Latest news with #non-English-language
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Streaming Ratings: 'Squid Game' Final Season Sets Three-Day Record on Netflix Charts
It's no surprise that the final season of Squid Game attracted a huge worldwide audience — it's the biggest show Netflix has ever hosted, after all — but the scale of the Korean hit continues to impress. The third and final season of the series amassed 60.1 million views worldwide from June 27-29, the largest three-day tally Netflix has ever recorded in its internal rankings. Season two, which premiered Dec. 26, 2024, had a higher opening-week total of 68 million views, but those came over four days. Both seasons made Netflix's all-time top 10 for non-English-language shows in their first week, the only times that has happened on either the English or non-English series charts. More from The Hollywood Reporter Netflix to Add NASA+ as It Launches Into Live Streaming Feeds 'Squid Game' Creator Weighs in on American Spinoff Reports and Explains That Surprise Cameo Sofia Carson and Corey Mylchreest Fall in Love Abroad in 'My Oxford Year' Trailer Season three's 60.1 million views equates to 368.4 million hours of watch time, per Netflix. At a little more than six hours, it's the shortest of the three Squid Game seasons, which will allow it to rack up view numbers (total viewing time divided by run time) a little faster than the previous two installments. Squid Game ranked No. 1 for the week of June 23-29 in every country that Netflix tracks, also a first for one of the streamer's shows. The final season sees Player 456/Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) make a final attempt to bring down the deadly game from within — while also hinting in its last scene that the games are global in scope. Another title with roots in Korean culture, KPop Demon Hunters, also had a big week for Netflix. The animated film moved up to No. 1 on the English-language movie chart in its second week with 24.2 million views (or the equivalent of that many complete runs of the movie). The first season of Squid Game remains Netflix's most watched series to date with 265.2 million views over its first 13 weeks of release (the cutoff time for the streamer's all-time top 10 lists). Season two is currently second among non-English-language series with 192.6 million views, and season three sits ninth — with the potential to move into the top five in another week. Best of The Hollywood Reporter 'The Studio': 30 Famous Faces Who Play (a Version of) Themselves in the Hollywood-Based Series 22 of the Most Shocking Character Deaths in Television History A 'Star Wars' Timeline: All the Movies and TV Shows in the Franchise
India Today
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- India Today
Squid Game Season 3 breaks records for Netflix but the game isn't over yet
Three days since its premiere, Netflix's number-one show 'Squid Game Season 3' has garnered over 60.1 million views, and earned a place in the platform's all-time charts. The final season may be closing the chapter on Gi-hun's story, but its legacy is only growing bolder, bloodier, and more last Friday, June 27, 'Squid Game Season 3' has not only topped Netflix's global Top 10 but also shattered records, becoming the biggest-ever TV launch in the streamer's history. Clocking 368.4 million hours viewed in just 72 hours, it has outpaced nearly all debut metrics—even when compared to the Season 2's 68 million views, which were garnered over four Netflix data juggernaut has already placed the third season as the ninth most-watched non-English-language TV show of all time, despite its brief time on air. For context, Squid Game Season 1 still holds the top spot, followed closely by its sophomore run. Few franchises can claim such a consistent reign over global streaming some critics calling the new season 'less nuanced,' the finale delivered enough drama and high-stakes strategy to satisfy core fans. Gi-hun's final arc, aiming to dismantle the operation from within, hit the emotional and socio-political beats that first made the show a breakout success in 2021. Actor Lee Jung-jae's quiet gravitas as 456, paired with Lee Byung-hun's enigmatic Front Man, kept the narrative sharp, even if not as shocking. But numbers aside, what Season 3 truly cements is Squid Game's transformation from viral sensation to long-term franchise. Netflix's previous reality show, Squid Game: The Challenge, saw solid success, with a second season already greenlit. And with Cate Blanchett making a cameo in the season, buzz around a US adaptation has been rife. The rumours also suggest that David Fincher might helm the US adaptation. Given Fincher's ability to craft tension-laced thrillers ('Gone Girl', 'Mindhunter', The Killer), he may just be the one to reinterpret Squid Game for Western Squid Game Season 3 review hereSeries creator Hwang Dong-hyuk has acknowledged the buzz, stating he hasn't heard anything official yet but would offer creative support if asked. 