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For tropes that apply specifically to the HYYH/WINGS/LOVE YOURSELF storyline and characters, go to the BTS Universe page.

For tropes that apply specifically to the webtoon, go to the SAVE ME page.


Tropes with their own pages:


  • Archive Binge: They have a lot of content. Even after you listen to their entire official discography, you can go listen to the mixtapes and a lot of Soundcloud-only songs. And even then, there's hours and hours of additional content, like variety and reality shows, interviews, videos from BANGTANTV and their social media accounts, and an entire music video canon. It's like a rabbit hole. Enter at your own risk.
  • Archive Panic: They have nine full albums (five Korean and four Japanese), six mini-albums, two single albums, over 50 singles total (including guest appearances on other artists' singles), multiple non-album and reissue-exclusive songs, and Solo Side Project releases by the members (including multiple full albums and mixtapes). Many of their videos have multiple versions, and they also have several other multimedia projects.
  • Award Snub: Despite being the most famous Korean act in the West, BTS' luck with Western awards has been hit or miss.
    • The group was not nominated for a Grammy Award until 2021. They currently have five nominations, including one for a feature on Coldplay's Music of the Spheres, but not a single win.
    • Their luck at the MTV Video Music Awards has been very hit or miss. Although the LOVE YOURSELF Series solidified BTS as a household name in the K-pop community and gave them their first major hits in the United States, they had no nominations until 2019. Most of their VMA wins since then have been in minor categories. The group has had only one nomination for Song of the Year ("Dynamite", which lost to Olivia Rodrigo's "Drivers License") and none for Video of the Year.
  • Better on DVD: With some exceptions, BTS' music is often released as concept albums, which in turn are often parts or chapters of a bigger seriesnote  that sometimes culminates in a Compilation Rerelease. Since the members write and plan their music based on their experiences and thoughts at the time, themes and ideas such as youth, love and the place of dreams in society are explored and revisited through Call-Backs and occasional Sequel Songs throughout their discography (even in their solo releases), to the point that you can find a whole Coming of Age Story in their work. Album singles such as "DNA", "FAKE LOVE", "IDOL" or "Boy With Luv" are therefore the songs that best represent the overall themes of each release, but are best understood in the context of their respective albums and their previous work.
  • Cargo Ship: A common old joke in the fandom is how SUGA has a tendency to stare lovingly at BTS' trophies whenever they win one.
  • Discredited Meme: Old jokes like "you got no jams" and "infires man" have long stopped being popular on Twitter, as they've been repeated to death in social media. The fans who still rely on them (most often seen in places like Youtube or Amino) came to be derisively referred to on Twitter as, appropriately enough, "no jam ARMYs", also sometimes used to refer to other types of less-than-ideal fan behavior. Ironically, it's become increasingly apparent that the members thoroughly enjoy some old jokes (including "you got no jams"), leading to jokes about having to accept that the members are, too, "no jams".
    • Certain ones, like calling certain members old nicknames like "god of destruction", "alien", "horse" or "mom/eomma/pink princess", are seen as Flanderizing or outright insulting in various ways when coming from fans, with members vocally expressing dislike for some of them. The fact that they've been very prevalent in fan-made "introduction to the members" videos partly explains the less-than-positive perception of Youtube ARMYs on Twitter. It's worth pointing out that some smaller circles (particularly Misaimed Fandom ones) can have the tendency to overcorrect, though.
    • Adding "-eu" to the end of words, since it makes fun of their accents.
    • Jokes about Jin and RM's dancing skills, which not only have proven to be actually hurtful to them according to interviews, but are also very outdated at best; both members have been able to keep up with the rest when dancing as a group even since debut, and they have improved a lot since.
  • Ensemble Dark Horse: Songs like Cyphers 2 and 3, "Tomorrow", "Baepsae/Silver Spoon", "Whalien 52", "Butterfly", "House of Cards", "Magic Shop" and "Outro: Tear" are some side-tracks that are very popular in the fandom.
    • "Pied Piper", "134340", "Love Maze" and "Paradise" are fan-favorites that have never been performed on tour. A common sentiment on Twitter is that "Paradise" in particular needs to be performed live.note 
    • Solo tracks from all the members tend to be extremely popular, due to showcasing the members' diverse personalities, styles, and sensitivities. For example, all of the solo tracks for the LOVE YOURSELF series ("Serendipity", "Singularity", "Euphoria" and "Epiphany" for the singers, "Just Dance", "Love" and "Seesaw" for the rappers) are incredibly popular in their own ways. "Euphoria" even appeared in the "Bubbling Under 100" Billboard list after Answer was released!
    • Some fans have begged for Soundcloud-only tracks like "DDAENG", "4 o'clock", "Promise" or "Still With You" to be released on Spotify and paid platforms - or even as singles - due to their charting potential or simply to be able to listen to them on non-Soundcloud platforms (particularly "DDAENG").
      • Notably, a short clip of 3 women twerking set to SUGA's verse from "DDAENG" had more than 100 million views on Twitter before it got deleted.
      • Jimin's "Promise" managed to shatter the record for most streams on Soundcloud during the first 24 hours. This record was set by none other than Drake, who was surpassed again by V's "Scenery".
