Lee Soo Man: King of K-Pop

Actually anything but that I reckon, so no pun intended. As with many styles and things that are successful: you have someone behind it all. And as with other bands and music success in general .... there will be "rumors" and people who may not entirely agree with the person behind it all.

K-Pop is a phenomena ... and it birthed quite a few groups ... and most of them worked quite hard to get where they are. Boybands or girlbands ... it kind of doesn't matter - or both sexes do well. Korea learned well from the West - and from J-Pop too apparently (according to a friend of mine at least).

But there are also stories of people who try to break free, stuff from behind the scenes ... and very rare interviews. How much creative control do the artists have? Who decides ultimately about anything? This is really well researched and well edited (structure wise that is). Obviously you should like the genre/style ... but you may hear and see things that you were not expecting ... still quite essential to say the least.

I have seen the documentary about Nine Muses. I know enough about the K Pop industry to understand how grueling and exploitative it is. Do I like K Pop? Sure, some of it. Am I glad SK culture now spans the world, including cinema? Of course.

But giving Lee Soo Man all of the credit for basically making Korea culturally capitalist is a bit irritating, to say the least. This man has been accused of slavery contracts and over-profiting off of the blood, sweat and tears of teenagers and young adults. He's all Toxic Positivity, telling you how he prays to spread joy - while sitting on the piles of money he stole from desperate children who wanted to be singers or dancers.

King of K-Pop is very biased and romanticized. Yes, it mentions the slavery contracts and the level of hard work these young people face. Up to 7 years of training without a guarantee they'll ever be famous. Children as young as middle school giving up regular education for becoming a pop star. An early scandal with a young man taking meth to face the challenges of his demanding career. But it fluffs it up a bit, you know?

Lee Soo Man is pictured as this dreamer, this go-getter who just wanted to be a singer and spread South Korean culture throughout the world. Sure, we can give him some credit. But to give him all the credit is so absurd. I feel like the documentary could have certainly been more critical. I have a feeling many reviews will be 1 or 10 with angry K-Pop fans in the US overrating the documentary and ignoring the problematic parts.