| Episode 149. Establishing Measures to Prevent Recurrence (2)
“What do you usually do in your free time, Assistant Manager?”
“I closed up the office and went home yesterday too.”
“Ah……”
Twelve years of doing nothing but studying until high school. Then the military, and Hanpyeong Industries on top of that.
For most of my life, I hadn’t had free time. If I had to name a hobby, the only thing that counted was playing a bit of bass in college.
And now, I had been given time to rest with nothing to do, nothing I could do, and no bass. Trapped in an empty lodging that wasn’t even my own home, unable to go outside.
“I’m bored.”
Resting? It was the best.
There wasn’t a single office worker who disliked lying in bed. I, too, had spent all of yesterday lying down all day.
But the thing was, there was such a thing as crowd psychology in this world.
Six people lived in one lodging, and five of them went off to practice in the morning and came back at night, living their best, most productive lives. In a situation like that, would your mind really be at ease if you were the only one doing absolutely nothing?
Thanks to that, I felt like I was sitting on a bed of nails. I couldn’t shake the thought that I was the only one wasting my life.
When I habitually turned on my laptop because I wanted to do something……
『spArk’s Treasure Vault
Please enter the password.』
……all that appeared was a lock message designed to piss people off. For the record, I tried to crack it and failed.
“Should I monitor the final performance?”
Because I’d collapsed right after the stage, even I hadn’t seen how Spark’s performance had actually been broadcast.
When I accessed MeTube with my phone, which I hadn’t returned yet, full-version videos of each group’s stage appeared in order.
“Hm?”
Something was strange.
I checked the six newest videos again. Then I looked back and forth between the view counts and the titles.
≫ Parte - 『Crown』 │ 790K
Logue - 『Final』 │ 630K
Spark - 『Sijeongga』 │ 1.34M
Allover - 『Utopia』 │ 580K
Sticky - 『Dreaming』 │ 420K
Berion - 『Goal』 │ 270K
Wasn’t Spark’s view count way too much of an outlier?
The thumbnail already had a gold ribbon for reaching one million views. It was about 1.7 times the number for Parte, who had taken final first place.
Below it, videos with embarrassing titles like “Idol Who Collapsed During Live Broadcast” and “Male Idol Who Fought Through Injury” were lined up one after another.
“If the videos are blowing up this much, then there must have been some kind of reaction.”
I put off watching the stage video for the moment and headed to the community, where traces of a huge blaze were clearly visible.
≫ Let’s talk about our IDA finals lol
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.
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And then the long-awaited Spark lmaoooo
My jaw seriously dropped. Maybe because all the other teams brought intense stages for the finals, it felt like these guys stood out like crazy?
And I finally understood why this place turns into a sea of fire every time Spark comes out
A certified visual group, seriously lololol and they were even wearing hanbok, but all their shoulders were as wide as the Manchurian plains
Every time Lee Cheonghyeon appeared, I couldn’t breathe, and then when Choe Jeho appeared, I clutched my heart → repeated this endlessly
Their last performance too, and this stage as well, I liked that you could tell they spent money on it, it was so nice to look at lol I think I get why fans are always sad their agency is sh*t lolololol sob sob sob sob sob
If they were from a big company, I feel like they would’ve gotten tons of support and made a legendary stage dripping with the smell of capital
.
.
.
└ Who wrote my diary here
└ Every time Lee Cheonghyeon appeared, I couldn’t breathe >> this was literally me lololololol but he’s too handsome, it’s thrilling, being handsome is the best
└ No. 1 group I’m most looking forward to seeing once they’re all adults
└ I get what you mean, they don’t dance in some stiff, rigid way, they’re really smooth…… but their angles are also sharp as knives, so the satisfaction is insane
└ This is it
≫ Is it okay for there to be six grand dukes in the North?
