I know I'm writing about a show that ended months ago and barely anyone watched so I'm sure this thread will flop but I gotta get these thoughts off the top of my head.
My Teenage Girl had the most talented contestants and the best performances out of any survival show I've ever watched. The level of performance and stage presence shown by many girls from nugu companies or who have never trained as a idol before is astonishing
Yet the show failed to gain traction comparable to that of produce of gp999 series and the resulting group is---to put it frankly---a mess.
So, what went wrong? is what this thread attempts to answer:
#1 Survival show over saturation: with gp999 just ending (and even that failed to reach the heights of former produce shows), the public is fatigued from survival shows. In a way this show, and sadly the trainees were doomed from the start.
#2 The freshmen class: I'm not gonna comment on the ethics of 11-14 year olds in kpop, however the controversy over the ages of the youngest contestants, and the show's name being "my teenage girl" which--undeniably--sounds creepy, really damaged the show.
regardless of the ethics, the child trainees really stick out like sore thumbs during both the show and the debut group, they are just too young to be performing with grown women, I mean look at this:
Yet the freshmen actually won this challenge against the seniors, which is the crux of the problem, people kept voting for the freshman members, and the show really wanted the debut group to have 2 freshmen, 1 sophomore, 2 juniors, and 2 seniors, which just takes away spots from more deserving trainees in the older grades
#3 They tried way too hard to re-invent the wheel: This shows voting and elimination system was freaking confusing. It's too complex to explain here but if you watched the show you get what I mean. Instead of just doing things straightforwardly: which ever trainees get the most votes debut (which is how survival shows should work), the show tried too hard to have a grade system and force younger members that nobody wanted.
The end result is a group with 0 synergy.
two 14 year old "freshmen", two "sophmores" a 14 year old and a 15 year old, 0 juniors (even tho the debut group was supposed to have 2 juniors and 1 sophmore, the show just ignored that in the finale lol, even tho the junior grade had some of the most talented and popular trainees), and three "seniors", two 18 year olds and a 20 year old
This is no hate to the girls that made it into the debut line up, all of them are talented, I just think the debut lineup could've picked members with more synergy and I think the younger members should've remained trainees and given more time to mature
