One of the first things "Fast & Furious" star Sung Kang says about his new TV show, marketed as a “multi-country car culture series”, is that it’s not about cars.

Netflix’s "Cigarette Girl" ("Gadis Kretek") is an epic series that is as sprawling & ambitious as the hopes & dreams it carries for Indonesia’s filmmakers. Co-director Kamila Andini talks about a show she had on her wish list for more than a decade.

Netflix continues to scale up in Southeast Asia, adding Indonesian director  Kamila Andini’s TV series, Cigarette Girl, which premieres on 2 November, to Sitisiri (Dome) Mongkolsiri’s Hunger – the #1 film on the global non-English movie top 10 earlier this year – and Timo Tjahjanto’s 2022 chart

A teen gunman in Bangkok may have forced BEC World/Channel 3’s glitzy live showcase off stage in an early-October real-life drama. But, even if the show didn’t go on that night, the party is far from over for Thailand’s storytellers, producers, commissioners and rights holders. 

Prime Video’s activity in Southeast Asia has so far been lower key than many hoped it might be. By all accounts, that’s about to end. Roll on 2024... 

Warner Bros Discovery will launch Max in some parts of Asia in 2024/5, after the Paris Summer Olympics.