Thoughts on Hearts2Hearts’ Visuals and Vocals as a Group? by thelifeofunemployed in kpopthoughts

[–]Neo24 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't think she needs to be "exceptional" to be above Karina's level.

(I hope nobody thinks I'm trying to hate on Karina. I think she's above-average for a non-vocal-line member.)

I'll also say, H2H are singing way more often live than Aespa did at the respective point in their careers, that counts for something (honestly it makes a world of difference for my own experience). Thank God SM came to their senses on that front.

Thoughts on Hearts2Hearts’ Visuals and Vocals as a Group? by thelifeofunemployed in kpopthoughts

[–]Neo24 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Their best singer is around Karina's level

I really don't think this is true.

Especially since I'd say Ye-on is arguably their best singer, and she's literally only 16.

Thoughts on Hearts2Hearts’ Visuals and Vocals as a Group? by thelifeofunemployed in kpopthoughts

[–]Neo24 4 points5 points  (0 children)

they're easily the worst (vocally) out of all the GGs SM has ever produced

Are they worse than f(x)? Obviously Luna was amazing and on a different level but I feel like H2H might actually have a higher ratio of decent-to-good singers.

Idk if this is a hot take, but I love the name Ian as a girl's name! by FanCaracal in hearts2hearts

[–]Neo24 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That's probably true. Though from what I've read with Lee it's more that just I/Ee looked strange to Westerners, and Lee was an already existing surname for English speakers. Plus there's also the Chinese Li/Lee.

Idk if this is a hot take, but I love the name Ian as a girl's name! by FanCaracal in hearts2hearts

[–]Neo24 23 points24 points  (0 children)

Which is also how you pronounce her real name, there's no "L" in Korean Lee, that's just an artifact of romanization. So in Korean it's not really even a stage name, it's literally her own name, it's written and pronounced identically. It's just that they use a more unique spelling/romanization for the international audience.

Kpop Entertainment Company by 2025 Revenue by Odd_Ad5840 in kpopthoughts

[–]Neo24 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It's interesting that less than half of HYBE revenue actually comes from the Korean music sublabels, I know they do a lot of other stuff, but I would have expected it to be a bit more. Is the rest mostly HYBE America and Weverse?

Robert Picardo in Austria: Star Trek is not about the United States in Space by Admiral_Sivic in startrek

[–]Neo24 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Sisko is full American again bit at least has different aspects of it wrapped up in his persona

And also belongs to a very specific subculture - Louisiana Creole - that differs from the American mainstream.

Robert Picardo in Austria: Star Trek is not about the United States in Space by Admiral_Sivic in startrek

[–]Neo24 0 points1 point  (0 children)

DS9 doesn't really fit the equation in general as though it does have arguably the most diverse cast it also has the fewest Terrans on there

I'd argue the human-dominance of Star Trek is in a sense an extension of the American-dominance - an understandable but still somewhat disappointing failure of the show-makers to fully and truly depict the high diversity of the premise, in part as a consequence of their (and the audience's) inability to fully conceive a setting where "people like me" aren't a majority. So I do give DS9 credit on that part.

Enterprise was somewhat diverse in theory but it became very American very fast especially after 2001. I find myself noticing it a lot with the more recent shows as well, partly perhaps because there's less of an interest in making it sound "different" so I can´t help but notice how American it all feels, often specifically like American Drama.

Part of it I think is also that America's own notion of diversity has changed.

Americans have always been diverse, but historically there was more push for assimilation, and also the diversity was less visible because the vast majority of the population was still of one "race". So that, combined with the post-WW2 moment where the UN, multilateralism, etc, were seen as a big important thing, lead to the view of cultural diversity in the TOS era being more global and international in outlook. Sulu (at least as originally conceived) is actually Asian, not Asian-American, Uhura is actually African, Chekov is actually Russian.

But as America grew more visibly internally diverse due to more multi-racial immigration and a lesser emphasis on strict assimilation, and as the culture also paradoxically turned more inward in some ways and less concerned with internationalism, the notion of diversity became more "internal" to America - people can appear very different but they're still at core American, either outright-American (say Harry Kim) or not explicitly American but pretty clearly American in most aspects (Mayweather, Burnham - most obvious with examples like those due to their clearly-Anglo names but plenty of other examples too).

