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Noting that South Korean pop culture has become at least as loved outside the Republic shouldn’t surprise anyone in 2025—look at the massive critical and streaming success of K-Pop Demon Hunters—an American production, technically, but one that makes the most of its South Korean cast and origins.
It all, perhaps, started with the international rise of K-pop, a broad umbrella term for just about any popular music coming from Korea, though South Korean films had a reverent following stateside long before Parasite’s history-making Academy Award victory way back in 2019. As with art from any country or culture, not all South Korean entertainment is gold, but the TV and movies the country is exporting are more than able to compete on a global scale.
Case in point: Squid Game, the buzzy survival drama captured the world’s attention in a big way over its three seasons, it’s first episode having been the most popular in the streamer’s history, beating the previous record-holder, the similarly buzzy Bridgerton, by nearly 30 million viewers. Even before Squid Game hit, Netflix was betting big on K-dramas—and while being spoiled for choice is a good thing, but it can be tough to know where to begin. Here are some of the best and most popular shows on Netflix that represent the breadth of South Korean TV: crime, horror, rom-com, science fiction, period drama…whatever you’re into, you can probably find a distinct Korean-language take.
Karma (2025)
A deeply satisfying, Coen-esque crime thriller, Karma stars Lee Hee-joon as Jae-yeong as a guy who’s desperately underwater in his debts to a loan shark—but, hey! It turns out that he’s the beneficiary of his dad’s rather large life insurance policy. What else to do but hire a co-worker to kill his father? That part goes fine, but then a couple on a date runs over the body, and, believing that he’s killed the man, driver Sang-hun nearly murders an eyewitness before paying the guy to help him dispose of the body. A hiker finds the body, the insurance payout is delayed, and Sang-hun comes to believe that he’s been played. It’s one of those great, twisty-turny crime dramas from which no character walks away without blood on their hands. Stream Karma.
Crash Landing on You (2019)
That title isn’t just a metaphor: The series involves a literal crash landing into the North side of the Korean Demilitarized Zone. Yoon Se-ri (Son Ye-jin) is an heiress and independent business owner whose complicated relationships with her family have caused her to step away from them. On a paragliding trip, a tornado sends her north, and she’s rescued from disaster by a captain in the North Korean Special Police Force. The romance between two strong characters, as well as the sensitive and humane portrayal of life in the north, made this a mega-hit on South Korean TV, and a fan fave worldwide. Stream Crash Landing on You.
All of Us Are Dead (2022 – , renewed for a second season)
For a little Z-drama with your K-drama: In All of Us Are Dead, high school becomes hell, almost literally, when a viral outbreak sees a Hyosan school become ground zero for a strange plague. Though it’s not clear at first, the teenagers soon realize that they’ve been quarantined from the rest of the city. Help isn’t coming. Nihilism isn’t uncommon in zombie narratives, nor are themes involving the breakdown of social structures. All of Us Are Dead, instead, explores the world of a cloistered high school under constant threat as a parallel to our own world: Class and background continue to be potent forces, even (or especially) amid the trauma of the attacks, and arbitrary social hierarchies solidify under the constant trauma rather than adapt. The closed school location is brilliantly utilized, and there’s some appropriately soapy drama, as well. Look for Squid Game‘s Emmy-winner Lee Yoo-mi as spoiled rich kid Lee Na-yeon. A long-gestating second season recently started production. Stream All of Us Are Dead.
The 8 Show (2024)
This might have seemed faintly over-the-top just a few years ago, but now looks and feels like a reasonably good distillation of our current capitalist hellscape. Here, eight strangers are selected to compete in a game in which they’re locked together in a building and sequestered on different floors each night. They earn money for each minute they last in the game, but all their provisions must be purchased with money they’ve won, at an extreme markup. At first, the contestants pool their resources so that everyone gets more money—until they learn that people on higher floors are getting more. Then things get nasty. Stream The 8 Show.
It’s Okay to Not Be Okay (2020)
Discussions around mental health in general remain fraught anywhere in the world, and South Korea is no exception. Though opportunities for treatment are better than in many other parts of the world, social stigma remains a problem. Which is all part of the reason Jo Yong and Park Shin-woo’s miniseries was such a sensation when it was released last year: Writer Jo based the show on her own personal experiences, plus a good bit of research. The series chronicles the slow-burn romance between Moon Gang-tae (Kim Soo-hyun), a health care worker living with his autistic brother, and a famous children’s book author (Seo Yea-ji) with antisocial personality disorder. It’s lovely, and was popular enough in South Korea to inspire a series of children’s books based on the work of the show’s fictional writer. Stream It’s Okay to Not Be Okay.
