[맥스무비= 조현주 기자]
Netflix, the world’s largest OTT (online video service) platform, will release games of the Professional Football League (NFL), the most popular sport in the United States, and season 2 of the worldwide box office hit ‘Squid Game’ in succession this year-end season. It can truly be called a ‘super golden day.’ In anticipation of this, Netflix’s ambitious plan is showing early results.
Netflix plans to broadcast two NFL games live in the United States on December 25th, which is Christmas Day. The games are between the Kansas City Chiefs and Pittsburgh Steelers, and the Baltimore Ravens and Houston Texans. The Kansas City Chiefs, the team of Travis Kelce, the boyfriend of pop star Taylor Swift, won the championship last season. The very next day, on the 26th, season 2 of ‘Squid Game’ directed by director Hwang Dong-hyuk will be shown. The previous episode, ‘Squid Game’, was a mega hit that swept the world, and Season 2 will release a total of 7 episodes.
Netflix announced last May that it would broadcast NFL games during the Christmas season for three years starting this year. Two games will be broadcast this year, and at least one game is expected to be broadcast next year and in 2026. The specific terms of the contract between Netflix and the NFL are not known, but Bloomberg News reported that Netflix will pay less than $150 million (211.1 billion won) per game.
The reason why Netflix is spending such a huge amount of money is because the NFL is the most popular sports game in the United States, so it can enjoy that much benefit. In the case of the final match, the ‘Super Bowl’, it is considered an astronomical stage for advertising, exceeding 9 billion won per 30 seconds, and global companies competing for significant effects are competing for marketing.
In fact, on the 13th, Netflix signed a partnership with sports betting company ‘Fanduel’ and ‘Verizon’, a corner that runs before the main game, in relation to the broadcast of the NFL Christmas Day game through its platform for delivering news, and will sell through the two games. It was announced that all available advertising products were sold.
Netflix Chief Content Officer (CCO) Bella Bajaria said, “Last year, we took on the challenge of live content, targeting a variety of fan bases such as comedy, reality, and sports. Among annual events, including sports, nothing attracts audiences like the NFL. NFL Christmas.” “I’m happy that the game can only be enjoyed through Netflix,” he said.
The same goes for ‘Squid Game’ Season 2, which will be released later.
Season 1 of ‘Squid Game’ depicts the story of 456 participants risking their lives in a game to win a prize of 45.6 billion won, and was released on September 17, 2021, with a total of 2.2 billion hours of viewing time over the next 13 weeks. It was the highest ever for a Netflix original series. There is no work that has yet broken that stronghold. It also set a record of winning six categories, including Best Actor (Lee Jung-jae) and Best Director (Hwang Dong-hyuk), at the Emmy Awards, which are recognized as the most prestigious in the American broadcasting industry, proving the status of K content to the world.
Thanks to the achievements of Season 1, Netflix is achieving various results with anticipation for Season 2 as well.
According to Netflix, ‘Squid Game’ Season 2 has partnered with multiple advertisers in 12 ad-supported countries. In Korea, a partnership was signed with Kia Motors. This is Netflix’s first ‘single title sponsorship’ in Korea, and was carried out in line with the launch of ‘The New Sportage’, Kia’s SUV (sports utility vehicle) model. Accordingly, Netflix and Kia Motors produced a three-part customized advertisement and also held a pop-up event.
Netflix announced in its performance report released last month that the number of subscribers increased by 5.07 million in the third quarter, reaching a total of 282.72 million. In addition, in the fourth quarter, Season 2 of ‘Squid Game’, ‘Outer Banks 4’, a work based on author Gabriel García Márquez’s masterpiece ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’, and a biopic about Ayrton Senna, the legendary Brazilian Formula 1 driver. They said they would introduce ‘Sena’. In addition, he predicted that “the number of paid net subscribers is expected to increase in the fourth quarter compared to the third quarter due to seasonal factors and a strong content lineup,” with NFL game broadcasts scheduled.
