Sworn-Seen

Why do we desire what we cannot aquire?

[igiveyoumyblood]

Connected to you.

ENGENE.

Hi. There are a few things I love in life; vampires, Gothic things, film analysis, folklore, demon ladies, non-linear stories, sinister superpowers, and Mr Yang Jungwon. Here I shall try to uncover the mysteries of all of these things, both by myself and with others.

MASTER THEORY POST

Happy 1st ENiversary!

My YouTube channel

Fly high, and don’t ignore the call of fate!

[igiveyoumyblood]

Tbh this makes me really sad because;

1. Actual album/comeback when?

2. I’m really angry that ENHYPEN and &TEAM are so unequal. ENHYPEN is far more well known and successful in general kpop right now, but &TEAM really ought to be more successful - their concept has been far more consistent and solid and their music more cohesive and imo, better. I’m sad for &TEAM because they don’t get the recognition that they deserve and I’m sad for ENHYPEN because their epic concept has been pretty much thrown out the window.

Not to mention all the other issues, like HYBE just generally not taking advantage of their dual concept properly (why is Sunghoon part werewolf, not Niki who’s Japanese? Why is EJ, a Korean, not part vampire? Why is Nicholas not some separate species? Why do the groups have uneven numbers of members and barely interact? MAMA collab stage when? 😩😩😩😩😩)

Seriously Hybe are just throwing away the cool concepts all of their groups have. No more super powered ghost BTS. No more animal TXT. No more angel Le Sserafim, and very little in the way of wolfishness and vampirism from &TEAM and ENHYPEN.

[igiveyoumyblood]

Brought the Heat Back

Okay, so, on the bright side;

Vampire concept back, and I mean REALLY back. Thanks HYBE for constantly forgetting about your groups' concepts...

Very vampire

Tons of vampire

Vampire

Fun vampire concept (horror comedy, kind of cringe, kind of 90s New York)

On the downside;

Doesn't seem at all related to their previous concept

No werewolves other than like one howl

No storyline :(

This should have been the title track - better song, better concept, related to their original concept, better MV.

TL;DW - Fun song, fun vampires. I'm quite sad that it doesn't seem to have much of their old story (although you can still draw connections between it and Bite Me, so it is vaguely related). If ENHYPEN kept doing this - somewhat story-less vampire shenanigans, I would be disappointed, but okay with it. As long as the vampire stays in ENHYPEN I will be happy.

But I am genuinely so upset at how HYBE (and many other companies) just seem to drop the groups' concepts in favour of sexiness, Tiktok appeal etc - it's happened with;

TXT

ENHYPEN

BTS

Kep1er

JUST B

and more

And has kind of happened to;

Dreamcatcher

ATEEZ

ZB1

&TEAM, etc

Sad times. I know that kpop will always be about profit over artistry, but I think that groups have shown time and time again that you can have both and can be both - a prime example is BTS, where a good chunk of their popularity and thus profit came out of their storyline... so what did HYBE do? Get rid of it, duh!

[igiveyoumyblood]

Wait, is this a proper comeback? I thought it was just a special kind of OST release for the webtoon?

Oh wait actually looking, this came after the OST release… I’m confused. Enhypen and &TEAM seem to have weird comeback structures.

Anyway… I don’t think it suits them lol. They come off too strong to do brighter concepts that aren’t very well considered.

I just wanted to talk about it so my blog doesn’t seem dead tbh 😅

[igiveyoumyblood]

Samidare

I'm unsure if this is supposed to be a real comeback or not, but it's still interesting so let me make a quick little text post :)

'Samidare' means 'early summer rain' - which I think is reflected in the MV well. This is the spring/summer follow up to the winter from 'War Cry.' It's also a very pretty MV which would make me feel far more emotions if I had a better understanding of what was going on. Probably need to wait for the MV reaction to get that information.

Samidare when googled shows up two main things - a Naruto soundtrack and the character Samidare (an opportunistic and curious person, apparently), and the Japanese destroyer Samidare, which was launched in 1935 and sunk in 1944 in WWII. I don't think either of those are related to the MV but they are interesting fun facts.

The MV itself is the contrasts between grief and catharsis - kind of like the 5 stages of grief. When the boys have reached catharsis and understanding, they are in the classroom blooming with cherry blossoms, and the summer rain falls - but when they are distrustful of each other, are doing things behind each others' backs, are in the midst of arguments and grief, etc, they are in a darker, gritter world - represented by the fight in the field and the crumpled photograph.

There's also the grave shown at the beginning - which is to a 'Giri,' who I presume is K's mentor shown at the start of the 'Under the skin' MV. The monument to him is grounding, and resembles the cliffs and rocky surfaces in 'War Cry,' which were, in a way, an outward representation of K's grief - since he was the member most associated with them.

