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boysplanetrecaps · 2 years ago

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Boys Planet Episode 3-4 Recaps: Burn It Up

Aka “They Aren’t The Ones Who Are Currently Good.”

If you’re following the MNET show Boys Planet, you probably know by now that the editors are extremely irritating. For a song “mission” like this, they show 2-3 minute montages of some of the teams practicing, then fast forward to show time passing, then make it look like the performance will start any moment, and then have a lengthy flashback before we finally get to see the performance.

So, I made a main recap that takes you through episodes 3 and 4 in a linear way, but then when it comes to focusing on each team, I’ll put all those thoughts in a separate post so you can keep the storylines straight. This post covers the Burn It Up teams' rehearsal and performance.

The Teams

K team:

Leader: Park Min Seok

Other members:

Choi Seung Hun, Jeon Ho Young, Jung Ho Jin, Jung Se Yun, Park Gwan Young

Park Gwan Young is 22, auditioned with Lullaby, was ranked 61st and then 92nd, and has been 2 stars the whole time.

Jung Se Yun is 15, auditioned with Damdadi, was ranked 68th and then 85th, and has been 0 stars the whole time.

Jung Ho Jin is 20, auditioned with Lullaby, was ranked 48th and then 68th, and has been 1 star the whole time.

Choi Seung Hun is 14, the youngest in the whole show; he auditioned with Love Scenario, was ranked 46th and then 52nd, and has fallen from 1 star to 0 stars. He’s a former child actor who has been in 30+ dramas.

Jeon Ho Young is 18, auditioned with Love Scenario, was ranked 81st and then 80th, and has fallen from 2 stars to 1 star. He’s also an actor.

Park Min Seok is 20, auditioned with The Real, was ranked 64th and then 84th, and has fallen from 2 stars to 1 star. He was a lead vocal in The Real and did a good job -- that whole team was good. So it’s a bummer to see that he ended up a 1-star.

We can also see teammate Jung Hwan Rok there -- he has three stars -- but he left the show prior to its airing. He’s a member of the nugu group “withus.” No reason was given for him leaving the show that I know of, but perhaps he was unthrilled about being on this team of leftovers.

G team

Leader: Xuan Hao

Other members:

Yutaka, Chen Ren Yu, Hyo, Kei, Qui Sheng Yang, Riku, Xuan Hao

Top row: Chen Ren Yu (in yellow), Riku (in green)

The four sitting in a semi-circle around white-haired leader Xuan Hao: Qui Sheng Yang, Yutaka, Hyo, Kei

Yutaka is 23, didn’t get to audition, was ranked 57th and then 54th, and has risen from 0 stars to 1 star. We saw him in a segment on the poorly trained 0 zero stars at their vocal lesson, in episode 2 or 3, and we saw him making up his own choreo during the star level test.

Hyo is 21, didn’t get to audition, was ranked 62nd and then 9th, and has risen from 0 stars to 2 stars. We also saw him in that 0 stars vocal lesson segment.

Kei is 16, auditioned with Conduct Zero, was ranked 76th and then 83rd, and has been 2 stars the whole time. In my notes on his audition, I thought he overdanced a little bit, but that I thought he deserved 3 stars.

Qui Sheng Yang is 21, auditioned with Tiger Inside, was ranked 88th and then 70th, and has fallen from 2 stars to 1 star. I thought he overdanced a bit in his audition.

Chen Ren Yu is 19, auditioned with Tiger Inside, was ranked 59th and then 56th, and has fallen from 2 stars to 1 star. In my write up on his audition, I said he did really well, writing, “I thought his dancing was purposeful, but sort of calm, and his singing was really good. On key, on rhythm, pleasant, all that good stuff. I’m rooting for him, and curious to see how MNET will screw him over for no real reason.”

Riku is 18, auditioned with Maniac, was ranked 93rd (last!) and then 88th, and has risen from 1 star to 2 stars.

Xuan Hao is 27, auditioned with God’s Menu, was ranked 33rd and then 41st, and has been 1 star the whole time.

Team Selection:

This K-team is the leftovers team.

I am not sure when this G-group was picked or who picked it, but I think they were the sixth team picked.

Episode 3, 1:18:11

Part Selection

G-group is getting along great. Leader Xuan Hao says, in English, “who has this?” with his hands indicating his abs. Yutaka builds up suspense, but his abs aren’t exactly prominent -- “I’ve been eating a lot of snacks,” he explains, and like, same.

Then Chen Ren Yu shows his abs for a picosecond.

I don’t know what my 3 or 4 readers want to see, but in case it’s that, there you go!

