Allegations of plagiarism have been made against the newly released Netflix series Black Knight with some claiming that it bears similarities to the 2019 game Death Stranding.
The game revolves around a protagonist who delivers goods in a post-apocalyptic United States, while Black Knight is based on a webtoon of the same name, released in 2016.
After the teaser trailer for the new Netflix series was released, some online users accused the show of plagiarism, citing similarities with the game Death Stranding, particularly in the main character delivering packages and the dystopian settings. However, the show is based on a webtoon of the same name serialized in 2016, which discredits the accusations.
Others have noted that the teaser trailer for Death Stranding was already publicized in June 2016, alongside other promotional materials such as trailers and interviews, which suggests a possible connection. There have also been claims of “visual concept plagiarism” regarding the directing.
However, some have questioned whether it is fair to judge the originality of Black Knight solely based on the premise. “Are we going to label every work as plagiarized whenever they share similarities with other works in terms of setting or premise?” argued some online users, while others believe that labeling it as plagiarism is excessive, stating, “I think people are overreacting by calling it plagiarism. The show just has a similar vibe to the game.”
The production team of Black Knight responded to Newsen on May 16th, refuting the allegations of plagiarism. In their statement, they emphasized that “Black Knight is a series based on the webtoon of the same name by author Lee Yoon Gyun, which began serialization in 2016.”
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