While visual members, regardless of their talents, are often the most famous ones in
an act considering the odd obsession of the South Korean public with a perfect beauty,
there are still cases where they are still overshadowed by other members.
Sometimes, it might come down to the fact that the other members are believed to have
a prettier face yet sometimes, it all boils down to the vibe and the unique feeling of
one.
Here are 3 female idols who, despite being believed to hold the visual position in their
group, are still outpaced in terms of visuals by other members.
aespa’s Karina over Winter
As I’ve mentioned in many previous videos, SM Entertainment has neither specifically
pointed out that Winter is the visual of the act nor given her the visual privileges such
as always having most screentime and most catered stage outfits.
However, many MYs still believe that the visual position belongs to Winter only considering
the way SM Entertainment introduced her in the SYNK debut teaser series where all the
members showcased their specific skills, such as dancing for Karina, rapping for Giselle
and singing for Ningning yet Winter only did some stuns to highlight her visual.
When people saw Winter for the first time, many called her the combination of two iconic
visuals of SM Entertainment, Red Velvet’s Irene and SNSD’s Taeyeon, because of her
striking resemblance to her seniors.
She even went viral the other day just for changing the hair color to pure black and
according to netizens, as this was a rather plain color, only those whose visual features
were stunning could look ethereal enough to give off an idol-vibe.
However, things swiftly change after Karina appears more in the public and probably because
commercial brands also notice something special about her, she also steadily gained more exposure
than the rest of the members.
As in a domino effect, the masses also pay her more attention and whenever aespa makes
their public appearances, Karina is alway the one to make headlines first.
Just after several days since aespa’ debut, Karina was already chosen to appear on the
first episode of 'Travel Diary: Soul; Seoul' to give a tour around the city and while Winter
was the visual member of the act, she wasn’t picked to come along this time.
Seeing the potential of Karina’s visual and how lots of talk could later revolve around
such a surreal, AI beauty, several months after that, KB Kookmin Bank, aka one of the
four of the largest banks ranked by asset value in South Korea, also craftily turned
the group advertisement of aespa into the one of Karina only.
Not only selecting her to be the spokesperson throughout the ads, KB Kookmin Bank even let
just Karina have a solo scene, push other members to the back when they appeared along
with Karina.
After the constant exposure by major players in South Korea, the public also shifted more
attention to Karina and as of now, it’s literally always Karina that made the headlines
when it comes to aespa’s representative visual.
Most recently when the girls attended the YSL Beauty event and the 32nd Seoul Music
Awards, she was also the only one to go viral for the breathtaking CGI beauty.
Whereas, no one has mentioned Winter lately and even when she was standing right next
to Karina like this, all the hype was still for Karina as everyone's cheers when she was
speaking seemed to drown Winter.
Not only that, Winter's name is also constantly absent from many beauty and brand value charts,
instead, it’s always Karina’s name which appeared.
To explain this, some people said that netizens' tastes have changed recently, fans now prefer
sharp and powerful visuals over sweet and cute ones, so the fact that Winter isn’t
as popular as Karina is totally understandable.
Plus, considering the way SM pushes Karina so hard on every front without giving other
members the same treatment, it’s nothing surprising when her coverage is way larger
than Winter’s.
NewJeans’ Haerin over Minji
Being called the Olivia Hussey of Kpop gen4, it’s undeniable that Minji possesses one
of the most perfect beauties in the industry.
In fact, her visual was not only gorgeous but also super rare because up till now, only
S.E.S’ Eugene was referred to under such a prestigious title and now, Minji was the
second.
That was not to mention how she is only 18 years old and since most people’s appearance
would ripen as they grow up, netizens believed the beauty of Minji would most probably grant
her the Visual Queen title of Kpop gen4.
However, as NewJeans debuted and managed to gain massive successes, people started to
notice the act actually has more than just a gorgeous face of Minji and as you can tell,
the unique visual as well as aura of Haerin was there on top of the list.
According to netizens, Haerin has a unique feline-like visual and while there have been
lots of idols who have a cat-like visual like BLACKPINK’s Jennie, ITZY’s Yeji and many
more, none have ever looked more like a cat than Haerin.
Some pointed out specifically that it was Haerin’s eye angles and nose thickness that
made up such a unique visual and even at first glance, her features already screamed “cat.”
