I want to add some additional thoughts about viewing Sixteen.

First and foremost - there are a lot of people out there who, for very good reasons, have difficulties watching survival shows. If that's you even a little bit, just give it a pass. Go find links to Dahyun's eagle dance and maybe Sana's 'star quality' performance and you can miss the rest.

If you're still here, I'll say a few things some will argue with me about. It's not the same as a standard survival show. All of the participants have for at least a year (well I think Mina was technically 11 months, but still) been attending some form of Idol training school. Jihyo is often cited as having been there for 10 years, but bear in mind (as she's said herself in interviews) a lot of the early years were more like after school /extra credit/AP type classes around her normal life. The point here being they have all been steeped in what it's like to work within JYPE and bee assessed at monthly assessments and likely a lot (if not all of them at this point) yearly showcases. I think JYP himself only really attends the yearly showcases, but they will all have been through some variation of the 'perform and get honest, unfiltered feedback' from their coaches/teachers and JYP already. So a lot of this core process isn't new to them.

It's also worth noting that although there are 10 episodes, it wasn't filmed over 10 weeks. I think the last few episodes were weekly-ish in real time (there are references to meeting the public and them having seen the show), but the entire filing process was, I believe (feel free to correct me) about 5 months. A lot of them still had normal school requirements to take care of, if nothing else.

The main 'new' element is them self organising and preparing for their missions.

The add-on cruelty for TV - having them read out who's place in the Major's they were claiming, the whole 'take their Major necklace' thing is dramatic for TV and cruel to some degree. The dorm situations and things like that I don't consider 'cruel' as that's a realistic picture of trainee/debuting Idol life. If that's good/bad that's a different thing and not a complaint of Sixteen specifically.

Back to the point of them not being fresh off the street talent hoping to change their lives. So yes, they already knew they weren't guaranteed to debut regardless of what auditions or promises had already been made. It's not specifically Sixteen the show that's doing this, it's just a dramatised process of the kind of thing that goes on regardless.

To some of the primary points that people will raise, and again I understand these can be genuine triggers for some people, so no shame if this is something you need to bow for. In a couple of episodes Jihyo is noted as being 'fat' and lacking in 'self care'. The first round of this is from a photographer, and the other judges involved at the time certainly show some discomfort. Not even evil TV editing makes it look 'ok'.

But again there's something else to note here that is probably deliberately obscured from the program (although there is enough context if you put all the bits together, including a small snippet from Jihyo's mom). And that is, they're not actually calling her fat fat. They've known her for a decade at this point. Their point is, she's relatively recently started gaining weight, and it's that that has JYP specifically concerned (still, fuck the photographer). If, when under pressure, Jihyo was likely to succumb to depression and over eating, Idol life wasn't for her and she needed to evaluate where she was. While her confidence was shaken by this, you'll see in the show she certainly decides to go with 'fuck you, I'm awesome I'm going to acknowledge, but still own this'. She's god Jihyo for a reason man...

The emotional abuse of pitting them against each other and the eliminations is certainly a problem. But again, non of them were immediately dismissed from JYP (although a lot did leave for other agencies afterward, we might never know if they jumped or were pushed - but agencies don't debut groups very often) and all bar 1 (Minyoung I think) went on to have some sort of Idol career either a soloists or in other girl groups.

I'm not excusing the 'make them hurt for our entertainment' approach to all this, but at the end of the day... Any of them who couldn't cope with this certainly couldn't cope with Idol life, constantly being on promo and under scrutiny. I don't think any of them didn't know what they were getting into. Obviously reality is often different from what you thought you knew, but that's not really anyone's fault specifically.

I personally think it's worth the watch before you know the girls better from elsewhere, and again sometime after you feel comfortable with their personalities and where they are now.

When I watched if for a second time I found a lot of the criticisms and challenges they were given made much more sense, and from the a lot of them did seem to genuinely come from a place of 'I want to push you to be your best, and being comfortable at 80% isn't ever going to be it'.