ABS-CBN & Viu Partner For Philippines Adaptation Of Hit K-Drama ‘What’s Wrong With Secretary Kim’

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Carmen,” “Foe,” “Limbo,” Australia’s Oscar contender “Shayda,” “Streets of Colour” and “The Royal Hotel” have received the six nominations for best feature film at this year’s Screen Producers Australia Awards. The SPA Awards will be held on Thursday, March 21, 2024, the final evening of the Screen Forever conference. In the documentary feature section, the nominations are “Flyaways,” “Harley & Katya,” “Living With Devils,” “ONEFOUR: Against All Odds,” “The Cape,” “The Giants,” “The Jewish Nazi?” and “The Platypus Garden.” Nominations for best telemovie or miniseries production are “While the Men Are Away,” “The Claremont Murders,” “Wellmania,” “The Messenger,” “Bad Behaviour” and “The Clearing.” “2023 was a year filled with a number of challenges for our industry, but the Australian screen sector continued to delight audiences globally with stories that share our unique culture and creativity,” said SPA CEO Matthew Deaner.

Squid Game: The Challenge appears to have launched with a splash in the UK.

Death’s Game, starring Seo In-guk and Park So-dam. Here’s everything you need to know about the new Korean series.Based on a Naver webtoon of the same name, Death’s Game will follow a young man named Choi Yi-jae (Seo In-guk), who tries to take his life after losing his savings in a bitcoin scam.However, Yi-jae’s indifference towards dying offends Death (Parasite’s Park So-dam), and she decides to punish him with a game: Yi-jae has to experience 12 lives and deaths before he is sent to hell.However, Yi-jae learns that he will be able to live on if he manages to evade death in any of the 12 lives.

EXCLUSIVE: Squid Game: The Challenge has piqued the interest of quite a few spectators.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The Philippines’ ABS-CBN is to launch its new series “The Bagman” at next month’s ATF market in Singapore. Series star Arjo Atayde will attend as part of the promotional team. “The Bagman” is a spin-off from the original, locally-produced digital series “Bagman” that was aimed at the Filipino audience.

Philippines media and entertainment company ABS-CBN is set to launch tentpole co-production The Bagman at this year’s Asia TV Forum & Market (ATF) in Singapore, with the star of the series, Arjo Atayde, also attending the event. 

Netflix this week launched a real-life version of its super-popular dystopian Korean drama, Squid Game. The new show, Squid Game: The Challenge, is streaming now and features hundreds of everyday people competing in games from the original series for a chance to win a life-changing multi-million dollar prize. Created by the same people who made The Traitors and Race Across the World, Studio Lambert, it follows 456 real players all vying for a whopping $4.56 million – the biggest cash prize in reality TV history, according to Netflix.

K-pop girl group aespa have released their own version of Bobby Helms’ classic holiday song, ‘Jingle Bell Rock’.Today (November 24), the quartet unveiled a lyric video for their remake of the iconic 1957 Christmas song. aespa’s version of ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ features a hip-hop-inspired beat, as well as a brand-new rap verse.“Ring ring ring, jingle bell rock / Play like a spell I won’t tell, jingle bell talk / So giddy up, giddy up / Turn it up fast till we burn up / We ain’t ever gonna stop, jingle bell rock,” Giselle and Winter rap on the second verse.SM Entertainment first announced the song via a press release earlier this week, describing it as a “catchy and hip” reinterpretation of the classic track, with the girl group’s “unique vocals and rap” setting it aside from the original ‘Jingle Bell Rock’.aespa’s ‘Jingle Bell Rock’ comes just two weeks after they released their fourth mini-album ‘Drama’.

Gyeongseong Creature, starring Han So-hee and Park Seo-jun.Set in the spring of 1945, Gyeongseong Creature will follow several individuals in the city of Gyeongseong – which was the colonial name for Seoul city during the Japanese rule over Korea – as they go up against monstrous creatures born out of human greed.Park Seo-jun will play Jang Tae-sang, the wealthiest and most attractive man in the Bukchon district, who has a penchant for insider information. Meanwhile, Han So-hee will portray Yoon Chae-ok, a skilled todugun (bounty hunter and sleuth who tracks down the missing).The new trailer for Gyeongseong Creature opens with the tense first meeting between Jang Tae-sang and Yoon Chae-ok, as we are introduced to the two character’s contrasting worlds.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The QCinema Project Market, the industry initiative that accompanies The Philippines’ QCinema International Film Festival, revealed its winners list on Tuesday delivering almost $500,000 of grants and in-kind support. The prizes followed a two-day networking and pitching event on Nov. 18 and 19 for 19 feature-length fiction film projects from Southeast Asia.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief BTS, the biggest act in K-pop and one of the world’s hottest contemporary music acts, will be forced into hiatus through 2024 and much of 2025 after it was confirmed Wednesday that four band members — RM, Jimin, V and Jung Kook — will imminently enlist in the Korean military. The four follow Jin, who enlisted in December last year, J-Hope (April) and Suga, who have already begun their mandatory military service. The news was announced by Big Hit Music via social media.

