That Ki-an 84 Ideal Type Moment Was All a Setup: Kang Mina Opens Up About Her Real Longtime Crush

Kang Mina has a confession: that "tall guy" ideal type she mentioned on Ki-an 84's YouTube channel? Completely scripted. In a recent sit-down interview at a café in Samcheong-dong, Seoul, the actress laughed as she set the record straight, revealing the real name she had been keeping to herself all along.

Back in May, Kang Mina appeared on the YouTube content series hosted by webtoon artist and entertainer Ki-an 84. When asked about her ideal type, she said she preferred someone "tall and striking." The answer, she now admits, was a planted line. "It was scripted," she said with a grin. "They wanted to use the Squid AI feature afterward, so they needed a buildup for a 'tall squid' punchline." In the actual video, her ideal type answer leads directly into a squid-fishing gag, with Ki-an 84's eyes going white as he asks, "You like tall guys?" before Mina runs away in exaggerated fright.

The connection to Ki-an 84 came through actor Lee Si-eon, who shares her management company. "Ki-an oppa reached out because Si-eon sunbaenim and I are at the same agency," she explained. "He said he wanted us to do something together, and mentioned we had run into each other at an entertainment awards ceremony once and he wanted to revisit those stories." The collaboration clearly landed: "The response was really good, and thanks to so many people watching, we ended up doing it again."

Kang Mina also opened up about something she has kept quiet for a while: a genuine anxiety around variety show appearances. "I have a bit of a variety phobia," she admitted. "I've been avoiding it because of that. If a variety schedule gets confirmed, I can't sleep for a week beforehand. I'd be up all night thinking, 'What am I going to do? I can't speak properly when I'm nervous.'" Working with Ki-an 84, she said, was the first time a filming felt genuinely relaxed. "I had actually started thinking I just shouldn't do variety shows at all, but he made it so comfortable. Now I'm slowly trying to get over it."

As for her actual ideal type, the answer goes back much further than any YouTube script. Kang Mina grew up a devoted SHINee fan, and one member in particular left a lasting impression: Taemin. "I've loved SHINee sunbaenims since I was little," she said. "During the Juliette era, I was so obsessed with Taemin sunbaenim's wavy hair. I loved that styling so much that I kept a photocard of him in my wallet."

She did, at one point, get to meet him in person. "I think I saw him when I was MC-ing a music broadcast and did an interview," she recalled. When asked whether she ever told Taemin she had been a longtime fan, she shook her head with a shy smile. "I couldn't say it. I was too nervous."

The interview came alongside promotions for the tvN Monday-Tuesday drama Tomorrow, I'll Go to Work!, in which Kang Mina plays Yun Noa, a five-year office worker navigating the push and pull between love and career. It's the kind of role that asks a lot of quiet emotional specificity, and based on this interview, she seems to bring that quality offscreen just as naturally.