They seem to be getting along well -- it’s nice to see.

Over on the K-side, it’s a bit quieter. These are the leftovers, and their spirits are a bit low. They have elected Park Min Seok leader, and when Jeon Ho Young suggests that they start with their strengths, Minseok jumps on that as a good idea. “Try to promote yourself so we can choose our parts,” Minseok says, and like, yeah, man. 💖That’s the way.

Park Gwan Young says his voice is his strength, and the editors roll the tape. I guess he can hit high notes. Not sure he… should?... but hey, it’s a start. Jung Hwan Rok and Park Min Seok also say they’re most confident in singing. Jung Ho Jin says, “those guys lost out on these talents,” which I love. The team continues to build each other up -- “we’re the hidden talents!”-- “We’re the ones that were left behind, but we’re all good people!” -- but little Choi Seung Hun says with an embarrassed smile, “I’m not really confident about anything.” You’re an actor, child -- maybe mention that! Say, “Well, I’m a really good actor, so I think I can at least charm the audience from the stage.” Right?

We get a flashback to an early vocal lesson, and it really seems to me that Choi Seung Hun is either tone deaf or going through the vocal change boys go through as they mature. His voice is breathy and almost tuneless, and he shows his misery clearly on his face. Oh, MNET editors, can we not focus on this? He’s a child and you shouldn’t have put him on the show.

His teammates seem to feel a mixture of concern for and irritation about him. He’s a child, and he’s annoying, but he’s a child, so… what can you do? Yell at him? Send him to his room? It is hard all around.

Let’s skip to Episode 4, at 5:16 in. After Minhyun does a little bit of half hearted choreo, the teams come up.

Leading us into a flashback, one of the psychopath dance teachers points out that neither team has anyone above two stars. The kindly main vocal teacher, Master Lee, says, “They aren’t the one who are currently good,” which is the kindest way to describe this battle.

In a flashback, we see the teams beginning a dance instruction with one of the psychopath dance teachers. He points out that they have a difficult song, and no all stars or even 3 stars. We see G-team try and they are kind of a mess. I assume K team tries with the same result; we don’t see it, but we see that both teams are now in a combined dance practice. Well, that’s unorthodox…? You’re going to do a dance rehearsal and teach them how to dance? I mean, you could TRY that, instead of simply yelling at them and insulting them, but I don’t see how it’ll help. At least he’s being kind of harsh and uncompromising about it, so there’s that.

Poor Chen Ren Yu. I theorize he doesn’t really understand Korean so well, on top of not understanding the basics of choreography. I know I thought he did ok in his audition, but in this context it’s clear that he hasn’t had any dance instruction.

He is confusion.

He’s supposed to bend his arms at the elbow in this sort of bird flap arm gesture, but he can’t do the motion. Master Choi is obsessed with this one move and I think it might just be too hard for Ren Yu.

In the vocal lesson, at least we see Kei doing good rapping, but the singing is really off rhythm. Master Lee, the firm but kind male vocal instructor, doesn’t really know what to do. He compliments Kei’s excellent rapping, and then tries to get some like, melodic… singing… out of Xian Hao. His teammates sweetly encourage him. You just don’t see young men interacting like this on US television, which is why I guess this is so interesting to me.

Hey, here’s a good idea! Xian Hao goes to visit our auburn haired center, Zhang Hao, for some help with his singing! Zhang listens to Xian kindly, then gives real instruction.

They keep practicing. Xian Hao really wants to pull off that vocal run. Chen Ren Yu seems to have a good sense of pitch and is helping as well. It’s just all very sweet. The editing continues to focus on Chen Ren Yu and that one arm move, and I honestly have a bad feeling about it… so let’s see.

As G-team takes the stage, K-team watches. Reaction King Jung Ho Jin is a head taller than most of his teammates, so he gives the impression of a teacher talking to his students as he tells his teammates, “Watch what they do well and do that too.” Good advice…?

The performance:

It was actually pretty decent. The leader, Xuan Hao, had pretty good facial expressions, though maybe they were too much? Like he was being an evil Bond villain or something. He does the shirt lift with conviction, and that’s good. Do or don’t do, but don’t half-ass it. Chen Ren Yu’s singing is mostly pretty good. Kei’s rapping sounded ok to me. No one was awful, though the few notes Qui Sheng Yang (in the eyepatch) got out sounded rullll shaky. The whole thing was a bit flat, and I don’t want to watch the whole thing over and over again. To be fair, I’m not a huge fan of the song itself. Don’t get me wrong, I like Kang Daniel and the boys as much as anyone, but that song is sort of meh for me.

