Catherine philp is world affairs editor at the times. She's reported from war zones for decades, and recently accompanied ukrainian forces across the border into kursk. So, i was coming into ukraine for. . . I've been coming on and off since before the invasion, and this was a long—scheduled visit. Itjust so happened that it came at a time when ukrainian forces had crossed the border into russia. So, obviously, my immediate question was, can we go? can we get there? setting it up with the ukrainians was not the hard bit. Actually, it was convincing my editors and, you know, layers of management back at the times that this was a safe thing to do, or that we could mitigate the risks involved in it. Because they weren't just about the danger there. They were also these legal risks about. . . . . The legal consequences of illegally crossing into russia, which is how the russian government have perceived the trip. But you obviously persuaded them, cos you went. Just to explain, then, who you did speak to and what the terms were. I suppose the question is, whether you were changing names to protect russians, because getting people, presumably, in russia to speak candidly to western journalists must be very hard? well, yeah, these are people who lived in a very quiet corner of russia, and probably had never had anything to do with a journalist, even a russianjournalist, never mind a foreign one. I gave them their choices. I used first names only. And, you know, gave them the choice. I also made. . . I made very sure to speak to them out of the earshot of ukrainian journalists as much. . . Sorry. Of soldiers as much as was possible. Just because, you know, obviously, people may change what they say if someone's listening to them, not just what they might say because of any fears about how the russian authorities would react. But, i mean, i heard every different shade of view from them, from those who were horrified by the war in ukraine, to those who'd never given it a second thought and didn't care. And even, in one case, a woman who was very reluctant to accept that russia had, you know, invaded ukraine and had taken aggressive action there. And you attended something that sounded very fascinating, which was that ukraine's civilian military liaison officers were showing films to local people about the invasion. And i wonder what the reaction was to the films as you were there? yeah, i mean, that was extraordinary, and one of the most extraordinary things to watch. There was a small audience of older people who were watching it. I spoke to one of them afterwards, nikolai, who, you know, ithink, had been horrified by what he saw. But this was new for everyone. Theyjust haven't seen those kind of images of places like bucha and some of the atrocities that we're familiar with. One guy actually told me that he only knew that there was fighting going on in the donbas. The most resistant person to this was a village mayor, who kept interrupting the movie to say to the soldier, well, you know, this has happened in russia. This has happened in belgorod. People have been shelled there. And then this image footage flashed up of a mass grave being disinterred in bucha, and i said to her, do you have those in russia? and she conceded they did not. Catherine, thank you very much indeed, for the moment. Please stay with us. Francis scarr is with us in the studio. He's a russia specialist at bbc monitoring, a regular contributor to the media show. Francis, i'm sure what catherine has been describing doesn't match what people watching russian media are seeing and hearing. No, quite far from it, of course. Well, on the russian state media, which is of course very tightly controlled by the kremlin, there have been efforts to downplay the scale of what's happened. And so, we've seen them really not really going into detail, in terms of having any. Reporters on the ground. They're showing lots of footage from the defence ministry of ukrainian tanks and armoured vehicles being destroyed, and using these kind of boilerplate statements about russian forces l repelling these forces. And putin himself is downplaying it. J he's using phrases such as i circumstances or situation to describe the events there, rather than actually referring | to it as an invasion, or incursion. That said, the russian state media never miss an opportunity to reinforce their pre—existing narratives around the war and around ukraine. And so, we have seen them trying to use it. To galvanise support. They're talking about the whole nation coming together to support those who have been affected, and supplying humanitarian aid, and offering homes and accommodation. . But i'm interested that they are talking about it, because, presumably, another option would be to ignore it. They are talking about it, | but it has definitely fallen off the agenda since it began almost a month ago. Now, of course, they. Are talking much more about the increasing pace of the russian offensive i in eastern ukraine, because they like to talk about their successes, i rather than their failures. I think the reason why they've mentioned it at all is that, with certain stories, like this, they are simply too big to ignore, and the kremlin would be embarrassed if it were to simply pretendl nothing was happening. I was going to ask you about that. To what degree does detail of what's happening start appearing on social media, whether the authorities like it or not? or are they able to control