Episode 142: Beyond the Record
The record for the highest viewership rating in tvM history.
The reaction to Byeonghwa, which broke this record, was explosive.
That’s because even though they predicted it, it wasn’t any less surprising.
+ Interest
-It’s really the highest viewership rating in history!
-Wow, I get to see this with my own eyes lol
-It’s amazing hehe. To be number one in historical drama viewership in times like these hehe
-Maybe it worked out because it was a historical drama?
-Certainly, the historical drama had a lot of episodes.
-No matter how much you try to belittle it, the fact that Byeonghwa is number one in history doesn’t change^^
-It was a perfect work to the end♡♡♡
-Can’t we get a few more episodes as a spin-off?
-I know right T_T I want to see more stories about Kim Seong-wol and Han Seung-hye’s family T_T
-How can they not release a special for such a successful drama… tvM is ruthless
-I don’t know about anything else! I’m still disappointed the main character didn’t meet Yi Sun-sin!
-Stop it already lol It was an impossible dream anyway lol
-It would have been overkill for the main character to meet Yi Sun-sin given the storyline lol
-Am I the only one feeling this? T_T I binge-watched after seeing the final episode because the lingering feeling wouldn’t go away T_T
Same! But the more I watch, I wonder if I’ll ever meet another drama this good.
-Seriously, my life’s work bb
-Back then, we were all Byeonghwa…
-It’s really impressive. You wrote such a high-quality piece and even acted in it yourself?
-As Byeonghwa became the greatest drama ever, Kang Tae-ha also became the greatest OP character lol
-And wasn’t Kang Tae-ha the most noticeable in Byeonghwa?
-Song Ji-eun did really well too, but honestly, Kang Tae-ha was on another level.
-I think Song Ji-eun showed global star-level acting, but Kang Tae-ha was just a legend.
-Byeonghwa’s OST music rankings are crazy lol Still number one lol
-I’m also listening to it morning and evening hehe
-The aftermath of Byeonghwa will last for a few more days, right?
-First of all, it doesn’t seem like the Netflix rankings and Macaron music rankings will change.
-Are you going to make Kang Tae-ha a world star now?
-No need to say more lol He’s already a Prada global ambassador because Byeonghwa did well lol
-It’s surprising anew… that a historical drama gains worldwide popularity.
-And even more so that it’s not a fusion historical drama with zombies running wild lol
-Regardless of it being a historical drama, the narrative structure of Byeonghwa was already global.
-Seeing that Byeonghwa did well, I can only think that way.
-Guys, do you think Byeonghwa can win an Emmy?
-Yep hehe It seems totally possible for prime time hehe
-But honestly, doesn’t Byeonghwa’s impact fall short of the Dabangg game?
-The Dabangg game did too well lol Don’t downplay it lol
-I think Byeonghwa is enough to win an Emmy^^
-Who knows, a success like Byeonghwa might appear soon.
-No no, since Byeonghwa did so well, many don’t know, but overseas, the content industry is in a dark age.
-Honestly, only Byeonghwa did well. Our country’s content industry is also in crisis lol
-I’m in the industry, hehe. Everyone is busy analyzing how Byeonghwa succeeded hehe
-Then Byeonghwa will win the Emmy.
Certainly, considering the overall mood of the content industry, the success of Byeonghwa was quite exceptional and yet an encouraging event.
For that reason, some people were also gauging the possibility of Byeonghwa winning an Emmy.
But despite this atmosphere, Taeha was not optimistic about the situation.
Because even in a crisis, flowers always bloom.
In fact, Taeha had competed against strong contenders at award ceremonies every year.
But in the case of the Emmy, the competition was all the works from around the world shown to viewers in a given year, so it was hard to see the situation positively.
Of course, domestically, it was clear that there would be no significant competitor to Byeonghwa this year.
It was only natural since it broke the record for the highest viewership rating in tvM history.
Even Taeha was certain that this atmosphere would continue for a few more days.
But even so, he thought it was premature to highly estimate the chances of winning an Emmy.
‘But who knows. After all, I didn’t even predict that Byeonghwa would become the highest-rated tvM drama in history.’
Taeha was still dazed by this success.
Because he didn’t know people would love the final episode of Byeonghwa so much.
And because of this result, Taeha became convinced of a hypothesis he had been half-doubting.
‘As expected, what people want is narrative?’
Even Taeha, back when he was preparing “Your Brilliant Sparkle,” thought that the key element of content that people go wild for was characters.
Of course, that wasn’t wrong.
In fact, works that created impressive characters were loved by many.
Driven by this, writing manuals arguing that works should be written around characters were pouring out from the publishing world.
But the ironic fact was that even though all writers were focusing on characters, the content industry as a whole was experiencing a downturn.