In the MNET editing of the performance, they’re pretty cruel, of course. The song has barely started and the camera freezes to show Chen Ren Yu make the same mistake with the arms, but like, if they hadn’t focused on it I don’t think a soul would have noticed. I know I didn’t notice just watching it.

The trainees' applause back stage feels slightly indulgent. Like, “look how well they did, considering,” not just “look how well they did.” They’re hoping that this team -- the 6th picked from G-group -- could beat the leftovers of the K-group. Come on, they have to be able to beat the leftovers, right???

The judges say that they did a nice job, and that’s about all they say. I think they know that most likely, none of these guys is going to survive the first elim, so why be cruel? I mean it’s never stopped the psychopath dance teachers before, but I swear a saw a glimmer of human compassion on their faces when they were dealing with this team.

At 15:30, the K-team comes out, and everyone exclaims over how how tiny and little the two maknae -- Jung Se Yoon and Choi Seung Hoon -- are.

We go into flashback mode and see that Seung Hoon is already crying at a vocal rehearsal, and trying to dry his eyes and wipe his nose on the inside collar of his shirt, which is such a child-like thing to do.

Vocal Master Lee asks, “Do you not feel confident?” and Seung Hoon says “with singing, dancing, rapping, and everything.” Master Lee asks, “Why do you think that?” and he says, “because it’s true,” and it’s just like. Oh, my heart. What do you say back to that? Because it IS true. Master Lee can only reply, in the gentlest of voices, “That’s a very sad thing to say.”

And I mean, Jesus H Christ, why did his agency send this kid to this show? If they were so dead set on making their cute little actor into an idol, they should have given him two years of intensive vocal and dance lessons and sent him to the show for season 4, when he was 16. His voice seems to be in the middle of changing right now, on top of everything else. Like what the fuq? Do they not remember what happened to Lee Eugene, who was so humiliated by his experience on Produce X 101 that he changed his legal and professional name to Yoo Jinwoo and gave up the idol life altogether?

Anyway.

Master Lee tries to get the other maknae, little Se Yoon, to say that he’s happy, and it’s kind of a joke so Se Yoon smiles, but then says, “My confidence level dropped.” You can’t blame him -- he came to this show with one friend/teammate from his agency, but that friend had to leave the competition, and now he’s here alone, and he’s ranked 85th, and has been in 0 stars the whole time, probably being constantly berated by the psychopath dance teachers, and then no one picked him for this mission.

Further decreasing the team’s balance is that they had one three star on their team, Jung Hwan Rok, and he was the main vocal, but “he’s been sick,” or at least that’s what they tell Master Lee. It’s totally possible that Hwan Rok got sick, but also maybe he was just sick of being on this show? Anyway, he's not here any more, and they're left trying to deal without him.

They give the performance a try, and they don’t know the lyrics even though they’re reading them off of sheets of paper. Master Lee is actually quite gentle as he scolds them, but little Se Yoon begins crying and Leader Park Min Seok goes over to hold him as he sobs. It’s really something.

Poor kid.

Hey MNET? Raise the minimum age to 17, how’s that sound? It’s still too young but it’s better than THIS.

Jung Ho Jin, who is the reaction king of this whole segment, interviews:

“They’re all crying. I’m going crazy. They cry so much. To be honest, I really want to cry too. But I thought I shouldn’t join them. If they just stare at the floor because they have no confidence, we’ll really become Team Gush Out.”

You guys, I adore Reaction King Jung Ho Jin.

Time passes, and little Se Yoon is acting like the little kid he is, and that’s not a value judgement, just an assessment of what you clearly can see on screen. He’s claiming his ankle hurts, and is sort of scooting around on the floor on his butt like an elementary school kid. Leader Park Min Seok, wearing glasses and looking like he’s been put through the wringer, basically doesn’t know what to do. The kid won’t rehearse. They can’t lose another performer, but Se Yoon isn’t even trying. He’s just sort of bored and ignoring what everyone else is doing.

If I were Min Seok, I would be fighting the urge to strangle him, honestly. Not advocating violence, just acknowledging that my patience has limits. Min Seok finally calls the child out on his behavior. He’s been wandering around, hiding in storage rooms, stuff like that. Min Seok scolds him, not cruelly. He just says, in essence, “Every minute right now is precious, and the stakes are so high -- why are you wasting time?”

Min Seok auditioned with The Real, (he’s the one in the leather jacket), which means he has been training with Kim Tae Rae, the awesome vocalist we will see in Back Door; blue haired Park Han Bin, the All Star we will see in Hot Sauce; Lee Jeong Hyeon, age 20, one of the Avengers on the Love Me Right team chosen by Hui; Mun Jung Hyun, age 17, the charming kid who messed up the vocals in Very Nice but really does have a lot of talent. That’s who Min Seok trained with, and now he has to literally babysit. I can’t blame him for losing his patience.

