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      Sweden’s Songwriters Look to K-Pop

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      When the Swedish songwriter Ellen Berg first heard a K-pop track, in 2013, her reaction was typical of many Western listeners: “What the hell is this?” she recalled thinking.Berg, 31, was studying at Musikmakarna — a songwriting academy about 330 miles north of Stockholm — and her class had been asked to write a Korean hit.To get the aspiring songwriters in the mood, the students listened to “I Got a Boy” by Girls’ Generation, a wildly popular K-pop girl group. “It’s one of the craziest K-pop songs ever,” Berg said recently by phone. The track includes raps, bursts of high-speed dance music and even a verse in the style of a rock ballad. “It’s really five different songs in one,” Berg said.The class was given a week to write something like it. “It didn’t go very well,” Berg said, with a laugh.BTS performing during the American Music Awards in November in Los Angeles.Kevin Winter/Getty Images For MrcEight years later, Berg has certainly improved her K-pop songwriting abilities: She is now one of dozens of Swedish musicians who make a living exclusively from writing tracks for the genre. She has contributed to a hit for the pop juggernaut BTS, as well as to wildly successful tracks by groups like Red Velvet and Itzy.While Swedes have long been go-to figures for American pop stars — with songwriters like Max Martin and Shellback producing or co-writing tracks for Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, the Weeknd and others — Swedish musicians are now becoming a force in K-pop, too.Berg is signed to EKKO, a Korea-based music publisher with studios in Stockholm, where Berg works alongside Moa Carlebecker, a sought-after K-pop songwriter better known by her stage name, Cazzi Opeia. The two musicians (who collaborate under the name Sunshine) also regularly write with another duo — Ludvig Evers and Jonatan Gusmark, who call themselves Moonshine — based in a studio next door. Seven other Swedish songwriters who work on K-pop tracks have studios in the same building.Berg, Carlebecker, Evers and Gusmark first worked together in 2017 on “Peek-a-Boo,” a Red Velvet track that Berg likened to an old “Scooby-Doo” episode or a trip to a haunted house. “Peek-a-Boo” has since been streamed more than 217 million times on YouTube.EKKO is not the only company pumping out K-pop in Stockholm. Cosmos, a publisher, has seven songwriters working full time on K-pop tracks, Peo Nylen, its creative director, said in an email. The Kennel, another songwriting company, employs 14 K-pop writers, said Iggy Strange-Dahl, one of its founders.K-pop may seem like a recent phenomenon to Western music fans who caught on with the rise of BTS, but Korean record labels have been seeking out European songwriters since the late 1990s in a bid for global success, said Michael Fuhr, a German academic who wrote a book about K-pop. “They had Max Martin productions in mind,” he said, adding that the first successful European K-pop writers were actually Finnish and Norwegian, not Swedish.Today, songwriters of many nationalities are trying to make K-pop hits, Fuhr said, attracted, in part, by the fact that Koreans still buy CDs, so there is a lot of money to be made. SM Entertainment, a Korean entertainment conglomerate, says on its website that it works with 864 songwriters worldwide, including 451 across Europe and 210 in North America.Fuhr said that many K-pop hits were written at songwriting “camps” organized by record labels or publishers who invite musicians from across the world. Over multiple days, songwriters work in teams to create new songs. (American pop songs are also commonly written this way.)Gusmark, left, and Evers working in the studio. They perform together as Moonshine.Felix Odell for The New York TimesCarlebecker said in a video interview that she became hooked on K-pop when she first heard it, in 2016. As a child, she loved the Spice Girls, she said — “I had all the posters, I had all the CDs” — so K-pop instantly felt familiar, with its multitude of girl and boy groups in which each member has a uniquely defined personality.She immediately grasped that K-pop tracks must have multiple sections so each group member has a chance to shine, she said, whether they want to rap, sing softly or belt out a chorus. Having so many sections provides a lot more opportunities to be creative than on a typical Western pop song, she added.“There are no rules in K-pop — you can have three hooks, one after each other, if you feel like it,” Carlebecker said. “You can be crazy and colorful, and that’s what appealed the most.”Carlebecker, who is covered neck-to-toe in tattoos — a look that would be unlikely on an actual K-pop star — said she knew only two words of Korean: “annyeonghaseyo” (hello) and “gamsahabnida” (thank you).But that didn’t get in the way of her songwriting, she said: Carlebecker writes in English, and then Korean songwriters add new lyrics to her melodies, often keeping in a few random English words to help the track stand out.In interviews, Berg and Carlebecker offered multiple theories to explain why Swedes produce such good K-pop tracks, including the country’s strong songwriting tradition and comprehensive music education system. Sweden is cold, Berg noted, which meant that there was often “nothing better to do” than stay in and work on music.For some Koreans, the reason is actually quite simple: Swedes write melodies that are so catchy, fans want to sing them at packed stadium shows and at their local karaoke bars.