#flashback formula

I love when I’m right. 

I came into this hoping the 18 contestants would want some payback, and right off the bat, the show opens with confessionals of our boys sharing their experiences on Boys II Planet.  “I disappeared before I could even perform once.”  “Ninety-nine percent of people don’t even know I exist.”  “I stayed at One Star the whole time and got eliminated.”  “I couldn’t stop thinking that I just wasn’t good enough.”

I’m here to eat goji berries and kick ass, and I’m all out of goji berries.

Welcome to Episode One!

Our host explains that this will be a faster, harsher race than these candidates have ever faced.  So, you’re going to put MORE bugs in their dorms and make the food even colder?  Wow. 

Also, the online voters are now called Planet Makers.  And the votes are still going to be 50% from Korea, and 50% from everywhere else, which makes absolutely no sense.  I guess the producers must realize that, because in an effort to encourage more Global voters, the number of spots in the final group will depend on how many of them vote.  The more Global votes they get, the larger the actual group will be.  I really don’t think they’re going to be able to get enough Global votes to compete with the 50% given to Korea, unless Korea doesn’t really care about a C-pop group and doesn’t watch the show. 

Well, let’s see how this goes.  Our first trainee enters the studio.  It’s the handsome Fan Zheyi.  He was cut from Boys II Planet in the second elimination, just missing the Top 24 by ranking 25th. 

Other trainees join him.  Hu Hanwen and Chen Bowen.  The three of them did their first star ranking performance together on B2P.  I want to look up more information on them, but I don’t want to find out if they made it to the final group.  That’s how I found out about Li Zihao making it.  So I’ll just take the information this show gives me.

The huge screen in front of them suddenly lights up with a message.

A cheerful female voice tells them, “The cruel survival competition begins again.  Only those who overcome hardship and limits will be able to achieve the dream of debut.”  This sounds vaguely threatening.

The voice tells them they will be graded on their performance all through the competition, and that their current grades are already written on their nametags.  For what, may I ask?  They haven’t done anything yet.   

The three grades are Top, Mid, and Low.  Our boys peel stickers off their nametags to find their scores for just walking in the door and saying hi.  Hu Hanwen gets a Top score.  Fan Zheyi and Chen Bowen both get Mid.  I already have so many questions, but we’re only 12 minutes in, so let’s just move forward.

A huge door opens, and the boys walk through.  This entire set looks like a K-pop version of Star Wars.

The boys find a row of black chairs and five red chairs with the letter “C” painted on the back.  Just plain wooden chairs.  Nothing like the pyramid.  The producers really did just throw this set together, didn’t they?  “Boss, where are the trainees going to sit?”  “Oh, just grab some chairs from the cafeteria and spray-paint them.  I’m too busy randomly assigning grades.”

Our boys guess that only five members will debut.  As they choose their seats, other trainees join them and reveal their scores.  BOY STORY’s Li Zihao is in the Top group.  We see other familiar faces, like Dang Hong Hai and Sun Hengyu.  The show helpfully reminds us of who they were on B2P.  Sun Hengyu hit some crazy high notes on the song “Rising Sun” and wound up losing his voice.  Dong Hong Hai was on both seasons of BP and was eliminated both times.  Now he gets a Mid grade, and Sun Hengyu gets a Top grade. 

The doors slide open as more trainees come in, and I swear, the sliding doors look just like the ones on the Death Star.  Did the producers steal these sets off Disney’s Millennium Falcon ride?  

The last trainee to enter is Lim Jack.  He comes roaring in, and I remember how loud he was on the few episodes of B2P before he got eliminated.  For all his energy, he only has a Mid grade.  Maybe now that all the trainees are here, we can find out what these grades are supposed to mean.

A pulsing red planet appears on a screen in front of them. 

Strong with the Killing Part you are.  A great idol will you be.

The cheerful female voice greets them.  She tells them that K-pop fans all over the world will be the Planet Makers.  Wait, doesn’t she mean C-pop?  And it sounds like she’s speaking Korean.  I’ve watched enough of these shows to know that when I hear the “mida” or “sumnida” at the end of sentences, I’m hearing Korean.  Is this a C-pop show or not?

