Pachinko

When Min Jin Lee’s book Pachinko was first published back in 2017, its cover soon became ubiquitous wherever you went. The life and family history of Kim Sunja—which spanned much of the twentieth century and captured a history of colonialism and immigration in Japan, Korea and the United States—gripped readers who welcomed such a complex tale of being and belonging. Adapting the bestseller for the small screen armed with a cast that included not only recent Oscar winner Youn Yuh-jung but the likes of Lee Min-ho, Soo Hugh developed Pachinko into a handsome period piece that tenderly traces an intergenerational saga that begins in Japan-occupied Korea in the 1920s and splinters its aching melodrama plots in the lifetimes that follow, playfully putting that titular matching game at its center. Directed by Kogonada and Justin Chon with an eye and ear for the often clashing, often complementary cultures conjured in this story of memory and survival, this literate adaptation grounds painful histories in heartrending tales of love and loss. For depicting a sweeping, decades-spanning family history that feels intimately personal and gloriously epic in equal measure, and for presenting a global, forward-thinking vision of contemporary television that defies borders while telling culturally specific tales, Pachinko wins a Peabody.