“Swedes seem to have an emotional understanding of us Koreans,” Michelle Cho, a Korean songwriter who also scouts foreign songwriters for Korean record labels, said in a telephone interview. “They write melodies that seem to really hit our emotions.”Whatever the reason, as K-pop booms, competition among songwriters around the world is becoming fierce. Evers, of Moonshine, said that a few years ago, some songwriters in Sweden used to look down on his work as “a bit lame,” as though he’d failed to land gigs with American or European musicians and now had to ply his trade in Asia. Now, Evers said, those same people were coming up to him in bars saying, “We should write K-pop sometime!”Thanks to his success, he added, he was starting to get a tiny insight into the life of a K-pop idol. K-pop fans regularly contacted Moonshine on social media to praise the duo for its work, Evers said, and a popular K-pop YouTube channel has interviewed him.Swedish K-pop writers are getting noticed in Sweden, too. In November, Carlebecker was named “international success of the year” at Sweden’s annual songwriting awards, beating Max Martin (and Moonshine). Articles about the songwriters have appeared in the country’s major newspapers, and Berg and Carlebecker have been interviewed for TV news.Still, Evers said, not everyone has grasped just how significant K-pop is becoming for Sweden’s music industry.“My grandma still doesn’t understand what I do for a living,” Evers said. “She doesn’t think it’s real.” More

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      Suga of BTS Tests Positive for Covid

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      SEOUL — Suga, a member of the global K-pop phenomenon BTS, has tested positive for the coronavirus, the group’s management company said on Friday.The company, Big Hit Music, said in a statement that Suga, 28, who returned to South Korea from the United States on Thursday, discovered on Friday that he was infected while in quarantine and after taking a P.C.R. test.He had tested negative before traveling to the United States, the statement said, and had received his second vaccine dose in August.Suga had no contact with the other members of BTS — RM, Jin, J-Hope, Jimin, V and Jungkook — the statement said. He was not displaying any symptoms as of Friday, and he was isolating at home, the company said.The news comes a month after another K-pop megastar, Lalisa Manoban, 24, of Blackpink, better known as Lisa, also tested positive for the coronavirus. The other members of Blackpink — Jennie, Jisoo and Rosé — tested negative for the virus, the production company, YG Entertainment, said in an emailed statement last month.Suga, the stage name for the artist Min Yoon-gi, made his debut with BTS in 2013. The Korean pop group, a multibillion-dollar act, is known for dynamic dance moves, catchy lyrics and fiercely devoted fans.In 2018, BTS became the first K-pop group to top the Billboard album chart, with “Love Yourself: Tear.” In September this year, the group gave a speech at the U.N. headquarters in New York, promoting coronavirus vaccinations and praising young people for their resiliency during the pandemic.Suga has stepped out for solo projects, sometimes performing as Agust D, and as a commercial producer. In an interview with GQ Australia that was published this week, he said: “All three are me. They each take up a third of myself, and one isn’t more reflective of me than another. I simply give people a choice. These three sides of myself are incredibly different, so I’m giving people a choice to see me as they want.”This week, Billboard’s Charts reported that Suga and Juice WRLD, the stage name for the artist Jarad A. Higgins, had the best-selling song in the United States with “Girl of My Dreams,” the first time a song by either artist to hit No. 1 on any chart, according to Yahoo News. Juice WRLD died in December 2019, and the song is part of the artist’s posthumous album, “Fighting Demons.”John Yoon More

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      North Korea Executes People for Watching K-Pop, Rights Group Says