Most experts attributed this market trend to the loss of interest in the content industry after the pandemic, but Taeha thought differently.
He thought that since there were steadily successful works despite this atmosphere, a new analysis was needed.
‘Especially as a writer, you should analyze the cause from internal factors of the work, not external factors.’
Thus, Taeha steadily examined works.
As someone who always thought input was important, Taeha consumed more content than ordinary people could imagine, but this time he focused on analyzing the cause.
And before writing Byeonghwa, he came up with one hypothesis.
It was that consumers might be feeling nostalgia for narrative, which was becoming less important.
Certainly, the importance of emotive narrative had been decreasing recently.
On the other hand, impressive characters, dynamic relationships, distinctive material, witty dialogue, and high-quality composition had gained great importance.
But,
‘There’s no more differentiation in these. Because all writers are writing them at a sufficiently great level. Rather, this trend only raises the entry barrier for works.’
For people unfamiliar with content, the excessive depth of characters, relationships, material, dialogue, and composition caused fatigue.
Why does this character appear? Why is the relationship so deep?
And what is this material for? What meme is this dialogue from?
And because they didn’t understand why a complex composition was different.
In the end, the content springing up like mushrooms every day was becoming something that couldn’t be enjoyed lightly.
Of course, writers who recognized this tried to grab people’s interest by compressing events in the early part of the content to increase pacing, but this was merely a temporary solution.
It was an inevitable trend that content was gradually becoming more complex and niche.
In some ways, the method of cramming events into the beginning was even causing boredom with the content overall.
‘In the end, to solve the fundamental problem and create differentiation for a work, I have no choice but to focus on emotive narrative.’
Just 10 years ago, narrative wasn’t a very important element in developing content.
Because just as there is no writer now who can’t write characters, there was no writer in the past who couldn’t write narrative.
But recently, newly emerging content tends to be weak in narrative overall.
As the importance of other elements was emphasized, the importance of narrative was pushed to the back.
Thus, narrative-centered content was gradually disappearing from the world, and creators of this era, familiar with this trend, showed weakness in narrative.
It was an inevitable result since they had obtained input by consuming content weak in narrative.
But Taeha thought that narrative was the only way to overcome the dark age of content in this era.
‘That’s how it is. Whenever a dark age comes to any market, you have to go back to the basics.’
The basis of all content is, of course, narrative.
In other words, story.
And the root of all creators in the world was storytellers.
Taeha also emphasized this idea and created Byeonghwa, and got that result.
The fact that the final episode of Byeonghwa, which he thought would receive the least reaction, got a great response from viewers could be understood in this context.
For that reason, the following thought came to Taeha’s mind, who was preparing a new challenge.
‘Maybe the next work I’m planning now might be okay.’
Of course, only time would tell whether it would be good or bad.
***
However, it wasn’t time yet to think concretely about writing the next work.
Taeha had something to prepare during the gap before starting the next work.
That was Taeha’s second fan meeting.
And at this fan meeting, Taeha was planning to reveal a new song by Prequel.
‘At first, I didn’t plan to do that.’
Originally, Taeha had planned to keep the fan meeting separate from the new song release.
But as soon as the notice went up on the fan cafe, expectations poured in that Prequel would reveal a new song at the fan meeting again.
It was an unexpected situation for Taeha.
And it was the same for the Prequel members.
Back then, no one would listen even if they released a new song, so they had no choice but to get Taeha’s help.
The reaction was quite good.
But they didn’t think fans would want this again.
Because from a negative perspective, it could be seen as bundling.
But none of the Taecho thought negatively about Prequel’s new song being revealed.
Rather, all of Taecho hoped that Prequel’s new song would be revealed at this fan meeting too.
Well, it’s touching.
“In a situation like this, we should meet the expectations.”
“A new song performance! That’ll be fun!”
“Let’s go!”
The Prequel members, who had checked the Taecho reactions together with Taeha, exchanged words with satisfied expressions.
Thus, the Prequel members happily began preparing a new song in time for the fan meeting date.
Fortunately, TT, who had joined AH Entertainment and was producing Prequel’s entire album himself, had made thorough preparations.
It wasn’t just TT.
The Prequel members also had built up their skills solidly by gaining stage experience, such as doing separate events while Taeha was busy with his work.
Now, the only thing left was to choose the songs TT had prepared according to the album concept.
“Alright, since everyone’s gathered, let’s begin.”
TT played the prepared songs for Taeha and the Prequel members.
There were 10 songs in total, and each time a song with a guide track played, the Prequel members’ expressions hardened.
And it was the same for Taeha.
Finally, when all 10 songs had played through.
Among the members looking at each other’s faces, Taeha quietly opened his mouth.
“This… are we really okay?”
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