Itaewon Class (2020)
Another great example of the willingness of South Korean producers to tackle increasingly challenging social issues alongside the action and drama, Itaewon Class stars Park Seo-joon as Park Sae-ro-yi, a high school kid whose life is shattered by Geun-won, the son of the powerful owner of a food conglomerate. First, he’s suspended for fighting back against the bully, and then his father is killed in a reckless driving incident involving Geun-won. Instead of consequences for the rich kid, it’s Sae-ro-yi who winds up going to prison for nearly beating his father’s killer to death. On release, he opens up a local bar for outsiders while plotting to bring down the all-powerful conglomerate that ruined his life. The staff at his bar includes a transgender woman, a Guinean-Korean, and another ex-con, all of whom struggle with acceptance but find a home among the other underdogs at the bar. Stream Itaewon Class.
Business Proposal (2022)
A lot of the shows on this list are on the heavy side; it’s time to lighten things up with this popular romantic comedy/drama series. The set-up is classic romantic tomfoolery: Shin Ha-ri (Kim Se-jeong) goes on a blind date pretending to be her best friend, who didn’t want to go because her dad set the whole thing up. Ha-ri is just doing her bestie a solid, but things get complicated when the date turns out to be Kang Tae-moo (Ahn Hyo-seop), CEO of the company where Ha-ri works. Sick of his grandfather’s pressure to find the right woman and secure the future of the family business, Ha-ri decides he’s going to marry his date—who is, again, pretending to be someone she’s not. Complicated in the best tradition of the genre, and also pretty darned cute. Stream Business Proposal.
The Frog (2024)
Following his wife’s death, Yeong-ha (Kim Yoon-seok) just wants a quiet life in the secluded town where he lives, renting out the house next door as a vacation rental—though he’s not even all that enthusiastic about that. It’s all going fine until a young woman shows up with her son, the same woman abruptly leaving behind blood stains and, even more disturbingly, the kid. Though it’s a bit of a spoiler, this very-slow-burn and cinematic thriller takes place in multiple time periods—a clever storytelling technique given the show’s unchanging locale. Stream The Frog.
The Silent Sea (2021)
Bae Doona, whom you’ll know from everything from Cloud Atlas to Sense8 to Rebel Moon) stars in this twisty-turny sci-fi drama that starts on a dry, near-waterless Earth of the near-future, following a team of astronauts and scientists sent on a mission to an abandoned lunar base. They’re tasked with retrieving a mysterious sample, and it soon becomes clear that the bureaucrats on Earth know a lot more about that sample than they’re telling. Suffice it to say that nothing goes particularly well—there are deaths, betrayals, and a deadly something that might be humanity’s future, but might just as easily be its end. Stream The Silent Sea.
Vincenzo (2021)
Having been adopted into an Italian organized crime family as a baby, Park Joo-hyung took on the name Vincenzo Cassano, eventually becoming a mafia consigliere. After his adoptive father Don Fabio dies, Fabio’s biological son comes gunning for his brother, whom he now sees only as competition. He flees to Seoul on the hunt for a secret stash of money, but in the process discovers a love interest and a new adversary in a giant business conglomerate that quite deserves to be taken down. Another incredibly popular series, this one definitely puts a unique spin on the tropes of the mob drama. Stream Vincenzo.
Alice in Borderland (2020– , third season coming soon)
Video-game-obsessed Arisu gets his wish, after a fashion: He finds himself, along with a couple of friends, transported to an alternate, eerily abandoned version of Tokyo—the title’s Borderland—vividly brought to life via some clever green-screen work. The three are directed to an arena and given the instructions for the game—one they’ll be playing whether they want to or not. The first competition, for example, involves a locked-room-style puzzle; if they fail, the room goes up in flames with them in it. Think Ready Player One, with deadlier stakes. There are games each night, though the rules allow for winners to get time off…there are a lot of rules, actually, but the games are cleverly and sadistically constructed. The third season is on its way. Stream Alice in Borderland.
Sweet Home (2020 – 2024)
Based on the title alone, you might guess that Sweet Home is a charming family comedy about three generations of a single family living under one roof. But no, it’s actually about the residents of an apartment building who’ve holed themselves up inside against the zombie-esque plague ravaging the world (here, the infection turns people into a variety of monsters, but otherwise the plot works along traditional zombie lines). High school student Cha Hyun-soo lost his entire family to a car accident, and moves into the building just in time. The added twist? Hyun-soo eventually gains control over his own infection and develops something like superpowers. This popular series is based on a very, very popular webtoon. Stream Sweet Home.
