre could bring out less calculated, more spontaneous reactions.

“There’s no one here who’s putting on an act,” he said. “They’re very honest and very real.”

Take Lee, for example. 

“He looks so proper on the outside, but when you actually talk to him — well, first of all, he talks a lot,” Nah said. “I got the sense that there was this whole unexplored side of him that hadn’t been developed yet.”

Tarzzan, meanwhile, surprised the producers after casting. Producers had expected the playful, mischievous image he showed in public when performing or hanging with his Allday Project crew, only to find a more serious side once he was made president of the hiking club, said producer Park.

“He really tried to lead the members and fulfill that role," Park said. "We call him Zan-i."

“My goal was to create a new generation of variety stars who could lead Korea’s entertainment scene for the next 10 years,” Nah said. “I wanted to bring together fresh faces no one had really tapped before — people who would make viewers go, ‘Wait, they had this kind of variety show talent?’”

For their part, the four cast members emphasized that they went into the hikes kicking and screaming, having initially signed on for what they were told would be a show about traveling and playing games.

“I felt like I’d been scammed into a job,” Car, the garden said. “I started thinking, ‘If I quit here, how badly is this going to hurt my reputation?’”

“I tell people around me not to watch it,” he joked. “If they watch it and it becomes popular, I might have to climb another mountain. Don’t watch it.”

"Take a Hike!" releases next Tuesday.

BY KIM JU-YEON [kim.juyeon2@joongang.co.kr]