Squid Game is first K-drama to be nominated at Critics Choice Awards

Squid Game will face off against seven other shows for best drama series. PHOTO: NETFLIX

SEOUL - Hit Netflix series Squid Game is up for three awards at the Critics Choice Awards, including best drama series and best actor in a drama series for Lee Jung-jae.

One of the major ceremonies of the award season in the United States, the Critics Choice Award announced the nominees on Monday (Dec 6).

This is the first time a K-drama drama has been nominated, although South Korean director Boon Jong-ho's 2019 movie, Parasite, was nominated for seven awards and eventually took home best film and best director last January (2020).

Squid Game will face off against seven other shows for best drama series, including Succession, which leads the contenders with eight nominations, This Is Us, Yellowjackets, Evil, For All Mankind, The Good Fight and Pose.

Lee is the only non-English-speaking nominee in the best actor in a drama series category. He is up against Sterling K. Brown for This Is Us, Mike Colter for Evil, Brian Cox and Jeremy Strong, both for Succession, and Billy Porter for Pose.

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The nine-parter, about a group of desperate people playing deadly childhood games for a huge cash prize, is also nominated for best foreign language series.

Fellow nominees include two French series, Call My Agent! and Lupin; and Money Heist, Acapulco and Narcos: Mexico in Spanish.

Mare Of Easttown, a crime drama starring Kate Winslet, and Evil, a supernatural thriller with Katja Herbers, both had five nominations each, including best actress in a drama series.

The ceremony will take place in Los Angeles on Jan 9 next year (2022).

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