Airdate: Inside North Korea’s Dynasty

Four part documentary series Inside North Korea’s Dynasty will screen on SBS from Saturday.

This is a 2018 National Geographic series.

The Kim family’s dark and surreal story provides a fresh perspective on a nation ruled for more than seven decades by one dynasty.

Episode One: Kingdom Of The Kims
For decades, Korea and its people laboured under Japanese imperialist rule. But in 1912, in a small town outside Pyongyang, a child is born – Kim Il Sung, coinciding with an omen of imperialism’s doom. This is the story of how an unknown guerrilla fighter rises to power, takes complete control of his country and makes himself a god in the eyes of his people. Recounted through firsthand testimony and expertly curated archive, this episode explores Sung’s early days in power, how he starts the Korean War, establishes gulags for anyone who could be ‘hostile’, tries to assassinate the President of South Korea, and plays a dangerous game of brinksmanship with the United States, including capturing a U.S. Navy ship – the USS Pueblo – taking American sailors prisoner, and the infamous tree-cutting axe murders in the Demilitarized Zone.

Saturday, 24 August at 7.30pm on SBS.