    • From MAP OF THE SOUL: PERSONA, there's "HOME", "Mikrokosmos", and "Dionysus", none of which became a single (though "Dionysus" has a choreography). "HOME" in particular stands out for its popularity in the fandom despite also never being performed on tour (though performed in an awards show and on the Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon).
    • From MAP OF THE SOUL: 7, all of the members' solo tracks are very popular, though "Filter" and "My Time" stand out for being global chart-toppers for all of 2020. There's also "We are Bulletproof: The Eternal" and "Louder than Bombs", the latter of which joins "Paradise" as a song many fans want to see a live performance of.
    • The original tracks that are released alongside the Japanese versions of the Korean songs are incredibly beloved in the fandom, having as much international popularity as some of the Korean tracks despite getting mainly promoted in Japan.
      • The original tracks from FACE YOURSELF ("Don't Leave Me", "Let Go" and "Crystal Snow") are the best examples of this. None of them were released with a music video, and there aren't many live performances for all three of them. However, they're very popular on streaming platforms (particularly Spotify) and are still heavily praised by fans to this day for their showcasing of the group's skills, particularly the vocal line.
      • "Your Eyes Tell" from MAP OF THE SOUL: THE JOURNEY is a side track that quickly gained attention and streams when it was released, especially on Spotify.
    • All of the side tracks of BE are very popular in their own right, but special mention goes to "Dis-ease" and "Blue and Grey". The bridge of "Dis-ease" even gained its own fanbase amongst ARMYs, and "Blue and Grey" is especially notable due to selling 100K units on iTunes in the first week it of its release, and even outdid title tracks "Dynamite" and "Life Goes On" in some regions.
    • Jin's 2021 birthday release, "Super Tuna", ended up going viral to the point where ARMYs and non-ARMY alike made videos for the fan-created "Super Tuna Challenge". As a result, it topped YouTube charts for days and even got a mini documentary.
    • From the non-music side, Min Yoonji. The Aloof Dark-Haired Girl played by SUGA for a one-off sketch in Run BTS! is incredibly popular in fanart, and many fans want her to return.
      • Kim Army (an Adorkable BTS Fangirl as portrayed by RM for the "House of ARMY" sketch) is also popular. She's often portrayed and/or shipped with Yoonji in fanart.
      • To a lesser extent, Kim Army's mother (hamtastically played by J-Hope) also appears often on fanart.
    • The BT21 characters have reached a Cash-Cow Franchise-in-the-making level of popularity, even reaching non-fans.
    • V’s pet dog Yeontan is very popular among fans and frequently trends on Twitter whenever V post a picture of him. The fact that he's a very cute Pomeranian that looks like he has eyebrows simultaneously makes him extremely adorable to fans and a great Fountain of Memes.
  • Epic Riff:
    • The instrumentals from "Blood, Sweat and Tears" are among the most recognizable ones from BTS' entire career, and perhaps from Korean pop as a whole.
    • The saxophone in "Dope"'s chorus.
    • The repeating instrumentals of "Baepsae/Silver Spoon".
    • The opening and drop of "Save Me".
    • The "BWOOONG"s from "Not Today".
    • The whistle in "DNA", the melody in "Mic Drop", and the recorder on repeat in "Go Go".
    • The synths in "FAKE LOVE".
    • The saxophone melody (again) from "IDOL".
    • The openings of "Boy With Luv" and "Mikrokosmos" are instantly recognizable.
    • The haunting acoustic guitar melody of "Black Swan".
  • Even Better Sequel: While LOVE YOURSELF: Her was a well-done album to start off the series, its sequels LOVE YOURSELF: Tear and LOVE YOURSELF: Answer are widely acclaimed masterpieces and are considered to have some of BTS's best works, especially the former. It also helps that thanks to these sequels and the progression of the LOVE YOURSELF series in general, several of the tracks in Her became Vindicated by History as they're crucial to that storyline.
  • Fan Nickname: Before the BTS Universe was officially named, fans called it the "HYYH story/universe". The name still sticks around in some parts.
    • Since 2017, international fans have taken to call Korean ARMYs "K-diamonds"note , while Korean fans call international ARMYs "I-Lovelies" in return.
  • Fandom-Enraging Misconception: Being a Korean boyband from a small company, there are layers upon layers of prejudice that fans constantly have to correct, such as:
    • Any assumptions based on Girl-Show Ghetto: that they're only popular because of their looks, that their work has no depth whatsoever, or that their fanbase is made exclusively of teenage girlsnote  and fans of boybands who jumped ship, when there are fans of all ages, genders and music tastes.
    • Saying that they're plastic puppets exploited by their company and that they have no creative input in their content. Here's a list of all the producing/songwriting credits for each of the members, for starters - and one of the factors fans cite for why they like BTS is their sincerity in both their lyrics and behavior.
