Hallyu (Korean Wave)
From the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s, South Korean TV dramas and popular music gained great popularity in Asian countries such as China and Japan. In 1997, when the TV drama entitled What Is Love was aired by the Chinese major state broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV), it ranked second in China’s alltime imported video content. Then, the term Hallyu or the “Korean Wave” first appeared, referring to the global craze for Korean culture.
The Korean Wave landed in Japan in 2003 when the KBS TV drama series Winter Sonata was aired via NHK. The drama became a megahit, and Nami Island in Chuncheon, the filming site of the drama, was a must-visit destination for Japanese tourists.
From the mid-2000s to the early 2010s, the spread of the Korean Wave was mainly led by Korean boy groups and girl groups called idol stars such as Big Bang, Girls’ Generation, and Kara. During this period, the Korean Wave extended its fan base into the global stage, including Latin America and the Middle East beyond Asia, especially loved by young people in their teens and 20s.
The Korean Wave, which had established a solid foundation through popular culture such as TV dramas and music, has been pushing the boundaries of its influence since the 2010s. As the unique charm of Korean culture is widely known to people around the world through global online platforms such as YouTube and social networking services, the craze has expanded to Korean traditional culture, food, literature, and language, creating more and more enthusiasts.
In 2020, the film Parasite, which was nominated in six categories, won four leading awards at the 92nd Academy Awards, including Best Director and Best Picture, which serves as an opportunity to introduce Korean movies around the world.
The number of Hallyu-related organizations enthusiastic about Korean culture is on the rise. Every year, the number of these organizations increases by 7% and the number of members by 36%. As of 2020, the total number of members who have joined Hallyu-related organizations in all countries around the world have reached nearly 100 million. This is a five-fold increase over five years. The majority of them consist of K-pop fan clubs such as ARMY, BTS’s global official fan club, and BLINK, BLACKPINK’s official fan club. In addition, other organizations and communities are also active in various fields such as South Korean dramas, food, and tourism.
BTS has opened a new chapter in the history of K-pop. In August 2020, upon the release of its new digital single entitled “Dynamite,” it topped the Billboard Hot 100 for the first two weeks in a row.
TWICE, loved by local and international fans, shows off a passionate performance.
K-Pop
One area that is growing more rapidly than any other is 21st century K-pop, or Korean pop music, which spans dance-pop, pop ballads, techno, rock, hip-hop, R&B, and so on. K-pop is a generic term for popular music from South Korea, which was originally called gayo, meaning pop music. Recently, the term “pop,” which originally referred to British and American pop music, has been used to refer to popular music in other countries by adding it to the first letter of the country’s name, like “K-pop” of Korea. For example, popular music in Thailand, Japan, and China is called T-pop, J-pop, and C-pop, respectively. In the same context, Korean pop music is called K-pop.
In the mid-2000s, idol groups such as TVXQ, Kara, Big Bang, Girls’ Generation, and 2NE1 gained explosive popularity in Asia including China, Japan, Taiwan, and Singapore, which consequently triggered global interest in K-pop.
In 2009, the girl group Wonder Girls became the first Korean singers toappear on the Billboard Hot 100 with the English variant of “Nobody.”
In 2012, as Psy’s “Gangnam Style” maintained its ranking as No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 for seven consecutive weeks and finally reached three billion views on YouTube, the K-pop craze began to spread around the world in earnest.
The worldwide success of “Gangnam Style” was followed by a surge of K-pop boy group, BTS. BTS topped the Billboard 200 chart in 2019 and won the Top Social Artist award for the third consecutive year at the Billboard Music Awards. This attracted attention from the world, resulting in the global recognition of K-pop as a genre. After landing atop the Billboard 200 chart in February 2020, “Map of the Soul: 7” maintained high rankings for 23 consecutive weeks. BTS has achieved various Guinness World Records titles, including a title for most viewers for a music concert livestream. In August 2020, BTS made history by becoming the first South Korean act to top the Billboard Hot 100 with its first English-language song “Dynamite.”
The influence of K-pop is further expanding. In 2019, Best K-pop, was launched as a new category at the MTV Video Music Awards, an award show presented by the cable channel MTV to honor the best in the music video medium.
K-pop features remarkable feats of idol groups. Among more than 150 idol groups active in South Korea, the representative ones include BTS, BLACKPINK, TWICE, EXO, Red Velvet, SF9, NCT, ITZY, MONSTA X, and more.
K-pop has special value in many areas and not just limited to music. The popularity of K-pop lies in a splendid performance that harmonizes excellent singing skills, stage manners, and flashy dance moves. The songs and choreography of the idol groups for perfect performance are not built in a day or two. They are attributed to years of thorough planning in conjunction with systematic training programs and sweat during their trainee periods.
Active communication with fans also accounts for K-pop’s ever-growing popularity. Idol group members are devoted to real-time communication with their fans from around the world by means of social media, thereby quickly building stronger intimacy and bonds with them.
Fans are contributing to the growth of the singers and, furthermore, K-pop through active fan club activities. Fans do not think of singers as just their stars. Fans who have supported idol groups since their debut or early days watch them grow up to be adults from boys or girls, and feel like they are also growing together. This naturally leads to forming stronger bonds by sharing satisfaction and rewards.