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      At least seven people have been put to death in the past decade for watching or distributing K-pop videos, as the North cracks down on what its leader calls a “vicious cancer.”SEOUL — North Korea has publicly executed at least seven people in the past decade for watching or distributing K-pop videos from South Korea, as it cracks down on what its leader, Kim Jong-un, calls a “vicious cancer,” according to a human rights report released on Wednesday.​The group, ​ Transitional Justice Working Group, which is based in Seoul, interviewed 683 North Korean defectors since 2015 to help map places in the North where people were ​killed and buried​ in state-sanctioned public executions​. In its latest report, the group said it had documented 23 such executions under Mr. Kim’s government.Since taking power a decade ago, Mr. Kim has attacked South Korean entertainment — songs, movies and TV dramas — which, he says, corrupts North Koreans’ minds. Under a law adopted last December, those who distribute South Korean entertainment can face the death penalty. One tactic of Mr. Kim’s clampdown has been to create an atmosphere of terror by publicly executing people found guilty of watching or circulating the banned content.It remains impossible to find out the true scale of public executions in the isolated totalitarian state. But Transitional Justice Working Group focused on executions that have taken place since Mr. Kim ascended and on those that have occurred in Hyesan, a North Korean city and a major trading hub on the border with China.The North Korean town of Hyesan, near the border with China, is a gateway to smuggle in South Korean entertainment stored on USB sticks.Damir Sagolj/ReutersThousands of North Korean defectors to South Korea have lived in or have passed through Hyesan. The city of 200,000 people is the main gateway for outside information, including South Korean entertainment stored on computer memory sticks and bootlegged across the border from China. As such, Hyesan has become a focus in Mr. Kim’s efforts to stop the infiltration of K-pop.Of the seven executions for watching or distributing South Korean videos, all but one took place in Hyesan, the report says. The six in Hyesan occurred between 2012 and 2014. Citizens were mobilized to watch the grisly scenes, where officials called the condemned social evil before they each were put to death by a total of nine shots fired by three soldiers.“The families of those being executed were often forced to watch the execution,” the report said.Mr. Kim rules North Korea with the help of a personality cult and a state propaganda machine that controls nearly every aspect of life in the North. All radios and television sets are set to receive government broadcasts only. People are blocked from using the global internet. But some North Koreans still manage to secretly watch South Korea’s movies and TV dramas. As the North’s economy has floundered amid the pandemic and international sanctions, defections to the South have continued.North Korean defectors filling bottles with rice and USB sticks to toss into the sea toward their former homeland.Ed Jones/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe number of defectors arriving in South Korea has dropped sharply in recent years, however, so gathering fresh information on the North has become harder. Mr. Kim’s government has also further tightened border restrictions amid the pandemic.But Daily NK, a Seoul-based website that gathers news from clandestine sources in the North, reported that a villager and an army officer were publicly executed this year in towns deeper inland for distributing or possessing South Korean entertainment.And a few secretly filmed video clippings of public trials and executions have been smuggled out of North Korea. In footage shown on the South Korean TV station Channel A last year, a North Korean student was brought before a huge throng of people, including fellow students, and was condemned for possessing a USB stick that held “a movie and 75 songs from South Korea.”Shin Eun-ha told Channel A of a public execution she and her classmates had been made to watch from the front row when she was in second grade in North Korea. “The prisoner could hardly walk and had to be dragged out,” she said, adding, “I was so terrified that I could not dare look at a soldier in uniform for six months afterward.”Though Mr. Kim has described South Korean entertainment as a “vicious cancer,” North Koreans were able to watch the popular girl band Red Velvet and other South Korean stars who flew to Pyongyang in 2018 for two performances.Korea Pool via APMr. Kim has at times tried to appear more flexible toward outside culture​, allowing state television ​to play the theme song from “Rocky” and to show ​Mickey and Minnie Mouse characters ​onstage. He even invited South Korean K-pop stars to the capital, Pyongyang, in 2018, when he was engaged in summit diplomacy with President Moon Jae-in of South Korea. But at home, he has also escalated his crackdown on K-pop, especially after his talks with President Donald J. Trump collapsed in 2019 and the North’s economy has deteriorated in recent years.Amid growing international scrutiny of North Korea’s human rights abuses, the government appears to have taken steps to prevent information about its public executions from being leaked to the outside world.It no longer appears to execute prisoners at market places, moving the sites farther away from the border with China or town centers, and inspecting spectators more closely to prevent them from filming the executions, Transitional Justice Working Group said.Mr. Kim has also tried to create a public image as a benevolent leader by occasionally pardoning people condemned to death, especially when the size of an assembled crowd at a public trial is large, the group said.But K-pop seems to be an enemy that Mr. Kim cannot ignore.North Korea repeatedly lashes out against what it describes as an invasion of “anti-socialist and nonsocialist” influences from the South. It cracks down on South Korean slang spreading among its youths, including “oppa,” which became internationally known through Psy’s “Gangnam Style” song and video.The North’s state media has also warned that if left unchecked, K-pop’s influence would make North Korea “crumble like a damp wall.” More

