Paramount+ to launch Korean service on Tving platform next month

Paramount +, a US streaming service owned by Paramount Global, will begin its service in South Korea through local streamer Tving on June 16, Tving said Tuesday. It said the new American service will become available on its platform to all its subscribers without extra charge. South Korea will be the first Asian country where Paramount+ is serviced. The streaming service is currently available in the United States, Canada, Latin America, northern European countries and Australia, and is expected

May 24, 2022

BLACKPINK on cover of Rolling Stone

South Korea's K-pop girl group BLACKPINK has appeared on the front of the latest issue of the US music magazine Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone revealed the cover of its June issue Monday (US time), describing the girl group as a "pop supernova." It marks the first time any girl group has appeared on the magazine's cover since Destiny's Child of the United States in 2001 and BLACKPINK also is the second all-Asian act to appear on its cover, according to the magazine. "

May 24, 2022

[Today’s K-pop] TXT hits Billboard chart at No. 4 with 4th EP

Tomorrow X Together entered Billboard 200 at No. 4 with its fourth EP “minisode 2: Thursday’s Child.” 　 The boy band “notched its highest-charting album yet,” said the publication on the website on Sunday in the US. 　 This is the band’s sixth time entering the chart. It also put two albums among top five on the chart back to back, label Big Hit Music said. 　 TXT came in first place at a television music chart show with main track “Good Boy Gone Bad&rd

May 23, 2022

GOT7 is back to prove they have never separated, keep promise with fans

The return of boy band GOT7 to the K-pop scene in around a year and half on Monday was a comeback like no other. The septet, gathered at a hotel in Seoul that afternoon for a press conference about their new album, “GOT7,” referred to their comeback as “a miracle” themselves. “We’re so lucky that the seven of us could be doing this all together. We’d like to express a sincere gratitude to all the officials of each of our agencies, staff members of War

May 23, 2022

[Herald Interview] BIG Naughty sails through ‘love’ to find true meaning of ‘romance’

When 15-year-old rapper BIG Naughty appeared on the hip-hop audition program “Show Me The Money 8” in 2019, little did people know that he would be re-shaping the East-meets-street style of beats. In the same year, he got picked up by H1ghr Music, becoming one of the youngest faces on the global hip-hop agency’s roster. “Three years, I’ll be big in Korea,” he said, and true to his word, he has come far with his music since then. BIG Naughty has built himsel

May 23, 2022

’The Roundup’ sells more than 3.55m tickets within a week

“The Roundup,” the sequel to the hit crime film “The Outlaws” (2017), sold more than 3.55 million tickets in the first week of its release, according to the Korean Film Council. It surpassed Marvel’s “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” (2022), which sold 3,497,393 tickets during the first seven days of the film’s release. The sequel to the 2017 hit Korean comedy topped the local box office over the weekend -- from Friday to Sunday --

May 23, 2022

[Feature] Broadcast, content creators present school violence as inexcusable

School violence has become one of the hottest topics in the Korean entertainment industry in recent years. Accusations of past school bullying by K-pop artists and actors have made headlines and led to some celebrities exiting the industry and affecting the TV shows in which they were involved. Now, an increasing number of TV dramas, films and talk shows are depicting physical altercations in schools in a more serious, grave tone in an attempt to raise alarm about the gravity and preponderanc

May 22, 2022

Director Cha Bong-joo creates ‘Good Morning’ after watching documentary about hospice center

Director Cha Bong-joo said he created his debut feature “Good Morning” after he watched a documentary about patients at a hospice center. “As I was working on the script, I watched a documentary about a hospice center and there was one person who grabbed my attention,” Cha said at a press conference at CGV Yongsan on Thursday. “I found out that he did not have much time left, but he looked so bright and it made me shed tears. I wanted my character Soo-mi to feel

May 22, 2022

Controversy grows over ‘Music Bank’ scoring system

Public broadcaster KBS has come under fire over the scoring system of its music program “Music Bank” with some viewers raising the possibility of vote rigging despite explanations by the broadcaster. On May 13, hugely popular trot singer Lim Young-woong’s “If We Ever Meet Again” and rookie girl group Le Sserafim’s “Fearless” were in contention for first place on “Music Bank.” The trophy went to Le Sserafim as the band scored 7,881 poin

May 20, 2022

[Today’s K-pop] Seventeen sells 2m copies of 4th LP in preorders

   　 Seventeen’s upcoming fourth studio album sold more than 2 million copies in preorders, according to distributor YG Plus on Friday. 　 The LP “Face the Sun” is likely to become the biggest-selling album for the band whose five previous albums each sold over a million units. 　 The LP will be fully unveiled on May 27 and the 13-member act will host a showcase the next day. The event will be broadcast live around the world through a range of platforms including

