Wednesday, February 20, 2013

[MV Review] Sistar19 - Gone, Not Around Any Longer

I realize that SISTAR19 made their comeback ages ago, but I never got a chance to review the MV til now. Sorry this is so late. l0l



WARNING: There's a lot of pictures/gifs/wordvomit, so give it a bit of time to load. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Diving straight into the nitty gritty of things, the MV is a rather disturbing storyline MV that explores the very delicate world of fangirling, clingy girlfriends, bad break-ups, and mental insanity. Whew.

Let's start by running through the basic gist of the plot first. So Hyorin and Bora are both very happily in love with their own respective boyfriends until one day, they break up. We don't know how it happened, we don't know why it happened, but if we base it off their subsequent behavior it's probably because SISTAR19 were clingy bitches. At any rate, they go through the usual mourning phase where they mope around and make sad faces at the camera.

Someone should tell Bora that "sad" does not mean "thousand yard stare" or
"doped up on Valium."
However, that's when things encounter a little wrinkle. Certain details in the "flashback" montages of their old memories of their relationship combined with other little details in the mopey montages will clue you in that something is definitely not right here. Key things I want to point out that you may have missed in the "moping montages":

The house is a wreck and Hyorin looks very disheveled. Sure everyone turns into a slob
when they mope around, but just keep this in mind for later.
Waiting for a phone call that will never come? Common moping scene, but waiting
for said call outside in front of a public payphone? Hrm...
All of it on its own could be poor budgeting and poor oversight on the director's part but I prefer to think of it as symbolism that adds up to show a definite mental instability in our intrepid heroines. The final nail in the coffin that sealed the deal for me?

Dancing bizarrely by oneself in a barren room of concrete/padded walls?
Where else can we find barren isolation rooms that look like this...?
It's clear that the entire MV is the collective mad ravings of Hyorin and Bora who were driven insane by the grief and anguish of a bad breakup. Yeah. Not exactly the best message to be sending to their young impressionable fangirls. With that established, we can create a more accurate sequence of events for the MV. Most of the scenes are all jumbled up (further reinforcing the fact that SISTAR19 no longer have firm grasps on reality), but we now realize that most of the scenes are flashbacks that Hyorin and Bora are having from their rooms in a mental institution. Many of their memories have been corrupted by their mental breakdown though, so the way they remember things is suspect. Further proving my point, I might add.

Brushing teeth without toothpaste? HMMMM...
The car is very clearly in motion... and they're on the wrong side of the car...
BUT WHO WAS DRIVE
Probably the most damning evidence of mental insanity. Hyorin is unable to distinguish
between reality and memories. In fact, even the memory of the memory is
being bled into by her current situation (AKA in a mental institution).
The saddest part of the MV is the realization that some part of their old sane selves still resides in the insane mind of the present.

Bitch be screamin' in a white room, aka a symbolic representation of the situation.
Sane Hyorin is trapped in her own insane mind, and it fucking sucks.
On the outside, it looks like Hyorin and Bora are just batshit crazy fangirls, but on the inside they still dream of their idealized selves being swept off their feet by some dashing young men like any other girl.

Get it, gurlz.
((Note the symbolism of being clad in white, or a representation of
purity/innocence/whathaveyou/yaddayadda))
Without the benefit of my annotated storyline notes, the rest of the MV is pretty boring.

Personally, I found the song very meh. The chorus is solid, but nothing else particularly stands out. Hyorin sounds good as always, but only if I exclude her very strange 2NE1-eh-eh-eh vocal run at the climax of the song. There's also an awkward piano + dance break right before that climax that totally derails the song progression and built-up.

Objectively speaking, the song is pretty much Hyorin featuring Bora. The line distribution probably ends up like an 85/15 split in Hyorin's favor. Bora literally has just the one rap bit awkwardly shoved in there, and that's even counting the part at the end of her rap when Hyorin starts singing the same lines Bora's trying to get out. I mean sure, no one stans Bora for her amazing voice or rapping ability, but it still sucks that she still can't get any more lines or screen-time in the 2-woman sub-unit than she would with the full SISTAR.

Aw, don't cry cause your parts suck and are insignificant.
Visually speaking, the MV is solid. Hyorin and Bora look pretty good. Outfits are on point, and the sets are... kinda interesting. Well, at least that green holographic rainbow box one is to me.

The dance is similarly snooze worthy. I went ahead and gif-ed the few bits that were slightly note-worthy so you don't have to rewatch the MV for that shit.

This asswipe dance shit is the point choreo for the whole thing. Pretty shitty if you ask me,
but seeing Bora's ass sway like that is kinda hypnotizing.
inb4 Gangnam Style
Jiggle jiggle. This looks really painful though, not gonna lie.
This is my favorite part of the dance. The ab and leg muscle control needed to pull this
shit off... JJANGBAK. Hottest part of an otherwise snoozy dance, man.
TL;DR:
Boring Hyorin solo debut that happens to feature Bora.

+:
  • Bora
  • leg extension dance move is hot as fuck
-:
  • basic choreo
  • boring song
  • random dance break IN THE MIDDLE OF A BALLAD-EY SONG
  • l0l @ Bora's part
I give this song a 2/5.

10 comments:

  1. Yeah, this song was pretty disappointing to me. I would have preferred another "Ma Boy" over this.

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  2. Not a fan of the "there's some fecal matter stuck in between my ass cheeks and I'm trying to rub it onto this table to troll the janitor who has to clean this shit up" dance.

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    Replies
    1. I know some people who'd gladly clean that up.

      Delete
  3. The "eh-eh-eh-eh-ohhhh" high note and the dance break ruined it for me. IMO Bora's rap fits well in the song and the part where Hyorin raps together is pretty awesome.
    I still don't understand the point of doing a sub-unit in a group with 4 members using the most popular ones, Sistar19 should be Hyorin and Soyou if it's going to be ballad subgroup.

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  4. I really don't think Bora was a good fit for this song, at all. I love her, but her rap is boring as well. Whether it "fits the song" or not, it just sounds like she's half asleep. I really think Soyou would have been much better for this sub-unit. They should have gone the way of EXID's Dasoni, because BELIEVE IT OR NOT you can have a song that's entirely singing! No raps at all! And it will still sound fantastic!

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  5. I think its a dece song. Though I think its a little sleepy sounding, should be performed a bit differently or somethinnn.

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  6. Do more reviews like this! I haven't seen you guys do these sorts of reviews in ages!
    I want more funny moving gifs!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I also thought that 'Ma Boy' was much better than this, but after several replays of the song, it's actually quite good. Also, I think the choreographer is quite 'smart' as they make a dance that becomes an easily remembered trademark of their song. (I hope you guys know what I'm trying to say despite my poor language skills lol)

    ReplyDelete

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