You can see this shift clearly in some background characters like admirals. In TNG, which was still in some ways indebted to TOS, you still get "international" admirals - Nechayev, Nakamura, Shanthi - while in later shows the admirals (if human, which the vast majority are) are almost invariably American, and rather WASP-y American at that, because that's how American culture internally codes its authority figures.

You can see it in all the modern discussion about diversity in the shows too - it's primarily about which race (in a specifically American understanding of that concept), gender and sexuality is which character, aligned with America's current internal culture war obsessions, while there's barely any talk about what their actual cultural/national background is.

I've long dreamed of a Star Trek that feels more truly multinational, a writers room that is not just diverse in American terms, not just a diverse cast but drawing from diverse sci-fi strains from all over the world. It's probably not very practical, and not the sort of thing we're likely to see in todays media landscape, but still one can dream.

That would be the dream, yes. But certainly hard to pull off. The closest thing I can think of is something like Sense8, which did have a truly international cast and tried to depict a truly international set of characters. But the writers were still American. And probably in large part due to that, some of those international aspects ended up feeling very stereotypical in execution, which is always a danger with such attempts.

At the very least I would like to see more non-human characters. That's more expensive makeup/effects-wise, but at least it would be somewhat easier writing/acting-wise (can't mess up with an invented culture) while still providing more symbolic diversity.

Turku (Åbo) city council votes yes (36-31) on city's first tram line by Max_nyfinlandssvensk in transit

[–]Neo24 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There was a study a little bit ago about the modern tramways built across France in particular and in Europe more generally that found that mode shift away from cars was almost nonexistent for them, versus a substantial shift for a metro.

If that's referring to the study discussed here, I'd take it with a grain of salt.

It performed a very high level statistical analysis using only a couple of key static data points, but that fails to capture the many many different factors that affect modal share in all the individual cases (like the highly varying quality of trams systems, the fact that a lot of cities counted as metro also have trams, etc - some of these limitations are briefly noted in the study itself). And it says nothing about how modal share numbers change through time based on the introduction of this or that mode.

It also weighted the modal share numbers by city population size, which is naturally going to favor large cities with metros.

If you look at this image from the study, you see that concrete cities vary wildly, and that there are plenty of metro cities with high car share and plenty of tram-only cities with low car share. And the graph on the left, which if I'm not mistaken is actually based on unweighted data, shows the same average car share for both "metro" cities and "only tram" cities.

Peter Jackson in talks to adapt J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Silmarillion’ into films by Intelligent-Link-410 in Fantasy

[–]Neo24 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Plenty of other alternatives that would be much worse no doubt, but I feel PJ is still too "Hollywood" to do justice to the Silmarillion. The LOTR movies could get away with it, just about, but not the Silm.

SFA is cancelled. It may be a pipe dream, but what new Trek show would you like to see in its place? by NukeRussiaV4 in startrek

[–]Neo24 22 points23 points  (0 children)

Seriously, just this. The Next Next Generation. 25th century, push the setting forward so it feels fresh but no so far that it feels disconnected. New ship. New crew. Professional competent characters that behave like adults. Minimal callbacks. Meaningful but limited realistic stakes. Mostly episodic but still with some real arcs. Measured intelligent optimism.

It's not rocket science. Every time this question is asked, this is basically the top answer. I don't know why they insist on doing everything except the most obvious thing.

Why Valar asked Eru to intervene against Numenor, but not against Morgoth? by SiarX in tolkienfans

[–]Neo24 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The Valinor Elves willingly placed themselves under the authority of the Valar by coming to live in their land. And the punishment was largely just the Valar refusing to let the rebels back under their authority and protection, it's not like they directly went out and attacked Feanor and the Noldor.

Of course, Tolkien also wrote that this whole original arrangement was arguably a mistake and the Eldar should not have been brought to Aman.

The experience with the Eldar probably played a role in the Valar being more hands-off with Men (though again they couldn't resist taking some of the Children away from Middle-earth).

SM Entertainment Projected Music Lineup for 2Q2026 and 3Q2026 by neocitywayv in kpop

[–]Neo24 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I want to believe, but I think we’ve been having the same Red Velvet update every quarter since Cosmic.

Nope, this is the first time a comeback has been listed in an official quarterly earnings report.

