She worked as a television actress for over a decade before branching out into film, saying in an interview that, "I was getting older by the second, and I hated becoming complacent. The film was well received by critics, and Kim herself was singled out for praise, with The Japan Times commenting, "Kim's performance is a masterful balance of understatedness and open-wounded vulnerability. In Kim appeared in several films, first with Jo Jae-hyun in the melodrama Romance , though she was publicly critical about the lack of depth to her character. Kim returned to television in May with a leading role in the drama Women of the Sun. In she starred in her first historical series The King of Legend which focuses on Geunchogo , the 13th ruler of Baekje. Shortly before the drama's premiere, Kim was involved in a drunken hit-and-run accident this was her second offense; her first DUI was in for which she lost her license.