Rolling Quartz. Definition of a Nugu group, like selling a few hundred copies of their albums. But still building such a dedicated core fandom that they are able to tour the world and get invited to festivals and cons, get TV show soundtracks. They will never be huge but I'm proud of how well they've done
Itzy. First up, and this is a weird sounding one, but their English level. All kpop groups have members that show various levels of ability in second languages, but if you watch early Itzy videos compared to recent ones where they confidently use English, it's super clear just how much effort, time and energy they all put into learning AND using English. They are all at at least a conversational level (although Yeji does struggle a bit), which is not an easy thing and not all kpop groups have all their members get there.
Ryujin especially, because she managed to sub in Lia as the groups "translator and crowd talker" when their world tour started. Like many groups with one native/fluent speaker, Lia is the primary spokesperson. So when she went on her hiatus, Ryujin had to step up and become the primary, and I was super impressed with how well she took to it.
And Chaeryeong, because in Itzy's earlier days she was the brunt of some of the worst hate waves a kpop idol has been subject too. Just foul, constant bullying about her looks, to the point of her mother having to publicly beg people to leave her daughter alone. And that early bullying clearly had an impact on her confidence, as for a long time she was shy, hiding from cameras and attention. But in recent years she's really come out of her shell, become a lot more confident in herself, gotten CF's and shown the world just how much of a beautiful person she is.
And finally XG and their label, for an interesting one. Their maknae, Cocona, wanted to shave her head slappy bald. Instead of being a typical label and dictating her hairstyle for a comeback, or flatly refusing what is a bit of a silly request, they let her embrace the idea and they ran with it, using it as part of their promo and even into the next comeback, keep it as a central part of her look. The confidence needed for an 18 year old girl in a looks and image obsessed industry to do such an extreme change, and for a company to support her and embrace it, is pretty friggin neat.
