#bts lie

CW: contains mentions of trauma, blood, & drowning

Hello dear anon and thank you for your question! I will do my best to explain my interpretation and also provide a little more context for those who may be less familiar with the references you made.

I’m guessing that when you say it’s being “mentioned again,” you’re referring to the new third story of the Smeraldo Blog posted on July 15th, in which the florist Testesso witnesses a young man with an umbrella standing outside his unfinished shop during a typhoon. (If that wasn’t what you meant, please let me know!) The identity of the young man is unconfirmed, but plausible options include JiMin, due to the umbrella connection, and SeokJin, who is the only character so far who has definitely interacted with the florist in previous timelines. (Side note: if anyone would like to learn more about the contents of the Smeraldo Blog and the different versions of the stories, this post is a wonderful resource and is currently being updated for the 2020 revisions.) Second, I admit that due to the time difference I was unable to watch BangBangCon Live, so I had to search for some footage of the Boy With Luv performance. It looks like they all dance with umbrellas, though it’s perhaps a little striking that TaeHyung tosses his umbrella to JiMin at the beginning of the song. Regardless of the young man’s identity in the Smeraldo post and whether the BWL umbrella prop is a coincidence or a loose reference to BU (it certainly wouldn’t be the first time they incorporated such elements in their live shows and VCRs!), yes, JiMin’s connection to the umbrella is significant.

As you mentioned, in the Fake Love Teaser 1 we see JiMin exchange a photo of the arboretum for an umbrella in the video’s imagining of the Magic Shop. According to the teaser, “‘Magic Shop is a psychodramatic technique that exchanges fear for a positive attitude.” Psychodrama is a form of psychotherapy that engages clients’ self-reflections and insights with dramatizations and role-playing. Some Googling reveals that the real Magic Shop technique is broader than what is defined in the teaser, but it suffices for our purposes right now in considering BU.

JiMin’s fear is rooted in the truth of what happened in Grass Flower Arboretum on the day of his school picnic in Year 11. There are two forces that led him to witness/experience this traumatic event in the arboretum warehouse: first, the absence of his parents because they “were too busy to make it.” The mothers of JiMin’s friends praise him for being “mature and gentle.” JiMin seems determined to live up to this impression of maturity, rather than revealing how “down” he felt as the only unaccompanied student. So rather than waiting for his teacher, he sets off for home alone, confident that he can find the way on his own. The second force that leads him to the warehouse is the weather’s turn to rain. It is this element in particular, rather than the neglect of his parents, that stays with him for years to come.

“I began to run, holding my backpack over my head with both hands. The rain kept falling harder and harder. My pants got soaked in the rain after only a few steps. No shop, house, or bus stop came into sight. In the far distance, I could see a gate. I ran towards it without thinking. My hands felt numb from gripping the backpack. I was soaking wet, and my teeth were chattering. On top of the gate was a sign that read Grass Flower Arboretum. It was the back gate. There was a small warehouse just inside the gate.”

— JiMin, 6 April Year 11. The Notes 1.

Young JiMin does not have an umbrella and is forced to seek shelter at the first opportunity, which happens to be the warehouse. Later, he is found unconscious at the arboretum and taken to the hospital. When JiMin reflects on this in the May 11 Year 22 entry of Notes 1, he adds that his parents “didn’t ask any questions” about that or when he eventually developed seizures. There are many “what ifs” surrounding the event of April 6 Year 11. What if JiMin’s parents had accompanied him to the picnic? What if they had paid more attention and provided him an umbrella? What if they had been more present in his life, so that he did not feel the need to mask the disappointment of their absence from his peers and attempt the journey home alone?

But they didn’t, and they weren’t—and young JiMin sets off without an umbrella that day and lives with the consequences. We essentially experience the absence of the umbrella in some of the water imagery connected with JiMin in the MVs. The rest is connected with drowning and cleansing, both literally and metaphorically. As I note in my post Harboring Waters, “throughout the MVs and the Notes, we see that water, the element he uses to cleanse himself, is also the visual metaphor for his trauma. JiMin attempts to wash away his past rather than acknowledging his pain, only to drown again when his memories resurface.” In the years following the incident, he also conflates blood and mud: blood from what he witnessed/experienced in the warehouse and mud from the rain and his lack of umbrella.

