Naver Webtoon 'Iduna!' Original Animation Revealed

Naver Webtoon announced on the 20th that the animation "Aishangtaderiyou(?上?的理由)," based on the webtoon "Iduna!," will be released on the Chinese multi-video platform Bilibili. The Korean-subtitled animation can be viewed on Naver Series On and Laftel.

"Iduna!" is a popular work serialized on Naver Webtoon from July 2019 to July 2022. It tells the story of the male protagonist Lee Wonjun, who moves into a share house at the start of the university semester and discovers that retired idol Iduna lives downstairs. It was serialized in eight languages including Korean, Japanese, English, and Chinese, and recorded approximately 500 million views. A Netflix series of the same name starring actress Suzy is also set to be released soon.

Bilibili is a Chinese video platform. According to its Q4 earnings report last year, it has 326 million monthly active users (MAU). An animation based on Naver Webtoon's "Oh! Jo Yesu" is also scheduled to be released on Bilibili within this month. In September last year, an animation based on Naver Webtoon's "Moon You" was released on Bilibili. It was produced as the Chinese film "Duxing Yueqiu (獨行月球)" last year and achieved the second highest box office record in China.

With the recent increase in interest in webtoon-based video adaptations in China, collaborations between major local video platforms and Naver Webtoon are steadily increasing. In February this year, Kuaishou (快手), one of China's major video platforms, introduced a short-form drama based on Naver Webtoon's "Asking Each Other." In the same month, iQIYI, one of China's leading online video services (OTT), also released a drama based on Naver Webtoon's "Gauss Electronics."

A Naver Webtoon official said, "In the global entertainment industry, inquiries about webtoon-based intellectual property (IP) business centered on video adaptations are increasing," adding, "We will be a reliable partner that creators of Naver Webtoon can trust to help their webtoon IPs expand globally in various ways."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.