The first cherry blossom blooms near the grave - possibly 1) showing Giri looking down on them, and 2) showing how we can move on from grief, and that spring and summer always follow winter.

Everyone gets to be angsty in this MV, and it would make a great short drama (like 10 half hour episodes or something), but we know HYBE's never going to do that. Fun fact, the people who I think are the most angsty are EJ, Nicholas, and K. Why these guys? Idk - K is obvious but not so much the others.

I literally gasped when they started fighting at the end lol the punch Nicholas threw looked savage.

And the lyrics are very pretty (as expected, &TEAM).

And on another note, I really like Nicholas, and he is very pretty.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk.

[igiveyoumyblood]

Wooooohooo Given-Taken?!!!!??

[seongclb]

happy niki day <3

happiest bday to the maknae of enhypen, our precious riki <3 hope he has a great 18th and that enhypenblr remains a loving & respectful place towards him

[igiveyoumyblood]

Happy Birthday Niki! Sharing this cute message for his birthday.

[bamboobibi]

Happy SUNGHOON Day Mini Memories

[igiveyoumyblood]

Happy Birthday Sunghoon! I share this cute post with you all today.

[bamboobibi]

[igiveyoumyblood]

Happy 3rd Enniversary!!!!!

Holy moly, time flies.

I have included this picture since, as you all should know by now, this was an amazing styling choice. Best styling of the night. Storytelling, atmosphere, everything, 10/10.

I am very proud and happy to see what they've achieved over the past year, and especially how popular their world tour has been. We've had some great releases this year - although, of course, some are better than others (ahem, Bite Me!).

I hope that over the coming year, HYBE continues to expand their storyline and concept, and that, presuming we get two albums, they're both bangers, not just one.

Also please come to Australia, thank you.

Congratulations to ENHYPEN for their 3rd anniversary, and I hope that the year coming is happy and healthy for them all.

[igiveyoumyblood]

Sweet Venom may have disappointed, but ENHYPEN's MAMA outfits did not. If that isn't the most vampiric thing I've ever seen, I don't know what is.

Oh, what I'd give to be a blood-stained, jewel-encrusted MAMA vampire.

PS. Jungwon looked like he murdered someone by shoving his foot through their sternum. A very cool look. I love it.

[igiveyoumyblood]

‘Sweet Venom’ MV First Reactions Part 2

It’s part 2! See below the line for analysis.

Here are some more pictures from the montage, including some people having fun, Polaroid-style bicycle pictures, and this snazzy shot of Jungwon staring at us.

So last part I said that this has next to no meaning, right? It’s just showing the young, hedonistic, partying lifestyle that is synonymous with youth, the 80s, and vampires in general.

BUT!

This comeback came out at the same time as &TEAM’s, and, if you read my analysis of their MV ‘War Cry’, you’ll know that the werewolves are known for collecting memories, AND that they have ice powers now (in contrast to the vampire fire powers).

Additionally, none of our ENHYPEN vampires have time manipulation powers, unless you count Jungwon’s super speed which only applies to himself.

In ‘War Cry’, there was a lack of this memory-collection which the werewolves usually do. Hence, it is possible that the werewolves have trapped the vampires inside this frozen time bubble using their powers of memories, which are also shown through the Polaroids and grainy footage - two other visual signifiers for the past and memories! The dual comeback shows the power of the werewolves and thus the influence that they have over the vampires - literally using the power of love against immortal, unfeeling creatures. This would be great because it would explain the simplicity of the storyline, why they are in (presumably), Japan, and the time bubble/Polaroid flashbacks (Polaroids being something we have seen with &TEAM before).

…Mind you, ENHYPEN MVs have played loose with the lore of their powers (Niki floating and teleporting when that’s not his power, etc).

So it’s probably not true. 😭

Unlucky.

Moving on.

We have this picture with the frozen lightning which perpetuates the idea of the time bubble/being frozen in time.

And that’s it. It’s a short MV with very little going on.

Let’s talk lyrics.

Lyrics

Unfortunately, the lyrics don’t have that much going on. They’re very typical codependent relationship, heaven/hell imagery, blood and passion, euphoria, love and torment and so on. They’re what you’d expect from a song titled ‘Sweet Venom’ by a group with a vampire concept.

The only interesting thing about them is the ‘venom-nom-nom’ part in the chorus. It’s kind of cringey out loud (so luckily for it it’s catchy), but it COULD (this is a stretch) be seen as a ‘nom-nom-nom’ sound - as in, eating something. Which is funny because they’re vampires and they bite people (nom nom nom). It could also be seen sexually, but so can everything related to vampires and even everything in the world, if you try hard enough.

