[HanCinema's News] Completed South Korean Dramas Persist on Netflix Leaderboard

Even though "Business Proposal" and "Twenty Five Twenty One" finished their runs earlier this month, both romantic dramas have shown surprising resilience on the official Netflix leaderboard. According to recently released figures from the international streaming service, "Business Proposal" was fourth place 20,380,000 viewed hours and "Twenty Five Twenty One" was seventh place with 11,340,000 viewed hours. These rankings reflect the week of April 18th to April 24th only for non-English shows.

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Both dramas have now reached an unusual benchmark- they have been in the Netflix Top 10 for more weeks than they were actually premiering new episodes. "Business Proposal" was only actively premiering new episodes for six weeks, yet has now been in the Netflix Top 10 for seven weeks. Likewise, "Twenty Five Twenty One" was only actively premiering new episodes for eight weeks, yet has now been in the Netflix Top 10 for eight weeks.

These aren't the only dramas to show unusual persistence on Netflix either. "Forecasting Love and Weather" did not appear in the Netflix Top 10 this week, but had eight straight weeks there up until last week. But the even bigger surprise is the zombie-themed "Happiness - Drama" which finished airing new episodes last December. "Happiness - Drama" was recently licensed by Netflix for a large number of international markets, and had 10,820,000 viewed hours for eighth place this week.

The strength of "Happiness - Drama" is especially surprising given that it is not licensed for the United States, which is generally considered to be Netflix's largest individual market. Worldwide Netflix has become increasingly prominent as a distribution mechanism for South Korean cultural contents for a wide variety of genres. A new South Korean project becoming a Netflix hit now seems inevitable given the staying power even of older dramas.

Written by William Schwartz