Netflix Smash Picks Up Breakthrough Series Prize at Gotham Awards

Following Parasite in 2019 and Youn Yuhjung last year, the people behind Netflix’s Squid Game are the latest Korean creators to find themselves in the thick of Hollywood’s awards season. From director Hwang Donghyuk, the hit show earned the Breakthrough Series – Over 40 Minutes Award from this year’s Gotham Awards in New Work last week, and now it has secured three nominations for the forthcoming 27th Critics Choice Awards. 

The show is nominated in the Best Drama Series category at the Critics Choice Awards, making it the first non-English language show ever up for the prize. It is also among the nominees for Best Foreign Language Series, while Lee Jungjae is up for the Best Actor In A Drama Series Prize, following a similar nomination at the Gotham Awards.

Squid Game is the first Korean drama to be a contender at the Critics Choice Awards. Bong Joonho’s Parasite earned the Best Director and the Best Foreign Language Film Award at the 25th edition in 2020.

Launched in mid-September around the Chuseok holidays, Squid Game is the debut drama series of Silenced (2011) and The Fortress (2017) director Hwang Donghyuk and tells the story of 456 debt-laden contestants who unwittingly begin to take part in a playground game-inspired death game contest for a huge cash prize.

The film quickly became a global sensation as it shot up the charts and became the first Korean program to top Netflix’s global rankings. It soon broke all of the streamer’s prior viewing records to become the most popular show of all time, with 142 million subscribers tuning in over the show’s first four weeks.