Conclusions

This is probably the most boring ENHYPEN MV to me. The only thing that makes it better is a probably-not-true head cannon. But ‘the flaws of a story are removed and it itself is made much better by headcannons’ is also true of most HYBE storylines, most kpop storylines, and most stories in general, so I suppose we can’t fault ENHYPEN and their creative team too much for this.

And ENHYPEN MVs are either 1000000/10 or trash, so I don't know what I expected.

Unsurprisingly, &TEAM won this battle. Speaking of, without my headcannon there is no connection between the groups this comeback (which is the norm at this point). What’s the point of making opposing brother groups if the only thing you use their opposition to each other for is the webtoon, HYBE?!?

[igiveyoumyblood]

'Sweet Venom' MV First Reactions

&TEAM gave us a stellar release with a great, hype MV, and amazing choreography which suited their theme perfectly. Last comeback, ENHYPEN gave us a great vampire-themed concept, in a similar vein. So, what do we get this comeback? A cheap-looking MV, a song which will definitely be seen in a sexual manner towards Niki, and a mediocre song.

I'm relatively sure the song will grow on me (in fact, as expected, it has over the course of writing this post), but I don't know about the other things...

'Sweet Venom' is in the same vein as 'Fever,' which is far from a bad thing... except that I don't like either song, feel that both of them are mediocre, and have concerns about how they are used to sexualise the younger members and ESPECIALLY Niki.

So when I say 'the same vein as Fever,' it is NOT a compliment. The only good thing about it is that both songs very much fit a vampire concept... and even that isn't good because they fit the sexy idea of vampires (my least favourite version of them) as opposed to the Gothic, superpowered, or horror-based vampires.

So with my very biased asexual rants out of the way, but with the warning that they will definitely cloud the rest of my interpretation of the song, let's talk about the MV itself. By which I say... there is little for me to talk about. But let's see how we go.

'Sweet Venom'

Okay, Japanese setting. I actually had to go back and check this was a Korean comeback when I saw this...

The only thing to say about this setting is that it's grungey and thus relates to other (lacking in plot) MVs like 'Pass the Mic,' - hence is something we aren't surprised to see ENHYPEN do.

Also the neon lighting adds to the retro feel of the comeback.

At this point we get to screenshots I took on my phone. For some reason, I wasn’t able to increase the quality. Please forgive me and just watch the MV.

I like the title screen - with the frozen lightning, the storm clouds and the font, it looks like an 80s horror film.

We get these scenes where everyone is frozen - either partying or fighting or both - except the members are kind of… not frozen? They’re all frozen in place but their mouths are moving and they seem conscious so idk… I will assume they aren’t frozen but are staying still for whatever reason. It’s pretty cool and likely a representation of their power… or another power which I will discuss later.

The dance is cool, I guess? I don’t think it expresses the story of the song well, it’s just vaguely retro and vampire-sexual.

Then we get the exact same frozen scene as before, except we have different members subbed in to reflect who is singing.

If the director isn’t trying to express a time loop of some kind through this, I genuinely have no clue what they wanted us to take from the MV.

Hello Jungwon.

I also find it interesting that they chose to have these pulses of light/energy through the dance scenes - is this a further representation of their power? Maintaining the frozen time bubble? Or is it just supposed to look cool?

At which point we get this montage of a bizarre combination of abstract photography art, partying, people just generally having fun, and the members with these dots projected on them. I can’t include all of the images since I’ve hit my mobile image limit but I’ll include some of my favourites in the next post.

These don’t seem to have much meaning or tell much of a story, except that people are being young and hedonistic - ahem, Drunk-Dazed, ahem.

OR, there is an alternate explanation I will discuss in the second part.

[igiveyoumyblood]

'War Cry' MV Reactions Part 2.

This is Part 2. For the analysis, see below the line.

Starting off here with wolfiness #15.

Now that's just a cool shot. But also #16.

#17 hell yeah.

&TEAM coming through again for the third album in a row with 100000/10 choreography.

That's right, don't you let her control you.

I love this bit.

Why does he look so sad? TT

Okay my bad, it looks like the ice powers well and truly belong the the werewolves.

YESSSSSSS.

#22.

#23.

Nice.

Why does he look like Hwall from THEBOYZ here?

Forever missing Hwall TT

Dude that is so metal and Gothic. I love it.

It's also edited to be split-second enough that we, the audience, get an idea of something violent and spiky, but don't see the details - this particular scene is shown in something like 6 frames across 2 shots - VERY quick.

