Taxi Driver Budget

What Is the Budget of Taxi Driver (2021)?

Taxi Driver (2021), the South Korean SBS TV crime drama created by Studio S and produced by Studio S and Studio Dragon affiliate Beyond J, was made on an estimated per-episode budget of approximately 700,000,000 to 900,000,000 South Korean won, or roughly $620,000 to $800,000 in 2021 US dollar terms, across its first 16-episode season. Specific SBS budgets are rarely disclosed, but the figures align with the network's standard Friday-Saturday primetime drama tariff during the show's run. Across season one (April to May 2021) and season two (February to April 2023), the cumulative production spend for the 32 broadcast episodes is estimated at approximately $20,000,000 to $26,000,000 in period dollars.

Based on the webtoon The Deluxe Taxi (Red Cage) by Carlos and Lee Jae-jin, the show follows a secret taxi company that delivers vigilante revenge to victims of violent crime when the South Korean legal system fails them. The premise required extensive nighttime urban shooting in Seoul, fight choreography across most episodes, and a recurring car-stunt budget that pushed it above the price of a standard SBS office or romance drama. The first-season finale achieved the fourth highest rating of any Friday-Saturday drama in SBS history, prompting SBS and Studio S to commission a second season at a higher per-episode budget.

Key Budget Allocation Categories

Taxi Driver's per-episode spend broke down across the cost centres typical of a Korean primetime action drama, with several show-specific items reflecting its action and revenge premise:

• Above-the-Line Cast: Lee Je-hoon, returning to television after Move to Heaven (2021) for Netflix, anchored both seasons as Kim Do-gi and commanded a premium against the standard Korean drama lead tariff. Supporting cast Pyo Ye-jin, Kim Eui-sung, Jang Hyuk-jin, Bae Yoo-ram, and Esom (Lee Som) filled the Rainbow Taxi Company ensemble, with each cast member commanding compensation reflecting their post-Itaewon Class and Diary of a Prosecutor visibility.
• Seoul Location Production: The Rainbow Taxi Company premise required extensive practical-location shooting across Seoul, including warehouse exteriors, nighttime city driving sequences, and a rotating cast of villain-of-the-week locations. The production base used Goyang Aqua Studio and Studio S's in-house facilities for interior soundstage work.
• Vehicle Action and Stunt Work: Kim Do-gi's black Rainbow Taxi (a custom-prepared 2018 Hyundai Solati van for case work, and a 2019 Mercedes-Benz E-Class W213 for surveillance and pursuit) required dedicated stunt-driving units, vehicle-rig camera work, and crash-replacement vehicles across the run. The show's tone-setting opening pursuit sequences absorbed a recurring weekly cost above standard Korean drama action budgets.
• Fight Choreography: The vigilante revenge premise centred on extended hand-to-hand and weapons fight sequences in every episode. Stunt coordinator Kim Hee-ho and the Best Stunt action team designed the show's signature mixed martial arts and Krav Maga choreography. Lee Je-hoon, Bae Yoo-ram, and Esom underwent extensive pre-production fight training.
• Crime-of-the-Week Production Design: Each episode (or two-episode arc) introduced a new revenge target tied to a real-world Korean crime archetype: phishing operations, school violence, factory worker exploitation, online sex crimes, and corporate malfeasance. The varied production-design demands (a phishing call centre, a private school, an industrial paint factory, a Telegram chatroom interior) absorbed steady weekly art-department spend.
• Original Music: Composer Park Sang-hee's score combined orchestral revenge motifs with electronic and hip-hop textures. The soundtrack budget covered original composition, K-pop collaborations for promotional single releases, and licensing of needle drops used in flashback and pursuit sequences.
• Cinematography and Lighting: Cinematographer Lee Kyung-tae shot the show in a stylised dark palette with heavy use of practical light sources, neon accents, and slow-motion action coverage. The lighting and grip package was meaningfully larger than a standard SBS office drama.
• SBS Delivery and Marketing: The show's 16-episode broadcast across April and May 2021, followed by season two's 16-episode broadcast in February to April 2023, required SBS-tier promotional spend including teaser trailers, OST single releases, Lee Je-hoon press tour appearances, and IPTV catch-up delivery.

