'The Koreans' begins production with ‘Squid Game’ star Lee Byung-hun and Han Ji-min

The reimagined Korean version of ‘The Americans, ’ starring ‘Squid Game’ fame Lee Byung-hun and Han Ji-min, has officially begun. ‘The Koreans’ is set to star the actors as North Korean spies living undercover in South Korea. The narrative follows a seemingly ordinary middle-class family concealing a dangerous secret, set against the backdrop of South Korea’s democratisation and rapid cultural transformation in the early 1990s.The series will track the pair as they are pulled between allegiance to their homeland, their sense of self, and their bonds as a family, while a relentless Korean counterintelligence agent edges closer to exposing them.Lee Byung-hun, known for ‘Squid Game’ and ‘No Other Choice,’ and Han Jimin, of ‘Heavenly Ever After’ lead the cast. Ahn Gilho, whose credits include ‘The Glory’ directs the series. The screenplay is adapted by Park Eunkyo, known for 'Made in Korea' and 'Mother,' from the original series created by Joe Weisberg and showrun by Weisberg and Joel Fields, which starred Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys.The announcement positions the series as the latest addition to expanding the Korean content slate.‘The Koreans’ will release exclusively on Disney+ internationally and on Hulu in the U.S. The original series took home the Golden Globe for best drama in 2019 and earned AFI TV Program of the Year honors in each of its first five seasons, from 2014 to 2018. The series starred Philip and Elizabeth Jennings, two Soviet KGB officers posing as a married American couple in suburban Washington, D.C., during the 1980s Cold War.