A short drama expanding the "Baby Shark" universe will be produced.
On the 19th, The Heri Media said "the K-pop–based high-teen content 'Moonshark: The shark rides stardom' (hereafter 'Moonshark'), which expands the world of Pinkfong Baby Shark (Baby Shark, hereafter 'Baby Shark'), a global hit, will be produced as a short drama."
"Moonshark" is a spin-off webtoon IP (intellectual property) originating from the world of "Baby Shark," which ranks first in global YouTube views, and depicts the coming-of-age story of Sid, a shark princess from an underwater kingdom who falls in love at first sight with a terrestrial K-pop idol and comes ashore, unexpectedly debuting as an SNS celebrity.
To make it easy for the core readership of Generation Z to relate, the narrative centers on teen protagonists who challenge their dreams and build self-agency, and ties in fandom culture using love and passion for artists as a motif. "Moonshark" is a novel comic based on the web novel "Moonshark: How the princess debuts," jointly produced by The Pinkfong Company and M Story Hub. With high-quality artwork and character design and an exciting progression, it entered the top 10 in Naver Series real-time rankings immediately after release and expanded to Naver Webtoon's Japanese service LINE Manga and Kakao Page, building a fandom mainly among female readers in their teens and twenties.
The Heri Media declared through this project a differentiated route from the sensational, melodrama-oriented narratives commonly seen in the existing short drama market. The Heri Media said "Moonshark aims to present a new type of short drama that is warm and heart-fluttering by fusing K-romance, K-sentiment and K-pop," and added "we will showcase the competitiveness of Korean-style short dramas to global viewers."
In particular, The Heri Media plans to continuously develop short dramas in the romantic comedy, high-teen and human drama genres, areas in which Korea has strengths, starting with "Moonshark." It is also building its own platform, ZIPPYBOX, to support this. ZIPPYBOX is expected to establish itself as a key channel supplying Korea's original K short dramas to global and Chinese markets.
An industry insider said "Moonshark" is a case that combines the globally familiar Baby Shark IP with K-pop culture and could open a new horizon for K short dramas, and added "there is a strong possibility it will elevate the status of Korean short dramas in China and global markets." The actual production of Moonshark was undertaken by Romantic Panda Co., Ltd., a company specializing in short drama production.
[Photo] Provided by M Story Hub Co., Ltd.
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