It's pretty shocking how bad life too short is doing, especially considering that they went to Coachella to tease this and it's a release for an album that got 1m+ preorders and are supposed to be the top 4th generation gg and is one of the very few contents they release.
If it was any other group, I would genuinely be questioning how this happened but I think it's pretty clear why. The demand for aespa in the west is nonexistent. I'm sure there are people who like them in the west but it's a much smaller amount that sm expects. The majority of their fandom is from Asian countries and if they continue to keep feeding their nonexistent western hype, they're going to hurt their Asian fans. It was already pretty upsetting for Korean fans who expected Aespa to perform live after seeing that they did so at Coachella just for them to lip sync and barely interact with them. Whether this is an Aespa/SM decision (most likely SM), it's clear their priority lies in the West despite their support coming from Asia.
All the groups that are popular in the West grew naturally and they still embrace their Korean/Asian fandoms a lot. Even the groups that are only popular internationally give lots of love and events to their very small Korean fandoms. So it's very odd to see Aespa who literally rose to the top due to their very dedicated Asian fans not give that much love. Grantedz they're still in their newer years and their fans are pretty starved for content but that Western favoritism is going to become blatant pretty soon. Their first (+only) live performance in front of an audience was in the US. Instead of promoting in Korea, or anywhere in Asia, where the majority of their preorders/album sales come from,they're over here in the US just to get hit with a resale/lack of fans issue.
I think SM needs to really sit down and maybe just accept the fact that there is barely any hype in the West but they have some really strong Asian fandoms so they need to give them some love. I know they're doing a fanmeet which is a step in the right direction but I hope they seriously take some time to think about what they're doing with Aespa. Aespa might surprise them and do well in the West later on in their career (like Twice-never expected Twice to become popular in the west but they did it) but if SM keeps pushing Aespa like this, it's goingto become like the HER situation where the media keeps trying to act like shes one of the biggest RnB artists yet literally no one knows or cares abt her, making it so obvious shes just an industry plant who has a very small fanbase and backing from big companies to make her a "top artist". This is what SM is setting Aespa for.
I hope SM takes some time to really consider everything. Granted, I doubt SM is going to. I already know the comments for this are just going to be butthurt mys telling me excuses for why aespa flopped too.
