BTS, also known as Bangtan Boys, is a 7- member South Korean boy band formed in 2010, who debuted in 2013 under Big Hit Entertainment.
In 2017, BTS produced "Spring Day" for their You Never Walk Alone album and received numerous awards for its production, vocal delivery, and sentimental lyricism.
At first glance, the lyrics seem to simply be about longing, love, and friendship. Granted so, "Spring Day" holds a more sensitive and heavy allusion to the 2014 Sewol Ferry Tragedy in South Korea, especially within their music video.
Because BTS has become a very successful global boy-band within the past decade, their platform and the messages they convey through their music could have the potential to be progressive with respect to South Korea's current governmental system.
Usually, within K-Pop culture, most music videos contain a very synchronized choreography followed by interesting storylines and bold outfits to draw attention towards the members and their physical features/talents. With "Spring Day," however, the music video includes no choreography and the members are not very sexualized with respect to the roles they play. The lack of such foundational K-Pop factors within "Spring Day" suggest that maybe this specific song/music video could be about something tragic—something like the Sewol Ferry Tragedy in South Korea.
Sewol Ferry Tragedy Background:
On the morning of April 16, 2014, the Sewol Ferry, which was sailing from Incheon to Jeju, in South Korea sank due to overloading the ship, killing 304 of the 476 people on board, with more than 300 of them being students on a school field trip. Only the captain, Lee Joon-Seok, the crew, and 75 students survived.
This tragedy differs from others due to the intention of its beholders. The Ferry was more profitable through renovations that made the ship dangerous to load/unload. During the incident, however, Lee Joon-Seok ordered the students to remain where they were while he and the rest of the crew members evacuated immediately.
After the ship sank, there was little to no news coverage and families of the victims were left in the dark. To avoid ruining the captain's career, the media did not report the full truth. Families protested and mourned the death of their children until finally, Lee Joon-Seok was sentenced to life in prison for murdering over 300 people. Families started a "Yellow Ribbon" campaign to raise awareness for the injustices against their loved ones.
For more information on the full Sewol Ferry tragedy and the full documentary, click on the link below.
The lyrics of this song alone seem very cliche and repetitive—almost like any other song about love, friendship, and longing—but by watching this music video multiple times with the intention of finding something more meaningful that surely surpasses the basic themes of struggle, the subtle allusions to the Sewol Ferry Tragedy becomes more and more evident. Throughout the music video, each members' role serves to emphasize the different ways the survivors of the tragedy cope with the loss of their classmates—they each represent a different coping mechanism. These forms of mechanisms along with allusions to outside sources like Snowpiercer and The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas, etc. all serve to help the audience better understand the pain and suffering this Tragedy caused and how "brushing it under the rug," like the Korean government did, was beyond unjust.
In the very beginning of the music video, the first shown member, V, presents survivor's guilt (the idea of feeling guilty for being alive when your loved ones have passed) by placing his head on the tracks while the sound of the train inches closer followed by the first note of the song. When V places his head on the tracks, his face is surrounded by snow which serves to emphasize the contrast between the white color symbolizing innocence and the loss of innocence—that being, V attempting suicide. V's anesthetic facial expression layered with the the approaching sound of the train and the sustaining eye contact with the audience serves to emphasize his willingness to accept death in order to be rid of the heavy feeling of being alive when he shouldn't. By looking directly at the viewers, V forms a connection with the audience to suggest that we are also about to lose someone.
The other members, however, have a more brief introduction with respect to the coping mechanisms they display.
Jungkook, the second shown member, reminisces the loss of his classmates alone on a train with a "numbing" form of facial expression to emphasize that granted that the incident is over, but the empty feeling—the void within them that yearns for their fellow classmates—remains. Jungkook looking away from the audience into the distance (as opposed to V looking directly at us) creates a sense of disconnection with the viewers the same way he feels disconnected with his passed classmates.
Granted that the choice of thick, concealing clothes in this scene is overtly due to the winter setting, but it also serves to covertly emphasize wanting to hide and disappear from the world in order to be spared his pain.
Jimin, the third shown member, often goes back to the beach to reminisce the tragedy. The soft blue colors in this frame meshes the ocean with the sky and somewhat with Jimin's shirt to emphasize the effects of the trauma. The ocean and the sky are nearly the same color and out of focus, therefore it becomes difficult to see the line separating them, signifying that everyday after the tragedy is a blur. Jimin, however, remains in focus with his faded-away pink hair surrounded by the blue to emphasize that even though he survived, his innocence (the pinkness of his hair) was lost.