May 20, 2022

Kakao Entertainment presents ‘Thor’ webtoon

Kakao Entertainment unveiled a webtoon version of the upcoming American superhero film “Thor: Love and Thunder” Thursday. Celebrating the release of the film, the first four episodes are available free of charge. The webtoon, based on the Marvel Comics series of the same title published in 2019, revolves around the exciting journey of Thor, who seeks to solve the mystery behind Gorr the God Butcher and stop him from committing a massacre. The comic is widely recognized for Americ

May 20, 2022

Le Sserafim’s Kim Ga-ram halts activities as bullying allegations grow

Kim Ga-ram of rookie girl group Le Sserafim is halting all of her activities amid growing controversy over bullying allegations against her. The six-member act’s management agency Source Music announced a temporary suspension of Kim’s activities Friday via the group’s fan community platform Weverse. “After discussions with Kim Ga-ram, it has been decided that the member will take a break for a while to ease her mind. ... Until Kim’s return, Le Sserafim will conti

May 20, 2022

[Box Office] Movies in theaters this week

The Roundup (Korea) Opened May 18 Crime Directed by Lee Sang-yong Cop Ma Seok-do heads to Vietnam to extradite a suspect. But soon after his arrival, he discovers murder cases and finds out that the vicious Korean killer (Son Sook-ku) has been committing crimes against Korean tourists for several years. Ma Seok-do decides to chase after the killer but it is not easy as Korean cops do not have investigative power in Vietnam.  Operation Mincemeat (US) Opened May 11 Drama Directed

May 20, 2022

Kim Sae-ron to step down from TV drama

Actor Kim Sae-ron will step down from the upcoming SBS drama “Trolley” (translated) following a drunk driving incident involving the star earlier in the week. Kim and her agency, Gold Medalist, issued official apologies Thursday regarding the actor’s drunk driving on Wednesday morning, resulting in a power outage at some 50 shops in Cheongdam-dong, southern Seoul, after she allegedly bumped into several guardrails, street lamp posts and an electrical transformer box. “

May 19, 2022

BTS’ ‘Proof’: Nine years of evidence and more to come

K-pop sensation BTS’ upcoming anthology album “Proof” is set to offer an expansive look over the group’s nine-year career and what’s to come. BTS’ agency, BigHit Music, revealed the band will be returning to the stage on June 10 with an anthology album spanning the band’s discography. The three-CD collection will allow fans to walk down memory lane and explore unreleased rarities and never-before-heard tunes. The first CD will act as “the chroni

May 19, 2022

[Today’s K-pop] GOT7’s Jay B to host solo fan concert next month

Jay B of GOT7 will host his own fan concert in Seoul on June 18, his label H1gher Music announced on Thursday. 　 The “Nostalgic” concert comes a year after his online fan meet event “Somo:Fume, Style of My Own: Fume” that drew over 1,800 viewers. The concert will be broadcast online as well for fans from around the world. 　 The musician joined the label as a solo artist last year and released his first solo EP “Somo:Fume” that topped iTunes top albums chart

May 19, 2022

GOT7 to make full-group comeback with new self-titled EP

After rumors about GOT7’s new album circulated about a year ago, the boy band finally put a stop to the questions with an announcement of the release of the self-titled EP “GOT7.” On May 9, the band’s new agency Warner Bros Korea said that GOT7 is currently gearing up for a comeback. Set to be released on Monday, this marks the septet’s return in more than one year since its previous work, “Encore.” The news first broke on April 22 as local media out

May 19, 2022

‘American Song Contest’ winner AleXa eager to introduce K-pop globally

Rising K-pop artist AleXa, who won NBC’s “American Song Contest,” said the K-pop genre itself seemed like a new genre in the US music scene and that she was eager to introduce this style of music to US audiences through her performance on the show. “(Winning the competition) feels like a dream. It does not seem real,” AleXa said during a press conference held in Seoul on Thursday upon her arrival in Korea. “I received a lot of public votes. I think it was bec

May 19, 2022

[Herald Interview] ‘The Sound of Magic’ creator believes in magic, power of dreams

When asked about the famous line in the drama “The Sound of Magic” -- “Do you believe in magic?” -- the webtoon author and illustrator Ha Il-kwon replied with a brief answer: “I want to believe in magic.” “I think the question, which is continuously repeated throughout the webtoon, was my personal question to the readers, asking if they still have childhood innocence and dreams in their hearts,” Ha said in an email interview with The Korea Herald

May 19, 2022

From ‘Eternals’ to ‘Roundup,’ Don Lee dons a unique identity

“Ma Dong-seok is his own genre.” Korean moviegoers often say this in reference to the Korean-American movie star, also known as Don Lee, in recognition of his unique screen presence and charisma. A recent survey by online research firm PMI on Koreans aged 20-60 asked what word comes to mind when hearing his name. The answers were in the order of: “muscular/huge,” “tough/strong,” “Mavely (a combination of “Ma” and “lovely”),&rd

May 19, 2022