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Revolutionary heroes ranging from John Brown to Kim Il-Sung are isekai'd to a fantasy world that parodies shows like 'the rising of the shield hero' to break the chains of slavery in all forms once more and liberate the fantasy workers and the peasants from the yoke of feudal oppression while hunting down so-called "heroes" summoned by the feudal lords who intend to use them as tools to preserve their power and the economic base of their feudalistic slave economy.

Show me Stalin riding a chocobo or some shit leading a calvary charge against slaver caravans!

Show me Marx, Engels, and Lenin working together in the cities inspiring the proto-proletariate to take up arms against the feudal robber-barons and their land-leechs that bleed them dry

Show me Mao, Tito, and bonus character Jan Žižka, on a rural bro-venture with the three in a competitive rivalry to see who can organize the greatest peasant rebellion between the three!

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[-] Comrade_Mushroom@hexbear.net 16 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I know they do a lot of stuff for internal audiences, but if the DPRK produced home-grown media that was appealing to Western audiences, it would open up countless minds to their struggle.

[-] Le_Wokisme@hexbear.net 10 points 6 days ago

they don't seem to care what random westerners think about them, which is probably the correct choice.

[-] SkingradGuard@hexbear.net 7 points 6 days ago

Honestly the problem extends to the global south too, where western propaganda is very strong in many countries (see: Brazil).

[-] Le_Wokisme@hexbear.net 5 points 6 days ago

BRICS should hire them to do propaganda

[-] huf@hexbear.net 7 points 6 days ago

they might, if the westerners lived in democracies and their opinions could affect foreign policy

[-] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 2 points 6 days ago

Revolutionary heroes ranging from John Brown to Kim Il-Sung are isekai'd to a fantasy world that parodies shows like 'the rising of the shield hero' to break the chains of slavery in all forms once more and liberate the fantasy workers and the peasants from the yoke of feudal oppression while hunting down so-called "heroes" summoned by the feudal lords who intend to use them as tools to preserve their power and the economic base of their feudalistic slave economy.

I've wanted to make a comic like this (though without any specific historical figure, I think an everyman protagonist would work better for reaching libs) but I've never quite managed to write a version that felt right.

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 3 points 6 days ago

I'd like to write a fictional book like that too but I've been in a hell of a quagmire for a writers block for a bit over a year now.

[-] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 3 points 6 days ago

I know what you mean! It's so hard to find the time to write my own stuff, I'm always writing things for work and then just don't have the drive to really work on my stuff after that.

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 3 points 6 days ago

Yep that plus having writing reports or articles for my party, really not a cool time for having a writing block at this time. Like the most I'll write nowadays is when something tilts me in that special way that gets under your skin like fiberglass in the interdigital space between your fingers.

[-] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 2 points 6 days ago

Like the most I'll write nowadays is when something tilts me in that special way that gets under your skin like fiberglass in the interdigital space between your fingers.

That's how I use AI in my writing. If I'm struggling with a scene, I get the AI to write it, and then it is so awful that it makes me want to write better out of sheer spite, so I end up getting my work done. I can't really do that for my own personal projects though.

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 2 points 6 days ago

Oof I can't imagine asking the tickle-me-elmo to write my story for me, even if it's to get something down on paper I can stare at and turn red mad and nude over to redo the whole thing. At least for me it's a whole self-reliance thing (juche gang) combined with being a bit super self-controling when it comes to using possible proverbial crutches/training wheels. Honestly I should just schedule some time in the week to just sit there and stare at a piece of paper with pencil at hand with the intent of just cranking out one-shot stories until the block is bulldozed.

[-] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 2 points 6 days ago

It helps that I'm mostly motivated by spite, and often have confidence issues with my writing, so when I see something awful and generic as the "alternative" to what I am going to write, it really helps inspire me to keep going. I used to just look up bad writing in general, but AI has streamlined the process of finding terrible writing to compare my own too quite a bit. It helps stop me from getting into the cycle of nonstop revision as well, because I'm comparing my work to something worse, not some hypothetical perfect version in my head. It mainly works for me because I have deadlines to meet and do need to get stuff done even when I'm just not feeling it at all.

Honestly I should just schedule some time in the week to just sit there and stare at a piece of paper with pencil at hand with the intent of just cranking out one-shot stories until the block is bulldozed.

