Year-end review: BTS rocks US; celebrity wedding and suicide
THERE have been highs and lows in the South Korean entertainment industry.
Here is a list of the biggest entertainment stories of the year. BTS soars in US
BTS has dominated K-pop throughout 2017.
Since releasing “You Never Walk Alone” in February, the seven-member boy band, formed in 2013, has continued to smash K-pop records.
The music video for their song “DNA” has surpassed 200 million views on YouTube in the three months since its September release, which is the quickest for a K-pop music video, and including this the band has had four videos surpass the 200 million mark together with those for “Fire”, “Blood, Sweat & Tears” and “Dope”.
It won the top social artist award at the 2017 Billboard Music Awards, becoming the first Korean group to receive the honour in May. On Dec 5, “Mic Drop” broke into the Top 40 on the US singles chart, debuting at No. 28 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for the week, beating its previous best, “DNA”, which peaked at No. 67 on the Hot 100 chart on Oct 2, after debuting at 85 the previous week.
BTS performed “DNA” at the American Music Awards and ranked in the Top 10 artist of the Billboard Year-End Artists of the Year chart. Song-Song couple married
The year started with surprise news of a celebrity couple’s marriage. Singer Rain and actress Kim Tae-hee, after five years of dating, announced their marriage two days prior to their wedding a small affair at a Catholic church on Jan. 19.
Following were Song Joongki and Song Hye-kyo, costars of the 2016 smash-hit K-drama ‘Descendants of the Sun’. After strongly denying repeated rumours of them dating, the couple, nicknamed “Song-Song couple,” made a surprise announcement for their wedding.
Other celebrity couples married this year were Lee Dong-gun and Jo Yoon-hee, costars of the 2016 drama ‘Laurel Tree Tailors’, and Joo Sang-wook and Cha Ye-ryun, who worked together in the 2016 drama ‘Glamorous Temptation’. Film director, top actress in extramarital relationship
Director Hong Sang-soo, 56, and actress Kim Min-hee, 35, officially confirmed the rumours of their affair during a press conference in March for the film ‘On the Beach at Night Alone’.
The relationship between the director and the actress has been rumoured since Kim appeared in Hong’s 2015 film ‘Right Now, Wrong Then’. Their relationship raised controversy because Hong is a married man. Hong and his wife are currently estranged, due to his relationship with the actress.
The film won Kim a Silver Bear for Best Actress at the Berlin International Film Festival. BIGBANG’s T.O.P busted for drugs, enters coma
Rapper T.O.P of popular K-pop boy band BIGBANG was charged with smoking liquid marijuana with a female singer trainee at his home four times in October. The 29-year-old, whose real name is Choi Seung-hyun, has been doing his military service with the police since February.
The prosecution indicted him in June for breaking Korean narcotics laws after a hair sample obtained earlier this year tested positive for THC, the active ingredient in marijuana.
Choi made headlines again the day following his indictment, after he was hospitalised for an overdose of legally prescribed tranquilizers. Artists in sync with liberals ‘blacklisted’
The conservative Park Geunhye government “blacklisted” 9,473 artists, celebrities and writers who supported liberal figures and causes such as President Moon Jae-in and his party. SHINee member commits suicide
Jonghyun, a member of K-pop boy band SHINee, committed suicide in early December. He was 27 years old.
Jonghyun was alive but in serious condition when he was found by police in a studio apartment in Cheongdam-dong, southern Seoul. He was taken to a nearby hospital but did not survive.
According to a message he sent to his friend Nine of the rock band Dear Cloud, the singer suffered severe depression due to his status as a celebrity. He also complained about his therapist, who only blamed his personality. Korean-Nigerian model soars Korean fashion model Han Hyun-min with a Korean mother and Nigerian father has lived in Korea for his whole life.
The 16-year-old model was an ordinary middle school student until he was discovered and became a fashion model last year.
His unique identity as Korea’s first Korean-African fashion model got him on the most runways at Seoul Fashion Week this year among male models in an industry where racism is still strong.
After shooting to fame with his successful modelling career, he became an honorary ambassador for multiculturalism and now stars in the TV show “English Phobia” that first aired on Dec. 4.
For his influence in the entertainment industry, American weekly newsmagazine TIME last month picked Han as one of the 30 most influential teenagers in the world.