The Fall 2024 K-Comics Guide

He's Definitely My Son!

What's It About? 

After a one-night stand with Duke Klauzner, Baroness Claire Delford flees the capital when her sweet sister Elisa gets caught up in a dangerous political conflict. Five years later, Claire stirs up high society when she returns with her nephew, Elliot. Despite her adamant denial, everyone believes Elliot to be the duke's son. Can Claire clear up the misunderstanding and protect her nephew from scheming nobles? And does this mean she has to join hands with the prideful Duke Klauzner to do it?

He's Definitely My Son! has a story by Hanmint and art Horock. Adaptation is by RED. This volume is localized by Kakao Entertainment and published by Tapas.

Is It Worth Reading?

It's fascinating to me how many webtoons follow strict genre patterns when it comes to romance. That's not to say that all romances don't do the same, regardless of medium, but rather that manhwa in webtoon format seems to hew a lot closer to the established tropes of Western romance fiction that I was expecting. He's Definitely my Son! plays with the old “secret baby” subgenre, all the more interesting because it's generally not as frequently seen in manga, even Harlequin adaptations. Of course, this isn't the most standard version of the trope; although Claire and Erich did have a one-night stand five years ago, it didn't result in a child she then hid from him. No, the secret baby in question belonged to her younger sister, who died in childbirth. Although Ellie tried to hide the baby's father from Claire, by partway through these first fifteen chapters even she's figured out that baby Elliot's dad was the murdered crown prince. That would bring plenty of problems all on its own, but now there's Erich, utterly convinced that Elliot is his son – his and Claire's, that is.

It's not that difficult to see where he's coming from. Erich's long-standing crush on Claire was meant to have culminated in him proposing to her after she made her debut, but that never happened. When he had the chance a few years later, he happily allowed himself to be caught up in the moment, even if in the sober light of day he realized that proposing (or at least mentioning his feelings) first would have been the better plan. (And then he went and Mr. Darcy'd his proposal. It didn't work in 1813, sir, it won't work now.) Claire, on the other hand, is on her second life after a bad relationship with a man who was her social superior back in South Korea and has zero interest in marrying in a pre-Industrial revolution world, so once again, she leaves before he can get the words out…only to return to the city five years later with a little blond toddler.

Things progress about as you'd expect, with multiple suitors vying for Claire's hand, one very unpleasant dowager duchess, and Erich generally not being good at respecting Claire's boundaries and doing his damnedest to get her to marry him. He's also very taken with little Elliot, and if that starts as being because of an assumed parental link, by the end of chapter fifteen, it's beginning to look like there may be more to it than that. All of these play out against a backdrop of Claire anticipating the Industrial Revolution, introducing mechanical looms and other innovations to support her nephew. The art is a bit of an issue, mostly about Elliot who looks like he was drawn by a completely different artist and has weird proportions. On the whole, it's an enjoyable, familiar story. If Erich can pull his foot out of his mouth for two seconds, he may even get the girl!

This manhwa gave me renewed sympathy for what it must feel like to be a modern woman reincarnated in a historical setting. When you're accustomed to living in a society in which you have the right to vote, to work, and to raise a child on your own, your average isekai world is bound to feel rather stifling, even if you are reborn as a wealthy noble. He's Definitely My Son is based on what ought to be an easily-resolved misunderstanding, but DNA tests don't exist yet and a woman's insistence that she's the child's aunt means nothing. It may be frustrating, but it's refreshing for an otome story to actually address this past-present culture clash! Cute, simple art, a cuter child character, and a headstrong heroine keep this story moving forward.

After a workaholic past life with an ex-fiance who thinks overtime counts as a romantic date, Claire is thrilled to be reborn as a noble in another world. She vows to kick back and enjoy the good life, but that wouldn't make a very eventful manhwa, would it? The morning after a drunken graduation party, Claire wakes up naked in bed with her rival, Erich. She tells him it was a mistake, but he offers to marry her in case she gets pregnant—it's the pseudo-past and the unwed flings Claire remembers from modern Korea are no longer kosher. However, it's Claire's little sister Elisa, who gets pregnant instead, after fooling around with her mystery man on the same night. The two sisters flee to their barony, but when Elisa dies in childbirth (Why? Can't? Moms? Be? Living? Characters???) Claire decides to support her nephew, Elliot, using her past-life knowledge. So she constructs a weaving loom from scratch, as any white-collar worker ought to know how to do, of course, and establishes a cotton plantation (a locale which perhaps doesn't have the same fraught history in Korea). Now a captain of industry, Claire returns to the capital, Elliot in tow, to conduct her many successful businesses. However, Erich is still unmarried and never forgot her. What's more, he has done the math. It doesn't matter to Erich that Elliot calls Claire his aunt; Erich believes what he wants to.

It's hard to believe Claire isn't the only living female in the capital the way that every single male character is set on marrying her. From her business partner to her family lawyer to Erich, who is somewhere in the single-digits in line for the royal throne, they all want this powerful, stubborn firecracker of a woman, and since Claire is from our world, she won't settle for any less than she deserves. More than all the dudes, perhaps the most enviable component of this escapist story is the fantasy of having a 4-year-old who behaves as well as Elliot. Fast-paced with constant drama, the way Claire's modern sensibilities clash with an outdated world of patriarchal assumptions make this story more fun than it has any right to be.