Public order must be great
└ I was wondering what the hell you were talking about lolololololol
└ If you gather the grand dukes, they could probably play Rummikub too
└ Nope, can’t. Rummikub is for four people, so two of the grand dukes have to stand in the back
└ What happened to the grand duke aura that sweeps up all attention at society balls? They can’t even join the game now, their form is dead
└ Ah, please lololololol
≫ Summary of Spark’s stage, aka a compressed version of IDA (warning: blatant fan-recruitment post)
The over-immersive narrative that made me, who’d been in fan-denial since episode 1 of IDA, admit I was a Sparkler…… I loved it so much I’m posting this! Let’s die together
(Position evaluations seem like an exception, so I’m excluding them)
1. Self-PR Stage (Flowering)
They showed the founding of Joseon by comparing it to the concept of an idol debut
According to Iwol, when planning it, they focused on giving the feeling of starting from zero, like headbutting bare ground
ex. Original stage: starts with the sound of a door opening + Lee Cheonghyeon kneeling → added an opening sequence and started with choreography where everyone wakes up from sleep
He said they wondered how to show the founding of a country and the process of establishing its framework, and the members’ debut process seemed similar, so they put all of that in (so Jeho, you’re saying you’re a sleepyhead? If you feel wronged, explain on a live)
They also changed a lot of the lyrics to match the keyword “beginning” (in the darkness of the long, long night → until the long dawn has passed / sending to the night sky → dyeing the sky)
2. Song-Swap Performance (Desire)
The original concept was a great war over holy relics, so I wondered why Spark came out with a sports story
They said they only took the keyword “competition” from the original song’s struggle to seize the holy relic, the factional strife in Joseon history, and idols’ battle over results
Personally, I was impressed that they chose sports after thinking about a concept that would let viewers feel only enjoyment without getting stressed by the element of competition
↑↑ As an extension of that, they said they structured it so that what they gained at the end wasn’t a material thing like a trophy or medal, but “honor”
3. Cover Song (Starlight)
A stage that used cultural heritage like science and art as its subject
They said the concept was celestial researchers who look up at the sky every day, yearning for a shining existence, and that this is the image Spark pursues for themselves
Like the direction where Lee Cheonghyeon realizes something, they said they want to discover light someday
I guess they looked at stars every night and put star glitter on their faces because they wanted to become stars, but you guys are already stars, if you don’t believe me, look in the mirror
+ It was the only IDA stage with classical sampling, and they said they wanted to indirectly show cultural exchange during the Joseon era lol Our Iwol is definitely a concept pervert
They revealed later that the lighting effect shown onstage was also the Cheonsang Yeolcha Bunyajido
The moment Lee Cheonghyeon opens the lightbulb (approaching the essence of knowledge), stars pour down (gaining enlightenment), and the Cheonsang Yeolcha Bunyajido appears (seeing the shape of the universe)…… how can you not love this narrativeㅠㅠㅠ
More than anything, the stage is so pretty…… it’s my favorite stage…… I made a new Spark fan account after watching this, and the kids’ faces were legendary here, so if you still haven’t watched it, please do
4. Final Competition (Sijeongga)
The stage that showed why Spark dealt with idols and Joseon history at the same time = because the program is “Idol Dynasty Annals”
They said they wrote the narration at the very beginning while thinking of it as the introduction ment for a program called IDA
Their concept was that they were recorders writing the stages that would go into the program, yeah
At the end, the members become part of the letters, and apparently it means that they are recorders, while also meaning that they themselves want to remain as a record to someone
They said it was a stage they’d planned from the moment they decided to participate in IDA, so it was the project they worked on the longest and revised the most
Review summary: Spark, the genius idols who caught both rabbits, idols and the Annals of a Dynasty, you worked so hard, and Kim Iwol, please produce forever
└ 1 is a little…… feels like you’re forcing it too much
└ They said they focused on “idols” too, can the comment above not read????
└ They mixed both sides appropriately, yeah. If they’d obsessed only over the Annals, these guys would’ve worn hanbok throughout all of IDA
└ I think they made the right choice. It didn’t feel too overly concept-obsessed, but they still got the narrative
└ Right, I think they aimed well by revealing it at the end and making it a twist
└ The fact that they planned this all within one survival program is insane. Agencies that bring in whole universes usually explain them over at least three albums each, but they unpacked all of this in two months
≫ The reason Spark is the true No. 1
: You can tell just by looking at the view counts
└ It’s a gap you can’t even compete with, but only “that” group is gritting their teeth and pretending not to know
└ Mindless voting is ugly…… If it were me, I’d be embarrassed even if I got 1st like that
└ Why, exactly, do fans who spend their own money voting have to hear this? Anyone would think the vote count was rigged…… I can see the level of Sparkler cool-girl syndrome
└ I’m not a Sparkler, I’m a nomad, but you got pricked all by yourself lolololol okay, sure, your Parte who pressures fans to vote is the best
└ ???: I think I’ll be sad if we don’t get 1stㅠㅠ
└ Did they really say that? The idol themself?
