Hwang Dong-hyuk is the creator, writer and director of the South Korean survival thriller horror series Squid Game.
He is a South Korean film director, producer, and screenwriter who was born on May 26, 1971. His most well-known works include the creation of the 2021 Netflix survival drama series Squid Game and the 2011 crime drama picture Silenced.
Born and raised in Seoul, South Korea, Hwang Dong-hyuk spent hours at comic book cafes, immersing himself in manga and manhwa.
Hwang Dong-hyuk’s international popularity with Squid Game
Hwang had developed the idea for Squid Game in response to the class divide in South Korea and his own early financial hardships. Even though the script was first written in 2008, Hwang was unable to get a production company to support it until 2019, when Netflix decided to invest in it as part of their effort to increase the number of foreign shows they offered.
It became the most-watched series premiere in Netflix history when it was released on September 17, 2021. He lost six of his teeth as a result of the strain of making the series. Hwang's earlier films, Silenced, Miss Granny, and The Fortress, were added to Netflix in the US and other countries as a result of Squid Game's popularity.
Hwang became the first South Korean to win an Emmy in 2022 for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Television Series. President Yoon Suk-yeol bestowed upon Hwang the Geumgwan Order of Cultural Merit, the highest honor bestowed upon art and culture contributors.
Hwang’s early career
Hwang created and directed a number of short films, such as A Puff of Smoke and Our Sad Life, after earning a B.A. in Communications from Seoul National University. He continued to make movies after relocating to Los Angeles to pursue an M.F.A. in Film Production at the University of Southern California, finishing the shorts Heaven & Hell and Desperation (2000).
Miracle Mile (2004) was his graduation thesis film. It was a short film that starred Karl Yune as an illegal Korean-American cab driver who assists his passenger, a young Korean woman (Hana Kim) who is trying to find her brother who was adopted by Americans twenty years ago. Having been screened in more than 40 worldwide film festivals, Miracle Mile took home multiple honours, including the Student Emmy and DGA Student Film Awards.
Hwang revisited the subject of adoption in My Father (2007), his first feature film. A U.S. Army veteran stationed in Korea who goes on national television to look for his biological parents and discovers his father on death row for murder is the subject of the movie, which is based on the true tale of Korean-American adoptee Aaron Bates.
Despite Daniel Henney's reputation as a heartthrob, Hwang chose to cast Kim Yeong-cheol as the father opposite the star actor. In addition to Hwang's non-melodramatic treatment of forgiveness and acceptance, which was entwined with themes of cultural identity and the death penalty, Henney and Kim received accolades for their acting.
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Hwang Dong-hyuk is the creator, writer and director of the South Korean survival thriller horror series Squid Game.
Hwang had developed the idea for Squid Game in response to the class divide in South Korea and his own early financial hardships.
Oh Il-Nam, the originator of the Squid Games, is revealed as the primary antagonist of the story in the Squid Game season 1 finale. But Seong Gi-hun doesn't learn of this till II-Nam is near death.
