#superem

Super M being compared to Avengers is deceptive. It’s a group of villains in SMCU.

Taemin is the ultimate evil of SMCU. We don’t know his plans, but I suspect he wants to preserve chaos or find the Tree of life.

Super M members were introduced back in 2019 through a series of teasers. These teasers tell a story of Taemin gathering his group of helpers. 

- Baekhyun, Kai. I think these are copies (X-Exo, created by Red Force). Baek was in a labaratory and later confined in a cell. Kai looked lost, like he was directed by someone to the place with falling cars (Taemin’s place).

- Ten. Ten is fully on Taemin’s side, but he is under influence/brainwashed. When his other self drags him into the mirror, Ten dances like a villain. His eyes are blue in later promotional material. In Asia, where everyone has brown eyes, blue is evil. In the teaser you see a painting with flowers. In NCT lore Ten is associated with plants. His box is filled with them in The 7th sense. His real self is still dreaming, unaware that the picture was destroyed. 

- Mark. Mark comes into a white room with white tiles. His box in t7s also had white tiles. Mark looks carefree, relaxed. It’s his own space, representation of the inner world/mind. Out of the box comes Dark Mark (Jungian shadow). The Light Mark and Dark Mark change places, Dark Mark stays in the room and raps, Light Mark is lost in subconcious (the ladder, the Limitlessness of dreams is represented with a ladder in NCT dreamverse). Mark is willingly with Taemin, his dark self/dark desires/ambition took over. He works on his own accord.

- Taeyong. In NCT watching something on TV/screen means to watch someone else’s dream. Copies mean multiple versions in multiple dreams. Taeyong with blue eyes (evil) points a gun at another Taeyong with dark eyes, but doesn’t kill him. Taeyong is only partially under Taemin’s influence, or pretends he is. Only one of his eyes is blue later in promotional stuff. 

Lucas. He has the fallen angel imagery in WayV. In NCT lore he can connect to someone else’s dream he wants and enter it (that’s how he appeared in Dream in a Dream and Boss). The elevator in NCTverse symbolyzes going between dream levels (reality->dream->dream in a dream). Lucas is at work, he enters a dream, and we see multiple reflections of him (his self in multiple dreams). Red colour means Dream. Lucas looks both lost and dazed. I’m not sure, but I think he got corrupted by the limitlessness of Dream (Matrix), greedy for it. “I’m the other one, chillin’ with them other ones”. He wants to be with the “cool guys”. He is willingly with Taemin, but probably not very committed. Alternatively, he also pretends to be on Taemin’s side, he is a double agent (the suit in the teaser and what we know from unreleased “Jalapeno”).

Nouratan pointed out that Key has a double in his new teaser. There is a blue-eyed Key, and a brown-eyed Key. His teaser pictures also alternate between two eye colours. Key is from Shinee. Considering Taemin is there, he should have brainwashed other members by now. It looks like Key is like Taeyong and only pretends to be under influence. Or he in the middle of waking up from it.

Irene in “Queendom”, who is believed to be the leader of the coven, also had different eyes.

Interesting stuff from Musician folder.

- NCTU, WayV and SuperM have Lucas. Lucas is amidst the current artists. Other groups don't have ex-members mentioned. WayV group's introduction has all 7 members names listed in age order.

- NCT127 has WinWin listed. It's a 10 member unit.

- The duos of YY-Ten and Kun-XJ have their own pages like other established sub-units (K.R.Y., EXO-CBX), which hints at these units being permanent. Tende/4 seasons/TaeTen are under NCT U.

- Taeyong has his YT channel listed, Haechan doesn't have his IG yet. Heh.

- Brown-eyed-girls and the rookie gg Billie are under SMtown, I didn't know (sub-label Mystic story).

- Minseo is under SM. Which is a relief, so she does get OSTs, I thought she dissapeared.

Speaking of Lee Mark. I didn’t know before, but Super M had a series of black and white images. 