Recently, K-pop has been pursuing diversification. While the idol groups still play a pivotal role, indie pop musicians are constantly active in making their music careers. Collaboration between idol groups and indie musicians has been done to explore genre diversification.
Idol stars such as IU, Sunmi, (G)I-DLE, BTOB, and Seventeen are moving a step forward as singer-songwriters who create songs in person without relying on existing composers or lyricists.
In addition, major entertainment companies are developing and selling products such as idol goods through secondary content based on idol groups, thus maximizing the added value of K-pop. The representative examples include books with graphic lyrics of BTS’s “Butterfly” and BLACKPINK’s AR avatar service. These provide K-pop fans with new joy and value.
Descendants of the Sun was exported to 32 countries, generating an economic effect worth more than KRW 1 trillion.
EXO, one of the most popular idol groups that have captivated the world with their perfectly in-sync group dances
Enthusiastic global K-pop fans
TV Dramas
Moving beyond the Hallyu craze South Korean dramas are gaining attention from around the world, recognized as an independent genre called K-dramas.
Korean dramas have been steadily loved around the world after What Is Love made a splash in China in 1997 and Winter Sonata was a big hit in Japan in 2002.
Dae Jang Geum (MBC), an epic TV series about royal cuisine, which aired between 2003 and 2004, was exported to 91 countries around the world including Japan, China, and Turkey. This drama expanded the scope of the Korean Wave into Korean food, fashion, and medicine while drawing global interest in Korean culture.
In 2013, TV dramas such as My Love from the Star and That Winter, the Wind Blows, were loved by international fans, while in 2016, Dokkaebi (Guardian: The Lonely and Great God), Moonlight Drawn by Clouds, and Descendants of the Sun revived the Hallyu craze.
In 2019, Netflix’s first original Korean drama Kingdom successfully gained international traction. The high recognition of its cinematography based on the well-organized script and directing ability naturally led to the production of Kingdom Season 2 and the creation of a new genre called K-zombies. It is interesting that foreign viewers, using their social networking services, freely expressed their appreciation for the architecture and clothing styles of the Joseon dynasty, the background of the drama series. In particular, the growing curiosity about the Korean traditional hat for men called gat contributed to the increase in its sale on the global online shopping website Amazon.com.
As such, Korean dramas, recognized for their topicality and cinematography, have been expanding their fan base abroad in 2020. This is because they have benefited from the over-the-top (OTT) market, which has rapidly grown worldwide because of COVID-19.
Crash Landing on You, which aired in 2020, was premiered in 190 countries through Netflix. This drama is about a romance between a South Korean heiressof chaebol (conglomerate) and a captain in the North Korean Army. It caused a sensation in Asia, including Japan, where it reached the list of the top 10 most popular TV shows on Netflix in Japan for 10 weeks.
Crash Landing on You, a South Korean television series about a romance between a South Korean heiress of chaebol (conglomerate) and a captain in the North Korean Army
Movie
The cinema of South Korea has become a large market in the world, with the increasing global success and globalization of the Korean film industry.
According to the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the value of the cinema of South Korea in 2018 was USD 1.6 billion out of the global film market of USD 41.1 billion, placing the value of South Korean cinema at the fifth largest in the world following North America, China, Japan, and the United Kingdom.
South Korea ranks first for attendance frequency per capita in the world, and Korean films take 51% of the local box offices.
Korean cinema, the history of which spans 101 years, has been recognized for its cinematic quality at international film festivals, and is currently being introduced widely around the world. Since 1961, when The Coachman became the first Korean film to win the Silver Bear Extraordinary Jury Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival, South Korean films have stood out at the most prestigious film festivals in the world, known as the Big Three: Berlin (Germany), Cannes (France), and Venice (Italy).
Films such as Old Boy, Oasis, Burning, and On the Beach at Night Alone won leading awards in major categories. Famous Korean film directors such as Bong Joon-ho, Im Kwon-taek, Lee Chang-dong, Park Chan-wook, Hong Sang-soo, and Kim Jee-woon are attracting attention in the global film industry.
In 2019, Bong Joon-ho became the first Korean director to win the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival for his latest film Parasite, which also won four leading awards at the Academy Awards in 2020. This has triggered more global interest in Korean films.
As Parasite took home the most awards at the Oscars 2020, winning four Academy Awards including Best Picture, Directing, International Feature Film, and Writing, world media began earnestly reporting about Korean films. For example, the British newspaper, Guardian, recommended the film The Handmaiden, and Rotten Tomatoes, an American review-aggregation website for film and television, spotlighted Poetry.
Furthermore, South Korea also holds various international film festivals to enhance the status of its films, which serve as a driving force for the further development of the Asian film industry. For instance, the Busan International Film Festival, the largest film festival in South Korea, the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival, and the Jeonju International Film Festival attract attention from filmmakers around the world each year with a variety of concepts and programs.
In addition, South Korean films are gaining great popularity through OTT platforms. Specifically, #Alive, a South Korean zombie film released in June 2020, is an example of successful Korean films introduced abroad through OTT media services. It topped the global movie charts in 35 countries two days after its release on Netflix.
In 2020, Parasite, won leading awards at the 92nd Academy Awards such as Best Picture and Best Director.