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      K-Pop Star Lisa of Blackpink Tests Positive for Covid

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      Lalisa Manoban, a global megastar who performs as Lisa in the K-pop group Blackpink, tested positive for the coronavirus on Wednesday, her production company announced.The other members of Blackpink, a four-woman group whose fame and commercial success have traveled far beyond South Korea, were not listed as close contacts but were awaiting results of a PCR test, the production company, YG Entertainment, said in a statement sent to Korean news organizations.As of Wednesday morning, Ms. Manoban, 24, had not yet addressed her nearly 68 million Instagram followers on the positive test.A Thai-born singer and rapper, Ms. Manoban is among the most acclaimed faces of K-pop, with legions of fans. She is part of K-pop’s most globally successful all-female group; five of Blackpink’s videos have been watched more than 1 billion times on YouTube, including 1.7 billion views for “DDU-DU DDU-DU.”Ms. Manoban’s debut solo album, “Lalisa,” was released on Sept. 10; her first single, “LALISA,” set a YouTube record for the most-viewed music video by a solo artist in 24 hours with 73.6 million views, dethroning Taylor Swift’s “ME!” in 2019. More

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      From BTS to ‘Squid Game’: How South Korea Became a Cultural Juggernaut

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      The country was once largely known for cars and smartphones, but a global audience has become mesmerized by its entertainment, and creators say success didn’t happen overnight.PAJU, South Korea — In a new Korean drama being filmed inside a cavernous studio building outside of Seoul, a detective chases down a man cursed to live for 600 years. Pistol shots crack. A hush follows. Then, a woman pierces the silence, screaming: “I told you not to shoot him in ​the heart!”The scene was filmed several times for more than an hour as part of “Bulgasal: Immortal Souls,” a new show scheduled to be released on Netflix in December. Jang Young-woo, the director, hopes it will be the latest South Korean phenomenon to captivate an international audience.South Korea has long chafed at its lack of groundbreaking cultural exports. For decades the country’s reputation was defined by its cars and cellphones from companies like Hyundai and LG, while its movies, TV shows and music were mostly consumed by a regional audience. Now K-pop stars like Blackpink, the dystopian drama “Squid Game” and award-winning films such as “Parasite” appear as ubiquitous as any Samsung smartphone.Jang Young-woo, the director of “Bulgasal: Immortal Souls.” He hopes it will be the latest South Korean phenomenon to captivate an international audience.Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesIn the same way South Korea borrowed from Japan and the United States to develop its manufacturing prowess, the country’s directors and producers say they have been studying Hollywood and other entertainment hubs for years, adopting and refining formulas by adding distinctly Korean touches. Once streaming services like Netflix tore down geographical barriers, the creators say, the country transformed from a consumer of Western culture into an entertainment juggernaut and major cultural exporter in its own right.In the last few years alone, South Korea shocked the world with “Parasite,” the first foreign language film to win best picture at the Academy Awards. It has one of the biggest, if not the biggest, band in the world with BTS. Netflix has introduced 80 Korean movies and TV shows in the last few years, far more than it had imagined when it started its service in South Korea in 2016, according to the company. Three of the 10 most popular TV shows on Netflix as of Monday were South Korean.