Category: Entertainment Files

Here is one of these only in Korea stories where a K-pop star had to apologize for (gasp!) dating somebody:

Karina, a member of K-pop girl group aespa, issued a handwritten apology on Instagram, Tuesday, saying she was sorry for failing her fans. Although she did not specify what she was sorry for, people could easily determine that the SM Entertainment star was apologizing over recent news about her love life. But this has sparked a debate among internet users: Did she really have anything to apologize for?

Karina’s letter came about a week after she admitted to having a romantic relationship with actor Lee Jae-wook, confirming a report by Dispatch, a local media outlet, that broke on Feb. 27. The news that a popular K-pop star and a prominent actor who starred in a series of Korean dramas including, the “Alchemy of Souls” series (2022-23) were dating immediately generated a buzz online, triggering mixed reactions among fans.

“I am sorry to have surprised you,” reads Karina’s apology. “I know many of our fans must be disappointed and upset … I want to heal the wounds that I have inflicted. I will become more mature in the days ahead, so please keep an eye out for that.”

In the wake of her “scandal,” some fans criticized the 23-year-old for being an “irresponsible” leader of her group, insisting that the “scandal” will deal a critical blow to aespa’s future career prospects.

Many K-pop fans are very sensitive about their singers’ love lives as they believe romantic relationships can hamper their stars from focusing on their jobs and elevating their careers. Interestingly, some passionate followers also perceive them as their potential love interests, so they easily feel betrayed when dating news about their favorite singers arises.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link, but Karina has had protesters criticizing her for dating. You have to be quite the loser if a K-pop star you like dating someone causes this type of reaction.

Jewel in the Palace is one of my favorite Korean dramas, but I would be surprised that a sequel to the series after over 20 years will have the same charm as the original. With that said Tom Cruise pulled that off in Top Gun Maverick so maybe Lee Young-ae can do it in this sequel to Jewel in the Palace:

Actor Lee Young-ae pose at production press conference of “Maestra: Strings of Truth”, Seoul, Dec. 6, 2023. Courtesy of tvN

Actor Lee Young-ae will reprise the popular character Jang-geum again in a new TV series, a follow-up to the mega-hit MBC drama “Jewel in the Palace,” a local entertainment company said Tuesday.

Fantagio said it has recently sealed a contract with a writer for the series, seven months after it confirmed the casting of Lee in the new series, “Dae Jang Geum” (working title).

Shooting will begin in October, the company said, adding it plans to air the show early next year.

“Dae Jang Geum” will tell the life story of Jang-geum as the king’s first female physician.

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

Psy’s 2012 song Gangnam Style continues to be one of the top videos of all-time on Youtube:

“Gangnam Style,” a 2012 global sensation by South Korean singer-rapper Psy, reached another milestone Saturday as the song’s popularity has continued for more than a decade.

The music video for the song exceeded 5 billion views on YouTube.

Unveiled in July 2012, the main track from Psy’s sixth full-length album became a global sensation as its comical music video and the singer’s trademark horse dance went viral.

The song made him the first K-pop act to rise to No. 2 on Billboard’s Hot 100 main singles chart. Psy spent a total of seven weeks in the position.

Its music video became the first video to exceed YouTube’s view limit when it surpassed 2 billion views in May 2014, prompting the service to upgrade its counter. The video later surpassed 3 billion in November 2017 and 4 billion in March 2021.

Korea Herald

Even though Gangnam Style hit 5 billion views it still has not cracked Youtube’s Top 10 Videos; it actually ranks #11 right now. If you can believe it the number one video on Youtube is the Baby Shark Dance with over 13 billion views!

This is kind of funny, but I have to wonder where in Texas did they purchase jerseys from a Scottish professional soccer team?:

STAYC was seen wearing the wrong “Rangers” uniform during the girl group’s concert held in Dallas, Texas, on Thursday as part of its world tour.[JUN.DY]

STAYC was seen wearing the wrong “Rangers” uniform during the girl group’s concert held in Dallas, Texas, on Thursday as part of its world tour. 
  
Instead of wearing jerseys for the Texas Rangers baseball team — a Major League Baseball team — the group’s members wore uniforms of Rangers Football Club, a Scottish professional soccer club based in Glasgow, Scotland, during the performance, leaving fans to wonder whether the agency didn’t know they are two different teams. 
  
“We had a bit of a mix-up as we were purchasing the uniforms,” STAYC’s agency, Highup Entertainment told the Korea JoongAng Daily on Wednesday, admitting there was a mistake.

Joong Ang Ilbo

You can read more at the link.

Does anyone think the album would have been recalled if someone claimed it looked like a Bible or a Torah?:

The first production copies of K-Pop boy band Kingdom’s latest album are being pulled off the shelves and discarded amid a controversy over the album cover’s resemblance to the Quran. 

Kingdom’s agency GF Entertainment announced Monday that “There were concerns expressed that the Kingdom’s seventh mini-album cover, which was due to go on presale on Sept. 21, bore a striking similarity to the Quran.” 

The agency added, “In light of the circumstances, we have decided to recall, discard and redesign all 70,000 initial production copies of the album.”

Korea Times

You can read more at the link.

I actually finished watching this series a few days ago and it was okay. It is ironic that it is number one for a non-English series when the series actually has a lot of English spoken in it. Overall, I thought Narco-Saints should have been a movie, but was instead dragged out into a six part series with a lot of filler content. Many of the gunfights were also ridiculous and video game like in my opinion. It was no where near as good as any of the Narcos series put out by Netflix:

Netflix’s new South Korean series “Narco-Saints” has risen to the top of the streamer’s latest weekly viewership chart for non-English TV shows in its second week.

The undercover crime thriller, released on Sept. 9, marked 62.7 million hours of viewing for the week of Sept. 12-18 to lead the official top 10 list for non-English TV programs available on the service, according to Netflix on Wednesday.

It gained four notches from fifth place a week earlier, ending the seven-week-long reign by the smash-hit Korean legal drama “Extraordinary Attorney Woo.”

The six-part series about a businessman who takes undercover missions to capture a drug kingpin in a South American country is the ninth Korean-language show that has topped the weekly chart for the category, including the global sensation “Squid Game” (2021) and “All of Us Are Dead” (2022).

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.

This might end up being an interesting documentary to check out:

The upcoming documentary film “The 2nd Repatriation,” directed by Kim Dong-won, focuses on the voices of the 46 people who have demanded the Seoul government let them return to their communist homeland for more than 20 years.

The film is a follow-up to the director’s 2004 documentary “Repatriation” about the 63 “unconverted” North Koreans who went back home in 2000.

“The 2nd Repatriation” revolves around Kim Young-shik, one of the remaining North Korean communists living in South Korea. He was sent to the South in 1962, arrested soon afterward and served 27 years in prison. The 90-year-old claimed he was physically and psychologically tortured to convert his ideology and subsequently excluded from the 2000 repatriation. 

It took nearly 20 years to complete the film, as Seoul-Pyongyang relations have experienced ups and downs over the cited period, while Kim Young-shik and other former North Korean spies have still not been permitted to go back home. 

“After I made the 2004 film, I thought the second repatriation would come soon. So I started filming their stories,” the director said Tuesday in a press conference after a media screening of the 156-minute film. “But their return has been delayed for about 20 years, and I’ve been working on it for the longer-than-expected period.”

Out of the 46 people still seeking to be repatriated, nine people remain alive, and they are 91 years old on average. So far, only one of them was sent to the North after dying of an illness in Seoul in 2005.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.