On this picture you are looking at a reflection in the water. This is a classic, sofisticated use of the Shadow, the dark part that resides in everyone’s subconcious. For you to not doubt the meaning, half of the face is hidden in the shadow. Only Mark has such an image (all promo pics for Super M first EP). 

So the concept of taeyong being tempted by taemin into the evil is very much of a possibility (biting the apple)

Wanted also has karina in the video, so karina has been under influence for a while, taemin is in all the superm first teasers too. This bit of info makes me think that taemin is influencing them all and behind their acting weird (taeyong killing the other taeyong)

Another thing I realised is that jaehyun takes them to the dream realm but mark and taeyong are doing something the is effecting their dreams reality. Basically hacking their dreams

I think 127 neos can go to the Dream reality on their own. Jaehyun accessed another person's dream/another virtual reality.

Taeyong received text messages on his computer. Seems like he was talking to someone. Maybe Tae is the guy in the hoodie. It was a cartoon character, it's possible to fake (like the distorted voice). Out of the two, Tae would have interest in art.

music:

it does matter about the quality of music/type because it helps us chart well if it is appealing and good, then the general public can help us stream. (he is pretty known in the general public, not just only the core fandom, also due to lots of non-exo-l’s having baekhyun as their past bias/have affection for him). 

also, if it’s to core fans taste, then of course they’re happy. but at the end, if you already became a core fan— the music does not matter.

i am talking mainly japanese/korean/chinese fans who do most of the album buying/streaming. i am chinese and so i am on the chinese social medias (weibo), i also know japanese and i can read korean so i track the kinds of campaigns/thoughts there are. 

for international (western) fans, then the music might matter more. for instance, there is a small division of fans that actually started liking kpop because of superm. they might listen to baekhyun’s solo music and bias him, but not get to know exo at all. or a casual fan of another group might stumble upon his solo music and start liking his music from there. so there are lots of different types of ‘core fans’. 

most of us like baekhyun not because of his music, it’s just a bonus. so him being experimental is no problem. we preorder/buy his album before we hear the music. the thing he has to worry about is being inactive on social media, projects, and appearances, then some people might get bored. also- i think a good theory to think about the loyalty of some fans is the sunk cost fallacy- "when they continue a behavior or endeavor as a result of previously invested resources (time, money or effort)“. so change is no problem, unless you were not very invested in the first place.

it’s true exo-l’s did not like superm. this is because it was the final ‘insult’ to exo being inactive and not having many contents, while witnessing nct have nct lifes, 4 youtube channels, many members, more than one comeback a year. it does not matter that there are multiple units, they just see ’nct’ brand and feel resentment and blame them. superm having 4 nct members made it seem like a promotional unit for nct to exo-l’s, even if it might help exo too.

so, many exo-l’s who do not bias kai or baekhyun did not support. however, many kaibaek stans did support them— but it is not solely baekhyun’s name, it is not his solo, so we don’t invest much money into it. any ‘accomplishment’ will be transferred over to superm, not baekhyun (and we actually know there will be baekhyun solo album comebacks, instead of wishful thinking, we actually have something to save for). 

so for superm it is not music, just a combination of historical bitterness , not having the dynamics we are used to (exo members vs strangers if you don’t know nct), and waiting for a better time to support. 

the unit (exo-cbx) was a circumstance of having two not-as-popular members (chen and xiumin) so the sales/streaming force was decreased. baekhyun core fans will support it, but it is the same idea. the accomplishments and sales will not be credited to baekhyun, but the unit. as you can see from the difference in chen and baekhyun’s solo album sales - their core fandom buying power is different. the members who did solos so far (suho, chen, baekhyun, lay, kai) all did music they like and fit their image and their skills. suho and chen were never main dancers or performance strong, so they just did ballads. it was expected, not necessarily impact their sales, as a lot of the sales come from preorders anyway (before hearing the music).

actually, you can see this phenomenon in exo’s album obsession in 2019 which did not hit one million sales, versus baekhyun’s in 2020 which did. exo’s fandom is split up now, fans who will spend and pay attention to all members are not as common as the past. they are waiting for solos…

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Thank you for the long post, anon, you answered some of my old questions well. I asked, of course, to have a picture of how it works because of NCT. There are several candidates for going solo in the group. 

