“I smacked my head on the bathroom floor,” a bloodied and bandaged President Barack Obama says, “as I was so shocked by North Korea’s hydrogen bomb detonation!”
This is satirical political comedy, Pyongyang style.
A recent episode of the snappily named “The stage of optimism that Songun presented — Volume 11,” which airs on state-controlled Korea Central Television (KCTV), lampooned the US leader and “oppressed” South Koreans ahead of the North’s nuclear warhead test this month.
“So, Mr. President, you were testing the hardness of your skull while the North was testing its hydrogen bomb?” an actor playing Obama’s secretary asks him.
Later in the show, Seoul’s envoy to the US is described as a “bitch on the run,” while her Japanese counterpart is called a “monkey.”
According to NK News, a specialist website focused on North Korea, “this is the first time the North has explicitly used US and South Korea-related satire in its comedy.”
Propaganda overdrive
Though the show aired on September 1, according to NK News, before the latest weapons test, its tone is consistent with Pyongyang’s bullish rhetoric around its nuclear program.
On Wednesday, the North dismissed a US B-1 bomber flyover of South Korea as “bluffing” and “blustering” by Washington, and warned the US to “stop their rash actions.”
In March, Pyongyang released a video portraying the nation engaging in nuclear war with the US.
“This is America’s last chance,” the video warned, over footage of a missile striking Washington DC and the Stars and Stripes engulfed in flames.
North Korea’s fiery propaganda — which is intended for audiences at home — doesn’t always go as planned.
A documentary intended as a portrayal of a happy family in North Korea became something of a PR nightmare for Pyongyang when the filmmaker used his rare access to the country to produce a film about the inner workings of its propaganda machine.