INDIANAPOLIS — The wait is nearly over for the highly anticipated second season of "Pachinko."
Apple TV+'s critically acclaimed drama follows four generations of a Korean immigrant family as they leave their homeland in a quest to survive and thrive.
"Since the last episode of Season 1, seven years has passed, and (Sunja) is still in Osaka selling kimchi, and she is the master of selling kimchi," said actress Minha Kim, who plays the central character as a young adult. "She literally will do anything to save and protect her family, so obviously she became very strong, and she's more relaxed, and you get to see more of her laughter in this season."
"Pachinko" debuted to rave reviews in March 2022, with a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a score of 87 on Metacritic.
"Every single person helped me with concentrating on my work, and we became one of the closest friends to each other," Kim said.
Starring as the older version of Kim's character is Oscar winner Youn Yuh-jung ("Minari") — although the two obviously never got to work together since they play the same character during different periods of her life.
"Every time I saw her performance, it's just phenomenal. I learned a lot, and I respect her a lot," Kim said of Youn. "While I was working on my version of Sunja, I tried to separate me from Yuh-jung because I was afraid if I can think about it too much, then I could not focus on the situation that Sunja is actually facing."
International storytelling has seen a growth in popularity here in America, with the worldwide success of movies and TV shows like "Parasite" and "Squid Game."
"It's good now that there's no boundaries in the country right now in terms of the movie industry," Kim said. "People are getting more interested in the Asian stories, and we are also very interested in the western stories, so it's getting harmonized. And thanks for the platform, it's easy for audiences to accept the diversity of stories."
New episodes of the second season of "Pachinko" are released Fridays through Oct. 11 on Apple TV+.