In addition to “investment of time”, it also staying in the fandom, I suppose. The enjoyment of doing something together, achieving a goal. One guy compared k-pop fans to sport team fans, and I agree. A game is an occasion to gather together, drink, have fun. 

This reality of fans supporting those idols who are “giving” is such a double-edge sword. As you said yourself, the image and connection should be maintained all the time. What idols like Taeil or Jaehyun can do, when entertaining and flirting with fans is not in their character? Even Doyoung suffers from the need to constantly please.

Baekhyun works on his vocal skills, betters himself, but most idols don’t (or not even given an opportunity by their company). Another side effect of idols being popular because of being pretty/entertaining. 

Huh, now I wonder if it has worked out on itself or he planned it, but Doyoung does present himself as a singer a lot. Even his long solo vlives are mini-concerts. His core fanbase will grow slowly, but be long-lasting.  

SuperM is directed at the West first of all. The group was launched in US. It’s the other way around. NCT members introduces EXO and Shinee as 127 had been already known (I mean the new k-pop fans, not k-con era old fans). Baek’s, Taemin’s and Kai’s solo albums were advertised during SuperM promotions as well. Maybe Baekhyun himself didn’t earn much (fans wise), but EXO got new exposure for sure. Lots of Western reviewers talk about them. 

The bffs things was really a turning point for me. I had shipped Taeyong with Ten and Baekhyun in passing, but then I started to notice the many candies dotae were giving, their selfies, Taeyong's video to Doyoung, Do showing up in Taeyong's vlive, mentioning that they wanted friendship rings, Tae throwing himself on top of Do while "punching" him, their cute bickering. So, with many glowing arrows pointed at them (they seem to work so hard to showcase their friendship) it's hard to escape that pull.

But even though dotae is an easy ship to keep up with, for some unknown reason my fascination died down as I started writing taeten again. So my attention switched to jaedo because they look good together. They have a different chemistry, there are sparks between them that I don't see in dotae, or even baekyong for that matter. When I actually look past all the candy and facts and mentions, I only see friendship there (in dotae). There is no sexual tension. Their eyes don't shine bright like when Jae looks at Do and Do looks at Jae. People don't look at each other like that normally, they really seem infatuated. Even in their attempt to keep it low-key, it seeps between the cracks of their armors. (Jae literally let Do use him as a carpet and looked delighted about it).

After months of thinking I was alone in shipping jaedo I found your fic on ao3 that just fed into the narrative I already had in my head hahahahah. But I get why people like shipping bffs. It's wholesome and cute. This are just my 2 cents on it.

You sound like a SuperM fan. Are you? Seeing Taeyong with Baekhyun persuaded me for good that he has no romantic feelings towards Doyoung. 

Maybe you would be surprised to know that before 2020 DoTae shippers believed their ship to be underappreciated, and themselves a minority. 

Baekhyun treats Taeyong like he adopted him, and Taeyong calls him "dad" of the group. Really no romance there. I also don't see romance between dotae, even though I used to. It's like my eyes needed glasses and when I put them, I could see their relationship clearly. Platonic bffs it is.

As it's obvious by my last ask, I am more convinced by the way Doyoung and Jaehyun treat each other, even if they don't have as much candies as other pairings. The little they give away is a lot. I don't care about the divorce jokes. Jaedo seems genuinely in love with each other. The small gifs we have, which you post here a lot, say much about them. And to the ones that can't see it, the devil is in the details.

I really believe your analysis of them. They are a fact to me. Browsing your blog for new posts is one of the highlights of my day. Thanks for creating and continuing it!

Now I'll go write my dojae, but it's omegaverse hahahhaha (as idols, though). Maybe I'll write something else too, IC, like you mentioned you like, I like it too, I have many canon compliant fics. They are harder in the way that one needs to research properly for it. Since I'm watching everything in the vlive channel from old to new, I might get inspired.

The order of your ships and the time of getting to know TaeDo.