The Planet Makers will decide everything on this show.  What songs will be performed, who has the Killing Part, what kind of choreography will be done, pretty much everything these trainees do.  Should the voters really have that kind of power?  We’re talking about teenage girls.  If I’d had that kind of power as a teenage girl, I would have voted for Andy Gibb to marry me and for the Bay City Rollers to get back together.  I would have made their lives absolutely miserable.  Let’s please re-think this.

Oh God, this is how they’re going to get more Global voters, isn’t it?  With this kind of power, American voters will demand they sing nothing but Taylor Swift songs.  These guys are screwed.

It’s now time to meet their Chief Master, who’s pretty much the host of this show and probably one of the coaches.  It’s … oh no.  Not this guy again.  Say hello to Kim Jae Joong, the jerk from B2P who fat-shamed trainees and told them to lose weight.    

Welcome back, lardasses!

He explains the grades.  The Top grade means the trainee is closest to debut.  Mid means they’re halfway there, and Low means they’re on the verge of elimination.  The grades they have now were decided by the Planet Makers.  Wait, what?  The voters already decided on their grades?  This was another cost-cutting measure, wasn’t it?  You stole the set from a theme park and the chairs from a prison library, and now you’re just going to sit back and let the voters run the show while Kim Jae Joong eats Cheez-Its and watches episodes of Go Fighting! on his phone.

Is this going to continue when the group debuts?  Are the fans going to decide what they record, where they tour, what shows they’ll be on, and who will be the first to be caught dating and kicked out of the group?  This is turning into a horror show.

Okay, let’s see what grades the voters decided to give each group. 

The Mid and Low trainees are frustrated.  If this is how the Planet Makers see them before they’ve even walked through the door, how can they hope to rise above the most popular ones?  It really does feel like the voters have already chosen the debut group.

Now Kim Jae Joong announces the first mission.  It’s called the Planet Maker Producing Battle.  The voters will decide on the mission song, Killing Parts, and all other key elements.  When the trainees perform the song, they won’t have a live audience voting.  The Planet Makers will cast their votes online.  So will these guys be performing to an empty room? 

The trainees will be performing a group battle in three teams of six, which I’m guessing will also be decided by the voters.  Eliminations will be held right after this battle.  Everyone on the winning team will survive.  Half of the second place team will be candidates for elimination, and the last place team will all be elimination candidates.  I’m guessing the Planet Makers can vote to have the eliminated trainees shot out of a cannon in the direction of their hometowns, where they will hopefully land at their own front doors, saving Mnet the airfare.

Now to find out the three mission songs.  They are “Hot” by Seventeen, “Drama” by aespa, and “ISTJ” by NCT Dream.  The trainees are excitedly talking about what team they want to be on, but they don’t have any say in the matter.  The Planet Makers have already decided. 

Yay!  We are mere puppets with no autonomy!  Thanks, Mnet!

The voters have also decided who’s going to do the Killing Parts, and of course, those three come from the Top group.  I officially hate this.  One of the best ways for a lower-ranked trainee to rise in the ranks is to get the Killing Part so he can show what he can do.  This isn’t a survival show.  It’s a popularity contest. 

Killing Parts:  Xue Suren, Li Zihao, and Sun Hengyu

Now we learn that these guys do get some decision-making power.  The three Killing Part winners may not get to choose which song they perform, but they do get to choose their teams.  I’m sure the Planet Makers are renting protest trucks as we speak, but I’m happy about this.  If Hamilton taught us anything, it’s that tyrants with unchecked power are funny and handsome and have some of the best songs in the show.  Wait, no.  Bad.  Tyrants are bad. 

Right.  So.  Here are the teams:

The boys go to their dorm, and … wait, these are the same dorms as B2P!  This show is being filmed in Korea! 

I did some quick Googling, and Mnet originally planned to shoot the show in Thailand but decided to film in Korea, using their own production crews.  Those cheap bastards.

So in the dorms, all six members of the Low grade team have to share a room.  Mid grades sleep three to a room, and the Top grades get the nice 2-person rooms.  Cheer up, Mid and Low trainees.  At least everyone gets a bed, access to a bathroom, and all the bugs they can eat. 