'If it's the US version that they're making, I think sharing of ideas would be enough,' he its debut in 2021, Squid Game has redefined what a Korean-language drama can do on the global stage. It opened doors for a wave of K-content—from All of Us Are Dead to The Glory—and proved that language is no barrier to impact when the story hits deep. It became the first non-English-language series to win at the Emmys and quickly turned its cast into household Game's growing legacy includes:Season 1: No. 1 most-watched non-English-language TV series on 2: Held Netflix's premiere week record in 2023 with 68 million views in four 3: Most-viewed Netflix title over a debut weekend (60.1M views in 3 days), and already 9th most popular non-English TV show of all major players on the non-English global chart include Money Heist Parts 3-5, Lupin Parts 1 and 2, La Palma, and Who Killed Sara? Season 1 but none have quite maintained the same level of viewership dominance across three consecutive Next?While the core story may be over, Squid Game the phenomenon is just getting started. Netflix has struck gold, and it knows it. Between competition spin-offs, rumours of Western remakes, and a fandom that thrives on theories and moral dilemmas, Squid Game has all the makings of a streaming Season 3's early numbers are any indication, the game might not be over, at least for Netflix.- EndsYou May Also Like
Gulf Today
29-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Gulf Today
In Netflix's ‘The Eternaut,' an Argentine comic goes global
A group of friends gather to play cards in their host's cozy home when the power cuts. Cellphones die. An eerie snow falls all over the city, killing everyone it touches. The friends struggle to survive, their panic replaced by a growing awareness that humanity itself is at stake. This is the premise of 'The Eternaut,' a chilling dystopian drama out of Argentina that premiered its first season on Netflix on April 30. The six-episode, Spanish-language series with its mix of sci-fi elements and focus on human resilience has struck a universal nerve, rocketing to No. 1 among Netflix's most streamed non-English-language TV shows within days. Netflix already renewed the show for a second season, with filming scheduled to start next year. But 'The Eternaut' has touched on something deeper in Argentina, where legendary comic-strip writer Héctor Germán Oesterheld penned the original graphic novel in 1957 — two decades before he was 'disappeared' by Argentina's military dictatorship, along with all four of his daughters. Abroad, publishers are scrambling to keep pace with renewed interest in the source material. The Seattle-based Fantagraphics Books said it would reissue an out-of-print English translation due to the surge in US demand. At home, the TV adaptation has reopened historical wounds and found unexpected resonance at a moment of heightened anxiety about the state of Argentine society under far-right President Javier Milei. 'The boom of 'The Eternaut' has created a cultural and social event beyond the series,' said Martín Oesterheld, the writer's grandson and a creative consultant and executive producer on the show. 'It fills our hearts. It brings us pride.' For years, the surviving Oesterhelds resisted offers from Hollywood to adapt the cult classic, wary of the industry's seemingly irresistible urge to destroy New York City and other Western centers in apocalyptic dramas. To honour his grandfather's creation, Martín Oesterheld said the show had to be filmed in Spanish, with an Argentine cast and set in Buenos Aires. 'What he did was to do away with the representations of science fiction that we know in Europe and the United States,' Martín Oesterheld said of his grandfather. 'He told it on our own terms, through things that we recognize.' Netflix, pushing to expand beyond its saturated US market into previously untapped regions like Latin America, was a natural fit, he said. The streaming giant wouldn't disclose its budget, but said the special effect-laden show took four years of pre- and post-production, involved 2,900 people and pumped $34 million into Argentina's economy. In the show, aliens wreak predictable mayhem on an unpredictable cityscape — wide boulevards, neoclassical buildings, antique pizza halls and grimy suburbs — lending the show a shiver of curious power for Argentines who had never seen their city eviscerated on screen. The protagonists don't play poker but truco, a popular Argentine trick card game. They sip from gourds of mate, the signature Argentine drink made from yerba leaves. The snowfall is uncanny, and not just because it kills on contact. Buenos Aires has only seen snow twice in the last century. 'From truco in scene one, which couldn't be more Argentine, we see that 'The Eternaut' is playing with these contrasts — life and death, light and darkness, the familiar versus the alien,' said Martín Hadis, an Argentine researcher specializing in science fiction. 'It's not just a sci-fi story. It's a modern myth. That's what makes it so universal.' In updating the story to present-day Argentina, the show brings the nation's disastrous 1982 war with Britain over Las Malvinas, or the Falkland Islands, into the backstory of its hero, Juan Salvo, played by renowned actor Ricardo Darín. Salvo, a protective father and courageous ex-soldier who emerges to lead the group of survivors, is haunted by the rout of his comrades sent by Argentina's dictatorship to retake the South Atlantic islands. The defeat killed 649 Argentine soldiers, many of them untrained conscripts. 'The conflict in Las Malvinas is not closed, it's still a bloody wound,' Darín told The Associated Press. 'It's bringing the subject back to the table. That has moved a lot of people.' Faced with catastrophe, the protagonists rely on their own ingenuity, and on each other, to survive. Associated Press
Japan Today
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Japan Today
In Netflix's 'The Eternaut,' an Argentine comic goes global as dystopia hits home
