Welcome to Week in Review, where we highlight some of the past week’s biggest and best (sometimes worst) stories in Korean entertainment news.  There’s no way we can cover all the news and no way you can even see it all–unless you’re like a 24/7 K-entertainment junkie– so these are the tidbits that we think a fan should definitely have heard about.

…they been here for years

  •  If one was to say anything about the last week in K-pop it was that it was definitely the musical start of the year.  Among those who made a comeback this week were: VIXX with “On and On” and an intro courtesy of The Phantom of the Opera,  Phantom with “Like Cho Yong Pil,” U-Kiss with their Japanese release “Alone,” Baechigi with “Shower of Tears,” 1st generation idol and former member of H.O.T., Moon Hee-jun, released his mini Begins and the MV for the title track “I’m Not OK,” B.A.P. with “Rain Sound“–don’t these boys ever take a break, and C.N. Blue with their 4th mini album RE:BLUE and the MV for their title track “I’m Sorry.”
  • Actor Kim Nam-gil, freshly released from his military duty, tries his hand at singing again with a contribution to the OST for Yawang (Queen of Ambition) “You Don’t Know.”
  • Actor So Ji-sub, channels his inner musician again with the upcoming release of his second mini album,  6:00 … Playground, on January 23rd.  He has already released the MV of one song “Picnic” which features Younha, and a behind-the-scenes video of an upcoming MV starring Yoo Seung-ho and Park Shin-hye.
  • SPEED, the namja sub-unit of CCM‘s group CO-ED made a huge comeback with a dramatic new song and MV for “It’s Over” which portrayed the Gwangju Democratization Movement in which thousands died trying to rise up against the dictatorship of then President Chun Doo-hwan.  The MV was beautifully made and hopefully is just what SPEED needs to finally make a name for themselves in K-pop.

…’cause it’s a debut

  • There were also debuts from a couple of brand spankin’ new groups: Pixie, a new female duo released “Hot Spot,” Never Mind a new rookie punk/rock idol band debuted with “Shooting Star,” and a new girl group BPPOP released the MV for their debut track “Today.”
  • JYJ‘s Jaejoong released his first solo album Mine this week and the MV for the title track of the same name.  The song  for “Mine” is heavily J-rock reminiscent and Jaejoong looks to be in full visual-kei mode for the MV.  The song is great, the MV a little too disjointed for me, but with almost four and a half minutes of pure Jaejoong… not complaining.

…’cause it’s an ending

  • Park Yoochun and Yoon Eun-hye‘s popular K-drama I Miss You ended with its 21st episode this week and decent rating of almost 12%.  Yoochun and Eun-hye are gifting the cast and crew with a trip to Thailand for all their hard work–a very gracious gift from the leads for the hard working staff who had to work through all the tears and snow. (ajunews)
…’cause it’s still in progress
  • The news it out that G-Dragon is working on a new album and his first solo world tour.  But even though GD is busy preparing for his next solo pursuits including a new collab with Diplo, he still had time to work in a visit to Malaysia to pick up a couple of Golden Disks and a jaunt to Paris to catch a Mugler fashion show with Nicola Formichetti.  G-Dragon provided the song for the show after making the acquaintance of Formichetti who is Mugler’s Creative Director and a fan of Big Bang.  Check out this clip from the show and GD’s song “I am Mugler,”  Look at all the girls he whuuut…? (@IBGDRGN, TVREPORT, TVREPORT, CyCySanders)