└ Search “Parte MY Bubble Pop” and it comes up. The full text is even worse
“How many of these are there?”
It was only natural for review posts to go up after a program ended, but it wasn’t common for an entire page to be plastered with talk about one specific group.
But right now, no matter where I went, I saw people talking about Spark. And every single thing was praise.
And the reason it had turned out this way was……
≫ Male idol who fainted during today’s live broadcast
He’s a Spark member called Iwol, and he collapsed as soon as the final stage ended on IDA
He’s the kid who was in the news not long ago, and people are saying it might be aftereffects from that
(photo removed)
Most reactions are saying they had no idea because he looked fine onstage
└ Friend, please take the photo down…… It might be an appearance the person himself wouldn’t really want people to see
└ I heard he got hit in the head, so I wondered how he came out. Guess he really gritted his teeth and went on
└ He did grit his teeth and go on. You can tell because he finished the stage
≫ Iwol, I knew you were serious about being an idol
But I didn’t want to know you were this serious
I thought you’d be resting while eating warm hospital food, but I couldn’t believe my eyes
└ Wow, even the fans didn’t know
└ The whole fandom probably couldn’t have imagined it, right? I was watching while eating and dropped my spoon. He was diagnosed with eight weeks of recovery to begin with
└ At that level, shouldn’t he be resting……? The fans aren’t saying anything???
└ Sparklers were waiting in front of the agency with pitchforks, but they said the members decided voluntarily, so for now it’s being quietly passed over
└ If UA has any sense, they wouldn’t force the kid out right now…… It hasn’t even been that long since they got beaten like dogs
└ Still, maybe because they got ripped apart, this time they posted an apology and official statement quickly
≫ He performed so perfectly fine that I thought he’d recovered, but then he suddenly disappeared from the screen, so I was shocked
└ They said they originally had no intention of making him dance too, but apparently he was the one who said he’d join from the dance break, so I’m smacking my forehead like crazy. Kim Iwol, you’re a patient
└ It breaks my heart even more because he came out with his wound hidden by a headband, fuck
└ Now we have to lock the emperor up regardless of his own will…… This is all Kim Iwol’s own doing. Endure it, Kim Iwol. This is the premium welfare you brought upon yourself
……It seemed I’d had an influence. A sigh came out on its own.
In the meantime, I wondered what UA and the members had said, so I went into the fan cafe too.
≫ From. Seongbin
Sparklers, you were all very worried, weren’t you?
Iwol-hyung just returned to the lodging.
It’s not because he has an injury or problem, and they said it’s highly likely it happened because his activity level suddenly increased, so please don’t worry too much.
Thank you for cheering us on and worrying for us until such a late hour.
We always love you! ♥
└ Cheonghyeon @Seongbin That hyung needs to be scolded a little. Hyung, you’re the representative, so say something to him.
└ Seongbin @Cheonghyeon How could I do that to hyung^^;;;;;
└ Cheonghyeon @Seongbin You’re the leader, hyung!
≫ From. Juu
Thank you for cheering for us until the end.
It was an unexpected result, so I was stunned, but I’m really happy.
Soon, we’re thinking of making a place for all six of us to celebrate together. Once Iwol-hyung gets better!
Until then, Sparklers, don’t get sick and take good care of your health. Health comes first.
≫ From. Giyeon
Second place…… Thank you. The reason we could enjoy this long period without getting tired was all thanks to Sparklers. Thank you. Truly.
Iwol-hyung worked the hardest, but right now he’s out of it because he’s sleeping. (+Jeho-hyung moved Iwol-hyung and then his battery ran out too.)
Later, when hyung wakes up, Sparklers, please scold him a lot. He won’t listen to us, and it’s killing me.
Please watch the IDA behind-the-scenes video that will go up tomorrow too. Good night.
└ Jeho What do you mean my battery ran out
└ Giyeon @Jeho Sleep well, hyung
It was full of talk about me. They must have done it to reassure the fans, so I wasn’t going to say anything, but I couldn’t help feeling my mind go distant.
There was even a hot post titled “Collection of Quotes from Pro Idol Kim Iwol.” It seemed the aftermath of IDA had affected even the strangest places.
I was afraid. I couldn’t even guess what would be written inside that post.
However, an idol could not ignore public opinion.
I carefully tapped the post, whose comments were exploding.