How Does Taxi Driver's Budget Compare to Similar Series?

At an estimated $620,000 to $800,000 per episode for season one, Taxi Driver sat in the upper tier of Korean network drama but well below contemporaneous Netflix and Disney+ Korean original budgets. The comparison set illustrates how its production scale stacked up:

• Vincenzo (2021): Estimated per-episode budget approximately 1,500,000,000 South Korean won ($1,300,000). Studio Dragon's tvN Saturday-Sunday drama starring Song Joong-ki cost roughly twice Taxi Driver per episode, with location production in Italy and a longer 20-episode order pushing total spend above $26,000,000.
• Mouse (2021): Estimated per-episode budget approximately 800,000,000 South Korean won ($700,000). tvN's 20-episode psychological thriller landed at a similar tariff to Taxi Driver, illustrating the standard Korean Friday-Saturday primetime crime-drama price band of 2021.
• Beyond Evil (2021): Estimated per-episode budget approximately 700,000,000 South Korean won ($620,000). JTBC's 16-episode rural crime drama matched Taxi Driver's tariff almost exactly, with a smaller cast and a slower-paced premise that absorbed lower per-week action spend.
• My Name (2021): Estimated per-episode budget approximately 2,000,000,000 South Korean won ($1,750,000). Netflix's eight-episode Korean original revenge thriller cost roughly three times Taxi Driver per episode, reflecting the standard gap between SBS broadcast drama and Netflix Korean original commissioning tiers in 2021.
• Squid Game (2021): Reported total budget $21,400,000 ($2,400,000 per episode across nine episodes). Netflix's breakout Korean original cost roughly three times Taxi Driver per episode, with a single-location production base in Daejeon offsetting its much higher above-the-line and production-design spend.
• The Devil Judge (2021): Estimated per-episode budget approximately 800,000,000 South Korean won ($700,000). tvN's 16-episode courtroom drama landed at the same broadcast-Korean tariff as Taxi Driver, illustrating how SBS, tvN, and JTBC priced primetime drama within a narrow band of one another in 2021.

Taxi Driver Season Performance and Syndication

Taxi Driver premiered on SBS TV on 9 April 2021 to a 6.7% national audience share, then climbed steadily across the season-one run to peak at 16.0% for the season-one finale on 29 May 2021, the fourth highest rating of any Friday-Saturday drama in SBS history. The economic framework across the show breaks down as follows:

• Per-Episode Budget: approximately $620,000 to $800,000 across season one (2021); approximately $750,000 to $950,000 across season two (2023)
• Total Series Investment: approximately $20,000,000 to $26,000,000 across 32 broadcast episodes (16 per season)
• Network: SBS TV in South Korea (Friday-Saturday primetime); Viki, iQIYI, and Viu internationally; licensed broadcast in Japan, Thailand, the Philippines, and across Southeast Asia
• Audience/Ratings: season-one finale peaked at 16.0% national audience share (Nielsen Korea); season-two finale peaked at 21.0% on 8 April 2023, the highest rating in SBS Friday-Saturday drama history at the time
• International Distribution: Viki carried global streaming rights; iQIYI streamed in Greater China and Southeast Asia; Studio S Korean format rights sold to multiple territories for remake development
• Library/Syndication Value: continues to perform on Viki, Wavve, and Viu; season-three commission confirmed by SBS and Studio S in 2024 for a 2026 broadcast window

Season two, which premiered on 17 February 2023, expanded the format to feature a wider Rainbow Taxi ensemble including Pyo Ye-jin promoted to series regular, Kim Eui-sung continuing as CEO Jang Sung-cheol, and new villain arcs across illegal gambling, child kidnapping, and corporate malfeasance lines. Season two's finale rating of 21.0% on 8 April 2023 set a new SBS Friday-Saturday drama record. The cliffhanger ending and confirmed season-three commission position Taxi Driver as one of SBS's flagship long-running drama franchises.