An advertisement for Netflix series "The Eternaut" is partially covered by posters of sci-fi comic author Hector Oesterheld and his daughters, who were forcibly disappeared during Argentina's military dictatorship (1976–1983), in Buenos Aires, Argentina. By ISABEL DEBRE A group of friends gather to play cards in their host's cozy home when the power cuts. Cell phones die. An eerie snow falls all over the city, killing everyone it touches. The friends struggle to survive, their panic replaced by a growing awareness that humanity itself is at stake. This is the premise of 'The Eternaut,' a chilling dystopian drama out of Argentina that premiered its first season on Netflix on April 30. The six-episode, Spanish-language series with its mix of sci-fi elements and focus on humanity's resilience, has struck a universal nerve, rocketing to No. 1 among Netflix's most streamed non-English-language TV shows within days. Netflix already renewed the show for a second season, with filming scheduled to start next year. But 'The Eternaut' has touched on something deeper in Argentina, where legendary comic-strip writer Héctor Germán Oesterheld penned the original graphic novel in 1957 — two decades before he was 'disappeared' by Argentina's military dictatorship, along with all four of his daughters. Abroad, publishers are scrambling to keep pace with renewed interest in the source material. The Seattle-based Fantagraphics Books said it would reissue an out-of-print English translation due to the surge in U.S. demand. At home, the TV adaptation has reopened historical wounds and found unexpected resonance at a moment of heightened anxiety about the state of Argentine society under far-right President Javier Milei. 'The boom of 'The Eternaut' has created a cultural and social event beyond the series,' said Martín Oesterheld, the writer's grandson and a creative consultant and executive producer on the show. 'It fills our hearts. It brings us pride.' For years, the surviving Oesterhelds resisted offers from Hollywood to adapt the cult classic, wary of the industry's seemingly irresistible urge to destroy New York City and other Western centers in apocalyptic dramas. To honor his grandfather's creation, Martín Oesterheld said the show had to be filmed in Spanish, with an Argentine cast and set in Buenos Aires. 'What he did was to do away with the representations of science fiction that we know in Europe and the United States,' Martín Oesterheld said of his grandfather. 'He told it on our own terms, through things that we recognize.' Netflix, pushing to expand beyond its saturated U.S. market into previously untapped regions like Latin America, was a natural fit, he said. The streaming giant wouldn't disclose its budget, but said the special effect-laden show took four years of pre- and post-production, involved 2,900 people and pumped $34 million into Argentina's economy. In the show, aliens wreak predictable mayhem on an unpredictable cityscape — wide boulevards, neoclassical buildings, antique pizza halls and grimy suburbs — lending the show a shiver of curious power for Argentines who had never seen their city eviscerated on screen. The protagonists don't play poker but truco, a popular Argentine trick card game. They sip from gourds of mate, the signature Argentine drink made from yerba leaves. The snowfall is uncanny, and not just because it kills on contact. Buenos Aires has only seen snow twice in the last century. 'From truco in scene one, which couldn't be more Argentine, we see that 'The Eternaut' is playing with these contrasts — life and death, light and darkness, the familiar versus the alien,' said Martín Hadis, an Argentine researcher specializing in science fiction. 'It's not just a sci-fi story. It's a modern myth. That's what makes it so universal.' In updating the story to present-day Argentina, the show brings the nation's disastrous 1982 war with Britain over Las Malvinas, or the Falkland Islands, into the backstory of its hero, Juan Salvo, played by renowned actor Ricardo Darín. Salvo, a protective father and courageous ex-soldier who emerges to lead the group of survivors, is haunted by the rout of his comrades sent by Argentina's dictatorship to retake the South Atlantic islands. The defeat killed 649 Argentine soldiers, many of them untrained conscripts. 'The conflict in Las Malvinas is not closed, it's still a bloody wound,' Darín told The Associated Press. 'It's bringing the subject back to the table. That has moved a lot of people.' Faced with catastrophe, the protagonists rely on their own ingenuity, and on each other, to survive. What comes through, the creators say, is the Argentine saying 'atado con alambre' — roughly, 'held together with wire' — used to describe the inventive nature of those who do much with little in a nation that has suffered through decades of military rule and economic crises. 'It says a lot about being Argentine — taking whatever you have at your disposal and pushing your limitations,' said Martín Oesterheld. He was referring not only to the plot but also to the production at a time when Milei has waged war on Argentina's bloated state and slashed funding to cultural programs like the National Film Institute. 