‘All of Us Are Dead’ ranks No.1 on Netflix

“All of Us Are Dead,” Netflix’s first original South Korean series this year, rose to the No. 1 spot worldwide on Netflix.

According to FlixPatrol, an over-the-top content ranking site, on Wednesday, the South Korean series, which were released on Friday in over 190 countries around the world, is ranked No. 1 in 54 countries, including Canada, France, and Japan as of Tuesday and has been in the top position for four days since Saturday. The show is ranked No. 2 in the U.K. and the U.S. and is likely to move to the top soon.

According to Netflix, the total viewing time of "All of Us Are Dead" recorded 124.79 million hours in just three days after its release. “Ozark Season 4 Part 1,” which had ranked No. 1 on Netflix’s English-language series chart from January 24 to Sunday, had a total viewing time of 96.34 million hours over a week.

"All of Us Are Dead" is a 12-episode series about the students of Hyosan High School struggling to survive after a zombie virus has spread. It is based on Naver’s webtoon series of the same title, which had been published from 2009 to 2011. It catches viewers’ attention by applying recent situations, such as COVID-19. Some scenes remind viewers of social issues, including school violence and the sinking of the Sewol ferry where many students lost their lives due to incorrect instructions to have them stay inside the ship.

Many foreign media outlets praised the show. “Having high school students as the main characters is a very clever move,” The Guardian said in a Friday article titled “All of Us Are Dead: Netflix’s Korean zombie show will blow you away.” It also said many metaphors used by the show, such as COVID-19 as a zombie virus, are “the masterstroke of the series.” “Like ‘Squid Game’ before it, ‘All of Us Are Dead,’ makes the most out of its nightmarish central location to otherworldly, dizzying effect,” said U.S.-based entertainment news media Variety.

“The global top ranking of ‘All of Us Are Dead’ seems to be the result of events and phenomena that have already become familiar in South Korea but are still new and strange in other countries,” said Yoon Seok-jin, a TV series critic and a professor of the Department of Korean Language and Literature at Chungnam National University.

However, things become a little loose towards the end of the show and there is controversy about the explicit description of sexual violence in the process to depict issues at school.


Hyo-Ju Son hjson@donga.com