“When we made ‘Mr. Sunshine,’ ‘Crash Landing on You’ and ‘Sweet Home,’ we didn’t have a global reaction in mind,” said Mr. Jang, who worked as co-producer or co-director on all three hit Korean Netflix shows. “We just tried to make them as interesting and meaningful as possible. It’s the world that has started understanding and identifying with the emotional experiences we have been creating all along.”The South Korean dystopian drama “Squid Game” became the most watched show on Netflix.NetflixThe growing demand for Korean entertainment has inspired independent creators like Seo Jea-won, who wrote the script for “Bulgasal” with his wife. Mr. Seo said his generation devoured American TV hits like “The Six Million Dollar Man” and “Miami Vice,” learning “the basics” and experimenting with the form by adding Korean colors. “When over-the-top streaming services like Netflix arrived with a revolution in distributing TV shows, we were ready to compete,” he said.South Korea’s cultural output is still tiny compared with key exports like semiconductors, but it has given the country the sort of influence that can be hard to measure. In September, the Oxford English Dictionary added 26 new words of Korean origin, including “hallyu,” or Korean wave. North Korea has called the K-pop invasion a “vicious cancer.” China has suspended dozens of K-pop fan accounts on social media for their “unhealthy” behavior.The country’s ability to punch above its weight as a cultural powerhouse contrasts with Beijing’s ineffective state-led campaigns to achieve the same kind of sway. South Korean officials who have attempted to censor the country’s artists have not been very successful. Instead, politicians have begun promoting South Korean pop culture, enacting a law to allow some male pop artists to postpone conscription. This month, officials allowed Netflix to install a giant “Squid Game” statue in Seoul’s Olympic Park.Seo Jea-won, the writer behind “Bulgasal.” The show’s supernatural plot recalls American TV favorites like “X-Files” and “Stranger Things.”Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesThe explosive success didn’t happen overnight. Long before “Squid Game” became the most watched TV show on Netflix or BTS performed at the United Nations, Korean TV shows like “Winter Sonata” and bands like Bigbang and Girls’ Generation had conquered markets in Asia and beyond. But they were unable to achieve the global reach associated with the current wave. Psy’s “Gangnam Style” was a one-hit wonder.“We love to tell stories and have good stories to tell,” said Kim Young-kyu, CEO of Studio Dragon, South Korea’s largest studio, which makes dozens of TV shows a year. “But our domestic market is too small, too crowded. We needed to go global.”It wasn’t until last year when “Parasite,” a film highlighting the yawning gap between rich and poor, won the Oscar that international audiences truly began to pay attention, even though South Korea had been producing similar work for years.“The world just didn’t know about them until streaming platforms like Netflix and YouTube helped it discover them at a time when people watch more entertainment online,” said Kang Yu-jung, a professor at Kangnam University, in Seoul.A scene from “Parasite,” the first foreign language film to win best picture at the Academy Awards.EPA, via ShutterstockBefore Netflix, a select number of national broadcasters controlled South Korea’s television industry. Those broadcasters have since been eclipsed by streaming platforms and independent studios like Studio Dragon, which provide the financing and artistic freedom needed to target international markets.South Korean censors screen media for content deemed violent or sexually explicit, but Netflix shows are subject to less stringent restrictions than those broadcast on local TV networks. Creators also say that domestic censorship laws have forced ​them to dig deeper into their imagination, crafting characters and plots that are much more compelling than most..css-1xzcza9{list-style-type:disc;padding-inline-start:1em;}.css-3btd0c{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-3btd0c{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-3btd0c strong{font-weight:600;}.css-3btd0c em{font-style:italic;}.css-1kpebx{margin:0 auto;font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.3125rem;color:#121212;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:700;font-size:1.375rem;line-height:1.625rem;}@media (min-width:740px){#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-1kpebx{font-size:1.6875rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1kpebx{font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.4375rem;}}.css-1gtxqqv{margin-bottom:0;}.css-1g3vlj0{font-family:nyt-franklin,helvetica,arial,sans-serif;font-size:1rem;line-height:1.375rem;color:#333;margin-bottom:0.78125rem;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-1g3vlj0{font-size:1.0625rem;line-height:1.5rem;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}}.css-1g3vlj0 strong{font-weight:600;}.css-1g3vlj0 em{font-style:italic;}.css-1g3vlj0{margin-bottom:0;margin-top:0.25rem;}.css-19zsuqr{display:block;margin-bottom:0.9375rem;}.css-m80ywj header{margin-bottom:5px;}.css-m80ywj header h4{font-family:nyt-cheltenham,georgia,’times new roman’,times,serif;font-weight:500;font-size:1.25rem;line-height:1.5625rem;margin-bottom:0;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-m80ywj header h4{font-size:1.5625rem;line-height:1.875rem;}}.css-12vbvwq{background-color:white;border:1px solid #e2e2e2;width:calc(100% – 40px);max-width:600px;margin:1.5rem auto 1.9rem;padding:15px;box-sizing:border-box;}@media (min-width:740px){.css-12vbvwq{padding:20px;width:100%;}}.css-12vbvwq:focus{outline:1px solid #e2e2e2;}#NYT_BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT_REGION .css-12vbvwq{border:none;padding:10px 0 0;border-top:2px solid #121212;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-rdoyk0{-webkit-transform:rotate(0deg);-ms-transform:rotate(0deg);transform:rotate(0deg);}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-eb027h{max-height:300px;overflow:hidden;-webkit-transition:none;transition:none;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-5gimkt:after{content:’See more’;}.css-12vbvwq[data-truncated] .css-6mllg9{opacity:1;}.css-qjk116{margin:0 auto;overflow:hidden;}.css-qjk116 strong{font-weight:700;}.css-qjk116 em{font-style:italic;}.css-qjk116 a{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;text-underline-offset:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-thickness:1px;text-decoration-thickness:1px;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:visited{color:#326891;-webkit-text-decoration-color:#326891;text-decoration-color:#326891;}.css-qjk116 a:hover{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Scenes often overflow with emotionally rich interactions, or “sinpa.” Heroes are usually deeply flawed, ordinary people trapped in impossible situations, clinging to shared values such as love, family and caring for others. Directors and producers say they deliberately want all of their characters to “smell like humans.”Kim Young-kyu, CEO of Studio Dragon, which makes dozens of South Korean TV shows a year. Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesAs South Korea emerged from the vortex of war, dictatorship, democratization and rapid economic growth, its creators developed a keen nose for what people wanted to watch and hear, and it often had to do with social change. Most national blockbusters have story lines based on issues that speak to common people, such as income inequality and the despair and class conflict it has spawned.“Squid Game” director Hwang Dong-hyuk first made a name for himself with “Dogani,” a 2011 movie based on a real-life sexual abuse scandal in a school for the hearing-impaired. The widespread anger the film incited forced the government to ferret out teachers who had records of sexual abuse​ from schools for disabled minors​.Although K-pop artists rarely speak about politics, their music has loomed large in South Korea’s lively protest culture. When students in Ewha Womans University in Seoul started campus rallies that led to a nationwide anti-government uprising in 2016, they sang Girls’ Generation’s “Into the New World.” The boy band g.o.d.’s “One Candle” became an unofficial anthem for the “Candlelight Revolution” that toppled President Park Geun-hye.The K-Pop band Blackpink, which has conquered markets in Asia and beyond.Netflix, via Associated Press“One dominating feature of Korean content is its combativeness,” said Lim Myeong-mook, author of a book about Korean youth culture. “It channels the people’s frustrated desire for upward mobility, their anger and their motivation for mass activism.” And with many people now stuck at home trying to manage the enormous angst caused by the pandemic, global audiences may be more receptive to those themes than ever before.“Korean creators are adept at quickly copying what’s interesting from abroad and making it their own by making it more interesting and better,” said Lee Hark-joon, a professor of Kyungil University who co-authored “K-pop Idols.”On the set of “Bulgasal,” dozens of staffers scurried around to get every detail of the scene just right — the smog filling the air, the water drops falling on the damp floor and the “sad and pitiable​”​ look of the gunned-down man. The show’s supernatural plot recalls American TV favorites like “X-Files” and “Stranger Things,” yet Mr. Jang has created a uniquely Korean tragedy centered on “eopbo,” a belief among Koreans that both good and bad deeds affect a person in the afterlife.Based on the recent success of Korean shows abroad, Mr. Jang said he hopes viewers will flock to the new series. “The takeaway is: what sells in South Korea sells globally.”Construction of new studios at the complex where “Bulgasal” was filmed. “Our domestic market is too small, too crowded. We needed to go global,” Mr. Kim said.Chang W. Lee/The New York Times More

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      China's Weibo Suspends BTS, Blackpink and EXO Fan Accounts

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      Weibo accused one account devoted to a BTS member of illegal fund-raising amid a crackdown on 22 pages.HONG KONG — One month before the 26th birthday of Park Ji-min, a member of the South Korean boy band BTS, his fans in China pooled money to plaster his photographs and a declaration of their “eternal love” on the exterior of an airplane.As pictures of the customized Jeju Air plane circulated widely in China last week, Weibo, a Chinese microblogging platform, took notice. It accused the fan account of “illegal fund-raising,” and on Sunday, it banned the page from posting on the site for 60 days.The First in the world—Customized Exclusive Airplane in cooperation with Jeju AirPeriod: 9.1-11.30Flight Number: HL8087Note: The route may be changed due to some special reasons, please download Flightradar24 to check the flight information. pic.twitter.com/vp6AMpqjgd— PARKJIMINBAR👑 (@JIMINBAR_CHINA) September 1, 2021
