Life imitates art in Taiwan

{{< figure caption="In the Taiwanese political drama _Wave Makers_, PR aide Chang Ya-ching (left) talks about her experiences with deputy PR director Weng Wen-fang (right). Click for a higher-resolution version. Image © 2023 Netflix." src="/assets/images/wave-makers-chang-weng-embed.png" link="/assets/images/wave-makers-chang-weng.png" alt="A film still depicting two Taiwanese women talking with each other while standing on a rooftop looking out over Taipei." >}}

\This post was originally published on [Cohost.]

A little while ago I wrote about the Taiwanese political drama Wave Makers (now streaming on Netflix), and speculated on its impact on China. It turns out that its more immediate impact was on Taiwan itself, as the ruling Democratic Progressive Party finds itself embroiled in an ongoing scandal that echoes a #MeToo subplot in Wave Makers. (HT to James Turnbull for alerting me to this.)

When the show was originally released, President Tsai Ing-wen of the DPP tweeted, “I hope you all enjoy this peek into the workings of Taiwan’s democracy.” I guess she’s not enjoying it as much right now.