Kingdom (2019 – 2021)
It’s not exactly a history lesson, but Kingdom does open a window into the middle of Korea’s Joseon Dynasty, an era that ran for over 500 years, to nearly the 20th century. History doesn’t record an actual zombie plague during the early years of the 17th century, though, so perhaps a few liberties have been taken. As the series opens, rumors are swirling that the king has died, and his son, Crown Prince Lee Chang, is trying to find out the truth. Turns out that the king did, in fact, die—of smallpox—but the Queen Consort and her father, a powerful courtier, have a plan: they’ve given the king a little-known plant that revives him (you can see where this is headed) in the hope of keeping him alive long enough for the queen to bear a son. Since Lee Chang is merely the son of a concubine, he’d lose his claim to the throne in such an event. The show deftly combines horror and medieval-esque political intrigue, making it rather more than the sum of its parts. The show runs for two seasons with a spin-off movie, Ashin of the North, but there’s always chatter about a potential revival. Stream Kingdom.
Memories of the Alhambra (2019)
It sounds a bit like an episode of Black Mirror, if not nearly so dystopian. There’s an impressive new augmented reality game with a neat, but very specific spinoff: It involves medieval battles in and around the Alhambra fortress in Granada, Spain (where much of the series was filmed). A tech CEO interested in investing travels to Spain to meet the creator, only to find out that he’s gone missing. Fortunately, the creator’s ultra-cool sister owns a local hostel, and, with romance in the air, the two set out on hunt for her brother as the line between reality and fantasy becomes increasingly blurry. Another Korean hit, the show’s got some nice location work and solid special effects. Stream Memories of the Alhambra.
Melo Movie (2025)
Ko Gyeom (Choi Woo-shik, Parasite) is a film critic with an obsessive love of cinema—he dreams of seeing every film ever made which, while quixotic, is also deeply charming. He inadvertently moves next door to Kim Mu-bee (Park Bo-young), an estranged friend from the past with whom he split under mysterious circumstances. The romantic drama uses film references to punctuate its love story, but also to serve as a reminder that, for these two characters with unresolved issues, life is hardly a movie. Stream Melo Movie.
Extracurricular (2020)
Just another drama about a seemingly dull teenage overachiever running a sex ring by night. OK, so this one’s pretty unique, blending dark comedy and action with hints of relationship drama. Needing some extra money, Oh Ji-soo runs a prostitution ring when he’s not in school, but is otherwise a typical teenage doofus. His friend Gyu-ri comes from a wealthy family, but still wants in when she learns about Ji-soo’s sideline. Before long, both competitors and the police begin to circle, and life for the teens gets considerably more dangerous. Stream Extracurricular.
When the Camellia Blooms (2019)
I think we can all agree there’s one big thing lacking in the U.S. romantic-comedy genre: serial killers. Oh Dong-baek (Gong Hyo-jin) is a single mom who moves to a small town and opens a bar before kicking off a relationship with a local police officer. It seems at times as though he’s the only one happy to have her around: The older, more traditional women of the town don’t love that Dong-baek is a single mom, and they’re equally scandalized by her booze-related business. The show takes light aim at some of those outmoded views, but also complicates matters with the introduction of a serial killer whose next victim might well be Dong-baek.
Oh, and even though this is technically only one season, it’s 20 long-ish episodes, so a bigger commitment than you might have thought—but fun if you get into it. Stream When the Camellia Blooms.
When Life Gives You Tangerines (2025)
An epic love story that cleaned house at the 2025 Baeksang Arts Awards (that’s South Korea’s most prestigious entertainment award ceremony), Tangerines stars IU as Oh Ae-sun (and as Ae-sun’s daughter and the series’ narrator, Geum-myeong), a young woman born in the 1960s on rural Jeju Island. The series spans decades in her life with friend and later romantic interest Yang Gwan-sik (Park Bo-gum), as South Korea changes around them and their family. It’s a bit like Pachinko in that regard, though the emphasis here is more on family and Ae-sun’s own love story. Stream When Life Gives You Tangerines.
Mr. Sunshine (2018)
Another sweeping historical drama (a genre that South Korea excels at, and coincidentally one that I can’t get enough of), Mr. Sunshine takes place at the very end of the Joseon Dynasty, with activists fighting for Korean independence. Naturally, the heart of the epic is a cross-class love story between a vassal returning to Korea after time spent as an American Marine and the granddaughter of a powerful Korean aristocrat. Several significant local and world events serve as turning points over the course of the series’ 24 episodes—so aside from being an impressive feat of period drama, this one is also a window into critical moments in world history from a Korean perspective. Stream Mr. Sunshine.
Bloodhounds (2023 – )
Woo Do-hwan and Lee Sang-yi star as unlikely besties Kim Geon-woo and Hong Woo-jin, a couple of would-be boxers trying to save their families from the euphemistically named loan shark organization Smile Capital. The fistfights are thrillingly choreographed, and Woo and Lee are, by all accounts, best friends in real life—which lends an air of believable bromance to this action-crime drama. A second season is on the way. Stream Bloodhounds.