Very nice and emphasises their connection to ENHYPEN who had a similar shot - although far smooher and more choreographed (ahem vampires ahem) in 'Bite Me'.

YES I LOVE IT. It's circular, and it's wolfy.

So that's the end of the MV, with a large count of wolfy moments and some very cool shots. Let's talk about the lyrics for a moment.

Lyrics

Well, they're what you'd expect from a young highschool-themed werewolf boy group;

The moon and silver imagery

Light/dark/night/day imagery

Time and the changing of the world and yourself

Blood, instincts, pack mentality etc

The howl being a war cry

Being together/mirrors of each other/generally growing as a person as part of a group

Yep. Nice, but other than that, there isn't much to say about them that isn't a full-on analysis of them.

Conclusions

A very cool MV. I desperately want to be involved in directing HYBE MVs, and the creative team at HYBE in general.

There are wolves, they do wolfy things, they are very cool while doing so, and so on. What would you expect?

Even better, I know everyone's names and faces now, so I can have EVEN MORE appreciation for them than I already did!

The choreography is the best, as always.

Interestingly, this MV seemed to lack the motif of their other MVs - collecting and preserving memories. The only thing here is K's vision, which isn't even really a memory....? Perhaps the trauma of Sooha possibly murdering them in 'Firework' has made them rethink their obsession with the past.

[igiveyoumyblood]

'War Cry' MV First Reactions

Here it is. The dual comeback. Actual wolfy things going on. I love it. So of course, you would expect ENHYPEN to be super vampiric, right? Wrong... I'm super disappointed.

Anyway, I'm disappointed in ENHYPEN's creative team, not in &TEAM and their comeback. So let's talk about the wolfy half of our supernatural duo.

I will say, I tried to learn everyone's names and faces, and although I know all of the names, I'm in that period where I'm getting stuff wrong (probably), so please be nice to me and correct me if I get someone's name wrong.

As far as general thoughts - well really, it's more of the same. I like how there were more wolfy things here. I was especially a fan of the 'wolf's jaws' choreo, but we'll get to that.

&TEAM lack the explicit storyline that ENHYPEN do - we get the girls, we get K being traumatised and becoming the leader of the pack (fitting considering his irl story), and we get them doing wolfy things and having fun in high school (cough, K in his mid 20s, cough), while both hunting and being hunted by the girl and ENHYPEN. Snazzy.

So let's have a look at what goes on in this one, while trying to be less stressed about how it fits into the storyine and more interested in how it uses cinematography in general, and symbols etc to tell a story.

We open on K in this wondrous rocky environment which reminds me of the set from ENHYPEN's 'Sacrifice.' There is a full moon (wow, who would have guessed a werewolf story would have a full moon) and a bloody sky (wow who would have guessed that a vampire story would have a blood red sky).

I do think it's a bit interesting how fake the rocks look. I mean, obviously they are fake, it's a set. But HYBE has the money and dedicaton to concept to make them look real if it wants to. I think this is another case of songs like 'Sacrifice,' 'Film Out,' 'Nap of a Star' and so on - it's supposed to look fake because it's some alternate supernatural realm. The gardens in 'Nap of a Star' and 'Film Out' look fake because they're Magic Island, and the landscapes in 'Sacrifice' and 'War Cry' look fake because we're in some drunk-on-fantasy alternate universe.

Anyway, K also has this pendant with a circle and a fang/claw. Very wolfy.

So he puts it on and... I can only assume ascends to some kind of wolf godhood/leadership.

I mean, the fur coat screams 'power and leadership,' so unless the costum designer seriously lost the plot, I imagine this is what they are trying to communicate with this costume design.

Absolute genius shot, marry me director. Do you want to know all the things this shot does?

Is dark and creepy

Becomes almost monotone in the lighting - very Gothic

Lighting creates shillouettes of the members - so they in those positions, look like crouched creatures of prey stalking the audience

Lighting also highlights the ceiling - emphasising that they are underground, in the shadows (thus not trustworthy) and the room they are in, which mirrors ENHYPEN's previous cinematography.

The room also contrasts ENHYPEN, who are often shown in oppulent places - literally the peal-encrusted ballroom from 'Bite Me.' This is a common visual trope to show the difference between vampires and werewolves - luxury vs bare-bones, oppulent vs down-to-earth, godlike vs realistic. It's part of the vampire-werewolf fantasy which has been communicated wonderfully through just one shot of each group

Anyway. I like it, as you can tell. It's creepy, wolfy, AND it does some storyline heavy lifting.