Sometimes just putting aside time for a quick idea can work really well for people! It is a little hit or miss for me, but it has helped me with writer's block in the past. Just writing something you want to, with no rules, no audience in mind, just trying to create something to get back into the habit can be really effective. Creativity is a skill like any other, and like any other skill, it needs practice and discipline for you to keep going with it.

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 2 points 6 days ago

Well heres to us and anyone else dealing with the block to get over the hump one way or another! shinji-mug also I can't believe we don't have a toasting emoji.

I kinda want to share some of my writing ideas in the literature comm sometime just for the hell of jt

[-] Damarcusart@hexbear.net 2 points 6 days ago

I should probably share more stuff in the art com too, it would probably get me more motivated to do stuff outside of just work.

We should both go for it, it'll be rough at first I think, but it'll be better for both of us longer term! garf-chan (This is the only other vaguely "toast" themed emoji I could find)

[-] PKMKII@hexbear.net 57 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Libs when their treats are made in sweatshops in countries run by right wing despots: porky-happy

Libs when their treats are made in AES countries: porky-scared-flipped

[-] alexei_1917@hexbear.net 23 points 1 week ago

Tbh, I love when something I needed anyway comes all the way from an AES country. I'm happy to be supporting socialism in some very small way, that no one around me will notice.

[-] PKMKII@hexbear.net 15 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

NGL i scoured the internet to find a roaster that carries Yunnan coffee.

[-] TheSpectreOfGay@hexbear.net 32 points 1 week ago

you would think these people would see that the dprk has an animation industry and think some of the lies they were told about it were wrong. but instead they just go "oh no, show i like has bits made by The Bad People!"

But of course they hate the government, not the people

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[-] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 30 points 1 week ago

The DPRK has been working on animation programs since the late 1980s, if I'm not mistaken. I'm pretty sure they've worked on an episode of Avatar, several episodes of Invincible, Iyanu (Some design documents were leaked, which made some Redditors and US diplomats angry, as they don't want the North Koreans to get paid due to sanctions), several Italian Catholic and magical girl shows (The Original Winx and Angel Friends or Warriors, something like that), some Japanese anime and the Simpsons and Futurama movies.

Not to mention the fact that they make animation for the state television. Most of them seem to be fantasy shows related to Korean history, but the best-known show is probably Squirrel and Hedgehog and its 2005 remake (it seems they announced a new remake for it this year).

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 18 points 1 week ago

You think the embassy would mail DVDs od their shows if asked nicely?

[-] Redcuban1959@hexbear.net 17 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I doubt they would be able to give the foreign stuff they worked on. But the domestically made shows and movies are usually sold by Mokran Video (the main dubbing/localization and media company in the DPRK). The embassy staff will probably just tell you buy the licenced international versions (usually some Italian, Chinese or French company owns the copyright to it and have some generic english dub with the usual VAs for anime and video games) or watch it online, since those can easily be found on youtube and some other video hosting site.

Most of these DVDs are sold on Mokran Video stores that exist in most of the country, I think there some videos on youtube with people buying these dvds.

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[-] BelieveRevolt@hexbear.net 24 points 1 week ago

Yeah, and tons of Western, especially European, animated series were outsourced there.

I'm assuming outsourcing to the DPRK became cheaper than outsourcing to occupied Korea which Western animated shows also did. AKOM was an animation studio that was infamous for its terrible work on shows like G1 Transformers and Batman: TAS.

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 23 points 1 week ago

If the DPRK could start flexing their soft-power muscles by drip-feeding their own anime into the poisoned-well that is the contemporary anime market, they may end up counter-balancing If not outright turning the whole generally reactionary medium on its head.

[-] kristina@hexbear.net 21 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Waiting for chuds to shit on woke Japan and South Korea for trad DPRK or something because they made big booba anime communist girl

[-] alexei_1917@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

"Okay, so some of the stuff from North Korea is really communist, but, like, aside from that the storylines are really good, and the animation's the best I've ever seen! I suppose they really are Best Korea when it comes to making good media!"

[-] Moss@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

The animation in this episode is pretty good too if I recall, certainly of the same quality as most other episodes

[-] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 19 points 1 week ago

https://www.cbr.com/anime-north-korea-tv-series-outsource-sanctions/

Says here SEK also supposedly worked on Dahlia in Bloom, HBO's Iyanu, Child of Wonder and Invincible Season 3.

And

Files have also been identified that may suggest a relationship with the Japanese animation studio Ekachi Epilka (Demon Lord, Retry!).

