Lee Hoon

**Lee Hoon** (이훈) (also known as **Hooni** (훈이)) is the main character and protagonist of the Korean manhwa *Suicide Boy*. He is a 17-year-old teenager with suicidal tendencies, but without the will to kill himself. His first official debut is in Suicide Boy Volume 1, chapter 1.

## Lee Hooni

### Relatives

Mother (Deceased) Grandmother (Deceased) Father (Unknown)

### Occupation

Highschool StudentStuffed Animal Eye Attacher

## Appearances

### Appears in

Suicide Boy Volume 1Suicide Boy Volume 2Suicide Boy 2.5 (Cameo/Secondary Character)

## Appearance

Hooni has messy black hair and grey eyes with eye bags underneath. He has a white gauze on his right cheek and a bandage on his left. At home, he usually wears a white T-shirt, black shorts, and black knee-high socks. At school, his uniform varies depending on the season. During spring, he wears a white oxford shirt with a taupe brown vest and black pants. During summer, he wears a short-sleeved white dress shirt with a black tie and black pants. Both of his uniforms feature a rectangular yellow patch on the left side of his chest. He seldom wears his gym uniform, which is a black and yellow half-sleeved baseball tee with black shorts. He has brown gauze on his right arm and a bandage wrapped around his left wrist. Despite being 17, he retains very neotenous features and is considerably shorter than most characters in the Manhwa. He has a mostly thin build, though he does have some softness around his thigh and stomach, giving him a slightly androgynous appearance.

## Personality

Lee Hoon is often reserved and struggles with social interactions, sometimes describing himself as lonely or inadequate. He experiences feelings of depression and inferiority, and can be quick to give up in the face of adversity. However, Hooni also possesses positive qualities. He shows compassion and selflessness, demonstrated by his decision to use his own money to buy Jae Hoon an iced coffee. He has a strong sense of empathy and generally avoids conflict. At times, he can be overly confident, but also tends to exaggerate small details in social situations to impress others.

## Synopsis

### Background

Lee Hoon was born in South Korea on an unspecified day. Throughout his childhood, he endured physical abuse from his alcoholic father, who left him with debt due to his gambling addiction. Hoon also suffered from bullying by his classmates during his school years. The only source of kindness in his life was his mother, but she eventually passed away from illness. After his mother's death, his father abandoned him and left him to fend for himself, which motivates his many unsuccessful suicide attempts.

### Volume 1

The first time when we met Hoon is in one of his multiple suicide attempts, giving us a quick summary of his background. The attempt failed and the apartament owner comes to collect his renting debt, accompanied with his son, Jeong Haarim. After seeing how is his actual life, filled with bullying and despair and a neighbors meeting where Hoon comes out ashamed, Soorim finds him and is in that moment when they start to get along. In a start Hoon is scared of Soorim, but he slowly shows being a nice person. Later, we know an another character, Kim Jaehoon:a top tier student and the second best student in Hooni class. He starts caring for Hooni just for pity after seeing how he was cutting himself in the bathrooms. Seeing his "good actions", Hoon starts to hang out with him, besides Jaehoon see him as a molest person. In certain moment the three met in person and form a trio of "friends" (although Jaehoon and Soorim don't get along very well), being Hoon ignorant of why the two are with him. Is there where Hooni lives different experiences of his diary life: trying to kill himself with coal, experiencing the failed attempt of charity of his physic education, finding a work to have money, playing video games and getting accidentally drunk with Soorim, trying to kill himself with a fan, playing table games with his friends, studying with they for the mid-term tests, getting in love, trying to plan his last wishes and other stuff. One day, a manhwa drawer called Jeong Sana, his neighbor, see him in the street and make a manhwa series inspired in the life of Hooni, getting mad when Soorim discovers him.Is one day when Hooni plans to definitely to kill himself trowhing himself of and edifice, but in the process he discovers his reason to live, leaving the idea of the suicide, at least for certain time

### Volume 2

At the prologue, we see how he tried to kill himself, failing again. In the moment when he goes to leave his evidence of suicide, a mysterious blonde boy tries to catch him, failing and thinking he is dead. At certain moment the Soorim sister, Jeong Haarim meets him and fall in love with Hooni, tough he is scared of her for being to "menacing". Here Hooni lives more moments in his life: his back ache, his "breakup" with Jaehoon, his accidental locking in his house, his Chuseok (korean fall celebrations), him uploading suggestive images to social media, Sana serializing his manhwa about Hooni, Haarim defending him and him slowly leving his fear of her, making streams online and other moments. At some point Hooni start to consider how his life was getting better and he sees that he was seeing himself as a weak person, founding that he just need the will to live in a live thinking about a better future. Is in that moment when the mysterious blonde boy of the prologue meet with him: an "old friend" called Yang Heemin. Maybe his dreams of a better future will be truncated with a ghost of his past...

