Bigger and more powerful.

‘Zombieverse: New Blood’, which announced a fiery return with season 2, is taking over the baton from ‘Black and White Chef: Culinary Class Wars’ and is stepping forward to further elevate the ‘rising’ Netflix entertainment show.

Set in a virtual Seoul that has been transformed into a rain world, the variety entertainment show ‘Zombieverse’, in which the cast members must survive by completing extraordinary quests, gained popularity immediately after its release last year, settling on global charts with favorable reviews for its unique worldview and cinematic scale.

Season 2, which returned a year later with the subtitle ‘New Blood’, started its first quest on Jeju Island and traveled all over the country, expanding its stage to ‘nationwide’. It boasts an even larger scale than Season 1, such as boarding a helicopter and mobilizing an actual running subway.

The number of members has also increased from 10 to 14, making it even richer. In addition to members who were active in Season 1, such as Noh Hong-chul, Lee Si-young, Dex, DinDin, Tsuki, and Patricia, new faces such as Jo Se-ho, Defconn, Taeyeon, Yook Sung-jae, Code Kunst, Kwon Eun-bi, Kim Sun-tae, and Andre Rush have joined, and are expected to demonstrate realistic survival skills.

At a production conference held at CGV Yongsan I-Park Mall in Yongsan-gu, Seoul on the afternoon of the 14th ahead of the release on the 19th, PD Park Jin-kyung emphasized that the ‘dramatic story’ has been further strengthened compared to Season 1, saying, “It has effectively become a new genre of program that has never existed before.” The definition of ‘Yerama’ (variety show + drama) that has a unique combination of variety show and drama” has raised expectations to the max.

PD Park also said, “We put a lot of effort into transfusing new members, ‘new blood’, to match the subtitle ‘New Blood’,” and explained that he recruited mainly “passionate viewers of Season 1” so that the new members could quickly melt into the worldview.

New member Jo Se-ho expressed his satisfaction, saying, “At first, I was worried whether I would be able to immerse myself in the worldview right away, but the production team made the worldview so solid that I was able to focus right away. Taeyeon and Kwon Eun-bi, who said they were even more delighted to join the program because they are “mad about not only zombies but also all kinds of horror movies,” added to the curiosity by saying that they have brought out “a new side of me that I didn’t know about” and “my inner fighting power,” respectively.


Reporter Lee Seung-mi smlee@donga.com