'As our culture is being defunded, we're taking this Argentine product to the world,' Martín Oesterheld said. Against this backdrop, the show's message of solidarity has gained an urgent new meaning, with Argentines outraged over Milei's libertarian ideology transforming the series' motto, 'No one gets through it alone,' into a rallying cry. The slogan was scrawled on signs at protests by retirees demonstrating against the government's sharp cuts to their pensions this month. To protect against police tear gas, some traded bandannas for the gas masks used in the show to shield against toxic snowfall. 'There is a general policy these days that the state shouldn't take care of its citizens, which relates to individual freedom,' Darín said. But there are many cases where if the state disappears completely, people are left to drift, as if they were shipwrecked.' As the Netflix series exploded out of the gate, missing-persons flyers for Héctor Oesterheld, his daughters and potential grandchildren popped up on billboards for 'The Eternaut' all over Buenos Aires, a reminder of the real-life horror story behind the pulp adventure. By the time the military junta came to power in 1976, Oesterheld, 58, had become known as a committed leftist, his four daughters, ranging in age from 19 to 25, had joined a far-left guerilla group and the whole family had turned into a target of Latin America's deadliest dictatorship. Two of Oesterheld's daughters were pregnant at the time of their kidnapping. To this day, no one knows what happened to their unborn children, but they are believed to be among the estimated 500 newborns snatched from their parents and handed over to childless military officers, their true identities erased. The three surviving members of the Oesterheld family have never stopped searching. Martín Oesterheld's grandmother, Elsa, who raised him after his mother was killed, banded together with other women dedicated to finding their missing grandchildren. They became known as the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo. Seizing on national interest in the TV series, the Grandmothers this month issued public appeals for help finding the disappeared grandchildren. The response was overwhelming. 'It was incredible, it went viral,' said Esteban Herrera, who works with the Grandmothers and is still searching for his own missing sibling. 'Since it's a science-fiction series on a platform like Netflix, we're reaching homes that the Grandmothers perhaps hadn't before.' The outpouring of emails and calls raised more questions than answers. Reaching out were hundreds of Argentine viewers newly determined to find their own disappeared relatives or suddenly skeptical about the legality of their own adoptions. 'The Eternaut' is a living memory, a classic story that's passed down from generation to generation,' said Martín Oesterheld. 'For it to be embraced by so many people in this way ... there is no greater social commentary.' © Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Yahoo
25-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
In Netflix's 'The Eternaut,' an Argentine comic goes global as dystopia hits home
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — A group of friends gather to play cards in their host's cozy home when the power cuts. Cellphones die. An eerie snow falls all over the city, killing everyone it touches. The friends struggle to survive, their panic replaced by a growing awareness that humanity itself is at stake. This is the premise of 'The Eternaut,' a chilling dystopian drama out of Argentina that premiered its first season on Netflix on April 30. The six-episode, Spanish-language series with its mix of sci-fi elements and focus on humanity's resilience, has struck a universal nerve, rocketing to No. 1 among Netflix's most streamed non-English-language TV shows within days. Netflix already renewed the show for a second season, with filming scheduled to start next year. But 'The Eternaut' has touched on something deeper in Argentina, where legendary comic-strip writer Héctor Germán Oesterheld penned the original graphic novel in 1957 — two decades before he was 'disappeared' by Argentina's military dictatorship, along with all four of his daughters. Abroad, publishers are scrambling to keep pace with renewed interest in the source material. The Seattle-based Fantagraphics Books said it would reissue an out-of-print English translation due to the surge in U.S. demand. At home, the TV adaptation has reopened historical wounds and found unexpected resonance at a moment of heightened anxiety about the state of Argentine society under far-right President Javier Milei. 'The boom of 'The Eternaut' has created a cultural and social event beyond the series,' said Martín Oesterheld, the writer's grandson and a creative consultant and executive producer on the show. 'It fills our hearts. It brings us pride.' An alien invasion hits home For years, the surviving Oesterhelds resisted offers from Hollywood to adapt the cult classic, wary of the industry's seemingly irresistible urge to destroy New York City and other Western centers in apocalyptic dramas. To honor his grandfather's creation, Martín Oesterheld said the show had to be filmed in Spanish, with an Argentine cast and set in Buenos Aires. 'What he did was to do away with the representations of science fiction that we know in Europe and the United States,' Martín Oesterheld said of his grandfather. 