Dear Gossips,
One of our main storylines this week: everyone wants a piece of Squid Game. Four members of the cast will appear on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon tonight and while this has yet to be confirmed, it reportedly will be Lee Jung-jae, Park Hae-soo, Jung Ho-yeon, and Wi Ha-jun. As Anastasia wrote yesterday, Squid Game has been trending across all social media platforms, including TikTok, for days. And it doesn’t seem to be slowing down. In addition to all the memes and the videos that have been generated, there’s also a significant amount of thirst. And the best part about Squid Game thirst is that there’s a person for every kink.
Some of you are thirsting for Wi Ha-jun, who plays the police officer, and was interviewed by K-Ci Williams for Vulture. In just over two weeks, he’s gone from 300,000 Instagram followers to over 6 million. And if you’re wondering what’s behind the mask, flip through the carousel and enjoy:
And then of course there’s Jung Ho-yeon. I mentioned the other day that her IG went from 400,000 to 15 million (she’s gone up by two million since Monday), officially making her the most-followed Korean actor on Instagram, and there are now “X number of things to know about Squid Game star Jung Ho-yeon” posts all over the internet, including PEOPLE.com and Glamour. Back in 2016, Ho-yeon did a video with Vogue to share her beauty secrets and the digital team at Vogue refreshed that link by adding “Squid Game” to the title and look how many views it now has:
Also…this just in…
Right after their SS22 presentation in Paris, Louis Vuitton made this announcement:
It’s a total Squid Game takeover. But that’s also part of a general Korean takeover – and there’s actually a term for this: “hallyu”, loosely translated to mean “Korean wave”. I wrote about this a few months ago in a post about BTS. For decades South Korea has invested heavily in homegrown talent, from film and television to lifestyle and beauty, in an attempt to promote Korean culture around the world as a form of soft diplomacy. We have been seeing that return on investment with the success of directors like Bong Joon-ho, Yeon Sang-ho, Lee Chang-dong, and Park Chan-wook; musical acts like BTS, BLACKPINK, NCT, EXO, Monsta X, and more; Squid Game, obviously; and now…
The Oxford English Dictionary?
Over 20 words of Korean origin have been added this year. Per CNN:
"We are all riding the crest of the Korean wave, and this can be felt not only in film, music, or fashion, but also in our language, as evidenced by some of the words and phrases of Korean origin included in the latest update of the Oxford English Dictionary," the OED said in a statement.
Daebak!
Not sure if that one is in there but it should be. Look it up!
Yours in gossip,
Lainey