The next day, our teams report to practice.  We start with Team Drama.  They choose a Leader, and it’s BOY STORY’s Li Zihao, who also has the Killing Part and Main Rapper part.  He’s going to be very busy.  Chen Bowen takes the Lead Vocal.

Over on Team ISTJ, Killing Part Sun Hengyu is also elected Leader.  Lim Jack tells us he’s a good choice because he’s kind of quiet but very kind.  (Lim Jack’s default volume setting on B2P was Nuclear Explosion, so take his assessment with a grain of salt.)  Sun Hengyu is not the best leader because he just assigns parts to his teammates instead of letting them try out, and he assigns himself the Main Vocal part.  It’s interesting that Chrisen Yang is on this team.  He’s our Chinese trainee from Los Angeles who assigned a teammate the Sub-Rapper position on B2P because he was smaller than the Main Rapper.    I wonder how he feels being on the other end of this.

I certainly know how Lim Jack feels because when they start learning the choreography, he get the bulk of the criticism.  He’s moving too fast, he’s moving to slow, he’s not turning far enough, he’s not focusing.  He’s starting to get very frustrated.

Lim Jack

We suddenly cut to two days later, and Leader Sun Hengyu is in the hallway outside the practice room, crying.  I’m guessing there’s been a team revolt.  But I guess we’ll get to that later, because now we cut to Team Hot with Killing Part Xue Suren. 

Everyone agrees Xue Suren should also be the Leader, since he chose this team.  Zhao Guang Xu and Wong Sik Hei both audition for Main Vocal.  Unfortunately, neither one can sing, which is what got them kicked off B2P in the first place.  Their auditions are painful to listen to.  It makes me wonder, can THEY hear themselves?  They know it’s bad, right? 

With no other options, Xue Suren chooses Zhao Gang Xu for Main Vocal and Wong Sik Hei for Sub Vocal One.  Oh, this is going to be painful.  “Don’t feel too pressured, okay?” he says to them.  No, Xue Suren.  They need pressure to improve.  Lots of pressure.  Your inspiration should be the movie Whiplash.  You need to make sadistic conductor Terence Fletcher look like Mary Poppins.  Sure, his student lost his mind and got expelled from school and almost died in a car crash, but didn’t he wind up giving an amazing performance?  Didn’t he?  I’m seriously asking.  I never saw the movie. 

Now we get a plot twist.  The producers tell all three teams to start rehearsing the full performance, and if any of them decide they don’t like their position or how the whole thing is going, they will have the change to change teams.  Trainees who want to transfer teams will need to challenge the part holder of the desired song, except for the Killing Part, because the Planet Makers voted on the Killing Parts, and if you override their commands, they will form an army to attack China, because I don’t think they know this is actually being filmed in Korea. 

Xue Suren tells the producers he’s positive no one will leave his group and then is stunned when everyone grabs the sheet music from the other songs and starts practicing.

The teams gather for the Transfer Battle.  I’m concerned because there are only four episodes, and we’re spending a lot of time on games like this instead of doing actual performances.  Let’s move this along.

No one on Team Drama wants to transfer.  But they do get challenged by the other teams.  Li Zihao winds up trading his Main Vocalist Dang Hong Hai for Visual Stunner Fan Zheyi, which causes hurt feelings.  In the end, that’s the only transfer.  Dang Hong Hai is going to be out for revenge.  It doesn’t help that his new team, ISTJ, is unhappy that Fan Zheyi is gone.  They are not very welcoming to Dang Hong Hai. 

The teams practice for a week to prepare for the final battle.  Finally, we’re at D-Day.  This will be an online evaluation with no live audience.    I’m a little disappointed that we won’t have the fans here, but let’s see how this goes.

Everyone does the performances which we don’t get to see, and the videos go live so the Planet Makers can vote.  Then the trainees and coaches all gather in a big viewing room to watch the videos together and find out who won.