“I closed my eyes and wished that this was all a dream and that, when I awoke again, I wouldn’t be able to recall anything.

That wish was just a wish. Instead, a cycle of seizures, injections, and injection-induced sleep that felt like falling off a cliff continued. After I awoke from that sleep, my whole body felt like it was covered with mud. Mud that looked like blood. No matter how hard I tried to wash it off, that warehouse smell lingered. I scrubbed until I bled, but it still felt dirty.”

— JiMin, 11 May Year 22. The Notes 1.

Even though JiMin presumably follows through with his plan on May 19 Year 22 of returning to the arboretum to face his fear (accompanied by YoonGi), he is still vulnerable to the triggers that recall the trauma of his past. On July 4 Year 22, JiMin collides with his dancing partner (HoSeok’s friend) and both are injured. The sight of his own blood nearly shuts him down as he desperately tries to wash it off. This leads to the scene you referenced, which is depicted in the Highlight Reel: JiMin chases after HoSeok and the unconscious girl with an umbrella but soon stops and turns around, realizing he won’t be of any help.

“Every time I took a step, rain splattered onto my sneakers. The headlights of cars swished by me. It’d rained on that picnic day a long time ago, just like today. On that day, I’d run away from the Grass Flower Arboretum. My body was covered with mud that looked like blood. I hadn’t grown up one bit from that little eight-year-old kid.”

— JiMin, 4 July Year 22. The Notes 1.

Now, back to the Magic Shop. JiMin exchanges a photograph representing the source of his fear for an object of protection that might bring him a more “positive attitude.” I think it is worth noting that all of the objects the characters receive from the masked seller are far from representations of lasting joy, and I believe that this was carefully calculated. They are temporary fixes or reassurances in much the same way that SeokJin’s manipulations of the timelines are largely reactive and short-sighted in his efforts to save his friends. An umbrella is only a temporary shelter until the stormy weather has passed; it does not banish the storm itself.

As I have mentioned in my recent JiMin-focused posts, his journey of healing is portrayed, realistically, as a complex one. It is not as simple as facing one’s fears and carrying an umbrella. There are progressions and setbacks, twists and turns on a road that might never truly end. Sometimes the umbrella may shield him from the storm, and sometimes it won’t. When that umbrella takes the shape of friends who accept and love him for who he is, then perhaps they will help guide him one step closer to accepting and loving himself.

I’ll end with one of SeokJin’s narrated quotes in the Highlight Reel, as it feels appropriate and is quite lovely:

“Though many seasons pass, there are places that cannot be reached. Yet another storm to be faced and to be weathered head-on. Loving without fear, hesitating and parting, merely living as the person I am.”

— SeokJin, Love Yourself Highlight Reel '起承轉結'

“Once again I put on a mask and go to see you.”

pt2 v didn't said what he was about but the title and the lyrics are quite something. Also in that period they were very close he could be about jimin cheering up v because of his lost but something else too at the same time. Can you do a analysis about those songs and what you think of if you want and have the time?

I mean I suspect they could be connected in some form, especially since so many of their other songs seem to be. And as you say the lyrics seem to match and almost be responses to each other even. The two songs were one of the first things I noticed in regards to Vmin that went beyond just shipping them and finding them cute. Both of them also seemed quite private when talking about the songs and I definitely think there is a lot hidden underneath the lyrics they haven’t explained. It’s just difficult to know what, even if we can speculate.

Maybe you’ve missed it, but I have actually written about Stigma and Lie two times before. In my very first (and quite outdated) song analysis Vmin - The Sun, the Moon & The whole universe back in 2017 I talked about the songs briefly. Both how they could possibly match and also how they seemed to fit with possibly being about the struggle of being LGBT+. This was way before we learned about the Jungian theories that BTS are using and even their concept of Fake Love and Love Yourself. Both themes also fit well for Stigma and Lie and the songs could be interpreted as how the boys felt showing their personas were like lying.