### Suicide Boy 2.5

#### Brothers Rebellion

He really doesn't have major appearances in this part, just a cameo with Soorim and mentions of him

#### The Fist is Straight

He is a secondary character in this story. Haarim start to flirt with him, but the manager of the sports school press her to enter in the school. The desire of stay with Hooni wakes up the envy of the president of the boxing club, Ha Minseon, who gives him a strong beat that leave him inconcent. He finally breaks up relations with Haarim for fear, posteriorly is invited to the boxing tournament where Haarim will participate. At a start he refuses, but reflexing it, goes to the tournament and both declare they love to each other. Finally he promises Haarim that he only will start to date her when he a man able to maintain himself.

## Other histories

### Hoonirella

In an alternate history showed in the chapters 19, 20, 45, 46 and 47, is made a parody of the fairy tale Cinderella with Hooni as protagonist. Here he is a unhappy teenager who work as the domestic employee of his stepmother (portrayed by one of his bullies in the principal history) and sisters, constantly wants to kill himself. One night, he is left home alone while his stepsisters go to a ball at the castle, an opportunity he takes to attempt to hang himself. At the last minute a wizard appears and convinces him to help him dressing him with a luxurious dress and taking him to the dance until midnight, when the magic would end. At first he feels uncomfortable in front of so many people, even rejecting a gentleman who was trying to win him over, until suddenly the prince Soorim Al-de-font comes down and invites him to dance. After a slight accident, the prince meets Hooni again, chatting with him until midnight. Hooni withdraws and accidentally pulls the rope from him, picked up by the prince and he undertakes a search to find its owner.

Time later, the prince gives a notice to search for the princess. Hooni and the magician are left confused by the matter and even more so after a horse tries to attack Hooni without reason, forcing the magician to flee after defending Hooni. The responsible for this was a witch who believes that by making Hooni happy by fulfilling her wishes, she could rise in the ranks in the witches' society, asking for this one. The annoyed magician appears and due to their rivalry both begin to grant wishes to Hooni, giving him money, food, knowledge, a maiden for him and even a dragon. Mad, the witch gives him wings that make him fly and descend to a place where people consider him a witch deciding arrest and burn him. Terrified, he waits the end until the prince arrives and defends him, discovering in the process that she is the princess he was looking for. Happy, he takes her to the castle and, in theory, they should have lived happily ever after, however, Hooni lives in fear of being executed if it is known that he is a man, he tries to commit suicide, although he is saved by the wizard and witch who now live with him

### Suicide Boy of the future

In an alternate timeline of his future that is showed in chapter 63 and in Youtube short videos, Lee Hoon is a 29 years old man who is unemployed and lives with and from Soorim, who is a successful and rich musician. He receive a call from Jaehoon, who invites him to eat and drink alcohol, and being drunk, starts to spend money from Soorim. In the night, Soorim comes with him with a bag in one hand. Hooni start to beg for living with him and don't kick him of the house, but in the bag there is only pork chops and Soorim just want to eat with him. Hooni understand that he must search a work if he still want to live comfortable with Soorim.

He also had another problems with Soorim, like him trying to do housework, forgetting them or his addiction to cigarette which Soorim hates

### Suicide girl

In an alternate history in the chapters 100 and 101, Hooni wakes up feeling weird, looking himself in a mirror discovering that he turned into a woman. Disconcerted, is visited by Soorim who knows the truth after taking off him his shirt before an accident. Confused, convinces Hooni to go out to eat in a restaurant, feeling discomforted but slowly feeling happy. Coming back to home he is thinking about the calm of Soorim until his bullies appear in the street. Scared he hides behind Soorim, again, feeling bad. At night, Hooni returns to his home with Soorim, but before saying goodbye, he begins to abruptly transform into a man again, having a strong desire to die, again.