that, too? well, in recent weeks —| i don't know whether it's connected directly — but the kremlin is apparently taking more and more i measures to gain control over social media. We've seen youtube on desktop devices in russia being slowed i down, and certain providers are actually trying _ to counteract that by speeding it up themselves, for which they've received warning from the state media censor. But there have been videos on social media of locals i complaining they haven't i received the necessary level of support from the authorities, which, of course, goes against the narrative that we're seeing from putin himself. Catherine philp from the times, you're still with us. One of the things that i picked up from your reporting was that you had a very strong impression that there was a real sense of shock and betrayal that moscow's war in ukraine would directly impact their lives. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, this was. . . You know, you've got to remember, it was sold to them not as a war, but a special military operation to sort of take care of a little local trouble in their neighbour, ukraine. I mean, these are. . . These are people who did watch russian tanks thunder over the border that morning in february 2022, when the invasion happened. But apart from that, they really haven't been affected. Despite their extreme proximity to ukraine, the war over that border hasn't really impacted them the way it has in some other parts, like belgorod, where there's been sort of cross—border fire. So, the fact that the war had arrived on their doorstep was just astonishing to them. Everyone was, you know, talked of being in shock. And this was a good two weeks after it happened — they were still in shock. And i think, you know — as francis alluded to there — there were complaints about, and rumblings about things like the fact that they hadn't been prepared for it, that the authorities had upped and left before they did, and that those who evacuated did so mostly under their own steam, certainly from places like sudzha, and had no official help whatsoever. So, the people left behind were, you know, really, the benighted of this corner of russia, and really still disbelieving this had happened to them. And those films that they were being shown by the ukrainians, what was in them? so, it was actually. . . It was interesting because it wasn't actually terribly heavy—handed propaganda of the kind that you might use. It was pretty sort of light on atrocities. It was mostly people talking, people in ukraine talking about what they'd been through. So, interviews with people in places like bucha, irpin, and then some of the footage cut in. But, you know, ithought it was pretty lightly done. One of the interesting things they focused on was getting russian speakers in this video. And then, as it was playing, the civilian military officer, he turned to them and said, look, you've been told by vladimir putin that this operation was launched to protect russian speakers, and here are these russian speakers who've been affected by this and whose family members have been killed and houses destroyed. So, you know, they were trying to point out very. . . They were trying to very directly refute things that the russian state media narrative had, you know, had claimed to these people. Were they also making efforts to convey the message that the occupation by ukraine was temporary? yes, they were. And, you know, they also set about very much sort of trying to provide goods to people and sort of step into that breach left by the russian authorities who had gone. So, there were a group of people who'd taken shelter in a boarding school, on their own initiative. That wasn't where the ukrainians had told them to be or anything. But they were there, and they were providing them with food, water, medicines. There was a doctor there that people could go and see. And people were, you know, kind of appearing, who had taken refuge in their own basements, were sort of popping up aftertime, after a few days of hiding. And then, they were giving out supplies to them, too. So, it was kind of an effort to. . . And they said, quite explicitly, that, we want to show them that we will behave differently in this situation than the russians did when they came into ukrainian territory. And part of that was to say, we are not going to be staying forever. This is a temporary measure. Francis, let's bring you back in. Because catherine was for a time with ukrainian troops — would the russian state consider doing something similar? would you get tv reporters accompanying military operations in order to generate content for tv? definitely. In donbas, where russia's been advancing, most of the russian| state war correspondents are embedded with troops there. I've even seen one loading an artillery shell, which of course goes againsti any notion of what journalists should be doing. Joining in? joining in, exactly. And this is all about, sort of, turning the russian troops i into heroes in the idea. . . In the minds of the russian. Population. And about promoting what they're doing as a sort of defensive war for russian values against ukraine and, | and the west more broadly. And to what degree are. . . . . Is this kind of tv coverage simply sympathetic with the putin position or the russian state position, or to what degree is it actuallyjust one and the same, there's no dividing line between the tv news that's offered and what the