Supporters and fans of Korean cinema have greatly contributed to its rise on the global stage giving it further visibility mirroring the wider cultural industry and the fan communities that have helped propel Korea as a major soft power.

In the early years of contemporary Korean cinema in the 2000s before the era of social media it was English-language websites and blogs that were giving newcomers to Korean cinema along with fans and professionals information about Korean films and its growing pool of talent. The first such site that became a gateway into Korea’s film industry was Darcy Paquet’s Koreanfilm.org. Filled with reviews, box office data and other news it has been invaluable for those who can’t read Korean. As the profile of Korean cinema increased other sites soon followed.

In the 2010s with the ubiquitous nature of social media and its undeniable influence, platforms like Instagram, Twitter (now X), TikTok and YouTube have taken on a significant role in how Korean films are promoted and received overseas. In many respects there has been a further democratization in how information is disseminated on social media giving fans a platform to write and talk about Korean content. Studios in the US are also using social media influencers in the promotion of films as the ecosystem has shifted away from traditional media.

This week we take a closer look at how fan communities online are affecting how Korean films are being distributed beginning with the proliferation of social media platforms focusing on two case studies: Parasite (2019) that became a global hit and No Other Choice (2025) that’s now in contention for the Academy Awards as the race heats up. Its US distributor Neon has proven very savvy at using social media.  We’ll then turn to so-called “Fansubbing” where fans are subtitling Korean content.

Fandom & Social Media Platforms

The moment Parasite won Best Picture at the Academy Awards in the Dolby Theater in Hollywood in February 2020 will long live in the memory of fans of Korean cinema. It was historic as was Cannes 2019 when its director Bong Joon Ho took to the stage to receive the Palme d’Or marking the first time a Korean film had been given the top award on the Croisette.

Its unprecedented global success was attributed to a variety of factors with Bong Joon Ho’s deft skills as a storyteller and filmmaker chief among them but its journey on social media was also a crucial component. In Hollywood, studios spend millions on the awards race but as a small film compared to some of the Hollywood heavy weights Parasite was dependent on social media and fandom to help give it the momentum to take it to the academy awards bringing with it much success at the global box office where it accumulated $262m including $53m in North America. It was released on a small number of screens before being rolled out across the US as the success of the film snowballed.

Its global appeal was evident as early as 2018 on social media platforms when a first still was released after it commenced shooting in Goyang, north of Seoul with it widely shared on platforms such as X. While it was becoming increasingly common for Korean films featuring K-pop IDOLS to attract significant attention on social media with fan communities working together to help further raise the profile of the film, for a title without a K-pop star this was unusual. It was an early indication of what was to follow:  Bong himself was turning into a global star.

The hashtag #bonghive created by fans after it screened in Cannes was at the heart of what became an organic social media campaign with memes of Bong Joon Ho and the Parasite cast going viral. This picked up further pace in early 2020 with what were two significant moments that appeared on many feeds on social media: Bong’s Golden Globes speech in which he asked audiences to overcome the “one-inch subtitle barrier” and the cast winning the Best Performance by a cast in a Motion Picture at the Screen Actors Guild Awards.

The film itself was also the subject of many posts on X, Instagram and YouTube with fans singing the “Jessica Jingle” and people cooking “chapaguri” (a combination of the black bean noodles and the udon-like noodles neoguri) made famous by the film. Memes also parodied the poster, while fans also recorded their reaction to Parasite winning Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Parasite had become a global sensation.

Neon and CJ ENM that collaborated together in orchestrating Parasite’s Oscar campaign are also partnering again on Park Chan-wook’s No Other Choice that has begun its awards race after premiering in Venice to critical acclaim. While it didn’t win an award there it is gaining more visibility on social media as the film makes stops at festivals throughout the world including London as it tries to woo international voters.

The awards race does give the film and the talent a stage making memes and social media the ideal platform from which to further elevate the content and talent involved – this was also evident with Squid Game and its journey to the Emmys.

The film’s leading stars Son Ye-jin and Lee Byung-hun and their fan groups are also sharing posts and memes giving the film an added profile. The pair who have been working in the industry for over decades are among its most celebrated stars and have a dedicated following.  

Indeed, closely connected to the world of social media is Korea’s star system. The large number of followers Korean talent have on platforms like Instagram together with their fan communities could prove crucial in the promotion of titles both in Korea and overseas. This is particularly true for K-pop IDOLS with BTS and Blackpink and their artists dominating the top ten of the most followed Korea-based celebrities on social media with tens of millions of followers. Going forward with the worlds of Korean content and K-pop becoming more interrelated, it wouldn’t be surprising with the casting of IDOLS to see K-pop fan communities on social media help propel a film to a global success story as distributors rely more on social networking and fan sites. This has already happened with event cinema with BTS: Yet to Come in Cinemas (2023) that was distributed internationally through Trafalgar Releasing generating $50m globally.

“Fansubbing”

Owing to the explosive growth of Korean content overseas the work of subtitling and translating has come under the spotlight. Darcy Paquet translator of Parasite was widely praised in and out of Korea for his subtitles that helped the film become as accessible as it did. With Squid Game, however, some viewers on social media criticized the subtitles by Netflix, especially the closed captions that was reported by outlets such as the BBC giving the line in Bong Joon Ho’s Netflix film Okja (2017) added meaning: “Translation is sacred.”  Korean films have been translated for years but it’s only been since the widespread use of SNS and the wide reach of Korean content that subtitles have caused controversy. 

Fans have been involved in the translating of Korean content through a process known as fansubbing on platforms like Rakuten Viki where a contributor community creates the subtitles for Korean and other Asian content. Launched in 2010 and bought by the Japanese technology conglomerate Rakuten in 2013, volunteer roles include subtitlers, editors, segmenters, moderators and managers creating a community of dedicated fans that can subtitle content quickly, sometimes within days. It lists its top contributors each month and offers benefits such as free subscriptions to those who reach a certain status.

It can do the subtitling through a Creative Common’s License and the platform has partnered and signed distribution deals with some of the leading players including Netflix and Hulu. It has provided subtitles in more than 200 languages making Korean content accessible to audiences in more than 190 countries. Viki as of the end of 2024 had over 95 million users globally. Rakuten also owns the English-language site Soompi that provides regular updates on Korean popular culture including films and dramas.

It has also produced its own content that includes Dramaworld (2016) a ten-part series directed by US filmmaker Chris Martin about a K-drama fan who gets transported into her favorite show. Netflix also secured the streaming rights making it one of its early Korea-themed acquisitions as it was entering the Korean market that would later prove transformative. One of its first events in Seoul was the local premiere of the show in 2016.

What both Viki Rakuten and Netflix share in common is not only that they stream and produce Korean content but that they understood the global potential for Korean films and dramas before many of their competitors with the distribution of films and dramas now vastly different to the ecosystem compared to a decade ago. Viki Rakuten, though, stands out for its fan community of subtitlers that continue to translate Korean content into a whole array of languages as that once-inch barrier has become less of an obstacle.

Written by Jason Bechervaise

Edited by kofic