A fun meme where Chi Yamada, a cat anime, was dressed like Haerin and put beside her
also garnered great attention since the similarity was strikingly noticeable.
When NewJeans came to perform at The Green Zone 2022, Haerin was also the only one to
make most headlines regarding her feline visual and in unedited photos, her sharp features
stood out even more.
As she particularly has “refreshingly big ears,” which according to one netizen was
the feature helping complete her cat-like beauty, and the type of introvert as she always
quietly listens and pays attention to what the members were saying, Haerin also gave
off an elegant and low-key vibe of the Russian Blue cat.
Like a mysterious box, Haerin was voted by many people to be the member standing out
the most in terms of visuals as there always seems to be so much more about her while for
Minji, though everyone was easily drawn to her at first glance, the fact that she reminded
them of the previous beaties rather than bring something of her own to the table was a sort
of a minus point here.
The overwhelming reputation of Haerin compared to Minji was also seen in how she often has
the most-viewed fancams.
Even in the latest promotion with Ditto, Haerin’s fancams still receive way more views than
Minji, reaching 173k views in just several days while Minji stopped at 81k views as of
the same time.
So, obviously both Haerin and Minji are pretty and gorgeous, but perhaps netizens are in
need of something more special which gives them a different feeling than a flawless,
picture-perfect face.
LE SSERAFIM’s Yunjin over Kazuha
Starting out with an extremely impressive and elite background, Kazuha had always been
a hot topic in town when LE SSERAFIM first debuted.
The heat quickly moved onto her as according to people, it has been ages since Kpop welcomed
such a pure and elegant visual like Kazuha.
Not long after that, the national TV channel of South Korea even straight-up set Kazuha
and Suzy side by side, saying Kazuha is very likely the next Suzy of Kpop.
Even amid the huge bullying controversy of Kim Garam where lots of people were jumping
on the bandwagon to cancel LE SSERAFIM, her visual still shone through and remained unaffected
by all the negative tea.
However, as LE SSERAFIM went on more promotions, experienced a permanent line-up change at
last minutes and thus, leading to the drastic image shift of the members to live up to the
new direction, Kazuha was gradually pushed back by Yunjin’s glow-up.
After changing her make-up look and most recently, completely opting for the bright blonde hair,
Yunjin immediately took over the Internet with her classic American-muse beauty.
Around September 2022, people started to notice how Yunjin’s visual seemingly underwent
a huge upgrade yet somehow, it was also clear that she had nothing to do with plastic surgery.
Then, they figured out she had a different approach for the eyebrows makeup and instead
of doing them bold like her debut image, Yunjin lightened the colors and added curves to her
eyebrows, creating a softer and more loving look to her beauty.
From this point, lots of attention was already drawn to Yunjin because even with unedited
photos of her at music year-end award shows, people still went crazy over her visual.
Some said they definitely saw at Yunjin a unique aura that no other Kpop stars have
had.
In fact, it is so unique that netizens couldn’t really know how to describe it but overall,
she gave off an effortlessly attractive and hot-girl vibe.
This special temperament was accentuated even more in her photoshoot for Cosmopolitan Korea
December 2022 Issue and just a short while it was published, netizens went head over
heels for her charm.
The unpopular fact about her being chosen as the Top 3 Visuals by trainees in Produce
28 was also unveiled.
One even pointed out the specific order, saying that Huh Yunjin was only ranked behind Wang
Yiren and Kim Minjoo, two widely recognized visuals of Kpop, and the fact that she was
voted to be above IVE’s Jang Wonyoung also spoke a lot about her gorgeous beauty.
Others said Yunjin also gave off a strong Queen Bee vibe, popstar vibe and probably
because she had spent most of her teenage life in the States, these traits have already
been embedded in her blood.
So, it can be seen that although Kazuha's beauty is still very much appreciated, but
compared to Yunjin's unbelievable glow-up as well as bright and shining visual recently,
Kazuha is said to be somewhat underwhelmed and does not have the qualities of a superstar
like her fellow member.
So, do you really think Winter, Minji and Kazuha are outshone by the beauty of their
fellow members?
Or is it just the one-sided view and hasty conclusion of some netizens?