With a copious amount of investment ranging from two billion won to five billion won,
which is one-million-five-hundred to three-million-seven-hundred USD, to debut a girlgroup, and the number
isn’t much lower for a boygroup, entertainment agencies are believed to have a strict process
to cherry-pick the best of best trainees to become their artists.
Ironically, it is also this “best-of-best” approach that leads to the forming of acts
whose one member always sticks out like a sore thumb, making people believe their act
would be better-off without them.
Lily (NMIXX)
Seemingly, JYP Entertainment has really taken the “mix” element in the group’s name
“NMIXX” too literally since from music to fashion and now to the choice of the line-up,
netizens always find it hard to understand why on Earth they decided to do things they
way they did.
After the departure of Jinni, discussions about NMIXX’s harmony started to gain even
more attention and according to many, Lily is too mismatched of a member to stand along
with others.
Most recently, there is a long thread dedicated to only complaining how Lily has been sticking
out like a sore thumb compared to the rest of NMIXX and the very first reason boils down
to her visual.
Though the Kpop industry is no longer foreign to mixed-racial beauty and up to now, and
there have also been lots of idols who garner lots of attention like Chanty from Lapillus
or Lisa from BLACKPINK, many said Lily’s heavy Western visual was too unique to be
an idol.
When putting her into a group where all members possess a strong South Korean beauty, Lily
looked even more out-of-place.
Many in the comment also shared the same viewpoint, saying they totally agreed with the OP as
Lily’s features, despite being totally gorgeous on their own, looked weird together and also
too against the traditional beauty standards of Kpop.
Moreover, the fact that she had big round eyes yet always carried a soul-piercing gaze,
which is also in total contrast with the elegant and lovely vibe expected of a female idol,
also put people off.
For having a cool complexion, JYP Entertainment’s recent decision to dye Lily’s hair blonde
pink has considerably softened her visual, helping it better match with South Korean
beauty standards.
The OP also admitted that she felt like Lily has become less mismatched thanks to this
change but in the long run, it would still be impossible to cover her discrepancy as
she couldn’t stick with one haircolor forever.
The second reason making Lily a noticeable mismatch is said to be her vocal, which is
ironically assessed to be among the best in Kpop.
According to netizens, it is such a powerful singing capability that makes Lily too different
as the rest of the group opts for a fairly soothing, relaxing and controlling vocal color.
Especially on stages where she has to split the efforts to manage both singing and dancing,
her voice sounds even more tense and suffocating.
Lily’s highnotes are even said to sound like screaming though technically speaking,
it’s just her comfortable belting all the time.
Taking all aspects of Lily’s talents into consideration, netizens believe the biggest
reason making her unsuited with NMIXX is sarcastically her color being too unique and powerful, especially
visual-wise and vocal-wise.
I myself also agree with people at this point as whenever looking at NMIXX, the first thing
I noticed was Lily with her distinct appearance.
With a vocal packed with power and a uniquely stunning visual, probably JYP Entertainment
should have debuted her as a soloist because one, she has all it takes to be one and two,
she is the kind of artist that with just a glance, everyone can already feel a strong
a liberal, highly-individualistic vibe of American celebrities.
However, I don’t think she should leave NMIXX to add another gap to the line-up; instead,
JYP Entertainment’s debuting her as the very first soloist of NMIXX might be a better
idea to best increase her reputation.
Renjun (NCT Dream)
Being the only fixed sub-unit in the NCT extended system, NCT Dream’s line-up was once thought
to be perfectly curated.
However, rational assumptions aren't always correct and according to netizens, SM Entertainment
has failed them hard this time.
Similar to Lily, the inharmony between Renjun and other members also comes down to critical
aspects like: visual, singing, dancing and stage presence.
However, some said his case was more severe since besides personal factors, his chemistry
with other members was also too off.
In 2021, one netizen posted a long thread about how Renjun should have never been a
piece of NCT Dream, emphasizing that she had spent a large amount of time observing him
before deducting this conclusion.
According to this person, if Renjun continued to be in the group, he would forever run on
a treadmill when it came to his career because other members had outshone him in all aspects.
Singing-wise, Renjun’s vocal color is said to be forgettably good and by that, people
of all sub-units he debuts under and how Chenle has already built a solid background in singing
predebut thanks to his family long-lasting history in the Chinese music industry, the
chances of Renjun suddenly outperform them is extremely slim.