government wants? i don't think there i is any dividing line. Recently there was an interview given by one of the sort of most prominent talk show hosts on russian tv, and she spoke of her role as a propagandist and was quite open about the fact i that she was working for the kremlin and that she l didn't see journalism as a sort of pursuit of the truth in the way that real. Journalists might see it, that herjob was merely to work for her government and to work against governments _ in countries that are seen as hostile to russia. Francis, thank you. Catherine, thank you. Now, next on the media show, let's talk about korean television, because last week, bbc studios, which is the commercial arm of the bbc, signed a deal with a korean content agency, which could mean a lot more k—content, as it's sometimes called, heading in the direction of the uk. Now, korean tv has been making a name for itself, not least with hits like squid game and the masked singer. He sings in korean. That's the korean version of the masked singer and a contestant from one of the first episodes before it became a global hit that's been sold to more than 50 countries. Another is i can see your voice, where contestants have to tell the difference between good singers and bad singers without ever hearing them sing. And there's now huge amounts of investment heading south korea's way. Last year, netflix pledged to spend $2. 5 billion in the next four years. Disney+ is planning to create more korean originals for 2024 and 2025. One senior executive has described it as a gold rush for korean content. Let's hear from someone who knows a lot about developing hit formats and then selling them around the world. Insoon kim is head of content at a production company called something special, and she's been explaining to me why korean television is on such a run. The first reason would be korea is an extremely competitive society. We've always been surrounded by big countries historically, so we had to survive creatively. Our rapid economic growth was achieved within a half—century. K—pop industry is well—known for its competitive environment, which is not always a bright side. Korean viewers are absolutely not easy to please. So korean tv. . . Is that right? yeah, korean tv has to provide them new things all the time, so that could be one reason. Another reason could be, i think korean creative talents are really good at hybridising genres. The funny thing is when the masked singer and i can see your voice came out in 2015, nobody actually thought that that was an actual format because it was so different from the traditional franchise format, like got talent, the voice. So people said, why should we see a music game show mixed with a music competition show? it should be either a game show or a talent competition show, but now they call it a music guessing game show. So you've almost created a genre as well as creating certain formats. Yes. I was interested just now, you said that korean audiences are very hard to please. They're very demanding. Tell us more about that. Why. . . ? what is it that they want? korean people barely watch returning seasons of the show unless it's tied with the huge celebrities. Even the tv series, we don't. . . . . We barely do the returning seasons. Let's say there's one terrestrial channel. They have to commission 40 — four—zero — different tv series per year. So korean people want to. . . . . Always want to see new things, new celebrities, new faces, new ideas, rather than seeing old and watched formats. So. . . It sounds like an unforgiving audience, but it's evidently having a creative knock—on effect. I'm interested, though, in terms of the formats themselves. Originally, if we go back a few years, these were formats that were being created for the south korean market, which then became international hits. But now that it's been proven that korean tv producers can make international hits, is it more and more the case that when you're making programmes, actually you're thinking about the international market from the very beginning? sure. We do a lot of co—development with international partners so that that format could be created not only for the korean audience, but for the international audience from the very beginning. So we want to mix the dna of korean creative with the dna of the international market. For instance, a few years ago, we created a show called the beatbox, which was co—developed by the original creator of i can see your voice with fremantle netherlands. And it's also a fun studio music game show where everyday items become music instruments. Two teams of celebrities compete against each other in various music—related quiz games to obtain the sound of daily items. And. . . So they're using everyday items from maybe the kitchen or from other parts of our home to create music that we would know? exactly, exactly. After gaining the items. . . Sounds good fun. . . They only have 24 hours to recreate a well— known song using the sounds of items. That sounds great. That's called beatbox. There's another format with box in the title — battle in the box — that some people listening may have seen. It's quite an unusual format, too. Yes, we have a lot of boxes. Laughter. It's a show where two celebrity teams are locked in the iconic box, divided by a moving wall for 20 hours, and compete against each other through numerous games and challenges to gain more spaces in the box. So it was remarkably remade