In the previous episode of Queendom 2, the results of the cover round were announced. Hyolyn received a perfect score, and LOONA dug themselves out of the basement to place second.
WJSN landed in third, VIVIZ in fourth and Kep1er and Brave Girls in fifth and sixth, respectively.
Episode five started with each team celebrating or reflecting on their placements. WJSN and Brave Girls, in particular, were not pleased with the results. WJSN’s reason was seeing the reaction to changing GFRIEND’s song, and Brave Girls were left wondering what they could have done to rank last.
With the good (or bad) news out of the way, it was time to move on to round 3: the two-part Position Unit Battle and Fantastic Queendom (f.k.a. Fandora’s Box). I am not a fan of the re-naming of the latter. It sounds too drag queen contest-like to me.
Anyway, the rules for part one are that three units for vocal and dance will be formed, and up to 5000 points (2500 for vocal, 2500 for dance) can be earned.
There are no limits to the number of members who can participate and their chosen positions. Members can participate in both vocal and dance units as well. Hyolyn, as the only soloist, can be superwoman, and it’s obvious she’s going to do both.
Part two will have each team perform a song chosen by their fans. The points awarded for this performance are 15,000.
So the total number of points available for this round is 20,000. That could mean a big turnaround if a team wins the unit battle and fan song choice.
The remainder of episode five is A LOT of filler. Since this is the team building, group bonding, and BBQ portion of the program, there isn’t a lot of exciting stuff to go over other than the formation of the vocal and dance units.
First to be shown were the dancers. Hyolyn showed up first, followed by:
VIVIZ – SinB & Umji
Kep1er – Dayeon, Xiaoting & Hikaru
Brave Girls – Eunji
LOONA – Olivia Hye, Yves, Heejin & Choerry
WJSN – Yeoreum & Eunseo
Those in the dance units don’t have the freedom to choose any song. Instead, they are given a choice of three original songs that are choreographed in different styles.
KA-BOOM! is a song with a hip and playful vibe. On the other hand, greedy is a mid-tempo song with slow, sexy and flowy movements. Lastly, Purr is straight-up Hip-Hop with aggressive moves to match.
The order of song selection allowed the lower-ranked teams to choose first. However, if a higher-ranked team chooses the same song, they are kicked out and have to find the next available spot to fill.
LOONA went first and chose Purr with the hopes of working with Kep1er since they share similar qualities when it comes to dancing. It looked like that dream would be a reality, but VIVIZ booted them. So they went to KA-BOOM as a second choice. But they were again dismissed by Hyolyn.
Eunji chose Greedy, the song no one wanted for fear of getting kicked out of the more popular songs. So she sat alone in a secluded area until LOONA came trudging up the hill to greet her, having no other songs to choose.
The final dance units are:
WJSN & Hyolyn – KA-BOOM!
Kep1er & VIVIZ – Purr
Brave Girls & LOONA – Greedy
In the room for the vocalists, Eunha was sitting alone, waiting for everyone else to show up. She was followed by:
Kep1er – Chaehyun & Youngeun
Brave Girls – Minyoung
LOONA – Kim Lip, Jinsoul, Chuu & Haseul
WJSN – Soobin & Yeonjung
The last to arrive was Hyolyn, who everyone in the room speculated would be in both units.
The vocalists can choose any song they like. Their “hope songs” and their reasoning behind them help the others determine who will end up in each pairing.
Like the dance unit selection, LOONA was the first to go and wait for someone to choose them. Their hope choice was Eunha, but she had other plans and went into another room. Kep1er was their second priority, and they had no intention of letting them go once they entered the room.
Before heading up, Minyoung made a grand appeal to Hyolyn. She sat nervously in her room, praying that her begging would pay off. And it did as Hyolyn was specifically seeking her out. It was with some competition, though, as WJSN tried to bribe Hyolyn with cat-related merchandise.
Poor Eunha, who got the evil edit at the end of episode four, was left hanging by both Hyolyn and WJSN. (The two teams she wanted to be paired with) She was so cute asking people to stay. However, WJSN failed to pry Hyolyn from Minyoung’s grasp, so they returned to Eunha.
With all the teams set, the show focused on the vocal units figuring out their group names and what song they wanted to perform and practice.
Every team had a solid piece decided except for Eunha and WJSN, who picked Across The Universe as their interim check song leaving their actual choice to be revealed on performance day.
The members who were not participating in the units were tasked with preparing the feast for later in the evening. It wasn’t like Queendom 1, where they cooked the food, nor was there a Don Spike appearance for grilling meat. So it was difficult to determine if this was a banquet lovingly cooked by idols.
Instead, they set up decorations, set the tables and served food.
This was the bonding portion of the program, with all the teams sharing good times over a hearty meal. My favourite part was Brave Girls getting that meat. Get that meat, ladies.
After the dinner ended, everyone gathered for the interim check. The vocalists were first to be featured.
The team of The Milky Way That Embraced The Universe (VIVIZ + WJSN) was called up to perform. As they said, they sang Across The Universe. They sounded pretty good the first time singing together. However, it makes me curious about what their actual song will be.
Team number two was Sun and Moon (Kep1er + LOONA). They gave a short preview of Don’t Go showing off their harmonizing. Based on this quick look, this could be something special with some polishing.
The final team was 33 (Brave Girls + Hyolyn), who sang To My Youth. Minyoung was still feeling the after-effects of COVID and was also lacking confidence.
That showed a little bit when she stumbled on some of her lines. But if there’s anything that these types of shows teach, this will probably be something memorable come game time.
When the vocal units finished, everyone voted for who they were most excited to see. The winner of this mid-evaluation gets the right to pick the performance order. But, of course, that wasn’t shown; gotta leave the viewers hanging for the next episode.
Episode five ended with a preview of the progress of the dance units as they meet their choreographers and get tortured, I mean trained to dance.
Lastly, there is a small glimpse of the stages of The Milky Way That Embraced The Universe and 33.