## Relationships

### Jeong Soorim

Initially, Hooni felt very intimidated by Soorim due to his family relations with Hooni's landlord, his 'thug'-like appearance, and his exhaustingly cheerful demeanor. When Soorim started to accompany Hooni more often, Hooni discovered that perhaps he wasn’t so bad after all, even though he seemed quite scary.

Hooni sees Soorim as one of his closest friends. They walk to school together along with Jaehoon everyday.

### Jeong Harim

When Harim first met Hooni, she immediately ‘fell in love’ with him, ceasing to think of any ‘homosexual thoughts’ she may have been having. She made many attempts to catch his attention: showing up at his house more often, dressing cutesy, and more, but to no avail. She even went as far as to dress up in a tracksuit and motorcycle helmet to stalk and protect him, but she only ended up scaring him. As she began to lose hope, she stopped by his house one more time and immediately fell in love with him again as soon as he said ‘thank you’ to her as she was leaving. In another attempt for love, Harim quit boxing and rejected the offer to go a prestigious university so she could be with him, making that a rival deportist search them and punch him. She think that Hooni isn't important after he say that dont love her, focus on training for a boxing tournament and winning it, making Hooni declaring his love to her. They end up making a promise: if Hooni becomes a responsible adult and Harim still likes him, they'll date.

### Jeong Sana

Sana first saw Hooni walking home from school one day and discovered that Hooni was his neighbor. He talked to Hooni in order to get inspiration for his new webtoon “A Loser’s Survival”, which was based on Hooni and his friend. His motives towards Hooni were all but friendly, and he even spoke badly about him to Soorim behind his back.

### Kim Jaehoon

Hooni and Jaehoon have a complicated friendship. Jaehoon initially started hanging out with Hooni in order to make sure that he was not harming himself. He also helped him study and quickly grew attached to him. However, he was willing to throw Hooni under the bus a few times, even going so far as to hit him so that he would not be a target for the bullies. He soon regretted it once he saw how much worse Hooni was doing and apologized to Hooni, who suggested that Jaehoon should buy him food. After that, they seemed to get along better and Jaehoon also started to appreciate their friendship more.

## Trivia

* Parkgee ensures that he created the character based on him and his experiences as a try to help the readers to receive consolation
* The apartment Hooni lives is likely located in Jeollabuk do Jeollanam province.
* In the course of the manwha, Hooni has attempted suicide 9 times, has been bullied at least 16 times, and seriously beaten up 9 times.
* He likes video games alot, particularly *Overwatch*, *League of Legends*, and *Heroes of the Storm*.
* Lee Hoon's age is denoted through the Korean age system. Internationally, he is 15-16. He is in 10th grade, the first year of high school, which explains why, despite being a teenager, he is shorter than many of the other characters in the manwha. In Korea, students typically begin high school at age 15 or 16, so Hoon's age and height are consistent with this.
* The fact that he is burdened with heavy debts suggests that Lee Hoon's father is likely deceased, leaving him as the only surviving family member.
* Although there are occasional artistic inconsistencies, it appears that Lee Hoon is right-handed. This is evidenced by the fact that he often uses his right hand to hold his boxcutter. In the manwha, his left wrist is consistently bandaged, likely due to repeated use of the boxcutter with his dominant hand.
* Kim Jaehoon's uniform is similar to Hooni's, but in some panels, his name is displayed on a yellow patch on his uniform shirt. This suggests that the uniforms, or at least the patches, are customized.
* Hooni has a particular fondness for pork cutlets and burgers. It's possible that his fondness for burgers grew even stronger after Jaehoon treated him to an expensive one in chapter 11.
* He hates bugs, specifically cockroaches. Based on various panels and dialogue, however, he seems to have quite a reoccuring problem with them.
* Lee Hoon's poor academic performance in the manwha may be attributed to his ongoing bullying, lack of parental support, and poor retention ability. His textbooks are once described as "torn and unreadable." Nonetheless, Lee Hoon is portrayed as a (sometimes) hardworking student who studies late into the night and seeks help when possible, such as from Jaehoon.