into a uk version by interstellar and the uktv. I would love to be in all the conversations where you're imagining these ideas and thinking about which ones you want to make and which ones you don't. As you look at the industry you work in, can you see it being changed a great deal by the amount of interest from abroad? well, i started out this career as a researcher of the international tv format industry. At that time, korea was not even on any paper, any research papers, but now, it's totally changed. Korea is having some portion in the industry, and i'm really proud of it. And i wasn't even expecting that i would see this coming within my lifetime. And i would like to extend this phenomenon as long as possible by collaborating with international partners as well. Well, that was insoon kim from something special. For the bigger picture, we spoke to lucas shaw from bloomberg. It is one of the most popular genres, or i should say, kind of languagesl outside of english. You know, film and television from the united states, from the uk is still the mostl popular and is sent the most. Most of the biggest services, from netflix to disney+ on down, are american services. But when you look at| the different markets contributing the most popular shows, south korea is up there with spain, it'si up there with the uk, it's up there with brazil,. It's up there with colombia among the biggest and has produced arguably the two| or three biggest hits. For any country outside of the us and uk. And, ok, how much, then, have international streamers and broadcasters invested in that country, then, as a result of spotting this and realising that it's. . . . . You know, there's incredible popularity around the world? depends on the company. So i'd say in aggregate, kind of global media companies have now spent billions. Of dollars on korean film and television, especially television. Netflix is far and away| the biggest supporter. It identified korea as veryl important to its expansion across asia early on, | initially licensing a lot of existing shows and thenl subsequently also investing in original programming like squid game. And so it's spent billions of dollars alone in southj korea. Some of the other players, like disney and apple have| started to spend money, but doing so far more i judiciously. And what does that mean? what has it meant for the domestic market in south korea to suddenly have all this. . . . . These billions of dollars invested? well, initially it was a godsend. You know, you had a companyl in netflix coming and spending far more on individual projectsl than had been done previously. The average budget for a scripted show went from sort of high six—figures, low seven—figures to now several million dollars an episode. If you were lucky enoughj to be a star on that show or a creator of one of those. Shows, you were both getting paid more money and able to tell stories that were generally less common on the korean broadcasters. | i think, over time, _ there's been some questions as to whether this has| been all positive, both because of netflix's impact on some of the local broadcasters who have l struggled to retain some of their viewers, and there's a feeling that while some i people have made a lot of money from these shows, that the average worker maybe hasn't been paid as much as they would've liked. Ok, well, lucas shaw from bloomberg, thank you so much. And we're now going to focus in on korean drama in particular, which has, as we've been hearing, been finding international success. Regina kim is a freelance entertainmentjournalist and forbes contributor. Regina, just how popular is korean drama becoming? how many big hits can you point us to? oh, wow. Well, i mean, as lucas mentioned, it's super popular. It's actually been globally popular for a while now. It'sjust that i think a lot of mainstream audiences in the west haven't really been paying attention that much. But, like, korean dramas have been popular in many parts of the world like asia, africa, parts of the middle east and latin america since the 2000s, really. But, i mean, in recent years, obviously with the rise of netflix, if you look at, like, netflix's weekly global chart of, like, the top ten non—english language shows, it's very common to find, like, at least three or four k—dramas on that chart out of, like, you know, ten shows total. And so, you know, more recently we have, like, gyeongseong creature, which is. . . Well, that was like, you know, last year, the second season of gyeongseong creature's coming out. Obviously we have, like, squid game. We also have, like, parasyte: the grey. But, like, outside of netflix, you know, we've also seen lovely runner, which is actually on this platform called viki. It's also on netflix in some markets, so. . . And then also we have marry my husband, which is on amazon prime video, which is, like, the number one k—drama on amazon prime video for. . . It was, like. . . It was the number one k—drama, but then it was also in the top ten on amazon for, like, six months. So there's so many hits that we can point to, and. . . Regina, let mejust jump in there. Lots of hits. I'm curious, though. Is the type of drama that's being made in south korea changing as it finds a bigger and bigger international audience? well, i would say in recent years, again, like, thanks to the rise of streaming, we are seeing more and more k—dramas that have more graphic content. But i would say, you know, it's generally