    • Similarly, conflating them with the rest of the Korean idol industry and the Hallyu phenomenon, treating them as nothing more than a government strategy to promote Korean media or values, or (especially recently) dragging them into narratives about the "dark side of Kpop" (such as articles or videos having BTS as the thumbnail). Not only do they come from an atypical small company (with full case studies on Big Hit and BTS's peculiar methodology and history), having to fight tooth-and-nail to achieve their success, but their work (which is very much an outlier both in sales and in artistry) has consistently criticized Korean society and dealt with topics that are stigmatized in the country such as mental health, coming from the members' own creativity. Their success overseas was already established before they actively started promoting in the West, being a product of their work resonating with a Western audience rather than a pre-planned goal.
    • Another one is the belief that they lip-sync in live performances despite ample evidence to the contrary; even Variety magazine accused them of lip-syncing in their Saturday Night Live appearance, giving credit for doing "all the work" to back-up singer and "Boy With Luv" cowriter Melanie Fontana, who vehemently denied those claims. BTS is, in fact, one of the few Korean idol groups that always sing live even while doing complex choreography, and they have repeatedly been shown training hard to do so (Burn the Stage being a big example); Suga famously stopped rapping mid-verse while looking at the camera to show it was live in the 2017 SBS year-end show.
    • One topic that has become a very specific example is the idea that the fandom "made a petition" clamoring for the South Korean government to grant BTS exemption from South Korea's obligatory military enlistment note . This idea originated from an article on enlistment written by Tamar Herman for Billboard mid-2018, which made this claim in passing. Problem is (as explained here), the topic only arose from one Korean politician talking about exemption based on artistic contributions, doing so due to unsourced "requests"note , which media linked to an existing petition (the one cited by Herman in later tweets). This petition had (at the moment of the article's release) barely around 20 signatures, half of which only were only made to be able to leave disagreeing comments. This was after there had already been discussions in the fandom on Twitter (in and outside of Korea) noting what a controversial topic military exemption would be note .
      • In the same vein, the overwhelmingly negative reaction from fans to the article was directed at Herman's lack of research on the subject (which involved amateur translations) and misrepresentation of the fandom, and not an attempt to cover up the petition (which, again, had barely 2 digits of signatures) or (as she later claimed) accusing her of "making up" the petition.
    • Saying that the fandom thinks that any use of the color purple is plagiarism - what many in the fandom dislike is the use of the phrase "I purple you" by other fandoms to their idols, due to being specifically created by V in 2016 to refer to BTS and ARMY (so it wouldn't even make sense outside of that context).
    • Due to the influx of new fans in the LOVE YOURSELF, MOTS and especially "Dynamite" eras, Armys who refuse to listen to BTS' older music has become one - particularly those who don't look up the lyrics to BTS songs. Not only are BTS' lyrics central to what makes their identity (making "Dynamite" a Black Sheep Hit), with their songs often referencing and reexamining ideas from older songs, but there's a tendency in multifandom K-pop circles and stan Twitter circles to take lyrics and older moments out of context to incite arguments or otherwise create misinformation, with newer fans falling for it.
  • Fandom Rivalry: BTS being one of the only K-pop acts to reach international megastardom comes with the side effect of spawning a lot of fan wars with seemingly everyone else, some of which can get really nasty.
    • One of the most notorious fan wars is with fans of Exo. After BTS started to rise in 2015, the fandoms began a rivalry because the two groups are compared. The fact that the two groups are always nominated for the same awards doesn't help.
    • The other major fan war is with fans of the girl group BLACKPINK. When Blackpink started to blow up internationally, some circles hyped them up as the Distaff Counterpart to BTS, which other circles did not appreciate. It doesn't help that, despite being the most popular Girl Group in K-pop, Blackpink is perpetually in second place (behind BTS) when it comes to popularity in the industry as a whole.
    • Possibly since James Corden called BTS "the biggest boyband" (as well as many comparisons of both groups made by media since), the One Direction fandom has developed this with ARMY, starting with trending a hashtag in reaction to Corden's comment to show who really remains the biggest. Several have resorted to claiming that BTS' fandom is only made of fans of One Direction who jumped ship during 1D's hiatus - even though many ARMYs never listened to boybands at all before BTS -, and it all has led to various arguments between both fandoms, with topics ranging from music quality to white privilege.
    • NCTzens (mostly the ones that stan the subunit NCT127), the fandom of the boy group NCT, have fought with ARMYs (and MOAs) more often than not on Twitter, especially since 2020. The topics of these disputes include how (some) NCT fans constantly make viral tweets against BTS and the fandom and about how they "unstanned" (to the point of possibly taking the place of EXO-Ls in frequency), try to spread malicious rumors, have fought a music producer of a track from MAP OF THE SOUL: 7 for praising BTS, got angry and (in some cases) even wished death on ARMYs because of "ON"note  blocking a solo release of one of NCT's members from getting n. 1 in Koreanote , and about how some ARMYs have said NCT127 are "flops".
    • The success of "Dynamite" (and subsequently "Butter"), which solidly established BTS as an unarguably mainstream act in the USnote , has brought hostility from some fandoms of competing Western acts on stan Twitter (Swifties being an example).
  • Fountain of Memes: To be expected, given their presence in social media. Their peculiar personalities and use of facial expressions have made them a goldmine of memes and reaction images, as seen here.
