SNSD (or should I say Shojo Jidai?) returns to Japan with Paparazzi and a brand-spanking new PV to boot. Your mileage may vary on the irony of the most heavily scrutinized (probably) girl group of Korea singing about Paparazzi in Japanese.
This PV is just your standard SM-dance-in-a-box-with-closeups style production. However, since SNSD is SM's true cash cow, they actually give a shit about this group. They went HAM on the production values, even by SM and SNSD's standards. Not at all like f(x)'s comeback though, those poor poor darlings. Like you could possibly imagine from the song title, the PV's concept is paparazzi. SONEs will gush about the YG-like amounts of money thrown at this PV, all the staff and extras hired, hell even about the 30,000 lightbulbs used in all the sets (or so Allkpop says, IDEK).
The song itself is actually pretty good but not without a few flaws. My specific gripes:
This PV is just your standard SM-dance-in-a-box-with-closeups style production. However, since SNSD is SM's true cash cow, they actually give a shit about this group. They went HAM on the production values, even by SM and SNSD's standards. Not at all like f(x)'s comeback though, those poor poor darlings. Like you could possibly imagine from the song title, the PV's concept is paparazzi. SONEs will gush about the YG-like amounts of money thrown at this PV, all the staff and extras hired, hell even about the 30,000 lightbulbs used in all the sets (or so Allkpop says, IDEK).
YG should definitely take notes on how to spend exorbitant amounts of money THE RIGHT WAY. The sets look great and the outfits (while some do raise a few eyebrows) are fabulous and not at all fucking weird as hell.
Anyway, there's not much in this MV besides the aforementioned dance and closeups. There is the barest hints of a "storyline" though, so light it hardly even warrants mention. The gist of it follows the premise of the song. SNSD -- famous, beloved, idolized girls that they are, are walking towards their next concert gig in some fancy concert hall. Flocked on all sides by paparazzi, they coolly walk backstage and appear ready to go. The curtains open and you see them walk in on some shady downtown/red light district clad only in heels and trenchcoats, not at all like prostitutes I swear. All of this is accompanied by Singin' in the Rain, which is extremely weird as fuck, but probably is a bit of titillation for the old WOTA fogies fapping to America and SNSD.
The setup is stupid as fuck, and it bogs down the MV. Seriously, do yourself a favor and just skip the intro shit and go straight to the coat throwing bit which signals the start of the real MV.
The outfits and such are pretty good, and no one looks particularly fuglier than usual if the case may be. The gorgeous look gorgeous and the fugs look meh, so they did a good job for this promotion. Outfit-wise, I liked the tuxedo dresses better than the real dresses, but the pink gloves ruin those outfits. GOD, WHO THOUGHT THOSE WERE A GOOD IDEA?! FUCKING SONE STYLISTS I SWEAR
Since it is just a dance MV, here's some of the highlights that I enjoyed or thought were noteworthy.
The dance itself is pretty good. I think it's my favorite choreography from SNSD so far. It's the most... complicated (for lack of a better word) and it incorporates a lot more technical moves than we're used to seeing from them. I do notice a lot more voguing/vogue-like dance moves, not just here but in KPop in general. Really quite strange, but the more cynical of us would say it's expected of such a gay genre of music. However, all this technicality starts to highlight either SNSD's shortcomings as a 9-membered group of varying dancing ability (to say the least) or their growing laziness as performers who are starting to not give 2 shits cause they're already rich and established idols. |
| We throw our expensive coats up in the air sometimes, singin "AAAAAAAYO, BRING THE BOOOOOOYS OUT" |
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| "AISHITERU ONII-SAN~!!" Also, Seohyun finally learned how to wink. <3 |
The outfits and such are pretty good, and no one looks particularly fuglier than usual if the case may be. The gorgeous look gorgeous and the fugs look meh, so they did a good job for this promotion. Outfit-wise, I liked the tuxedo dresses better than the real dresses, but the pink gloves ruin those outfits. GOD, WHO THOUGHT THOSE WERE A GOOD IDEA?! FUCKING SONE STYLISTS I SWEAR
Since it is just a dance MV, here's some of the highlights that I enjoyed or thought were noteworthy.
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| The BOOM BOOM BOOM bit seems to be one of the point dances. |
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| SNSD demonstrates proper Fap Dance form and technique. They're also the only ones who remember clean their hands afterward too. |
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| Yuri is the dark horse (SONEpun) contender for SNSD's HBIC. Bitch better give her the money. |
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| YoonYul are so cute, but Yuri is starting to fuck up a lot of the dancing lately. Oh well, she's still adorable (pardon my SONE). |
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| Hyoppa's solo dance bits are getting shittier and shittier with each new promotion. Girl is getting more and more useless, I'm starting to feel bad for her. |
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| THIS BODY WAVE, SO GOOD SNSD'S DANCING SO JJANGBAK ES NUMBER 1 SYNCHRO |
- Their Japanese is improving, but even my untrained ear can hardly tell what language they're speaking at times.
- The "fairness" of the new line distribution also comes with the cost of Hyoppa sharing lines with Seohyun. GOD, WHO THE FUCK THOUGHT THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA?!
- The engrish can get grating at times, but it's nothing totally unbearable.
- The final slow breakdown at the climax is kind of out of place, and the transition was rather rough. But again, your milage may vary but it's nothing terribly deal-breaking either.
The rest of the song makes up for all that shit, at least in my opinion. Like I mentioned earlier, the line distribution is surprisingly more even than it's ever been, which is pretty good considering it's a 9-membered group with only 3-4 good singers (Fuck you SONEs, everyone else can see it). SM is also getting really fond of their bonus sound effects used to accentuate certain dance moves. My favorite part comes near the end with Tiffany's "RA TA TA" part. Her trilled R gives me life, yo.
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| We out this bitch~ |
I think it's the best shit they've put out in Japan to date, and it certainly rivals anything in their Korean discography as well.. It's the heaviest electrosound SNSD's ever put out, and it's a new direction that I really enjoyed. You could see the beginnings of it in their first Japanese album, but it was more of a tentative step in a new direction, probably out of fear of alienating new/old fans. After the piece of fetid shit that was The Boys and all its repackages, Paparazzi is especially fabulous. If the Korean version of this song ports well (and you'd best believe this shit is going to be repacked back to Korea), it may very well be my new favorite SNSD jam.
SIDE NOTE: I dunno if it's just CombatBaby (our resident SONE) or symptomatic of all truSONES, but he claims to see deep spiritual significance in the song's lyrics. I don't see shit, but maybe there's a cheatsheet of that shit flying around Tumblr SONE fapcircles like the VIPs had forFantastic Baby Monster everything. Just some food for thought.
SIDE NOTE: I dunno if it's just CombatBaby (our resident SONE) or symptomatic of all truSONES, but he claims to see deep spiritual significance in the song's lyrics. I don't see shit, but maybe there's a cheatsheet of that shit flying around Tumblr SONE fapcircles like the VIPs had for
TL;DR:
Fabulous song for a decent PV with the most useless fucking intro/outros I've seen in a while.
I give this PV a 4.25 out of 5 (Meh-PV, but the song is fab so plus points for that).
Thank you for reading article [MV Review] SNSD - Paparazzi