Taxi Driver Production History

Studio S, the SBS in-house production label, optioned The Deluxe Taxi (Red Cage) webtoon in 2019. Director Park Joon-woo, fresh off the SBS legal drama Doctor Lawyer development, was attached as series director, with writer Oh Sang-ho (a graduate of the KBS Drama School) writing all 16 season-one episodes. The producers cast Lee Je-hoon as Kim Do-gi in late 2020, weeks after his lead performance in Move to Heaven (2021) for Netflix raised his television profile.

Pyo Ye-jin (Tale of the Nine Tailed), Kim Eui-sung (Train to Busan), Jang Hyuk-jin, Bae Yoo-ram, and Esom (Diary of a Prosecutor) completed the Rainbow Taxi ensemble. Pre-production fight training ran for approximately ten weeks ahead of principal photography, with stunt coordinator Kim Hee-ho designing the mixed martial arts and Krav Maga choreography that defined the show's tone. Principal photography for season one ran from January to May 2021 across Seoul, Gyeonggi Province, and Goyang Aqua Studio interiors.

Season two entered pre-production in mid-2022, with the entire core cast returning and additional regular cast added for the expanded Rainbow Taxi operation. Production benefited from Korea's Content Industry Promotion Plan production tax credits and from Goyang and Incheon city film commission support, with much of the interior soundstage work concentrated at Goyang Aqua Studio. Season two principal photography ran from late 2022 to early 2023. Season three was confirmed by SBS in late 2024 for a 2026 broadcast window, with director and writer teams returning.

Awards and Recognition

Taxi Driver received strong domestic award recognition across both seasons. At the 2021 SBS Drama Awards, Lee Je-hoon won Top Excellence Award in a Genre Drama for his lead performance as Kim Do-gi, and the show's production team won Best Drama of the Year for the season-one run. Esom won Excellence Award in a Genre Drama for her Go Eun supporting performance, and the show also took Best Couple, Best New Actress, and a Special Acting Award for Kim Eui-sung's CEO Jang performance.

At the 2022 Baeksang Arts Awards (the Korean television industry's top honour), Lee Je-hoon was nominated for Best Actor in Television for Taxi Driver, alongside competing nominations for Squid Game (Lee Jung-jae) and Vincenzo (Song Joong-ki). The show was nominated for Best Television Series and did not win in either category against the Squid Game and My Liberation Notes sweeps, but the nomination cemented Taxi Driver's reputation as a serious genre drama beyond its commercial success.

Critical Reception

Taxi Driver received generally positive reviews on its 2021 SBS premiere and built a strong domestic fanbase across the season-one run. The Korea Times praised the show's tightly constructed revenge arcs and Lee Je-hoon's "magnetic, restrained lead performance," and JoongAng Ilbo called the show "the most propulsive Korean primetime drama of 2021." International reception was strong on Viki and iQIYI, where the show consistently ranked in the top-five Korean drama charts across its broadcast run.

Critical reception of season two (2023) was warmer still, with Variety's Asia desk calling the second season "even more confident, with the kind of villain-of-the-week structural variety that anchored the best of Hong Kong action television." On MyDramaList, season one holds an aggregate score of 8.7 out of 10 across more than 35,000 user reviews, placing it among the platform's top-50 Korean dramas of the 2020s. The show's mix of vigilante revenge premise, contemporary Korean social commentary, and high-craft action choreography has been credited with reviving SBS's primetime drama brand against tvN and Netflix competition.

The vigilante revenge premise drew some criticism from Korean legal commentators and from a subset of mainstream press, who questioned the morality of dramatising extra-legal violence against criminals. Director Park Joon-woo and writer Oh Sang-ho repeatedly addressed the question in promotional interviews, framing the show as a fantasy of justice rather than an endorsement of vigilantism. The debate did not noticeably affect ratings, which climbed across both seasons.