  • Friendly Fandoms:
    • With the Beyhive on Twitter, after a strange sequence of events. After realizing that LOVE YOURSELF: Tear was very close to beating Post Malone in getting a #1 on Billboard 200, a then popular account from Black Twitter called other Beyhive accounts to stream BTS' album to "defeat" Post Malone. This led to many of them (including said popular Twitter account) finding themselves actually liking the songs in the album, with ARMYs happily welcoming and introducing them to BTS; what's more, Tear actually debuted as #1, to the delight of both fandoms.
    • The "Chicken Noodle Soup" collaboration between j-hope and Becky G and the mutual respect between both has resulted in a good relationship between ARMY and Becky G's fandom, Beasters.
    • A lot of BTS fans like or at least respect Little Mix, who are also characterized by the members' creative control over their music and have also tackled social issues in songs (with Little Mix and one of the members' personal account following BTS on Instagram).
    • From the Korean side, one of the few cases where both fandoms consistently acted friendly (or at least civil) to each other was Wanna One's until said group's disbandment, particularly after an incident in the 2017 Melon Music Awards involving members of another fandom harassing Wannables. It helps that both groups are atypical in the industry (BTS more-so in content, Wanna One in format), and consistently acted friendly towards each other in award shows, with some members occasionally hanging out together and some Wanna One members being fans of BTS. When BTS confirmed their attendance to an award show at the last minute, meaning that ARMYs would not be able to go due to all tickets being sold out, Wannables decided to do the BTS fanchants in ARMYs' place.
      • There's some degree of this on Twitter with TWICE - another group with songwriting credits in their music that has developed a hatedom in spite/because of their massive popularity - with both fandoms generally staying out of each other's way and congratulating both group's achievements, helped by TWICE's Jihyo stating that BTS "paved the way" for Kpop artists in the West.
      • A similar relationship occurs with fans of with GFRIEND, another group that has managed to gain massive popularity despite coming from a small, non-Big 3 company, and also notorious for having very difficult choreography. Helped by both groups coming from sister companies and their CEOs being friends... as well as their collaboration in the infamous "Family Song". This led to mostly positive reactions to the BigHit/Source Music company merge.
      • Along with the above, several ARMYs on Twitter are also fans of or at least respect certain girl groups with members who write their songs and/or have more unusual images and music (especially from non-Big 3 companies), such as EXID (which has an ex-underground rapper as a member) or Mamamoo (who have highly skilled vocals and show a less conservative form of femininity by Korean standards).
      • A lot of ARMYs immediately went protective-mode over both BTS' labelmate TXT and their fans, even the ones who don't like TXT's music, given that TXT's status as labelmates and rookie groups under BH unfortunately had the Fandom Rivalries BTS had transferred to them and created rivalries with other rookie groups, down to receiving hate hashtags. That said, both fandoms also have some amount of overlap.
      • The same can be said for ENHYPEN, largely due to the fact that BTS mentored the trainees on I-LAND that would eventually form the group. After they formed, many ARMYs wished ENHYPEN great success.
    • Then there’s the complicated case of GOT7, Seventeen and Monsta X. In some (multifandom) circles, the relationship between ARMYs and those fandoms is quite friendly; with friendships existing between members of BTS and members of these groups (plus a collaboration stage at the 2015 MAMAs in the case of GOT7), fans often have found one through the others and a good number of multi-fandom Kpop fans like at least more than one of them. In other places such as Twitter, however, the relationship between BTS’ and these groups' fandoms is mostly neutral; while they’re not actively hostile, conflicts do arise now and then, with the three having a history of siding with other Kpop fandoms more often than not on Twitter disputes, especially as ARMYs' general views on multifandom circles (and, in turn, the view Kpop fandoms in general have of ARMYs) have only soured over time. Carats and Monbebes in particular have become more and more hostile to ARMYs in recent years.
    • Fans of Skillet have also taken a liking to BTS, due to both bands having empowering lyrics and themes that are very similar. There's even quite a number of Skillet FMVs for BTS on YouTube.
      • Also in the rock community, several fans of Coldplay reacted positively to the cover of "Fix You" that BTS had done for their MTV unplugged segment and began to like them and respect their fandom, helped by Chris Martin himself stating that he likes and respects them. When the two groups confirmed future projects, ARMYs and Coldplayers exchanged their favorite songs and facts about both groups on Twitter, cementing it further.
    • Thanks to "Dynamite" and "Butter" paying tribute to disco-pop and rock, fans of Michael Jackson (who was already very respected amongst ARMYs in general) gained respect for BTS. This is helped by the fact that MJ's nephew, Taj Jackson has shown his appreciation for them multiple times on Twitter and other platforms.
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The group was notoriously quicker in growing an international fanbase than in their home country, including countries like the US, Philippines, India, and the South American region; the wild crowd reaction to BTS in the 2014 KCON in LA is considered one of the earliest signs. In Korea, the general public and the media (aside from idol-centered shows) only started to really pay attention to BTS around 2017, particularly by the end of that year after their various US achievements and their performances at the MAMA and MMA award shows.
    • Their arrival in Chile in March 2017 led to some of the first comparisons by media to Beatlemania. According to the New York Times, the concert tickets were sold-out in record time (2 hours!) despite no publicity in TV or radio and no radioplay besides Kpop-focused Internet radio stations. Fans even got the loudest screams ever recorded on the Movistar Arena... in a moment when BTS wasn't even performing.
