So in my experience that makes both seasons of squid games, parasite and the horror movie 'the host' (also another Korean movie but I can't recall the name of it)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] Tervell@hexbear.net 15 points 4 weeks ago* (last edited 4 weeks ago)

I recently watched Designated Survivor: 60 Days which I felt was decent on this topic. Spoilers for the first couple of episodes:

spoiler

The current president was working on a peace treaty with North Korea, but the National Assembly gets bombed along with most of the government. Our protagonist is the remaining designated survivor and becomes the acting president, and the first couple of episodes tackle him and the remaining survivors of the previous president's staff trying to prevent the psychos in the military from starting a war - especially since during a state of war, control goes over to the Americans, which I wasn't expecting the show to actually bring up.

The American commander even shows up demanding South Korea goes over to a more severe DEFCON level (and thus hand over control to the country), and rather un-diplomatically, openly declares "Your actions are in direct defiance of the will of Washington!" once they refuse.

The North Koreans initially refuse to communicate via the hotline between the two governments, which of course the military psychos use to support their intention for war, but it's pointed out that it's really the US and Japan (which sent a ship into Korean territorial waters) that are escalating tensions - why should North Korea be the one to de-escalate (and, given what was pointed out earlier, how can they even trust negotiations if it's possible the Americans are actually in charge)?

But this was 2019, during the Moon Jae-In presidency and the attempts at reconciliation then, so maybe this was just reflective of the political climate at the time.