The ladies of Blackpink were among the special guests at a state dinner at Buckingham Palace!

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Cannes’ Directors Fortnight section has joined forces with The Philippines for the latest edition of its Directors Factory professional training program. Operating since 2013, when it kicked off in Taiwan, the Directors’ Factory works with a new partner country each year to mentor eight budding filmmakers who are preparing ambitious first or second feature projects that they will make in pairs. The four resulting co-written and co-directed short films will be screened as part of the Directors’ Fortnight (aka Quinzaine des Cineastes) in May. Four pairs were selected in Manila in October: Eve Baswel (Philippines) and Gogularaajan Rajendran (Malaysia); Maria Estela Paiso (Philippines) and Ashok Vish (India); Arvin Belarmino (Philippines) and Lomorpich Rithy (aka YoKi) (Cambodia); Don Josephus Raphael Eblahan (Philippines) and Tan Siyou (Singapore). They have now begun writing their screenplays and are expected to shoot their films March in Dapitan, a city in The Philippines’ Zamboanga Peninsula, known for its many shrines and as the place of exile of Philippines’ national hero, Jose Rizal. These days it is a hub for domestic and international tourism. Post-production of the four titles will then be hosted in Quezon City, which seeks to become the new film capital of the Philippines and where many of the country’s post-production houses are already based. The program is operated and co-produced by Epicmedia Productions of The Philippines and Dominique Welinski, founder and curator of DW (France).

Disney original animation is looking at a comeback this Thanksgiving. The princess pic Wish is looking at as much as $45M-$50M over five days after the studio suffering a setback over last year’s holiday with Strange World, which did $18.8M.

French studio Federation’s new theatrical sales arm Ginger & Fed and Paris-based genre specialist WTFilms have unveiled a slew of AFM deals for apocalyptic thriller Survive.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Leading Korean star Jung Woo-sung (“A Moment to Remember”) will star opposite Shin Hyun-been (“Hospital Playlist”) in “Tell Me That You Love Me,” an original series for Genie TV. The show is a remake of the hit Japanese series of the same name that first aired at Tokyo Broadcasting Systems linear channel in Japan some 28 years ago in 1995. The new show will upload to Genie’s own streaming service on Nov. 27 and the same day in Japan on Disney+.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Blackpink, the multinational female music act that is the biggest girl group in the Korean pop (K-pop) firmament, may finally be close to renewing its collective contract with YG Entertainment. The news was widely reported in Korea on Monday and comes after months of speculation that the four-piece act – Jisoo (real name Kim Ji-soo), Lisa (Lalisa Manobal), Jennie (Kim Jennie) and Rose (Roseanne Park) – would take their acts to another shop. Blackpink’s previous contracts with YG expired in August. The Munhwa Ilbo (or Culture Daily) publication Monday claimed an exclusive with the information that Blackpink will re-up with YG, but the four individuals will not renew their exclusive contracts with the agency.

OnlyOneOf have announced the dates and stops for the North American leg of their upcoming world tour in 2024.OnlyOneOf announced last week that they would be embarking on a world tour next year, with concerts set for cities across North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia. It will mark the band’s first-ever world tour.On November 14, the group announced that the world tour will kick off with its North American leg with 10 shows unveiled to take place in Vancouver, Chicago, New York City/New Jersey, Toronto, Atlanta, San Juan, Orlando, Dallas, San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Rachell “Valkyrae” Hofstetter, one of the biggest female streamers and gaming creators in the world, has signed with WME for representation. She most recently was repped by UTA. Valkyrae is known for streaming games “Among Us,” “Fortnite” and “Valorant,” among others.

Sweet Home, starring Song Kang.Taking place shortly after the events of season one, the new Sweet Home trailer reveals the world outside the Green Home apartment building. Monsters and soldiers hunt one another, while civilians are ushered into quarantine zones.Half-monster Cha Hyun-su (Song Kang) is seen chained up in captivity, where he offers himself up to be used to research a vaccine to stop monster transformations.