Politics
Liam O'Dell
Mar 25, 2022
Al Jazeera
Kim Jong-un, the Supreme Leader of North Korea, has released a cinematic trailer to coincide with the firing of the country’s first suspect intercontinental ballistic missile in five years – and it’s every bit as wild as you’d expect.
The projectile was fired on Thursday and landed in the sea 170km west of Japan’s northern prefecture of Aomori – according to the country and South Korea.
The launch – the 12th major firing this year – was also condemned by the United States, with White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki stating it was a “brazen violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions”.
"[It] needlessly raises tensions and risks destabilising the security situation in the region,” she said.
And if the threat of nuclear war wasn’t horrifying enough, an excessively edited video has come out of North Korea showing the country’s leader overseeing the test of the missile.
After walking out of a hangar containing the missile with two military officials by his side, Mr Jong-un and the guards are seen looking at their watches, before giving the nod for it to go ahead.
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All of that is not before they show several zoomed-in clips, flashes of frames, and Jong-un taking off his sunglasses, of course.
When the video emerged online, many Twitter users couldn’t believe what they were seeing – and thus, was memed accordingly:
This is not a parody, that's official video of Kim Jong-un guiding the test launch of Nork Korean missile pic.twitter.com/1ZSj5OnqTO— Ankiit Koomar (@Ankiit Koomar) 1648191001
I think Kim Jong Un is going through an 80s movie phasepic.twitter.com/qhX0kH9CgG— Populism Updates (@Populism Updates) 1648190427
Just because you asked for it @edgarwright Presenting KIM JONG UN FT . THUNDERBIRDS THEMEpic.twitter.com/qarVr3beqf— Sagar (@Sagar) 1648203181
Pyongyang style!\n\n(35 second mark is amazing)pic.twitter.com/XzIwHAHwMw— p (@p) 1648190630
danger zonepic.twitter.com/mmKkfDANkx— alva der fabiol\u00f6se (@alva der fabiol\u00f6se) 1648197099
Top Gun trended on Twitter following the release of the video, with the trend filed under ‘Movies and TV’.
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