    • J-Hope is said to be very popular in Latin America, especially Brazil.
    • While all the members have their fans in the US, the rap line seems to be very popular with rap fans. A similar case is V with R&B fans, at least in 2018 (his solo songs "Stigma" and "Singularity" are R&B, though his other solo songs in and outside of BTS' discography have gone to other genres since, with other members also exploring the genre in solo/unit songs).
      • BTS' Hip-Hop/R&B influenced-music and respect for both genres and their culture in general (with songs like "Hip Hop Lover", "Singularity" and "ON" being stand outs) have gained them a lot of Black audiences.
      • In recent years, a lot of rock and punk fans have started liking BTS due to their lyrics being thematically similar to those of many well-known bands of that genre, and the fact that the group often experiments with their musical style.
    • "Dynamite" is very popular in Japan to the point of still being in the top ten of the nation's Hot 100 chart almost a year after its release, and helped solidify their status as a household name there. It also had a positive impact on future releases there, like their Japanese-language album BTS, THE BEST (which had Dynamite as a bonus song in the tracklist) which shattered several first-day and first-week sales records.
  • Girl-Show Ghetto: Western media and non-fans tend to lump BTS in with more conventional boy bands due in part to BTS technically still being a boy band. This is not helped by the group having a "pretty boy" image (which is the standard for male K-pop idols) or Black Sheep Hits with "Dynamite" and the Butter single album. As a result, critics and non-fans tend to assume the group's songs are aimed almost strictly at young girls, overlooking that their usual sound is more Genre-Busting with prominent hip-hop leanings and more complex lyrical themes (which often talk about social and political issues, some of which are even taboo in Korea) that give them more of a multi- gender appeal (resulting in a large portion of the fans being male). While it's safe to say that the assumptions made about BTS by outsiders aren't too damaging, given that they're still far more commercially successful than most other K-pop acts in the west, they're still considered a thorn in the side for fans due to the assumptions persisting in the media regardless.
  • Growing the Beard: While the albums before it were far from bad - many tracks of that era like "Tomorrow", "Like" and "Rain" are beloved to this day -, it's maybe around the The Most Beautiful Moment in Life series where they really established a solid identity, expanding their predominantly Hip-Hop/R&B sound into other genres to build a diverse-yet-still-coherent pop soundnote , as well as introducing grander, darker, more mature narratives into their music and concepts, along with more ambitious storytelling though the introduction of the BTS Universe. It was also the point where BTS ditched their eyeliner-heavy "bad boy" image in favor of a more natural and flexible look and attitude.
  • Harsher in Hindsight:
    • Their debut era, which the members regard as intense, due to extreme dieting, packed schedules, and very little money when compared to their current situation. Especially after listening to "Sea" (released in 2017), which explicitly describes how much they suffered as a group from a small company and how they were told they wouldn't make it.
    • In early 2016, BTS had a few days of leisure time, and posted occasional updates on social media of what they were doing. ARMYs joked that Suga hadn't posted anything, and wondered if he was spending the break asleep. However, after a few days, Suga tweeted this. Yeah, instead of using the break to rest, Suga went back to the Kobe concert venue in order to sort out his thoughts and come to terms with the guilt he felt from not being able to perform. Not exactly a happy vacation.
    • V confessed, at a fanmeeting, that his grandmother, who had taken care of him for many years when he was young, had passed away while he was performing overseas in Manila. The footage of those performances have comments filled with condolences.
    • Anything from 2015 to late 2016, knowing that the members did suffer from the criticisms and accusations of plagiarism and sajaegi (digital chart manipulation) they kept receiving during those years. The highly emotional HYYH ON STAGE: EPILOGUE concerts, in particular, can get soured by the knowledge that they were immediately followed by the "plagiarism boys" hashtag incident (it trended #1 on Korea during and after the concerts). Indeed, a VCR from the final concerts of the WINGS Tour confirmed that yes, the members saw all of that.
    • FACE YOURSELF (particularly "Let Go", though whether there's an actual connection is dubious as it wasn't written by the members, being a Japanese song), parts of the 2018 BTS Festa and possibly anything from early 2018 can become either this or Heartwarming in Hindsight, after the members revealed at their 2018 MAMAs Artist of the Year Award speech that they struggled a lot emotionally at the beginning of the year under the overwhelming pressure to continue giving flawless performances after their international achievements in 2017, to the point that they talked about disbanding.
    • SUGA's verse in "Spring Day" hits even harder after the release of D-2's final track "Dear my friend", where SUGA details the story of a real long-lasting friendship that ended due to imprisonment, and talks about how he still mourns it and wonders "what if" - with a verse being a Call-Back to his "Spring Day" lines.
