We’re back with the second bunch of 80 trainees on “Planet C.” I looked it up and this group is indeed meant to be centered vaguely around China, but there seems to be a bit of looseness around the “K” and “C” planets.
One thing I didn’t mention last episode if that I hope ZEROBASEONE’s Hanbin and Hao are getting a nice paycheck for their narration during this season’s opening monologues. It must be weird to be narrating the rise of a group that’s essentially being created to replace you.
Unlike the Planet K trainees, this group’s initial seating was determined by the first impression of the other participants. This seemed like a needlessly mean way to kick things off. A couple of the guys also had a “sexy” showdown that felt a lot like BL pandering. Or, one could assume they’re simply ‘getting things out of their system’ outside the confines of a repressive government…
PREVIOUS RECAPS: Episode One
Highlights and Lowlights
“Regular” Trainees
I think it’s funny that they call these guys “regular” simply because they aren’t with an agency. During this segment, they must have said the word “sexy” about three hundred times. The shtick got old pretty quick. These guys picked an awesome song but this felt like a lot of style over substance to me. This was the first time we saw somewhat go from “no-star” to “1-star” thanks to an extra test, though.
Team Shanghai
I thought they were pretty slick. The vocals were decent and the performance had polish. It helps that they picked a fantastic song that’s a little less known than many of the others. The mentors sure seemed to like them a lot.
Team Beijing
This team was all about being “cute.” I know I tend to love bright boy group concepts, but this was an example of how “cute” can also be a bit annoying if overdone. The song was bad, too. To be honest, giving one of the guys an “all-star” was a joke.
Team Ningbo
This team has a guy who’s already quite famous (he filmed a movie with Jackie Chan and is also friends with Jun from Seventeen). Their song was absolutely terrible and that very same guy fell on his butt when they did their stunt, but they had decent energy, I guess. They can shout their way through a crappy song as well as the next guy.
iNKODE Trainees
This is awkward because iNKODE is Jaejoong’s agency and he’s also judging this round on the show. The guy in the stripes was a lot better and he’d been training nineteen months less than the other trainee. To make things even more awkward, Jaejoong ended up eliminating his own long-standing trainee. That’s gonna be a weird conversation later at the agency…
Sung Hen Yu (BLANK2Y)
The only thing more awkward than experienced idols coming on this show is experienced idols from groups no one has heard of. Jaejoong didn’t know BLANK2Y, one of the fellow trainees said, “It’s a group without much recognition,” and I had to look up whether I had ever written about them before (I did! Here and here). Anyway, this guy was pretty good.
The Boy Scouts
I don’t know what else to call this. It was just weird as hell, but at least it was… entertaining? I kind of want to see the whole performance!
Jack & Nian
Finally, someone with some personality! Jack’s over-the-top vibe could easily tumble over into obnoxiousness, but for now it’s nice to have some energy and his outbursts were legitimately funny in this overly-serious show. He’s an early standout for his silliness alone. I kind of want him to wreak havoc on the stuffy formula of this show. Plus, the performance was very solid (even if I don’t care for the song).
NOUER
No, this is not NouerA (though they were also formed from a survival series). NOUER is the agency that’s managing NouerA, I guess. It’s all a bit confusing. This video has a lot of views on YouTube but it doesn’t do much for me at all. Maybe the views are boosted by ENHYPEN fans watching to support the song. Anyway, these guys have talent but I don’t see much star power yet.
That Viral Moment
Hyolyn is currently going viral for her suggestion that judging shouldn’t be based on visuals and that these contestants should be able to sing. I can’t even believe this is controversial, but yeah… she’s right. The K-pop industry would do well to focus more on talent and less on visuals.
The Bias List // K-Pop Reviews & Discussion 
I decided to fall to the rabbit hole of B2P (beyond the forum-like feel of this site, aka I’ve gone to Reddit), so I got some stuff from there that would clarify your third paragraph. I’ll assume these are both real coz the people there know their SVS stuff haha.
1) The K trainees also had the first impression voting remotes when the trainees came in; it just wasn’t aired
2) (less sure of this) The PDs of the K and C episodes are different – the C one is handled by the same from the 2023 season (while the K was handled from 2020’s I-LAND). Explains the BL-ness of it all
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one of the guys from Team Beijing getting an all star was really baffling, he was good but had one facial expression the entire time.
