Webtoon Wave: the Rise in Popularity of South Korea’s Digital Comics
Japan popularized manga in the 2000s, and readers around the globe went crazy over these comics.
Mangas offered the convenience of reading visually alluring and interesting stories from compact books. No more bulky, boring reads, thanks to the revolution that mangas inspired. More recently, paper copies are decreasing, and it seems like relying on phones for entertainment is most common. South Korea, with a giant industry of manhwas [South Korean mangas] to back it up, transformed the world of comics with a captivating digital format. These digital manhwas, called webtoons, are spreading around like a wildfire. Mindlessly scrolling on your phone is out, and reading manhwas while scrolling on your phone is in - webtoons are the future of comics.
While it is pretty mainstream on a global scale, many people outside of South Korea are not familiar with webtoons. This digital format was first developped in the early 2000s, and had some sucess online with websites Daum Webtoon and Naver Webtoon. However, some readers were illegally uploading scans of printed manhwas, resulting in a demand for free comics over paid ones. The market hopped onto this opportunity to develop accessible platforms that will fuel this industry.
Thanks to the popularity of webtoons, many manhwa artists receive a lot of freedom when it comes to producing their webtoons. Along with the millions of South Koreans who are fully devoted to their comics, the market is currently expanding in Southern Asia and the Occident, and more and more platforms are offering translation services to push this expansion. On top of that, the art and illustrations are another level, with some incorporating sound and video.
With this boom, Netflix has their eyes on adapting certain webtoons in series, and the first European webtoon platform, Webtoon Factory, was launched in 2019.
There is no better way to crush boredom than with webtoons. Many can be read offline and for free, while supporting the artists behind them.
About the Author:
Mizuki Khoury
Born in Montreal, based in Tokyo. Sabukaru’s senior writer and works as an artist under Exit Number Five.
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