Earlier this year, I announced the BTS Essay contest here on The BTS Effect. The contest was designed for students at any level and open internationally. Participants were tasked with writing a 1,000-2,000 word essay addressing the topic of “life lessons” learned through BTS or their work.

Read one of the winning essays from the first BTS Essay contest hosted by The BTS Effect.

Read one of the winning essays from the first BTS Essay contest hosted by The BTS Effect.

Finding happiness in a time of great strife and suffering can be next to impossible, but the upbeat track with light, catchy lyrics and a music video full of joyous Bangtan members has helped ease the pain of many around the world. It’s not a panacea, but it doesn’t have to be. The onus is not on BTS to bear the weight of the world’s suffering, but that hasn’t stopped them from trying to help, in the ways they know best.

Two recent articles in mainstream media have severely missed the mark — but this will come as no surprise to most BTS fans.

With this mindset, they created MOTS: Persona both as an album about fans and an album about acknowledging the persona and all the good that came with it. With “Interlude: Shadow” and “Black Swan,” BTS continues this introspective theme by looking within and expressing some of the darker emotions there. So far, the MOTS series has told BTS’s own stories, rather than the more generalized stories of previous releases. Though previous releases of course contained some elements of themselves, their decision to look within and structure a series around developing the self is granting us a more intimate look at their personal narratives.

In “Interlude: Shadow,” Yoongi doesn’t try to hide his shadow but rather embraces it and acknowledges that it’s a part of him. This was one of the main points of Jung’s individuation process—you can’t be rid of your shadow or other unconscious elements, but you can work to integrate them into your whole self and become more harmonious within.

Both the MMA and MAMA wins are a satisfying way to close out the year, for both BTS and ARMY. BTS’s year isn’t over yet, but we all have a lot to look back on and reflect upon as we move into the new year and the upcoming album.

ARMYs harnessed their negative feelings and channeled that power into an effort that brings BTS the glory, awards or not. This is demonstrative of what a large fandom can do to make its voices heard, and is a much better strategy than raging on Twitter. So if you’re irritated at last night’s outcome, consider lifting BTS up instead of tearing others down, and #BuyPersonaOniTunes.

BTS fanfiction has grown exponentially since 2013. With over 100,000 fics live on just one fanfic website (AO3), there’s a lot to look at. Here, I take a look at how the number of BTS fics has changed over time, since 2013.

How has BTS impacted your life? Would you like to share your story?

It’s true! There will soon be an entire conference dedicated to BTS.

Save Me is a 15-episode webtoon that BigHit released in April 2019. The webtoon was announced on a Twitter account called Smeraldo Books and is currently available for free on the Naver webtoon app and website.  

The HYYH story of the Bangtan Universe features seven main characters, one that takes the name of each BTS member. Even though we’ve got all seven as main characters, the HYYH storyline does focus a bit more on Seokjin’s character as the protagonist. This webtoon follows him and his actions, and he’s the only character we have real insight into here.  

The Smeraldo blog mysteriously appeared before the Love Yourself: HER comeback. It provides background story related to the fictional smeraldo flower, which makes an appearance in the BU.

The BTS Universe is special because it extends its storytelling beyond just a music video, or even a series of videos, enabling fans to actively engage and solidifying the fans’ attachment to the series, the characters, and the members of BTS themselves.

Dr. Jiyoung Lee’s book BTS, Art Revolution: BTS Meets Deleuze is an important work for BTS, ARMY, and global pop culture in general.

The idea for this new series in which I examine some of BTS’s songs came to me while thinking about literary analysis and how oftentimes students of English/literature are asked to perform “a close read.” A close reading of a text is an analysis in which the writer reads and analyzes only what is available in the given text. No outside influences are taken into account; it’s just a close analysis of what we’re given on the page.

The BU runs parallel to the real BTS and their songs/album releases. While the BU does encompass many of BTS’s releases, there will be releases that aren’t canon to the universe.

Content summary of the HYYH notes.

English translations of the HYYH Notes.