He has a mini breakdown, and says, “I thought we could do it if we just shared the same goal. I thought everyone would be like that. But they must have feelings they can’t share. Same with Se Yoon, and Seung Hoon,” and here he looks at Seung Hoon. “Without fully understanding them, I think I criticized him too heavily.” Min Seok, lovey, I think you were entirely within your rights, but you are a sweet human being, and I hope your life is long, happy, and successful, whether or not you debut, ok?

That night, he asks Se Yoon to come see him, and I mean.

This is a kid who is CLEARLY too young to be on a show like this. He probably is going crazy just missing his mom and dad.

Min Seok apologizes to him for being hard on him (which he really wasn't!) and tells him he’s going to help him. “I want to be someone you can rely on.” They talk for a long time, and probably go through most of that box of tissues, and Se Yoon promises to work hard, and again Min Seok gathers him in his arms.

I mean this in the kindest way, but I really hope that Se Yoon gets eliminated in the first elimination. He needs to go home to his mother and father.

The good news is, I bet there are young women all over South Korea (and Japan, China, everywhere else…) who have just put Park Min Seok at the top of their “I want to marry this man” list. You never know for sure, but I will shocked if Min Seok doesn’t jump up quite a bit in the rankings (he’s currently at 84). I don’t think he’s doing this for views -- he probably assumes that MNET doesn’t give a shit about this team -- but this is some good TV, as exploitive and awful as it is. Like I said, you don’t usually see young men being this tender with each other on television in the US.

They get back to practice, and Se Yoon starts really trying again. That helps Seung Hoon also. They all try their best. And now… it’s show time! Back stage, Team K watches with empathy.

The Performance

Left to right: Choi Sunghoon, Park Min Seok, Jung Se Yun, Park Gwan Young, Jeon Ho Young

Not visible: Reaction King Jung Ho Jin but he’s the one in the blue blazer

Overall, about the same as G-group, more or less. Park Min Seok brought the right stage presence the song needed, though his vocals were a bit weak. I think Jung Ho Jin captures attention as the center, but his personality and vibe doesn’t match the song somehow. I think he would be a better fit for Very Nice. The three rappers did a perfectly decent job as far as I could tell. The two babies didn’t look wildly out of place, and Jeon Ho Young was brave enough to lift up his shirt for a picosecond, so good for him. For me, the real surprise of the whole performance was Park Gwan Young. He can sing! And he has a really nice voice! For real! He’s ranked 92, so I don’t have much hope for him surviving, but he may eventually do just fine.

The MNET editing is kind, and we do get some reaction shots for Park Gwan Young’s singing, so that’s good. There’s also a cute shot of Minhyun singing along to the song, as if unaware he’s doing it. But most of the post performance commentary is about the maknae.

Results

Oh, I hate this part.

Main Vocal:

Park Gwan Young 142

Chen Ren You 74

Sub vocal 1:

Park Min Seok 160

Yutaka 28

Sub vocal 2:

*Jung Ho Jin* 122

Riku 6

Main Rapper

Jeon Ho Young 41

Kei 57

Sub vocal 3:

Qui Sheng Yang 0 votes, oh no!

Sub Rapper 1

Jung Se Yoon 27

Hyo 46

Sub Rapper 2:

Choi Seung Hun 26

Xuan Hao 115

Totals:

K team takes it, 518 to 326.

When K wins, most of them jump up, but leader Min Seok just collapses. He’d been holding it together with like, duct tape and chewing gum, emotionally, and the second he didn’t have to hold it together any more he fell apart. He might be older than his maknae but that was a LOT of pressure for one person to have on his head. Everyone tries to get him to stop crying but he kind of can’t. He interviews later on that the maknae tried so hard, and that he’s always wanted to tell them he loved them. (And girls around the world swoon.)

Meanwhile, on the G-side, of course they’re heartbroken. Poor guys. They lost to the leftovers team. They worked hard too and didn’t do a bad job. I think the worst part was Hyo’s face crumpling up into tears as he said, “I don’t want to go back.”

This show is just a lot sometimes.

And that’s the end of the Burn It Up review.

Click here to return to the main review.

Click here to go on to the Danger review.

#boys planet recap #boys planet #boysplanet999 #boysplanet #boys planet 999 #park minseok #burn it up #kpop #k-pop #jung hojin #park gwanyoung #Xuan Hao

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