North Korea is known as a country that everyone wants to escape from because it lacks the basic necessities of life. As always happens, While the general population is doomed to constant suffering, tyrants are focused on personal enrichment.. It becomes quite difficult when they are faced with US sanctions, they are forced to get creative. That’s why they smuggle drugs, hack cryptocurrency companies, and, oddly enough, run a huge animation studio.
A successful North Korean animation studio called Science Education Korea (or SEK) was founded in 1957 with the goal of becoming one of the North Korean regime’s main propaganda tools. His first works were animated series praising the Kim dynasty (monarchs ruling the country). and in fables intended to convey the values of Juche, the official ideology of the Korean Workers’ Party. Over time, this became a less risky way to obtain foreign currency vital to the regime’s economic operations.
It turned out that many animation companies entered into contracts with SEK to save money. They used to do business publicly, but that was before the international community imposed all sorts of sanctions on the Asian country. after it conducted its first nuclear tests in 2006. Since then, job opportunities for the animation studio have decreased significantly. Although it is still being secretly outsourced to other companies who are also looking to save money as North Korea’s economy remains in ruins.
Prestigious catalog
The scale of SEK is quite impressive. At its peak in the early 21st century, the company had 1,600 employees, allowing it to animate 60 films a year.. While the most popular animation studios in the world, Pixar and Ghibli, employ 1,233 and 190 employees respectively. Despite this industrial approach to the art of animation, the quality of the work seems to be of international standards. Because they used to do business with 70 companies from all over the world. He continued to produce the French film “Corto Maltese: The Secret Court of Magic”, the Italian series “Simba: The Lion King”, then collaborated on the animation of “Avatar: The Last Airbender” and the series “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles”.
In the late 1990s, the South Korean government sought to reduce tensions with the North by encouraging economic cooperation between the two countries. Thus, the South Korean company Iconix sent technical specialists to North Korea to train its animators in the most modern techniques.. Both countries created the children’s television series Pororo the Penguin, which later became a national icon.
They would later collaborate with Nelson Shin, who is considered an animation giant in South Korea. Born in North Korea and fled to the South at age 13 due to the Korean War. Sheen moved to the United States and worked in the film industry for many years, helping animate the lightsabers in the original Star Wars.. He later returned to South Korea and founded the animation studio AKOM Production, which became famous for producing The Simpsons.
While preparing to make Empress Chung, a film based on the famous Korean tale about a daughter who sacrifices herself to restore her father’s sight, Nelson Shin met with SEK officials. Deciding to collaborate with them to save money, the North Korean studio took over the main production of the film. Empress Chung was the first film to be released simultaneously in both Koreas..
Having acquired several important contacts during this project, SEK was able to subcontract through AKOM for the animation of The Simpsons movie. and Futurama (titled Bender’s Big Score). I bet few people could imagine that such popular projects were created by employees of the most cruel tyranny in the world.
Geopolitical difficulties and mystery
Unfortunately, good things tend to be short-lived in North Korea. The first nuclear test, carried out in 2006, caused intense international tension, which materialized in economic sanctions that intensified in 2009 after the second explosion of a nuclear device. Nothing has changed for SEK since that year. They were forced to refocus on their national goals by filming another 50 episodes of the popular series The Boy General, a show that recreated Kim Jong Il’s rise to power, but in a medieval context. Most of the international collaborations disappeared, the only partner they managed to keep was China, or at least that’s how it was..
Recently, through a misconfigured North Korean server, it was revealed that Chinese animation companies working for American production companies are subcontracting SEK to work on projects such as “Invincible,” an Amazon original series “Iyanu, Child of Miracles,” premiering later this year on Max.Dahlia in Bloom, a Japanese series that will also premiere this year.
Everything seems to indicate that Chinese companies subcontracted to SEK without notifying the American manufacturing companies. That way, they could pay tiny North Korean salaries while getting more time to focus on more projects.. The same practice we described above, but the Chinese are the only ones who dare to continue it at this time, in the face of the threat of sanctions. It’s good to know that North Koreans are still competent despite their country’s precarious situation. But it is also distressing about the consequences that these political restrictions have on the population, all because of the desire of tyrants to remain in power.
Source: Hiper Textual
