Squid Game: How Netflix is Changing The K-Drama Industry
‘Squid Game’ quickly rose in popularity to become Netflix’s biggest show to date.
Perfectly exploring the cut-throat competition of capitalism, Squid Game offers 456 debt-ridden participants the chance to clear their loans and walk away with 45.6 billion won (the equivalent of around $38 million in USD).
The catch?
Participants must fight to the death over a series of schoolyard games.
After being in development hell for nearly a decade, Hwang Dong-hyuk’s series has instantly become a cult-classic around the world, breaking barriers across different cultures. Through the use of catchy visuals and an intriguing plot, Hwang perfectly critiques social structures and challenges characters to break their own morals in order to survive.
But how did Netflix, an American streaming and distribution company, suddenly pioneer one of the most successful pieces of South Korean entertainment?
Or better yet, how has Korean dramas and reality shows become such a big player in Netflix’s content library?
Netflix entered the market in 2016 and almost instantly became a massive player in the Korean entertainment industry. While they were quick to acquire licensing content from companies like JTBC, it was met with conflict from local companies like CJ E&M or SK Telecom who wanted to keep the streaming power in their hands.
Of course, several years later it’s easy to see just how far Netflix has come, with a whole range of shows that they’ve acquired to stream. Because of this, lots of these shows have hugely benefitted from being on a globally accessible platform like Netflix.
Having a back catalogue of various titles is great, but it doesn’t set them apart from competitors.
So, in order to beat out other platforms, Netflix began buying up licenses to stream dramas exclusively onto their platform, some even immediately after they’ve aired in Korea. A lot of ‘Netflix Originals’ aren’t in fact produced by them at all, Netflix merely has the exclusive rights to distribute them.
For example, Crash Landing On You was originally a TvN property that first aired on that channel before being streamed globally on Netflix, whereas Itaewon Class was a JTBC property that was given rights to stream on Netflix.
This is actually a common strategy in Netflix’s content model where they’ll get exclusive rights to stream content that can be found nowhere else, like how Riverdale and You are shown on TV before being streamed on Netflix for the rest of the world.
But Netflix can take it the next step further, where instead of snatching up distribution rights, they fund their own productions, namely shows like Stranger Things, Santa Clarita Diet, and of course, Squid Game.
Aside from Squid Game, Netflix has certainly dipped their toes into funding their own Korean productions, including Kingdom, Extracurricular and more recently, All Of Us Are Dead.
These tightly-constructed narratives only have a limited number of episodes that are released at once, as opposed to mainstream dramas that are broadcasted on a specific time slot every week.
It is for this reason that many of these shows’ stellar writing comes through.
For one, this allows the writer to really focus on one succinct story and fully flesh its characters. They aren’t bound by the restrictions of traditional TV shows, but they still have significantly more screen time than they would a movie. The director of Kingdom has even talked about this in a featurette where he mentions how he approached the first season as a whole trilogy of feature films, as opposed to a TV show.
For another, they don’t have the weight of requiring every episode to be somewhat independent from one another.
With streaming services, it’s implied that audiences can watch them one after the other at their own pace, as opposed to waiting each week.
That’s why traditionally each TV episode will have their own little story arcs, with an overarching story to connect the whole season. CW shows like The Flash or Arrow are a prominent example of this.
Squid Game abandons this entirely and instead focuses on tightening the narrative, creative important developments in each scene so that each episode is pivotal to the story.
Furthermore, the writers are given the freedom to tell the story they want to tell, in the right pacing without fillers. There’s no need for flashbacks and over-extended scenes of emotional weight, nor do they need to have recaps of previous episodes.
The explosive success of Netflix’s Korean catalogue has not come without its critics. Many were initially disapproving of Netflix’s exclusivity on K-drama content, as fans who used to rely on single sites like Viki or the now-defunct DramaFever had access to pretty much every title out there.
But streaming wars have changed media consumption forever.
Now, they’re forced to sign up to multiple platforms just to watch exclusive content.
But solely from a creative standpoint, it is immensely fascinating how a streaming service like Netflix can pave the way for more flexibility and freedom in the way people tell stories. They can do so with the extended run time of a tv show, with the budget and vision of a feature film.
A show like ‘Squid Game’ could have never been made into what it was, with the restrictions of either film or traditional TV, and it took something like Netflix to give them flexibility in the story they wanted to tell, how they wanted to tell it, and for how long they wanted it to be.