I love this close up on K's eye to transition to the next shot. He has blue contacts, which leads nicely into the blue of the next shot. The red of the sky around him also leads into the red of the bridge. It can also be seen as either a manifestation of his new power or a vision of the future he is given.

Yet again, we get more running from the boys. The bridge looks like the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, which.... guys can we please stop being American? Do you really want to be American?

So when I saw him being chased by the ice, I thought it must have been one of the vampire powers, but I did some digging and it doesn't seem that any of ENHYPEN have ice powers. So I thought, perhaps it's Sooha, the girl - I think this because we have seen her around ice a lot - an easy example is ENHYPEN's Dark Blood concept trailer. But I could be completely wrong, and it could be something random, another party, or even just a random werewolf curse.

Sooha?!?!?!?!

Y'all, this is Nicholas, right? I'm not going crazy, right?

Anyway, the blue/white/silver eyes are a pretty self-explanatory mark of werewolfhood.

Considering how unfazed he is about the cold, perhaps the snow is a werewolf power? Especially since we see them all dancing without any distress in the snow. It could have been either overused or turned against them separately at the start when they had to run away from it.

Either that or the shot was purely and only made to make Nicholas look cool and there's no deep meaning...

Yuma you're a very pretty guy but this is scary please go away.

That said, I find it interesting that they chose to go black-and-white for this shot when the rest of the scene, including the rest of Yuma's part, is quite saturated. To create emphasis and irony about him saying 'my blood' while all the blood red from the previous shot drains out? Possibly.

'War Cry' werewolf moment #4.

Okay maybe the director just likes this kind of thing and how it was used for coolness in MVs like 'Guerrilla.'

I do find it interesting, though (wow what a surprise, I find everything interesting), that the nice pristine monotone is broken by bats and weird... musculature? Viscera? In Fuma and EJ's part. Or at least, I did find it interesting, until...

...it was used to add context to and make a nice transition into the next shot, showing that Harua was the one running from the ice, AND that it is no longer there.

Suspicious.

But he's still running anyway, so I will assume he has reason to be scared.

'War Cry' werewolf thing #5 and also an obvious 1) transition towards wolfhood (he jumps towards the moon), 2) loss of a safety net (jumping away from the bridge) and 3) a leap of faith (duh).

Y'all, this IS the best shot. This is the one that instantly made this MV a 10/10... okay, not really, but it did a lot of heavy lifting. This is the moment we finally get explicit werewolfdom, and is also just generally great.

It's action-packed, it's scary, and it places Harua/the wolves in a position of power over us the viewer - as they should be. Even better than that, it perfectly transitions into the next shot with the wolf-jaw choreo.

Just don't look too close at that CGI...

This is the transition I'm talking about. And Maki's hair looking a little like the fur of a wolf in the background is also stellar.

Give yourself up to wolf-hood. Worship K.

HELLLLLLL YESSSSSSSSSSSS

The angle, the claw hands, the chaos of the shadows and the bridge beams. Yas. This is why I watch kpop.

I know &TEAM are jpop but they're kpop adjacent run by a kpop team so... yup.

'War Cry' wolfiness #9.

Omg I am so sorry for this screenshot but it shows the water-bending things they're doing, which is the important bit.

'War Cry' wolfiness #10.

#11.

#12 what a cool shot. This whole scene is wondrously done except for the weird crotch-povs on K earlier in the scene. Which I did not include for obvious reasons (ahem, asexual ahem).

YESSSSSS #13.

#14 and also there is now fire and broken glass - destruction and possibly a battle with ENHYPEN.

Or Sooha.

And that is my image limit for this post so see you in part 2!

[igiveyoumyblood]

Hi y'all. I have seen the MV.

K's screentime is through the roof.

The song isn't my favourite but I think it will grow on me.

Love the wolfy MV.

The choreo is great, very ENHYPEN-coded (bruv I'd hope so). I'm looking forward to seeing how ENHYPEN's comeback mirrors this one. I seriously hope it does. What's the point of making the groups brother groups if they don't mirror each other? Ahem, HYBE I want more.

I want to analyse it but I also want to at least know all of the members names before I do. Believe it or not I watched most of &AUDITION, but people's names kind of went in one ear and out the other.... probably because my only concern was whether the group would debut or not because I wanted K to get his debut.

So I will try and analyse it in the near future when I know names. I won't be watching it again until then so I can have relatively pure reactions, lol.

What did you think, LUNE and ENGENE?

[igiveyoumyblood]

They also did the MEDUSA challenge with JUST B I'm in love.

[igiveyoumyblood]

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OMG Comeback time?!?!?!

I will do my best to know everyone this time. But hopefully even if I get people wrong my love for the werewolves will make up for it <3