SJ is popular due to dedicated ELF's, the money there getting some/or most of it apparently goes to the company. Most members are doing there own thing, but still SM is not promoting them. There's also some shady business with the whole Kibum issue. He took a hiatus since 2008, but didn't do anything until 2011, and even now his dramas aren't that good and it's only one per year. What did he do in 2009 and 2010, he didn't promote with SJ or anything. There was no fight, so what happened?
I agree that SJ is still popular because of their fandom. I think they know it too - those ELF Entertainment jokes were definitely not meant to be funny, the fact that Heechul and Hyuk kept saying it during D&E’s comeback made it pretty obvious they’re at least aware that the fans they do have are the reason they have any success. Granted, that’s the same with a lot of idol groups, but there’s this discrepancy. I don’t think a group like EXO or Red Velvet can say SM doesn’t deserve some of their thanks when they succeed - all those promos and teasers and long promotional schedules on music shows are due to management. SJ seems mostly responsible for their own schedule, and it’s not that they’re older (I mean, yeah, older groups should have more say, take a look at TVXQ), it’s that you’re right, SM got lucky with SJ and they just kind of run with it.
Whenever there’s a report about an idol group making a ton of money and SJ is near the top, people doubt it because if they’re not following the group, they have no idea how much variety and concerts and albums SJ releases. A lot of people think Mamacita flopped when it actually earned as much as TVXQ, the highest selling full korean album on Gaon and Hanteo last year, between September and December (TVXQ’s album was released in January). (SJ’s Mamacita/This is Love sold ~413k. No, it’s not as high as SFS (~480k, album released nearly a month earlier than Mamacita, but during a time SJ was still the trend, pre-hiatus) or their highest selling album, Mr. Simple (~540k). But for comparison, the album everyone hears about doing well last year is EXO’s Overdose, which sold very well… but it was a mini album and the korean version still didn’t sell as well as SJ (by a small margin, but for a group with basically no promo, for a group that failed to be initially nominated for GDA by SM themselves - and TVXQ too, who was seriously robbed of at least bonsang, I still don’t understand that - that small margin makes a difference). After a two year hiatus, for a 3-4 month promo, ~413k is pretty damn impressive for “an old group no one in Korea wants to hear about anymore.” Especially considering this is the ranking of SJ’s album sales: Mr. Simple >>>>> SFS >> Mamacita > Bonamana (~403k) >> Sorry, Sorry (~320k) >>>> Don’t Don (~176k) >>>> Twins (~86k). (Haha, sorry for going on and on about album sales. I keep hearing that Mamacita was a flop when okay, not 500k, but pretty damn impressive for an album SJ worked on the most and promoted themselves, including teasers. And they had near full attendance at every stop of SS6, sold out concerts at Tokyo Dome and Kyocera Dome, and ALLLLLL the subunit comebacks (last year, SJM’s Swing broke foreign artist records in China, even won “most influential album of the year,” and this year, there’s M&D, and then D&E, who released in one month alone a korean mini album, a japanese album that in a single week broke the total album sales for their last japanese album, and then the repackage/ special album, and then went on a short arena tour where they managed over 100k in audience) and three solos (Kyu, Zhoumi, Henry), but of course, there is no way in hell SJ is “successful” to non-fans. If anything, all of this PLUS lack of marketing by SM should tell you SJ is making ALL the money. It’s not TVXQ’s tour in Japan (lol I don’t think a single act could make as much as Tohoshinki’s dome tours), but it’s pretty damn high since SM probably has very little to cut from their income for promotion or any teasers or whatever they have to do for a group like EXO that got sent to different countries to film teasers for their comeback. (But I don’t even know why an idol’s income matters to people anyway.)
This Is Love topped the Gaon Weekly chart for SJ many times in a row, and while it’s great for EXO that they achieved that with their Exodus album, it kind of really pissed me off seeing SM throw that news out there, even tweet about it, when they couldn’t tweet about SJ achieving the same last year (or any of the other stuff SJ achieved - they won so many awards in China for SJ AND SJ-M, EunHae were sent all over the place to attend group ceremonies for the group). But Heechul once said that SM doesn’t do media play for SJ - I think they’ve just accepted this now. :/
As for the Kibum thing, I don’t think that’s SM’s fault or Super Junior’s. I think Kibum probably always wanted to act (granted, Siwon acts more than Kibum now, I have no idea what he’s up to) or do something else, and Super Junior was meant to be a temporary arrangement for him. It’s the only thing I can think of that makes sense with the way he left, the fact that SM had nothing to say on it, and the fact that Suju still loves him a lot, has absolutely no hard feelings, and Kibum even sent those flowers to Sungmin for his wedding and signed it SJ Kibum. Maybe there’s more to the story, but I don’t think it’s really SM. It seems like it’s his choice tbh.
(So this was supposed to be one reply for all your asks, but I started getting angry as I wrote them and now you have five essay. ^^; Sorry! But thanks anon for the discussion. I feel like we will spend the rest of SJ’s career under SM ranting about this damn company, ugh.)
[since this is long, i am just going to connect all of your asks here: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 ]
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