SEVENTEEN’s “Phantasmagoric” Mingyu

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Welcome back to Fan Chant, a weekly column for K-pop fans, stans, and newbies alike. Today, like Pop Base, I’ve found myself ready to talk about Mingyu. As always, if you enjoy what you’re reading, feel free to subscribe to my companion newsletter to get Fan Chant delivered right to your inbox each week!

There are so many ways someone can slip into the diamond life, aka accept that you’re becoming a fan of K-pop performance powerhouses SEVENTEEN. I myself can confirm that the spiral can start anywhere, seeing as it was a ridiculous video of the members eating a seafood boil here in America that personally did me in.

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For many other fans out there, the gateway can often be traced back to Mingyu, the tall, dashing member of SEVENTEEN’s rap line. It sure doesn’t help that in SEVENTEEN’s extensive archive of content, Mingyu comes across as sweet, thoughtful, and a little bit bashful. He also likes to cook? Enough! Mingyu isn’t even my bias in SEVENTEEN — that’s a secret I’ll keep for another day — but it doesn’t take much at all to understand why a Carat would gravitate towards him.

For years now, one of the most vocal Mingyu stans has been an admin of Pop Base, the notorious update account that, honestly, clears the competition in terms of reliability and accuracy (Pop Crave falls in second place…Pop Tingz is absolutely on the bottom). Pop Base tweets out a shocking amount of content on a daily basis; they were on site at the DNC! But you know what Pop Base is never too busy to do? Tweet about Mingyu.

Every time SEVENTEEN rolls out new content or Mingyu appears at an event, I brace myself for the inevitable Pop Base tweet. In efforts to not become repetitive, the admins — and, I’d like to theorize, one admin in particular — have taken to shaking up the descriptors in absolutely hysterical (synonym: funny/comical/amusing/uproarious) ways.

Carats have started to embrace this trend, and some have even started compiling all the best, and most absurd, words Pop Base has landed on. Pop Base’s thirst for Mingyu transcends the thesaurus; it spans language, time periods, and boundaries. They want their 1.6 million followers to know when Mingyu is looking riveting and when he’s looking superlunary. Jane Austen possesses the spirit of Pop Base every now and then when Mingyu is looking formosus, statuesque, and paragonic. They do not care if the Latin word hasn’t entered conversational English; Mingyu is dulcis, to them. This is poetry, people! Much like Mingyu, this is art of the highest form!

Some of my favorite days, personally, have been when the English language has felt insufficient. They generously gave their followers an intro to the Korean language when his Vogue Korea cover felt “meotjida,” the Romanization of the Korean word for cool/handsome/stylish. No, no, you’re absolutely right, Pop Base…Mingyu is séduisant while strolling the streets of Paris.

Last month, my favorite admin seemed to hit a wall, but they persevered. Apparently having run out of adjectives in English and feeling like they’ve expanded far enough into French and Korean, they embraced compound sentences. They gave us simile. Pop Base hasn’t given up…I fear they’ve only just begun.

This week, South Korea is celebrating Chuseok, an autumn festival marking the harvest season. It became really important to Pop Base to emphasize their ongoing global inclusivity, and they tweeted out some Chuseok well-wishes with a photo of — who else? — Mingyu. No caption necessary; we know you, and we see you, Pop Base. May your thirst never be quenched, and may your admiration (synonym: acclaim/adoration/obsession/adulation/veneration) endure forever.

ICYMI: Interview with BOYNEXTDOOR

boynextdoor fan chant interview

BOYNEXTDOOR, photo courtesy of KOZ Entertainment

Last week, I connected with BOYNEXTDOOR to hear about their new album, 19.99. Read the interview.

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It’s not really K-pop, I just wanted to talk about it.

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