‘World of Street Woman Fighter’ brings global dance crews to center stage

Mnet’s hit dance competition show “Street Woman Fighter” is now taking the fight to the global stage with six elite dance crews from five countries — including a famed New Zealand dance team, The Royal Family — facing off in a rare, cutthroat get-together through “World of Street Woman Fighter.”

“This is the only way you bring this level of dancers to compete with each other,” said Mike Song, co-founder of the globally renowned dance crew Kinjaz, during a press conference held in southern Seoul on May 27 ahead of the premiere of “World of Street Woman Fighter,” scheduled to air in the evening at 10 p.m.

Song participated as a judge for the show along with producer and singer Park Jin-young, also known as JYP.

Describing the show as “legendary,“ Song stressed that the intense competition among the six renowned crews would be impossible under any other circumstances.

“So only a show like ‘Street Woman Fighter’ can bring these [veterans] of this level to go against each other,” the dancer added.

“World of Street Woman Fighter” is the third season of the “Street Woman Fighter” franchise (2021-), aside from other spinoffs such as “Street Dance Girls Fighter” (2021-23) and “Street Man Fighter” (2022).

The new season features six crews from five countries: AG Squad from Australia, Bumsup from Korea, Motiv from the United States, Osaka Ojo Gang and RHTokyo from Japan and The Royal Family from New Zealand.

The Korean team consists of nine crew leaders who featured on the first season of the franchise, including Monica, Gabee and Honey J.

Now larger than ever, the program’s production team is also pulling out all the stops to do it right. While the production team has about 35 people, about 100 translators have been hired for both English and Japanese, according to director Choi Jung-nam.

“I could really feel that this is a global project now,” said Choi, explaining that translators were involved not only in editing but also on set during shooting.

But the director added, “I hope viewers also look forward to the universal language that dancers speak through their movements.”

JYP, who started his career in the industry as a backup dancer, said that the cultural diversity of the crews made the competitive dynamic of the show even more compelling.

“There are distinctive characteristics between Western and Eastern teams,” noted Park.

“While Western teams tend to be very powerful and have a strong, cohesive team dynamic, Eastern teams have a sophisticated and commercially sharp edge to them.”

The host for this season is boy band ZeroBaseOne’s Sung Han-bin, a longtime fan of the show, according to the singer.

“I hope to be a host that meets all criteria as an M.C. — from emceeing to overall dance skills, visuals and reaction aspects,” he said.

Sung is set to release a hip-hop track, “Champion,” on Tuesday at 6 p.m., which is part of the soundtrack for the show.

“World of Street Woman Fighter” will be available in 38 countries and regions across the world through various platforms including Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video, Abema, Viu, iQIYI and FPT Play.

BY SHIN HA-NEE [shin.hanee@joongang.co.kr]