[-] BadTakesHaver@hexbear.net 18 points 1 week ago

Invincible Season 3

the reason mark grayson refuses to let earth be taken over by the imperialist viltrumite empire is because of Juche ideology kim-salute

[-] Erika3sis@hexbear.net 18 points 1 week ago

I remember hearing that that part of The Lion King that people sometimes claim has the stars spelling out "SEX", aCtUaLLy had the stars spelling out "SEK", because that scene had supposedly been outsourced to SEK Studio — and the stars were SEK's way of sneaking in some credits for themselves, since they wouldn't get credited otherwise. Now the evidence of this story actually being true are basically nonexistent, just rumors, but it's still a fun story if nothing else, right?

But honestly just give me more animation from every country in general, though. I used to say that I wanted to watch at least one animation from every country — really, I still kinda do, but it's just not easy to actually do this, right? It's easiest to get into animation from the Core Anglosphere and Japan, obviously; and it's decently easy to get into animation from Europe, the FSU, China and Korea if you know where to look; and I've found it considerably more difficult to get into animation from everywhere else, but part of that might just be that I'm just not trying hard enough, right?

This desire to see animation in all countries flourish really also goes hand in hand with my own interests in fanime / (budget) independent animation, as well as my interests in fandubbing and fansubbing, and my fantasies about Norway sort of reevaluating its relationship to animation from Seppoland and Japan and going through a whole sort of renaissance of local animation that cuts into these countries' soft power. Because basically nothing about anime that makes it so appealing for so many people is actually specific to Japan in any meaningful way, it's really just historical happenstance.

Oh, and another side note about animation in the DPRK specifically: the anime tracker website Anilist used to have a section for DPRK animation, but they got rid of it for some reason! Honestly I am STILL a bit ticked off about that, because that was one of the best resources I knew of for learning about and exploring that country's animation, and by Jove do they have animation in the DPRK, I can tell you that much!

[-] Le_Wokisme@hexbear.net 5 points 6 days ago

I remember hearing that that part of The Lion King that people sometimes claim has the stars spelling out "SEX", aCtUaLLy had the stars spelling out "SEK", because that scene had supposedly been outsourced to SEK Studio — and the stars were SEK's way of sneaking in some credits for themselves, since they wouldn't get credited otherwise. Now the evidence of this story actually being true are basically nonexistent, just rumors, but it's still a fun story if nothing else, right?

isn't it SFX?

[-] Erika3sis@hexbear.net 6 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Probably, that interpretation was apparently confirmed by someone who worked on the film.

But maybe thaaaat's a cooooover uuuuup oOoOoOh

[-] Le_Wokisme@hexbear.net 5 points 6 days ago

we need a juche specter

[-] alexei_1917@hexbear.net 18 points 1 week ago

That concept sounds so good. But then, I do absolutely love "modern socialist winds up in medieval fantasy world, quickly becomes so disgusted (s)he must apply dialectical materialism and drag this place kicking and screaming into a form of communism, 1917 style, after all, tsarist Russia wasn't an industrialized nation either" as a subgenre - I don't like isekai as it usually goes, I do like this variation of it - and I also like less explicitly isekai style dropping a modern communist into a decidedly apolitical or liberal hegemony universe in order to lead a revolution, especially when they didn't set out to do so, and they and the local party's attitude to it is "we want a revolution the way a desperate woman wants an abortion, or the way you want to gnaw your leg off when you've been caught in a bear trap" - the whole "no one wants to need a revolution" trope.

You might like the John Brown Isekai - it's not explicitly communist, he's very much written In Character and less as a revolutionary figure and very explicitly as a Christian acting out of religious conviction against slavery, and an early American who believes in the American style of democracy, but a student of historical communist tactics and governance practice might see some parallels in the military tactics and the very early council systems when they've got less than a hundred people. And, y'know, even a bourgeois revolution is a good thing in a feudal society if it ends slavery and brings some level of democracy. As much as I like stories that take that setting and skip straight to the proletarian revolution. Like the Bolsheviks actually did in our timeline.

[-] Collatz_problem@hexbear.net 4 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I'm reminded of "Blue Man" by Lazar Lagin, where a Soviet student from 1959 isekaied into 1894 and participates in budding revolutionary movement. I don't know, if it was translated into English.

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[-] dead@hexbear.net 12 points 1 week ago

DPRK has an official film promotion website. The website shows clips from the films, but I think it's not the full films. Some of the films are on youtube if you search the title. Screenshot from the Animation page.

http://www.korfilm.com.kp/en/kofilm?type=11

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this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2025
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