due to this diversification of genres that we've been seeing with the rise of streaming. Because previously, you know, most k—dramas were shown. . . . . Were, like, made by local broadcasters and cable tv channels. And in korea, there are certain, you know, general guidelines around what can and cannot be shown on korean tv. But with international streaming platforms like netflix or disney+, there really are no, like, local restrictions on the type of content that can or cannot be shown. And so that has led to, you know, more k—dramas that are, like, for example, horror, like what we saw with all of us are dead or kingdom. You know, those are a great examples of k—dramas that feature zombies. We obviously have thrillers like squid game, a bloody lucky day, which is on paramount+. It's also, like, one of the most violent shows i've seen ever. And we also have, like, superhero shows now. For example, disney+�*s moving, which had like, you know, people with superpowers, which you just never saw in k—dramas before. And so you're really seeing a wider variety of k—dramas in terms of genre thanks to streaming. Well, that's almost it for this week's media show, but, ros, i do want to ask you before you go — come on, which of those formats, if you had to go on a south korean tv show, what would it be? so i quite like this one where you take everyday items and try and create pop songs within 24 hours. Ican imagine. . . I thought you were going to do that. Might even go home and try that. . . Well, not for the viewers' benefit, just for mine. . . With a bit of drum and bass? maybe with a bit of drum and bass thrown in as well. You never know. Can't wait to hear it. That's a lie, by the way. Laughter but i'm afraid that is all we've got time for, so goodbye from us. Bye. And if you'd like to hear a longer version of today's show, search bbc the media show wherever you get your bbc podcasts. Hello there. Before we get to the weekend, friday brought some very big differences across the uk. We had sunny skies in western scotland, and in northern ireland, temperatures reached 27, the hottest it's been all year. It was quite a bit cooler here at the oval for the test match, where we struggled with bad light. Doesn't look quite so gloomy for saturday. Very misty, murky conditions, though, in bristol, where we've seen rain pushing in earlier on in the night and into south wales as well, with some thunderstorms, too. That's going to be clearing away later, and it's going to be quite a warm start to saturday, muggy as well. And because of that we've got extensive low clouds, some mist and some fog around for england and wales, so things may improve a little. It may cheer up a bit, but there may not be too much sunshine around, more cloud producing a few showers here and there. Looks dry for scotland, northern ireland, sunny for the most part, but that low cloud retreating back to the east coast of scotland keeping it cooler here. But in the sunshine in scotland, and northern ireland temperatures again into the mid—20s, and it may warm up where we get a bit of sunshine in east anglia, although not as warm as it was on friday. We've got this area of low pressure is going to bring some wetter weather overnight on saturday night, heavy rain and some thunderstorms, perhaps already arriving during the evening across these southern areas, and that rain will push its way northwards into england and wales. Drier for scotland and northern ireland, some clear spells, but also some mist and low cloud, again, filtering through the central belt of scotla nd and lingering along the east coast of scotland. But another quite warm start to sunday. But it comes with a lot of cloud, and we've got these showers, along with spells of rain affecting england and wales. Again, it could be heavy and thundery. A few showers popping up towards the southeast of scotland. Otherwise scotland, northern ireland, generally dry but more cloud around, so it's going to be quite a bit cooler, particularly so for northern ireland. If we get a bit of sunshine in the midlands across to lincolnshire, that could pop off a few thundery showers here. Now that area of low pressure is going to move away on monday, so it starts to turn drier, but then we change the wind direction. We're going to pick up more of a northwesterly wind over the week ahead, and that will make it feel quite a bit cooler as well. Now, most of the wet weather next week will be more towards the northwest of the uk this time, the drier weather in the southeast, but those temperatures are going to be lower, perhaps peaking at only 13 or 14 in belfast and edinburgh. Live from london, this is bbc news. Boeing's starliner capsule is about to land back on earth imminently, but the astronauts it was supposed to be carrying are staying behind on the international space station. The israeli military says it's investigating an incident in which an american—turkish dual citizen was shot dead in the occupied west bank. Sentencing in donald trump's hush—money trial has been postponed until after the us presidential election. Hello and welcome, i'm rajini vaidyanathan. Breaking news, boeing's starliner spacecraft is landing sta rliner spacecraft is landing back starliner spacecraft is landing back on earth without its crew after unblocking from the international space station. It's about to land back on earth, using parachutes to slow its descent to land at the white sands space harbour in new mexico in the us.