      Weibo did not stop there. Hours later, the social media platform said that it would also suspend 21 other K-pop fan accounts for a month, including those that worship other BTS members; the girl group Blackpink; and EXO, a band with Chinese members, after receiving complaints.It was not immediately clear what social media crimes the fan accounts for Blackpink and EXO were deemed to have committed, but the move by Weibo came amid the backdrop of a broader government crackdown on celebrity worship and online fan culture in China.Beijing has recently taken steps to rein in fan clubs amid growing concern that the quest for online attention and celebrity adulation is poisoning the minds of the country’s youth.In its statement, Weibo said that stricter oversight of the fan groups would “purify” the online atmosphere and fulfill the platform’s responsibilities to society. It said that it would remove related blog posts that violated regulations and stressed that it “firmly opposes such irrational celebrity-chasing behavior and will deal with it seriously.”Weibo repeatedly cited a National Radio and Television Administration notice issued on Thursday for the need to manage the “chaos of fan clubs.” In the notice, the government regulator said it would ban broadcasts of “vulgar internet celebrities” and feminine-looking men. It stressed the importance of rectifying the “unlawful and immoral behavior” of celebrities and of upholding an industrywide standard of “loving the party and loving the country” in artistic creations.Representatives for BTS, Blackpink and EXO could not immediately be reached for comment. K-pop fans denounced Weibo’s action, calling it unwarranted and overly harsh.Agnes He, a university student in the southeastern Jiangsu Province of China, said that she believed it could help rein in fan behavior that had gone too far. But she also fretted about whether she could still buy albums at a discounted price through group purchases organized by the fan accounts.“I am quite sensible when chasing stars,” Ms. He said in a phone interview on Monday, adding that she saw pop idols as positive and energizing influences. “It’s a personal freedom. Just because I like Korean pop idols doesn’t mean I’m not patriotic.”K-pop fans around the world are known for their organizational prowess, with many decking out billboards, giant LED screens and public transportation vehicles to show support ahead of an album release or a favorite band member’s birthday. Some have turned to political activism, and others took credit for helping to inflate expectations for a rally in Oklahoma for Donald J. Trump, then the American president, by reserving tickets they had no intentions of using.But the online armies of Korean pop music fans are running up against President Xi Jinping’s sweeping agenda to clean up aspects of the entertainment industry in China. The Cyberspace Administration of China banned the ranking of celebrities by popularity. A regulator also accused an actress, Zheng Shuang, of tax evasion, fined her more than $46 million and ordered broadcasters to stop showing content in which she had appeared.BTS ran afoul of Chinese patriotic sentiment last year, when its leader, Kim Nam-joon, who performs under the stage name RM (formerly Rap Monster), made a seemingly innocuous remark about the shared suffering of Americans and Koreans during a ceremony commemorating the Korean War.Chinese internet users erupted in anger, questioning why he had not also recognized the sacrifices of the Chinese soldiers who had fought on the side of North Korea. To pre-empt a nationalistic backlash, multinational brands scrubbed references of their collaborations with BTS on their Chinese websites and social media accounts.This week, Chinese internet users both celebrated and criticized the suspension of the K-pop fan accounts. Some saw it as a necessary balm against idol worship and excessive spending on celebrities, even going as far as to call BTS an “anti-China group” and Korean pop music a form of “cultural invasion.”Dew Ding, a 24-year-old filmmaker in Beijing, was among those who supported the banning of the BTS singer’s fan account, saying that fans were overly incentivized to spend money in order to maintain an imaginary relationship with their idol.“This crowdfunding is getting more and more crazy, so I don’t think is a good thing,” she said.But Allen Huang, a Taipei-based D.J. who often writes about K-pop, said he did not believe that the ban would be effective in stopping fan accounts. To evade censorship and suspensions, many were rushing to hide their fund-raising campaigns, he said, sometimes by merely removing the word “fan page” from their accounts.“Chinese people will find ways to continue to support, whether that’s through non-Weibo fan clubs, silent fund-raising or just a rebranding of the idea of fan funding,” he said.Li You More

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      Police in China Detain Canadian Pop Star Kris Wu on Suspicion of Rape