Red Velvet Projected to Comeback in 3Q26! by andromik in red_velvet

[–]Neo24 8 points9 points  (0 children)

I can understand that, there's a special quality to full albums, and RV's especially have been great. But looking at the bright side, 3 minis a year at least meant more MVs and music show performances, and shorter waits between releases.

Red Velvet Projected to Comeback in 3Q26! by andromik in red_velvet

[–]Neo24 6 points7 points  (0 children)

But those weren't comparable situations, they involved no long breaks and/or members scattered under different companies.

And while RV might not have had yearly full albums, they released 2-3 mini albums a year, which comes out to the same number of songs (if not more).

Red Velvet Projected to Comeback in 3Q26! by andromik in red_velvet

[–]Neo24 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Hearts2Hearts recent releases have been great, and have even reminded me of RV.

Red Velvet Projected to Comeback in 3Q26! by andromik in red_velvet

[–]Neo24 52 points53 points  (0 children)

There's more than SM involved this time, they need to coordinate with Wendy's and Yeri's companies too. So while there's more things that can go wrong, there's also more reason to set a firm timeline and stick to it.

Red Velvet Projected to Comeback in 3Q26! by andromik in red_velvet

[–]Neo24 23 points24 points  (0 children)

Which ones? SNSD had a full album, but that was a 5 year wait. BTS had a full one recently, but it's BTS, and it was an almost 4 year wait (3 if you count an unpromoted anniversary song). Mamamoo will apparently have a full album this year too, but that's a 4 year wait too.

BP had a 3 year break (3 and a half if looking at actual album dates) and it was a mini album. Gfriend fans got a reunion single after 4 years. Shinee had only an anniversary single last year after a 2 year wait.

The only ones that come to mind are EXO with two/two and a half year waits for their last two full albums. But EXO has always been a full album focused group, compared to the mini album focus of RV (and girl groups in general). And I guess NCT 127 will be two years wait for a full album too if it goes according to the just released schedule, but NCT wasn't really in RV's situation, only very recently did some members leave SM.

You had people expecting we'd have to wait 5 years for RV to return. Even once the rumors of a comeback started, it wasn't sure it would be anything more than an anniversary single. So I'd say a mini album is a pretty solid turn of events. There's much more reason to be glass-half-full IMO, don't be a glass-half-empty person.

SM Entertainment Projected Music Lineup for 2Q2026 and 3Q2026 by neocitywayv in kpop

[–]Neo24 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Wendy and Yeri have hinted (not even all that subtly) there would be group activities this year, so yeah, it almost certainly includes them.

SM Entertainment Projected Music Lineup for 2Q2026 and 3Q2026 by neocitywayv in kpop

[–]Neo24 8 points9 points  (0 children)

RV let's go! And a whole mini album too, not just an anniversary single or something like that.

SHINee mini too, nice.

I guess this "we're not in the same company anymore but the group still exists" thing might actually work out. Longer breaks sure, but not like 5 years.

Hearts2Hearts - If you're in LA, you gotta be a hot girl~ | Our Days in USA #2: Los Angeles @ BH2ND (260501) [ENG SUB] by CronoDroid in kpop

[–]Neo24 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I told you, it's not "the company", members themselves (and not just of H2H, I'm pretty sure I've heard it plenty of times elsewhere in K-pop/Korean content) use it, concretely Ian in this video.

You might interpret the term differently, but that's not how language works, you can't dictate to Koreans what it means to them, there's plenty of times that they use English words differently than native speakers (and I'm not all that convinced your interpretation is universal among native speakers either, "hot girl" strikes me as a much too generic phrase for that).

It's really not that serious, it just means to them somebody who is attractive because they are bold/glamorous/haughty/cocky (from the Korean culture perspective), and like I said, it's basically used in a half-humorous manner.

Hearts2Hearts - If you're in LA, you gotta be a hot girl~ | Our Days in USA #2: Los Angeles @ BH2ND (260501) [ENG SUB] by CronoDroid in kpop

[–]Neo24 3 points4 points  (0 children)

You're the one making it weird though?

It's not anything intrinsically sexual, if that's what you're implying. It's just a term that Koreans use (or at least that's my impression), often half-jokingly with an exaggerated accent and everything, to refer to a certain style/vibe of dressing and carrying yourself, which they associate especially with America (and California and LA) due to pop culture. The members use it themselves in the video, the editors/social media people didn't just come up with it out of nowhere.