    • "Outro: Tear" is already a heavy-hitting track about separation, but Break the Silence brings a whole new meaning to the song. Suga reveals that when the group were talking about disbandment in 2018, he had written "Outro: Tear" for the members about his feelings on the possibility, and they had all cried when he played it for them.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • It's Popular, Now It Sucks!: BTS' popularity and entrance to the international mainstream starting from 2015 has led increasingly more people (mainly Kpop fans outside of the fandom) to declare that the group has become "too big" - with some even saying they liked them better as underdogs - or that other groups are equally or more deserving of their success. It quickly reached the point that whenever a popular channel/Twitter account/anything makes a video or a post about BTS, it will invariably be bombarded with comments talking about BTS being overrated and/or asking people to check other ("better") Kpop groups (even though the reasons ARMYs like BTS and the reasons kpop fans like kpop are not the same).
  • LGBT Fanbase: While LGBT+ fans are far from rare for Kpop groups, the fact that BTS often makes comforting/empowering music about social issues with an underdog narrative, the support that members have expressed for the community and LGBTQ+ fans on several occasions examples , as well as their "androgynous, fluid style", it's not surprising that a sizable portion of the fanbase is part of the LGBTQ+ community.
    • An LGBT+ flag was seen on the concert in Paris with messages written on it, with the biggest one being "Thanks for showing us reasons to love ourselves".
    • Oddly enough, Jin and especially Suga are said to be really popular among LGBT+ fans, including lesbians. As this tweet theorizes:
      yoongi and seokjin have so many lesbian fans because yoongi is to lesbians what lady gaga is to gay men while seokjin is to lesbians what jeff goldblum is to also lesbians
      • A fan famously went to a BTS concert in 2018 holding a banner with the inscription "Lesbians (heart) Jin".
    • This article also mentions Suga (again), Jungkook and especially RM as popular among lesbian/queer female fans, both due to their aforementioned support towards the community and the group's lack of adherence to heteronormative standards in their appearance and behavior.
    • Every single member seems to get this to some degree in various sides of the community - from parts of Twitter proclaiming J-Hope as a bisexual icon, to the various memes portraying Jungkook theoretically stomping on homophobes and TERFs, to people appreciating Jimin and V's particularly flexible approach to gender presentation/performance.
    • There are plenty of songs with themes LGBT+ fans relate to. If this poll (with a sample of 1759 people) is to be believed, this includes the Most Beautiful Moment in Life series, the LOVE YOURSELF series, WINGS, and Jimin and V's solo/unit songs in general - with the top 3 in the poll being Jimin's "Lie" (from WINGS) at n. 3, Jimin and V's "Friends" at 2, and V's "Stigma" (also from WINGS) at n. 1, the latter winning by a landslide.
    • They're also notable for having a strong fanbase on the asexual/aromantic spectrum, due to speaking out and writing songs about types of love that aren't romantic, and with their LOVE YOURSELF series defying the common belief that a romantic relationship takes priority over everything else. The fact that RM has stated that there are many types of love and all are equally important certainly helped.
  • Memetic Badass:
    • Jin is a powerful chaotic deity who will do whatever he wants, unconcerned and unfettered by the forces of other members, BigHit, TV producers, or earthly beings in general. Except Jungkook's.
    • Roughly speaking, 1 in every 3 fanart pieces featuring Yoonji (the name of a crossdressing Yoongi on Run BTS!) will portray her with a lethal weapon.
    • Jungkook can absolutely defeat anyone on anything, including physical combat.
  • Memetic Mutation: They have their own page now.
  • Minority Show Ghetto: Being a Korean group that sings and raps in Korean, BTS' break in radio in the US and other countries has been made notoriously difficult due to a combination of this trope and Girl-Show Ghetto. With BTS constantly being framed as a "social media phenomenon" and/or a pre-teen fad, radios have been reluctant to play their songs, often outright ignoring requests or demanding thousands of retweets for a single play. Collective organized efforts had to be made to even get "DNA" and "Mic Drop" in US radio, but the reluctance has persisted - even after the singles "FAKE LOVE" and "Boy With Luv" charted in the Hot100 Top 10 and every album and EP from LOVE YOURSELF: Tear onwardsnote  charted on Billboard 200 at #1.
  • Misaimed Fandom: "House of Cards" and "Singularity" have gained some reputation as "sexy" songs (down to apparently appearing in a "sex songs" playlist on Spotify). Both, however, have decidedly unsexy lyrics: "House of Cards" talks about a Destructive Romance where the parts delude themselves into maintaining it even though its end is imminent, while "Singularity" talks about trying to keep a loved person happy through a Stepford Smiler façade and going through a Loss of Identity.
    • There's a ridiculously large amount of people and media pieces that treat BTS as a boyband whose music is senseless noise and entirely manufactured from an assembly line, when a simple look at their music and lyrics show they're anything but.
    • Songs like "HOME" (which is about BTS and their fans) or even "Spring Day" (about loss of a loved one, especially a friend) are sometimes wrongly referred to as romantic songs - yes, even with the line "You know it all, you're my best friend" in the latter.
    • Other songs like "My Time" (about longing for a normal life and being unable to stop time) have been misinterpreted as being directed towards a lover, in spite of the meanings of the songs having been explained.
