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BOYS II PLANET: Episode Five Recap

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PREVIOUS RECAPS: Episode One // Episode Two // Episode Three // Episode Four

The Fated Meeting

At the beginning of the episode, the Planet K and Planet C survivors were revealed to each other via a dramatic falling curtain flourish. I have no idea how they got everyone situated behind each side of the curtain without each other noticing (though I would bet good money that they did notice and had to fake shock). Gosh, the number of Planet C boys looked so small.

Song Battle

This first performance round is made up of songs from artists who all won the best rookie award at MAMA, though most of the songs aren’t debut title tracks. We’ve got TVXQ’s Rising Sun in there, which in addition to being my second favorite K-pop song of all time is an… ambitious choice, to say the least. (And by “ambitious,” I mean there’s no way these guys are going to do it justice)

And predictably, MNET has structured the rules so that we get an “Avengers team” filled with all the standout, top-ranked participants. The producers LOVE this trope and refuse to let it go despite how predictable it’s become. And of course, the highest-ranking group gets to pick their song first. The caste system is strong this season.

Anyway, this round is set up so that two teams perform the same song and challenge each other for the win. It’s a real “David & Goliath” concept, as the lower-ranked teams have a chance to win more points if they challenge the higher-ranked ones and win. Lots of strategy, here.

At one point, one of the groups was panicking, saying “we don’t have a main singer!” I’m like… welcome to K-pop right now, guys! “Main singers” aren’t in vogue, unfortunately. In fact, so many trainees were avoiding the main vocal position like the plague. I guess they don’t want that dreaded voice crack moment that gets replayed over and over. Meanwhile, rap and dance were popular in every group. Le sigh.

At one point, a member was almost forced into the “sub-rapper” spot just because he was the shortest! Not cool. I’m rooting for that shorty, now.

Also, we were treated to a really terrible rendition of Rising Sun’s iconic high note over and over again. Thank you, producers. I hate it.

In fact, that power note became a recurring drama throughout the episode. You know, if you focus on something too much you’re bound to psyche yourself out. But if you have any doubts whether or not you can hit a big note, you probably shouldn’t be attempting it in the first place.

The 1-On-1 Class Battle

Okay, now it’s time to get this show on the road. We won’t see all performances this week because each comes with approximately two hours of behind-the-scenes footage (very slight exaggeration, there), but the first round kicks off this week. The performance order was decided by a series of silly games that’s basically just an advertisement for one of the show’s sponsors (Bibigo). It’s ALWAYS product placement with MNET.

S-Class (Stray Kids) Team 2

This is a “one star” team, meaning their ranks are all very low. They’re battling an “all star” team, which is obviously not fair but creates good TV drama, I guess. Even though they’re “Team 2,” they’re performing first. Confusing.

This performance was a real mixed bag. Min Jae is quite a strong performer and anchored the stage, but there were also some downright awful vocal moments from other members (Han Wen, mostly) and it’s not like this is a vocally demanding song. Plus, it felt like they kind of lost the beat as the song went on. Some of the rap felt a bit aimless. I guess that’s what you get with a “one star” team, though.

S-Class (Stray Kids) Team 1

This is that aforementioned “all star” team. Obviously, their performance is much better than that last one. Thanks for eliminating all tension, MNET! They really nailed the energy, even if I don’t personally like this song or style of performance. It was very polished and debut-ready. Mostly, though, I’m just happy I don’t have to hear this song again.

My Choice: Team 1
Voting Results: Team 1 (as if it was ever in question)

Plot Twist (TWS) Team 1

I’ve said this before, but I actually think “refreshing” songs like this are a lot harder to pull off than the badass shouty numbers. You really have to get the balance of personality and vocal talent just right. The big story behind this team is that some of the members don’t fit this concept because of their deep voices and “manly” presentation. They’re kind of sour apples about it, too.

Anyway, I thought this performance was pretty good. The vocals were solid across the board and the energy was bright and buoyant. I liked the addition of a climactic high note, too. Of course, the strength of the actual song does a lot of heavy lifting too.

20 thoughts on “BOYS II PLANET: Episode Five Recap”

  1. I have nothing to add, but episode 4 (6) aired tonight and both Rising Sun teams did okay. both main vocalists sadly had problems, but the sub-vocalists did a great job and so did the rappers.

    the overall best performances for me were plot twist all star and KILL THE ROMEO 2 star. honorable mention to Sangwon (my pick) who absolutely KILLED it in Whiplash.

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    • the worst performance was KILL THE ROMEO 1 star. it was absolutely awful.

      also, there’s a great TV moment after both Whiplash teams perform, during the individual score reveal. the entire chat was gagging.

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  2. Sho (the kid who got picked on for being short) has actually been incredibly annoying in the show’s edit prior to this moment. Good for him getting a bit of underdog moment though, clearly it is working for viewers like yourself who are half-watching this show while doing laundry/dishes etc (don’t worry, I do this too LOL… I mean it’s long and sometimes pretty boring. I just have a good memory for boys I guess).

    Standout moments this ep came from MCND Minjae and WHIB’s Kim Junmin. I am really rooting for the WHIB kids so far and I hope they can at least get some exposure from this show if none of them debut (although I think Junmin is quite likely to make it).

