BEHIND THE SCENES

chapter 143: things are looking up

<OST: Start - Gaho>

A few months passed.

And those were the most eventful and fruitful few months any of them had experienced in their whole lives.

BTS Entertainment was established on the 1st of January 2021. After the press conference held on 11th January, the first episode of My Brightest Star was uploaded on the Behind-The-Scenes application on 1st February, and the final episode aired on 12th April. The reception to the drama was astronomical, both locally and internationally... perhaps due to the hype created by many news outlets (by the increasingly popular KNJ News, in particular) over the past few months.

My Brightest Star ended up being one of the top critically-acclaimed dramas of all-time, praised for its stunning visuals, acting and stellar cinematography. Actor Kim Taehyung's acting debut was praised as one of the best acting debuts since Hyun Bin's and actress Jennie Kim's amazing portrayal of her role was compared to that of legends like actress Jun Jihyun and Ha Jiwon. On top of the stellar cast, Min Yoongi PD-nim was complimented for his successful film debut... and gained recognition from directors all over the world for his masterpiece of a drama.

Jungkook released two mixtapes over this short one-year period as well - Euphoria debuted on the Billboard world charts at #3, and stayed in the top #10 spots for a total of 26 weeks. The platform was serving him well, and he used it to upload clips of his dance practices and vlogs of him doing his favourite hobbies over the weekend. People soon forgot about his whole saga with BG Entertainment and were soon starting to accept his change in style - both musically and in terms of his character. He could finally be himself in front of camera - say what he wanted without being controlled, do what he wanted and release all the music he wanted. He was extremely content.

Seokjin and Byulyi were benefiting greatly from the platform as well. They had started writing together again shortly after they got together, and their stories impressed Yoongi so much that he simply had to sign them on under his label. They started a couple channel on the application, where they came up with weekly content for people on how they brainstormed writing ideas and all. It was doing decently well especially amongst the local community, since many were already fans of moonstarsandsun. Their channel was called Jin's Moon - a pretty apt name, if you ask me.

If there was a person who benefited the most from this whole concept... it would have to be none other than Miss Lee Jieun herself. Her channel became the most popular sub-channel on the Behind-The-Scenes application, exceeding over a million subscribers within the past three months, and it was still rising at an alarming rate. Jieun was overwhelmed by the popularity she was gaining because of her makeup videos - it was mind-boggling that a makeup channel like hers would do so well on an entertainment-based application. But she was grateful, and she was happy reading the comments every night about how they adored her videos. Occasionally, she would see a comment or two mentioning her past scandal with the JKJK couple, but she would brush it off easily - it didn't bother her any longer.

Now, back to the present.

"Min Yoongi-ssi! Min Yoongi-ssi! Please say a few words!"

"Min Yoongi PD-nim! What do you have to say about the success of My Brightest Star? Did you expect it at all?"

"Yoongi-ssi! Please look over here!"

"Min daepyo-nim! I'm a huge fan!"

"Min Yoongi PD! I have a question for you - we all just read in the news this morning that you received an offer to go overseas to pursue a Masters in film production... is that true?"

Yoongi stopped in his tracks as he heard the question. He stopped, turned around and looked at the reporter for a few seconds, as if hesitating on whether to reply. However, he evidently decided not to as he turned back around and hopped onto the car waiting for him by the roadside and quickly slammed the door behind him.