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      Kris Wu, a 30-year-old celebrity, is the most prominent figure in China to be held over #MeToo allegations.The police in Beijing said Saturday they had detained Kris Wu, a popular Canadian Chinese singer, on suspicion of rape amid a #MeToo controversy that has set off outrage in China.The police did not provide details of their investigation into Mr. Wu. But it comes several weeks after an 18-year-old university student in Beijing accused him of enticing young women like herself with the promise of career opportunities, then pressuring them into having sex.Known in China as Wu Yifan, Mr. Wu, 30, is the most prominent figure in China to be detained over #MeToo allegations.He rose to fame as a member of the Korean pop band EXO, then started a successful solo career as a model, actor and singer. Though he denied the allegations when they first surfaced, they set off an uproar that led at least a dozen companies, including Bulgari, Louis Vuitton and Porsche, to sever ties with the singer.The Chaoyang District branch of the Beijing police said in a statement on social media on Saturday night that it had been looking into accusations posted online that Mr. Wu “repeatedly deceived young women into sexual relations.” It said that Mr. Wu had been detained while the criminal investigation continued.Mr. Wu’s accuser, Du Meizhu, has said publicly that when she first met Mr. Wu in December last year, she was taken by the singer’s agent to his home in Beijing for work-related discussions. She said that she was pressured to drink cocktails until she passed out, and later found herself in his bed.They dated until March, according to her account of the events, when he stopped responding to her calls and messages. She has also said she believed that he targeted other young women.Mr. Wu’s lawyer did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Ms. Du could not be reached.It was not immediately clear if the police were specifically investigating Ms. Du’s claims. In a statement in July, the police had released what appeared to be preliminary findings about Ms. Du’s allegations. The police had said Ms. Du had hyped her story “to enhance her online popularity,” an assessment that was criticized by her supporters as victim shaming.The outpouring of support for Ms. Du was a sign that the country’s nascent #MeToo movement continues to grow despite the government’s strict limits on activism and dissent. After Ms. Du spoke out, her supporters flooded the social media pages of several brands, threatening boycotts if they did not drop their partnerships with Mr. Wu, a campaign that quickly forced the companies to distance themselves from him.The accusations have triggered a heated debate on issues like victim-shaming, consent and abuse of power in the workplace — concepts that had rarely featured in mainstream discussions before the #MeToo movement went global.The authorities in China often discourage women from filing sexual misconduct complaints, and sexual assault or harassment survivors are frequently shamed and even sued for defamation. Censorship and limits on dissent have also stymied efforts among feminist activists to organize, even as trolls are given cover to spew abuse.Yet the high-profile nature of the controversy made Ms. Du’s allegations impossible to ignore for Chinese authorities, who are always on the lookout for what they deem to be potential sources of social unrest.The police announcement, posted on the country’s popular Weibo social media platform, immediately started trending, drawing more than six million likes.Lu Pin, a New York-based feminist activist, said the detention of Mr. Wu was a major step forward for the #MeToo movement in China.“Regardless of what the motivation of the police may have been, just the fact that he was detained is huge,” Ms. Lu said.“For the last three years, a number of prominent figures have faced #MeToo accusations but nothing ever happened to them,” Ms. Lu said. “Now with Wu Yifan, #MeToo has finally taken down someone with real power in China — it has shown that no matter how powerful you are, rape is not acceptable.”The detention of Mr. Wu comes amid a broader government crackdown on the entertainment industry.In recent years, Chinese authorities have moved aggressively to clean up the industrywide problem of tax evasion and to cap salaries for the country’s biggest movie stars. In June, the country’s internet watchdog began a crackdown on what it called the country’s “chaotic” online celebrity fan clubs, which the government has come to see as an increasing source of volatility in public opinion.The People’s Daily, the mouthpiece of the ruling Communist Party, depicted Mr. Wu’s detention as a warning to celebrities that neither fame nor a foreign citizenship would shield them from the law.“A foreign nationality is not a talisman. No matter how famous one is, there is no immunity,” the propaganda outlet wrote. “Remember: The higher the popularity, the more you must be self-disciplined, the more popular you are, the more you must abide by the law.” More