Compared to the other three members’ vocal, Renjun’s voice sounds smoother and more
refined but it doesn’t have the rough and one-of-a-kind factor of the others’, leading
to people usually overlooking his singing capability.
Dancing-wise, Renjun is also said to have a huge gap from Jisung and Jeno as his moves
lack dynamics, a critical element in pulling off NCT Dream’s strong choreography.
While fans defended that he was simply dancing with his personal color, which focused more
on fluidity and energy rhythm, most believed it just amplified the mismatch since other
members’ dancing was robust and packed with energy.
That’s why out of the seven members, he was often ranked sixth and followed by Chenle.
So, why wasn’t Chenle criticized?
According to netizens, as he held a critical role vocal-wise, his dancing could just be
acceptable.
Even Renjun’s visual was assessed to be too vague compared to Jaemin, a member whose
handsomeness gained recognition from both fans and the public.
The fact that Renjun wasn’t into body-building, which made him way more petite compared to
the rest of the act, was another point that put-off netizens.
The OP then continued to talk about Renjun’s redundant appearance in NCT Dream when taking
his chemistry with other members into consideration.
She felt like he had always been an outlier that other members tried to include just for
the sake of not getting into detrimental rumors.
Backing up this assumption, the OP pointed out that while all members had built their
tight-knit bond with a certain member, like the couple MarkHyuk, NoMin and ChenJi, Renjun
was left out with no close friend.
Several months after that, another long post discussing the same topic also went viral
and here, the OP talked in-depth about Renjun’s distant relationship with others.
However, DREAMERs said they only found such threads hilarious and misleading.
Firstly, had it not been for Renjun’s visual, NCT Dream would have totally lost the signature
SM-vibe since he was the only member whose handsomeness was a perfect mixture of femininity
and masculinity.
Considering the member’s extremely unique vocal color, the soothing voice of Renjun
was the critical element tying together everything and making NCT Dream’s songs harmonious
as a group.
The most ridiculous point was still the way people forced the outlier image on Renjun
while in fact, the members always treated him with utmost love and care.
Especially for the friendship between him and Haechan, fans said people should have
stopped dubbing Haechan’s loving actions toward Renjun as fabricated because it was
simply their hobby to make fun of each other all the time.
I.N.
(Stray Kids)
Despite StrayKids being a group formed through JYP Entertainment’s survival show, the line-up
still fails to meet their expectations.
According to netizens, I.N. is too much of a mismatch, or worse, a useless member of
StrayKids since there is nothing special about him.
One netizen said that I.N.
was so vague that she didn’t even know about his existence until one of her friends, aka
a hardcore fan of StrayKids, mentioned him.
In StrayKids, I.N.
was said to bring nothing to the table because while other members had their own area to
shine, for example Hyunjin with his visual and impressive dancing capability, 3Racha
with his rapping and composing talent, Felix with the gender-fluid beauty and uniquely
low voice, Seungmin with the melting vocal shown through his performance in Kingdom,
Lino with the rising popularity as MusicCore’s MC and Bangchan as an all-rounded leader of
the act, I.N.’s met the bare minimum in all aspects.
It seems that I.N. also implicitly acknowledges his vague position in StrayKids as even fans,
in an attempt to defend him, had admitted that I.N.
seemed to be super insecure about his role.
When being asked about what he lacked most, I.N also admitted he needed to work harder,
especially in his dance skills, to catch up with the act.
However, fans believed these allegations were all nonsense.
One, as BangChan has proven himself a sensible leader, there would be no way he would self-pick
I.N. to the line-up with no good reasons.
Two, considering how JYP Entertainment immediately kicked Woojin out when they found him a real
mismatch, the fact that I.N.
was let to debut and kept to stay with StrayKids for good has already told a lot about his
ability.
Of course it’s true that I.N.
still had a long way to go compared to other members yet because he is the maknae and also
has a strong determination to improve, fans believed netizens should have given him a
pat on the shoulders rather than cyber-bullying and non-stop criticizing him.
So, do you think these idols are indeed the redundant members of their group or people
were simply blowing things out of proportion and forcing an unreasonably harsh standard
on them?