First, we watch the ISTJ team, the one that Dang Hong Hai got traded into.  Here’s where we get a flashback and find out that the sadistic Planet Makers had added another part to each song earlier in the week during practice.  Each song has a Hidden Part that the teams have to compose themselves.  Our ISTJ team will have to create harmonies for their Hidden Part.

Our vocalists try harmonizing lines from the song, and they sound like Spinal Tap trying to sing “Heartbreak Hotel” at Elvis’ grave.  Their midpoint eval is a disaster.  The coaches tell them, “If you perform onstage like this, the program will be ruined.”  They also tell Lim Jack he’s the worst one in the group. If I remember correctly from B2P, he was never able to sing.  If he sings this badly for the Planet Makers, he’s going to take the whole team down with him.

Later, when the ISTJ team goes back to practice, we find that Lim Jack still can’t do the choreography and is in physical pain from trying again and again.  Team Leader Sun Hengyu is losing patience with him.  “It’s not your knee that’s the problem right now,” he snaps, “You just fundamentally don’t know how to do it.  Because of you, our progress is slow.  We can’t even get past one part properly.” 

Lim Jack and Sun Hengyu

This is hard to watch, and now I’m pretty sure Lim Jack was only allowed to be on this show so they’d have someone to eliminate.  But it’s breaking his heart in the process.  I really hope this is the typical Flashback Formula and that Lim Jack is pretending to be worse than he is. 

Lim Jack sits on the floor in tears while all his teammates except Sun Hengyu gather around to reassure him.  “This is too hard for me,” he says between sobs.  “I’m still trying, but my knee hurts so badly, I’m trying to stay focused, I’m the one who practices the latest every night…” as he’s talking, Sun Hengyu gets up and leaves the room, which is cold. 

Later, in the dorm, the two of them talk things out.  Lim Jack keeps working hard during practice, and now I really think this is a storyline. Let’s see the final performance.

Of course, Lim Jack can now suddenly sing and dance.  I do not believe that storyline for one minute. I will say I’m a little disappointed in the low energy of this choreography.  They sing and dance well, but there’s no real excitement.  The Hidden Part harmonies are gorgeous because I’m sure one of the vocal coaches wrote that part for them.  They do a good job, but it just doesn’t feel like a battle performance.

“They changed so much!” the coaches say.  Yeah, no kidding. 

The voter comments are kind of lukewarm.  “For Ngan Chau Yuet, since expectations were low, he was better than expected,” one says.  Another one is meaner:  “It looks fine with the sound off.”  It gets worse.  “It’s like a children’s choir.” 

We see how the Planet Makers ranked the team.  Ngan Chau Yuet actually comes in second.  The team trade Dang Hong Hai comes in fourth, Lim Jack comes in third and Team Leader Sun Hengyu is in top place.  Those are the only names that are translated into English in the subtitles.  Did I mention I hate Mnet’s streaming service? 

So we’re down to the last five minutes of the episode, and we find out that Team Drama is up next.  This is Li Zihao’s team, and knowing how aggressive a performer he and Fan Zheyi are, I think they are going to blow Team ISTJ out of the water.  However, we see that they will have a horrible dress rehearsal, with the coaches saying, “Does this even make sense?  Is this stage even entertaining?  I don’t even have the courage to watch.  It’s honestly embarrassing.”

We close with Li Zihao scolding his team afterwards, saying they embarrassed him, and “What’s the point of looking pretty with makeup if you can’t dance?”  He is PISSED.  Because I’m pretty sure that’s what the storyline told him to be. 

According to the script they gave me, I’ve never been so angry in my life!

The episode ends here. 

Honestly, I don’t get a sense that Mnet is trying to do better by these Planet C contestants, and I’m wondering if that’s why more of them didn’t come back to compete.  The whole vibe feels like, “Okay, FINE.  Here’s your own damn show, and boy are we going to make you pay for complaining so much.”

Next time, we’ll cover Episode 2.  I expect to see eliminations since we’ll be halfway through the show. I’m hoping Mnet will give the trainees the option to be packed into FedEx boxes and shipped home.  Of course they will be shipped Ground Economy with a bag of pretzels for sustenance.  Mnet’s not spending a dime more than they have to.

See you then!