Then I talked about it again later and more properly in my post Vmin - Scenery, Promise and song connections. In it I go through all Vmin songs up until Scenery and Promise and how they could possibly show several types of connections between Vmin’s songs. Spoiler, but there are a lot!

Even back in 2017 I felt it was possible that Vmin’s songs were about each other in different ways. And since then it just seems to get more and more likely for every song they make. Especially for Tae, and this time for “Friends” I was even able to predict a few of the themes in the song because they love to use them so much.

But while we have a lot now, we did not back then, and I am still not sure Lie and Stigma are related. But here is a little piece about Lie and Stigma specifically from my first post about it:

First, there is “Lie” in which Jimin begs for someone to save him.

Whatever it takes, save me, meSave the me who’s being punished

Then there is Stigma, which has possibly matching lyrics. Where Taehyung speaks of another person being punished in his stead, or because of him.

Deeper, it’s just the heart that hurts every day(You) who was punished in my stead,You who were only delicate and fragile

There is also this line:

Even if (I try to) hide it, or conceal it, it can’t be erased.

Which of course also matches Jimin being caught in a lie, as they both have to pretend and hide what they really feel. Here they both hate the situation they are in, and Taehyung goes as far as to apologize for it. He also mentions being called a sinner. Both of the songs can easily be seen as reflecting the hardships of not being straight. Especially considering that Taehyung’s song is called “Stigma”.

So yes, even then I saw it as a possibility and of course I still do now, even more so now becuse it’s not just two songs anymore.

Because then it just kept on coming, and when Singularity and Serendipity seemed to match I also wrote Taehyung and Jimin - Yin and Yang which focused on their portrayals in the HER and TEAR albums.

And of course with Scenary and Promise I kind of made a more updated full version where I went through all their songs and other relevant connections between Vmin’s song up until then.

After that because the connections have (in my opinion) gotten bigger and more obvious I have added on posts about Winter Bear and Friends specifically as well. So you can probably tell that song analysis is basically one of the things I have written the most about on this blog, and for good reason. There are a lot of interesting things to find about Vmin in regards to their songs.

I am considering making an updated version with the main points for all the songs, but maybe long posts isn’t that good? I’m feeling people don’t like it when there is too much text... So maybe it’s better if I make one analysis per song? But then people kind of miss the scale of it all, because to me it’s the amount of connections between all songs that makes them being on purpose more likely.

I could also go into analysing BTS songs and concepts in general because a lot of them fit together with stuff from Vmin’s songs as well, like the theme of temptation. For example with Jimin basically showing the “Fall of man” as he sings about “smooth like a snake” in Lie and has been shown giving in to temptation and eating the apple of knowledge in both the short film for Lie as well as in Blood Sweat and Tears Japanese version.

Yoongi literally tries to protect and blind Jimin to shield him from temptation, but Jimin is stuck and tied to the door through which Tae went, which indicates Tae could be a form of temptation in the form of the fallen angel or Icarus wings.

We even have a small hint that the temptation could be the love of a man, as seen in Jin kissing the statue that represents Tae. But of course these things aren’t limited to only Vmin.

Anyways, this is getting out of hand.... So I’ll stop here.

There are many speculations I could make and maybe I should do a post specifically about Lie and Stigma, but for now since there are so many topics to cover I’ll probably focus on other things first.

I hope you enjoyed reading and sorry for not making more of an analysis now even though it is an interesting topic. I am saving your second ask to remind myself I didn’t answer all of it... Sorry!

31.1.19 / ⛓🐍

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이 지옥에서 날 꺼내줘

Free me from this hell

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I fell in love with this song the moment I heard it. It sounded beautiful yet twisted with the lyrics, and it conveyed the pain and inner demons that he faced at that point in his life. He seems to be in a better place right now but I’d still like to draw this as a tribute to his efforts in sharing his pain with us as well as writing this song and performing it. Thank you, Jimin. You’re an amazing performer and person as well, and I’ll never regret the day I started stanning you. 🌟

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ig. peonyun1108