The biggest band in the world will now be available on Disney. According to the media company, this part of its streaming services expanding its stable of online celebrities.
The entertainment behemoth announced Monday that it would be adding new original shows to Disney+ that would include members of the South Korean pop trio, sharing the news exclusively with CNN Business.
Five new titles with BTS’ management business, HYBE, will arise from that. Big Hit Entertainment used to be the name of the company.
A filmed concert special in Los Angeles and a behind-the-scenes documentary series are two of the new projects that will be shot with the complete band. Disney anticipates that the latter will arrive in 2019.
The band expressed their excitement at giving fans “a more close-up and personal side of us” in a taped video message that was shared with CNN Business.
With their recent huge success, BTS has gained a lot of fans, called “Army,” all over the world.
However, the seven-person team recently declared that it would be taking a sabbatical to work on different projects, some of which would be solo.
The most recent alliance with Disney illustrates that. One upcoming title, according to the company, is a reality show in which V, a member of the BTS, travels with other famous Koreans.
Read Also: BTS wins big at the Billboard Music Awards 2022
As they get ready for their second chapter, the band’s daily life will also be shown in the documentary, according to a joint release from Disney and HYBE.
The agreement’s terms were kept confidential. In order to compete with Netflix (NFLX) and profit from the current wave of popularity around Korean content and culture, Disney (DIS) has made a move that demonstrates how it is putting a priority on top-tier talent.
For instance, “Squid Game,” a South Korean blockbuster from Netflix that rose to the position of the company’s top show globally last year, generated a lot of talk among fans worldwide. Disney claimed that shows like “Snowdrop,” a Korean series that has recently become one of its most popular in Asia, have also been successful.
The move is a part of the company’s significant expansion into Asian content, which was revealed in October. By 2023, it hopes to have more than 50 regionally produced original films in the works.
The juggernaut of Hollywood announced at the time that it had ordered new shows from South Korea, Japan, Australia, Taiwan, and Indonesia. There will be a lot of local language programming, from Mandarin to Bahasa Indonesia.
Furthermore, Netflix has been heavily investing in original Asian-language programming and is emphasizing the global success of its Korean and Japanese series in particular.
The company reported in April that it had lost subscribers for the first time in ten years, which put pressure on the stock in recent months. Discussion regarding the streaming industry’s long-term prospects was sparked by the revelation.
But investors appear to be less anxious about Disney. The firm reported that it had added more Disney+ subscribers than anticipated over the prior quarter, raising its total to 137.7 million, at its most recent results presentation in May.