'He told it on our own terms, through things that we recognize.' Netflix, pushing to expand beyond its saturated U.S. market into previously untapped regions like Latin America, was a natural fit, he said. The streaming giant wouldn't disclose its budget, but said the special effect-laden show took four years of pre- and post-production, involved 2,900 people and pumped $34 million into Argentina's economy. In the show, aliens wreak predictable mayhem on an unpredictable cityscape — wide boulevards, neoclassical buildings, antique pizza halls and grimy suburbs — lending the show a shiver of curious power for Argentines who had never seen their city eviscerated on screen. The protagonists don't play poker but truco, a popular Argentine trick card game. They sip from gourds of mate, the signature Argentine drink made from yerba leaves. The snowfall is uncanny, and not just because it kills on contact. Buenos Aires has only seen snow twice in the last century. 'From truco in scene one, which couldn't be more Argentine, we see that 'The Eternaut' is playing with these contrasts — life and death, light and darkness, the familiar versus the alien,' said Martín Hadis, an Argentine researcher specializing in science fiction. 'It's not just a sci-fi story. It's a modern myth. That's what makes it so universal.' In updating the story to present-day Argentina, the show brings the nation's disastrous 1982 war with Britain over Las Malvinas, or the Falkland Islands, into the backstory of its hero, Juan Salvo, played by renowned actor Ricardo Darín. Salvo, a protective father and courageous ex-soldier who emerges to lead the group of survivors, is haunted by the rout of his comrades sent by Argentina's dictatorship to retake the South Atlantic islands. The defeat killed 649 Argentine soldiers, many of them untrained conscripts. 'The conflict in Las Malvinas is not closed, it's still a bloody wound,' Darín told The Associated Press. 'It's bringing the subject back to the table. That has moved a lot of people.' Argentine underdogs Faced with catastrophe, the protagonists rely on their own ingenuity, and on each other, to survive. What comes through, the creators say, is the Argentine saying 'atado con alambre' — roughly, 'held together with wire' — used to describe the inventive nature of those who do much with little in a nation that has suffered through decades of military rule and economic crises. 'It says a lot about being Argentine — taking whatever you have at your disposal and pushing your limitations,' said Martín Oesterheld. He was referring not only to the plot but also to the production at a time when Milei has waged war on Argentina's bloated state and slashed funding to cultural programs like the National Film Institute. 'As our culture is being defunded, we're taking this Argentine product to the world,' Martín Oesterheld said. Against this backdrop, the show's message of solidarity has gained an urgent new meaning, with Argentines outraged over Milei's libertarian ideology transforming the series' motto, 'No one gets through it alone,' into a rallying cry. The slogan was scrawled on signs at protests by retirees demonstrating against the government's sharp cuts to their pensions this month. To protect against police tear gas, some traded bandannas for the gas masks used in the show to shield against toxic snowfall. 'There is a general policy these days that the state shouldn't take care of its citizens, which relates to individual freedom,' Darín said. But there are many cases where if the state disappears completely, people are left to drift, as if they were shipwrecked.' A search reignited As the Netflix series exploded out of the gate, missing-persons flyers for Héctor Oesterheld, his daughters and potential grandchildren popped up on billboards for 'The Eternaut' all over Buenos Aires, a reminder of the real-life horror story behind the pulp adventure. By the time the military junta came to power in 1976, Oesterheld, 58, had become known as a committed leftist, his four daughters, ranging in age from 19 to 25, had joined a far-left guerilla group and the whole family had turned into a target of Latin America's deadliest dictatorship. Two of Oesterheld's daughters were pregnant at the time of their kidnapping. To this day, no one knows what happened to their unborn children, but they are believed to be among the estimated 500 newborns snatched from their parents and handed over to childless military officers, their true identities erased. The three surviving members of the Oesterheld family have never stopped searching. Martín Oesterheld's grandmother, Elsa, who raised him after his mother was killed, banded together with other women dedicated to finding their missing grandchildren. They became known as the Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo. Seizing on national interest in the TV series, the Grandmothers this month issued public appeals for help finding the disappeared grandchildren. The response was overwhelming. 'It was incredible, it went viral,' said Esteban Herrera, who works with the Grandmothers and is still searching for his own missing sibling. 'Since it's a science-fiction series on a platform like Netflix, we're reaching homes that the Grandmothers perhaps hadn't before.' The outpouring of emails and calls raised more questions than answers. Reaching out were hundreds of Argentine viewers newly determined to find their own disappeared relatives or suddenly skeptical about the legality of their own adoptions. 'The Eternaut' is a living memory, a classic story that's passed down from generation to generation,' said Martín Oesterheld. 'For it to be embraced by so many people in this way ... there is no greater social commentary.' ___ Follow AP's coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at
