A few days ago, Netflix (Netflix) announced that "Squid Games" has become the most watched series in its history. In the company's new quarterly financial report released on September 30, "Squid Game" was also highlighted - more than 142 million users watched, and the derived clips and memes were played on platforms such as TikTok more than 42 billion.
For a woman, the popularity of the series is a moment of great significance. She is Minyoung Kim, Netflix's first content director in charge of asia-Pacific affairs. It was she who brought "The Squid Game", which the director had been brewing for many years but no one wanted to make, to Netflix, and to audiences around the world.
Kim Min-young. Graph network
Since its launch on September 17, the series has topped the "Today Ratings List" in 94 countries and regions, and as a non-English drama, it has led the top ten list in the United States for 21 consecutive days. In the face of the overwhelming success, Kim Min-young sat in his office in South Korea, looking at the steady stream of positive feedback from users and colleagues from other countries and regions of the company, and he felt that it was "not like it is true".
The woman who single-handedly created the Netflix blockbuster
Kim has been listed as one of the "20 Most Powerful Women in the Global Entertainment Industry."
According to Netflix's official website, Kim joined Netflix in 2016 and became one of the company's earliest batch of content executives in Asia. It was the office she set out to build in Seoul that opened a new chapter in the win-win cooperation between the Korean entertainment industry and the American giants.
At the time, Netflix was not well known in South Korea, and the entire Korean entertainment industry was skeptical about whether to work with the foreign video service company. In 2018, when director Hwang Dong-hyuk approached Kim Min-young with the script for "Squid Games," the latter was still working in a small temporary office.
Promotional poster for Squid Games. Graph network
Unexpectedly, just 5 years later, Netflix not only gained a foothold in South Korea, but also created one of its highest-watched series in history in this land.
Under the leadership of Kim Min-young, Netflix has brought a series of well-received Korean original dramas and movies to global audiences in a few years, including the original drama "Kingdom", as well as "The Forced Landing of Love" that was broadcast worldwide through licensing, thus establishing a Korean drama audience from all over the world.
Kim Min-young herself has gone all the way up with Netflix's success in South Korea. In June, Kim was promoted to vice president of content for Netflix's Asia Pacific region, where he was responsible for content decisions for the company's entire Asia-Pacific region, except India, including key growth markets such as Japan and South Korea. One colleague called Kim Min-young "a really personal figure."
Kim Min-young was Twitter's Asia Pacific content executive before joining Netflix, and also worked for NBCUniversal's French company and South Korean entertainment media group CJ E&M.
The "Secret" of Squid Games
For Kim Min-young, the success that is now pouring in is simply "not like it's real." Although creating a phenomenon Korean drama has always been her ambition, she never expected that this series would set off a "squid game sequelae" that swept the world.
It was also a "surprise gift" for her team – although it had been predicted that Squid Games would be a hit, all the members did not expect it to be so "explosive". In an interview, Kim said: "The reason why Squid Games is significant for our team is that it proves that our international strategy is right. ”
"We have always believed that the most local and original dramas can have the best communication. So when this drama with the most local games and the most local characters is not only local, but also popular in the world, it is a very exciting time for us. Jin Minying sighed.
Kim said that since she began working with South Korea's film and television industry in 2016, one of her team's favorite questions was, "What is the story you've always wanted to tell but haven't been able to tell?" ”
And it was this problem that made them find Netflix's first Korean original hit drama "Kingdom", which was the same problem, which contributed to the "Squid Game" that director Hwang Dong Hyuk waited for 10 years and the script was rejected many times, making itself and the Netflix behind it.
The "Netflix + Korean Drama" era
With the saturation of the two major european markets in the United States and closer geo-culture, since 2010, Netflix, which started as a DVD rental business, has actively "expanded its territory" overseas, expanding to more than 190 countries in just 7 years, and its content production has also been localized and globalized.
Infographic: Netflix
After setting up offices in Japan, India, Singapore and other countries and regions, South Korea's Netflix is the company's fifth "development center" in Asia. In the Asian market alone, Netflix has produced good dramas and hit dramas rooted in India and Japan, but these are not as "out of the circle" as "Squid Games".
According to internal Netflix data, Squid Games brought nearly $900 million in impact value to the company with an investment of about $21 million. And this is just one of the many contents it launched this year: the prequel to "A Letter of the North" has been launched, and a number of serials of different genres and themes, movies, documentaries, sitcoms, etc. will also be released.
And "Squid Games" is said to be like "Kingdom" to do a big IP, the first one is only a month online, everyone is talking about the second part, and may even launch the game on the platform next year. Marked by "Squid Games", the era of globalization of "Netflix + Korean dramas" may have just begun.
Kim said that since 2016, Netflix has increased its investment in the South Korean market every year, investing up to $500 million in 2021, which is about 70% of the total investment in 2016 and 2020.
Netflix has stepped up its investment in the South Korean market. Graph network
Many analysts believe that despite Netflix's increasing competition with its global rivals Disney+, HBO Max and Apple TV+, its strong lead in South Korea's entertainment industry has become a major advantage.
Kim Min-young is confident that Netflix's investment in the South Korean market will only get bigger and bigger, and the content will become more and more abundant, because "you can't expect a show to satisfy everyone." As head of Asia Pacific, she also said her team will also increase investment in countries such as Japan, Thailand and Indonesia.
Red Star News reporter Lin Rong
Edited by Li Binbin
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