Next Recapping Project: Produce 101 Japan Shinsekai
I knew I had to get to a Produce 101 show sooner or later. In my other recaps, we’ve talked about the show’s 2019 vote-rigging scandal that resulted in prison sentences for a couple of the producers. The show has also been criticized for evil edits, traumatizing contestants with hidden camera pranks, and pushing very unethical contracts on their winners. And yet, we have 101 contestants ready to give it a shot again this year.
For its fourth season, the Japanese version is going global for the first time. This means I can watch it on Mnet’s website. The show is currently in progress and will wrap up on June 6th with a live finale. This is my first recap of a J-pop series, but the resulting group will debut in both Japan and Korea. This group will have a whopping 11 members, which might explain why the producers keep trying to weasel out of paying the winners through those stingy contracts. Those are a lot of paychecks.
We’ll see a few familiar faces from my K-pop recaps, but not a lot, since we’re in a new pop genre. South Korean singer Park Si Young made it to the finale of Under Nineteen before being eliminated and going on to join the now-disbanded MIRAE. What a brutal industry this is. MIRAE breaks up, and this 23 year-old is spit right back into the survival show machine to try again.
On a more pleasant note, Kevin Woo will be one of the vocal coaches. You may know him as the singing voice of Mystery Saja in KPop Demon Hunters, and he also has a long history of being on K-pop shows and being an idol himself.
Park Si Young and Kevin Woo
We’ll get 11 episodes, each one around the 3-hour mark, so I’ll try to keep these recaps as tightly-written as possible. (I can’t imagine how long that finale is going to be.) So join me for Produce 101 Japan Shinsekai (“New World”)! Time to see some trainees in a whole different country get traumatized!
I’m breaking out the frosting to cover this mess. Let’s do this.
Go to Episode 1 recap