Jack and Nian were so much fun. I’m rooting for Nian since Jack is allegedly already eliminated.
anyways, the insider tea I’ve read is most likely true & this show is already a mess. Mnet are back to their old tricks lmao. why can’t these producers just leave it alone…
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that’s not a spoiler?
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it was lmao I’m sorry 😭
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Hyolyn speaks the truth.
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This is somewhat of a side comment, but I must say way that people always seem to expect reality tv competition shows to not be rigged (down to not having favoritism in the editing toward some contestants over others) never fails to tickle me. You are all like Charlie Brown and Lucy with the football!
Something about these shows just gives me endless dopamine, so I couldn’t care less about the riggery of it all. And I know scripting when I see it. Did you ask yourself why the BLANK2Y guy asked Jaejoong if he’d ever heard of BLANK2Y? It’s because the producers fed him that line, of course… he knows Jaejoong has not heard either of his 2 bad songs lol. But this creates an underdog storyline for him and a storyline for his interactions with Jaejoong in particular. I’m certainly rooting for him.
Also… not too much on Sun Jia Yang… he actually was on Starlight Boys where he showed massive improvement and I like him quite a lot.
Anyway these initial rankings obviously don’t matter terribly much considering Lim Jack apparently got eliminated shortly after making it into All-Star. Oops.
Personally I like that they’re doing a lot of eliminations early, though. It’s better not to put the kids through this when they’re clearly not ready. Seeing them struggle through dances like a baby giraffe is always a tough watch.
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Also, after clicking the video again, I have to agree with you on one point: the “cute” team (with Jia Yang getting his all-star) did cover a truly awful song. The “Mary Had a Little Lamb” sample had my jaw on the floor. It’s especially crazy because it’s apparently a cover of a Boy Story song and they made a huge deal out of this on the show with Jia Yang going up to the BS members and asking them how to perform the song and stuff. They’re huge in China apparently— but not huge enough that they’re not willing to go on Boys Planet like 8 years into their careers…? idk. Anyway, I just figured c-pop has gotta be a different kind of beast than what I’m used to.
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Sorry, it was actually “London Bridge is Falling Down.” If you care.
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It’s baffling that the same reactions to rigging accusations are repeated time and time again, like we’ve been over this many times! Yes the producers show you what to vote for! That’s how TV is done!
Another note that should be its own comment but isn’t substantial enough: I have realised that not watching the actual show but instead reading this blog (and the comments) along with my B2P friends’ commentary is much more entertaining and interesting to me. It’s the editing of these shows istg.
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Different strokes I suppose, I love watching the show because I love my survivalslop! #myslop
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Oh I fully understand why people watch it, I tried to watch BP and saw the appeal, but I’ve noticed the discourse is always more fun than the show itself, so comments like yours and posts like Nick’s are always gonna be insightful to me 🙂
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Also I think that anyone who PAYS MONEY to vote for these things has rocks for brains and deserves whatever occurs LOL
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like you said, NOUER’s performance was just there to boost views from ENHYPEN’S fans. they’re not bad, but we all (hopefully) know how hard ipeun’s songs are to perform, and fever is probably one of the hardest. i don’t doubt their talent, but i just don’t see the star aura for them to debut.
like someone wondered before, are the songs chosen here picked by judges or the trainees themselves? cause if they continue covering ENHYPEN’s songs, especially the hard ones, i don’t think they’ll make it unless they have incredible talent and aura. yeah, it’s good for ipeun to get recognition and their songs covered, but i’m starting to think this is just a marketing strategy and a way to attract the group’s fan and increase views rather than actually highlighting the trainee’s talents
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I don’t think it’s clear who picks the songs, it might depend on the situation. Like in BP1 Yuehua G-group was assigned NCT Dream’s Beatbox before it was changed at the last minute to NCT 127’s Kick It, which was also Yuehua K-group’s song. It does seem fishy that both Leo/Sangwon and Anxin/Jiahao did Enhypen songs. It might be a combination of easily obtained rights and deliberate strategizing.
Whoever chose Never for Sun Hengyu though, it was a stroke of genius.
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yes, Never was perfect !!! but the thing is, it now seems like a strategy to boost viewers, seeing from sangwon and leo’s video. i’d prefer if there’d be songs that fit them and they can shine (unlike that rainism one…)
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I heard abt Sun Hengyu being an ethnic Korean from China so i wonder what’s the choice why they put him in C Grp when he could have been in K grp due to him being a former kpop idol as well (could be he auditioned for C grp specifically?)
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