On February 24, Netflix staged a major presentation in Seoul during which they revealed their 2021 lineup in Korea as well as their achievements in the market to date and several details on their plans. 

The ‘See What’s Next Korea 2021’ event was led by KIM Min-young, Netflix’s vice-president of content for Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand, who revealed that the streamer had earmarked KRW 550 billion (USD 500 million) for Korean content in 2021. She also revealed that as of the end of 2020, the streamer had topped 3.8 million subscribers in the market.

Among the titles introduced were Netflix’s first original films for Korea. Like for Likes (2016) director PARK Hyun-jin will make Moral Sense, a story of a male office worker whose BDSM fetish is accidentally discovered by a female co-worker. The Villainess (2017) filmmaker JUNG Byung-gil is helming the action film Carter, about a man who wakes up in a motel room with no memory of who he is and quickly finds himself on the run.

Beyond these new titles, Netflix also unveiled stills for a range of previously announced series, welcoming their directors and stars to the stage to introduce them.

The original series slated to drop on Netflix Korea this year include TRAIN TO BUSAN (2016) director YEON Sang-ho’s horror-thriller Hellbound, starring YOO Ah-in; the sci-fi series The Silent Sea with BAE Doo-na and GONG Yoo, which is produced by JUNG Woo-suk; the Kingdom prequel event Kingdom: Ashin of the North with Gianna JUN (aka JUN Ji-hyun); and the action series Round Six with LEE Jung-jae and PARK Hae-soo from director HWANG Dong-hyuk (Miss Granny, 2014).

Netflix, which became the home of Korean films such as Time to Hunt, CALL and SPACE SWEEPERS over the past year, all made for different companies but bought by the streamer, revealed they had also acquired PARK Hoon-jung’s crime drama Night in Paradise, which premiered at the Venice International Film Festival last year.