    • There's a Vocal Minority of "fans" who twist or selectively pick moments where a specific membernote  has expressed slight disagreements or has been supposedly "disrespected" or "mistreated" by the company or other members (which are either incidents that can be argued as minor mishaps - as it's natural in a company -, decisions the members made themselves, problems that are not problems anymore since they have been fixed over the years, such as line distribution, or are simply out of contextnote ), and pressure other fans into agreeing that said member is being mistreated by accusing them of "not caring enough" about said member if they don't; the more extreme onesnote  insist that their preferred member isn't being allowed to release solo work and that they should go solo and leave the company; all of this while ignoring the members' actual (recent) statements about those subjects and about how much they enjoy working under the company and with each other - and how some members have only recently started to work more seriously in solo projects and have expressed not feeling confident enough about their work to release a full project soon.
      • Some of these people also tend to aggressively blame BigHit and BangPD for things they had no responsibility for, or for not acting on some issue only for BigHit to reveal they were working on it quietly behind the scenes for various reasons.
      • This vocal minority also has the tendency to claim the fandom doesn't care about a specific member (again, this kind of minority exists for every single member), guilt-tripping and demotivating fans in the process, and to target big Twitter accounts that actually contribute to the fandom and fandom projects (translators, accounts that promote voting or organizing, etc.), make "expose" threads with selective, out of context information, and harass them and the people who follow them. It doesn't help that the projects they tend to guilt trip the fandom into participating in are often things that create unnecessary competition between different members and, all things considered, don't matter in the long runnote , making it all wasted energy.
  • Most Wonderful Sound: Just to name a few:
    • Any time one of the vocalists opens his mouth to sing. The exclusively-vocal tracks "The Truth Untold" and "House of Cards" are notable examples of the vocal line at their finest.
    • Any time one of the rappers opens his mouth to rap. Also, they may pretend to be bad at singing, but in actuality, they've got some pretty good vocal chops. Take RM's low, soothing vocals in his mono. playlist, SUGA's vocals in "Trivia: Seesaw", and any live performance of "Spring Day" where j-hope sings the beginning verses.
    • V's impressive falsetto in "Stigma."
    • The catchy-as-all-hell saxophone riffs in "Dope" and "IDOL."
    • This may vary between fans, but the opening to any fan-favorite song counts.
  • Narm:
    • The commercial they did for LG was okay enough... until an unexpected English dub version appeared. The less than enthusiastic voice acting ("My eyes. It's so bright.") and the fact that the English actors kinda, but not quite sound like them made the dubbed version the butt of jokes from fans.
    English!J-Hope: (animatedly gesturing so the others come over)
    English!J-Hope: (monotone) Guys.
    • The Gratuitous English in their songs isn't always the best, either.
    • Some of their videos have questionable special effects, like the CGI heads and obvious Chromo Key in "IDOL". Though this could be deliberate.
  • Nightmare Fuel:
    • The concept images for the "S" version and the "E" version of LOVE YOURSELF: Answer are pretty unsettling. The former has the members in narrow rooms, surrounded by cameras, hands, or eyes coming from the walls, creating a claustrophobic atmosphere heavy on Paranoia Fuel. The "E" version has each one of the members inside a small bubble containing pretty flowers in what (judging by the members' poses) is clearly a Gilded Cage to a big, empty exterior; if you look closely, you'll see that the flowers in Jungkook's bubble are dead. The group picture in the "E" version shows the members inside a closet like dolls, tied to the cupboards.
      • Interpretations of the images as representations of how the members feel in their lives as idols - as well as the similarities between the "E" version in Answer and the "O" version in LOVE YOURSELF: Her- add a heavy dose of Fridge Horror.
      • Version 1 of MAP OF THE SOUL: 7 (see the BTS page image) shows the members in what looks like an old house, standing around a huge hole that leads to nothing but pure darkness. It can be unsettling in a Nothing Is Scarier sort of way.
    • "Interlude: Shadow" is already a gloomy song, but the music video filled with hooded figures massing up to chase around SUGA in enclosed spaces and the Last Note Nightmare cement it as this.
    • "UGH!" goes even further with the aggression. Each member sounds pretty damn angry and the beat is very loud and choppy, occasionally chopped up by clips of screaming or gunfire.
    • j-hope's music videos for his mixtape Jack in The Box certainly turn up the scare factor. The music video for ''MORE'' ha a lot of psychological horror, with j-hope walking around through rooms that feature people constantly—and maybe eternally—stuck working forever because time is frozen there, a room where he sees himself undergoing psychosis, and a room for him to just smash stuff. The twist at the end reveals that what was in the box was all of those rooms.
  • Periphery Demographic: Though the group's music was (at least initially) mostly aimed at people in their teens and 20s, the fandom is very diverse, with fans of all ages and genders resonating with their lyrics - reader statistics for articles about BTS on Naver often shows a majority of readers in their 30s and 40s (which, for other idol groups, typically would be teenagers by far), not to mention the attention BTS has gotten from critics, producers and celebrities like John Cena (a very vocal fan of the group).
  • The Producer Thinks of Everything: BTS and BigHit have been able to include Foreshadowing for album concepts/themes/songs and even story elements from the BTS Universe in their music, music videos, concept images, photoshoots, interviews, concerts, award show performances and speeches, commercials, selfies, etc., sometimes years in advance; an example of their long-term thinking is their reveal that the LOVE YOURSELF series - which was officially announced in the second half of 2017 and continued through 2018 - was planned since March 2016, even before the end of the The Most Beautiful Moment in Life era. It has come to the point that fans have become suspicious of anything that could be a clue to the point of paranoia.
  • Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: While not hated, "So What" wasn't as loved as other songs (and considered the only, or one of the only skips) from LOVE YOURSELF: Tear upon release, due to being perceived by many as a too-long So Okay, It's Average song set near the end of an album full of riskier, more experimental tracks, coming right before fan-favorite "Outro: Tear". The song has become much more beloved since it was performed on stage in the LOVE YOURSELF Tour, being one of the songs where the members just go goofing around and having fun on stage and bringing some of the most memorable moments of the tour. The fact that other EDM or electro-dance songs (particularly from LOVE YOURSELF: Her) have become Vindicated by History has also likely helped.
  • Ship-to-Ship Combat: There are sectors of the shipping community within the fandom that are notoriously toxic and are generally looked down upon by the rest of ARMY (by contrast, most of the shipping community don't actually take ships seriously, for starters). Many people who like the music but don't give a damn about the entire Yaoi Fangirl perception of the relationships between the members have been attacked on social media by a Vocal Minority (with significant overlap with the similarly small-but-vocal solo stan sectors described under Misaimed Fandom above) who accuse them of being "homophobic" for not supporting their specific ship, even though this is usually not the case and some are even part of the LGBT community. And of course, the less said about the infighting between various of those shipping groups, the better.
  • Shocking Moments:
    • Incredibly high in BTS' music videos, either due to story (from the BTS Universe), the increasing rate of Visual Effects of Awesome, or both. Particular videos where this can happen are "I NEED U (Original version)", "Dope", the WINGS teasers, "Blood, Sweat and Tears", "Not Today", "Mic Drop (Steve Aoki remix)" and "Fake Love".
    • BTS' live performances at Korean award shows and year-end shows are also full of this. Some examples:
      • 2016 Mnet Asian Music Awards (MAMAs): Jungkook hovering mid-air, Jimin dancing blindfolded in synchro with J-Hope to "Intro: Boy Meets Evil", and V's wing scars.
      • 2017 MAMAs: The Visual Effects of Awesome intro, followed by a non-stop, highly demanding 15-minute performance (including an extended version of "Mic Drop" at the very end).
      • The transition from "DNA" to "Not Today" (with great use of camera angles) in the 2017 year-end SBS show.
      • 2017 KBS year-end show: The 20-minute "ALL. LIVE. BAND." performance. Including a short choreography nostalgia-trip, performances of side-tracks from WINGS, and most notably, a rock version of "DNA", and a grand finale with "Not Today".
      • 2018 Melon Music Awards: The members replicating the "E" version concept picture from LOVE YOURSELF: Answer with a seamless transition to "Fake Love", plus the jaw-dropping dance performance by J-Hope, Jimin and Jungkook performance of traditional Korean dances followed by a version of "IDOL" with traditional Korean instruments.
  • Tear Jerker: See here.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: BTS' experimentation with their sound, which has changed from mostly Hip-Hop and R&B to also include other genres such as moombathon, EDM and Latin pop, has inevitably gathered this kind of reactions in some circles, especially regarding the LOVE YOURSELF series. That said, there's a particularly strange kind of criticism directed at the aforementioned series, which is that BTS now is "too Western" or "not Kpop enough" note .
  • Visual Effects of Awesome: Aside from their music and choreography, BTS are notorious for their music videos, which have often and increasingly (as their budget becomes higher and higher) fallen into this.
    • The videos featured in the BTS Universe have particularly become very visually impressive throughout the years. See the BU YMMV page for examples.
    • "Dope" features an Epic Tracking Shot (disguised as The Oner) that quickly and almost seamlessly transitions between different shots of the fast-paced choreography, with various costume-changes in between. Some people have been surprised to learn that RM was filmed using a green-screen for his verse.
    • "Spring Day" is a gorgeous video, using slow motion, low shutter speed, sets, Scenery Porn and saturated colors for a poetic, emotional effect.
    • "Not Today" has a much more epic feel, with an Epic Tracking Shot at the beginning, wide-shots showing off the larger-scale choreography and the Scenery Porn, a set in the featuring a huge triangular block of ice (or mirror), and, again, slow motion.
    • "Mic Drop (Steve Aoki Remix)" makes full use of the choreography with a dynamic use of wide-shots, close-ups, and camera movement while adding just the right effects, featuring powerful visuals such as an enormous holographic version of Steve Aoki looming over the group dancing, or a dark room exploding in slow motion (backup dancers Jimin and Jungkook included) right behind Suga during his verse. The biggest example, however, is the shot where an explosion goes off in the background... in sync with the music and choreography. And it's not CGI; they really filmed it that way!
    • "ON" (the Official Music Video version) is co-produced by FREENJOY (the team behind music videos such as Kendrick Lamar's "Humble", Beyoncé's "Formation" and Ariana Grande's "No Tears Left To Cry"), and it shows. It features the members in a post-apocalyptic medieval setting, complete with scenes reminiscent of The Lord of The Rings and Game of Thrones with added biblical reference, including a war aftermath, cults, an ark, instances of Scenery Porn, lava falling from volcanoes, etc.

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