    I remember Plot Twist being very good a week ago but honestly in retrospect I hardly remember a thing about it. Hyunjun was the obvious pick for center but I do remember thinking that I just don’t feel drawn to him, even though he is obviously very talented. I am rooting for the one-star team here even though I feel it’s kind of a lost cause (Leejeong from WHIB is the leader of that team and I really like how well he’s strategizing).

    The bond between Na Yunseo and He Xin Long (who was very unhappy about performing Plot Twist) was extremely heartwarming and I’m now rooting for them to debut together as well. It’s refreshing to see an older experienced idol depending on a young fresh kid, and then to see that reciprocated. Na Yunseo has also emerged as a sleeper fave of mine. Even if he doesn’t debut with this show I think he’s more or less guaranteed to make it somewhere.

    And we’ll agree to disagree re: S-Class being a good song or not 🙂 it’s not my favorite skz title track but it has grown on me over time. One thing I’ll say is that when I watch trainees cover their songs I always feel validated in some way because it becomes obvious that there are very few idols who can actually do what they do. (Included in that number, however, is Kim Junmin, who I think could join Stray Kids today.)

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    • Btw I’m a little confused on the rules here— is it fair to say that if a one-star team loses then every single member is automatically eliminated because “all one-stars will be eliminated”? Or will ranks be reshuffled based on their individual audience scores? This would make more sense and be fairer but I don’t really expect sense or fairness from this show at this point…. On the other hand, the losing one-star team this ep didn’t have the vibe of a group that knows they’re all going home.

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    • I am old school Stray Kids, so I think something like “Hellevator” would be a better challenge, vocally especially.

      As for the rules, earlier this year I watched every Wagner opera on MetOpera online, all of them. “Die Meistersinger von Nuremburg” is essentially a singing contest to win the lovely girl’s hand in marriage. It runs forever, like 4 and half hours ever, not including breaks. It has an entire scene singing about the song rules, that goes on and on, an hour or more of the master singers singing about song rules. Immediately these kind of kpop survival shows came to mind because of all the rules, all the voting methods, all the ways it can be influenced. In the end, the nice guy will get the girl. That is all I know.

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  3. I’m curious what’s gonna happen with song minjae. He clearly did a great job as the group’s center, but I think his edit in the behind the scenes segment was rather negative

    The lack of vocalists is gonna make the vocalists who do stand out very popular I think. Was this the case on the first boys planet? Cause it would explain zb1 being a group with consistent vocals. There are too many “I dance and rap” trainees; it makes it less noteworthy when someone is good in those regards. I swore it wasn’t like that in the earlier produce seasons, they used to challenge each other over who’d get the main vocal part (in the same place behind the scenes comes to mind). Now it’s “who can produce a sound at that pitch? Anyone? Anyone? You’ll give it shot? Good enough, it’s not like I’m gonna do it”

    and to the trainees who don’t like doing a certain concept? Have they seen the show before. Getting put in a situation that doesn’t play to your strengths is common. I’m not saying they can’t be upset about it, but I felt like I heard that so much and more often than not it’s the “I want to be badass” participants having to do cute and bright

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  4. I went too deep in a rabbit hole for “covers of TVXQ Rising Sun” on youtube, and to be fair it does seem like in the past 5-10-15 years this song has been a regular challenge for new and nugu groups. (Wanna One did great! I mean Kim Jae Hwan, yass. Also my besties nSSign did very well too, since they went higher on their own “Higher” and actually have falsettos).

    And then the next episode “Rising Sun” performances for this show autoplayed so I got a preview for Nick’s next episode post. The kid who was flat a dozen times in the clip Nick clips above is …. still flat. I’ll save the rest for his next post.

    I do appreciate however that the producers have not autotuned the production, because people can really hear what real voices sound like, the good, the bad, and the flat. The regular music shows these days have the “live” vocals pre-taped or have the autotune-on-the-mic technology or have a heavy post-production polish, or all three. (“Oh my god so stable!!!!” … honey, its not live.)

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    • True that I think we’re hearing a lot of real voices this season, both the good and bad. It should always be like that but it’s become very common in the past couple of years for survival shows to edit vocals in post. I think this is really annoying because it defeats the whole point of us being able to evaluate how the trainees actually sound….

      Re: Rising Sun, Sun Hengyu (of the obviously winning team) did his damndest despite his vocal cords being apparently torn up, so I have to hand it to him. Also, I just like him lol

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  5. Minjae should have given the main vocal part to someone else once it was clear that Hanwen couldn’t do it. But I also don’t think that he did this on purpose in order to make himself stand out. Even though he did a good job it feels like he’s just kind of checked out of the show.

    I love Hyunjun—he’s my favorite dancer on the show—but I can see how his mugging for the camera might be too much for some. I don’t think he’ll stick around long but hopefully he’ll debut elsewhere. Overall this has made me really notice the quality of contestants from Nouer/CEG (Anxin, Kaiwen, Jiahao, Hyunjun)…maybe the ones who don’t make it should just form their own group a la EVNNE.

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