The first words of the song being "Miss you" also serves the visuals of Jimin going to the beach to reflect on the memories the ocean holds for him.
J-Hope and Suga having a conversation with each other under the "No Vacancy" sign serves to emphasize the sympathetic conversations survivors have with each other to get by.
The name of the hotel (Omelas), however, refers to a fictional town in the novel The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas. The story takes place in a utopian society in which the survival and happiness of the town relies on the suffering of one child. No one can talk to this child, for they should not form meaningful connections with them—the child should not have any possible silver linings.
This allusion serves to emphasize the notion that the prosperity of one means the suffering of another; the suffering of the friends and families of those who passed means the prosperity lying with those who choose to ignore this injustice and live on.
In the lyrics, RM mentions 'Snowpiercer,' referencing the 2013 film Snowpiercer by Korean director, Joon-ho Bong (the one who also directed the 2019 film, Parasite). This film takes place entirely on a train due to the outside world not being livable for humans, so all of humanity is living in a singular train that is divided by class—the rich/government live at the front of the train and treat those living in the tail of the train (regular people) inhumanely.
This reference serves to emphasize the roles of children and ordinary people in South Korea in which they must follow the orders given to them regardless of its morality—they must "know their place." With respect to the Sewol Ferry, the South Korean government handled the tragedy poorly and ordered the families and friends of those who passed to simply "get over it," go back to "their place," and quit being a nuisance—anyone failing to do so would face harsh consequences.
In Snowpiercer, one of the ordinary people decides to confront those at the front of the train and revolt against the injustice. In the clip above, RM is doing the same thing; he is seeking justice for his fellow classmates who were unjustly dismissed. The journey, however, is not easy and that is reflected within this next scene.
In the following scene, RM is shown to enter a room with the other members throwing food at him in a very whimsical manner—almost as though it is a mutual food fight amongst friends. His contrasting facial expression before everything is thrown at him serves to emphasize the obstacles in his way with respect to getting justice. This segment also alludes to a scene in Snowpiercer in which the main character—the rebel—goes to fight against the injustice and nearly everyone in the middle/front of the train beat him with objects to "go back to his place."
The lyrics within this scene also serve to emphasize the extremely difficult process of seeking and achieving such justice ("snowing down") to finally mourning peacefully, knowing the deaths of their fellow classmates did not go unnoticed ("days of spring").
Throughout the whole music video, there are countless, subtle references to the actual visual tragedy of the incident in which many could look through if not analyzed more closely. The level of meticulous imagery serves to enhance the audience's understanding of the pain and suffering that the survivors and the families of those who passed are going through. These snippets create the sentimentality within the music video that takes this masterpiece beyond the themes of love, friendship, and longing.
The Merry-Go-Round behind Jungkook represents the abandonment of childhood that later is covered with yellow ribbons symbolizing the Yellow Ribbon project honoring what's lost—lives of those passed and the innocence of the survivors.
In Jin's Stair scene, Jin is shown for the first time and represents those who've passed while also somewhat connecting this role to his own personal life. In previous interviews, Jin has specified that granted being the eldest member, the other members are better than him at their craft whereas he struggles to be "good" at his. Symbolically, however, this scene emphasizes the inability of the victims to experience life and progress up the stairs whereas those who survived will. The occasional glances the other members (the survivors) give at Jin from above as they go up the stairs signifies the future thoughts spent on their passed classmates as they learn to live on.
The laundry scene is a very meaningful one due to the amount of heavy symbolism conveyed through just a few seconds. In this scene, the sticker titled "Don't Forget" placed on the washing machine as it circulates the clothes inside serves to convey that the survivors will never forget their passed classmates: “Grownups are constantly telling us to forget and cheer up,” an 18-year-old boy who spoke for the survivors said, fighting back tears. “But we will remember and recollect our friends. Because not forgetting them is what we can do at best. Just as we will remember them, please don’t forget them” (article from Daily Mail). The lyrics within this scene also serve to emphasize the heavy longing survivors have for the victims with respect to their memory of them "[staying] there a little longer."
The circulating clothes behind the washing machine glass also symbolizes the clothes of those who did not survive the tragedy, therefore the "Don't Forget" sign creates a more dense meaning when placed on the outside of the glass by the survivors. Right after this scene, Jin (the one who represented the victims in the stair scene) is looking out at us, the living, from the circulating clothes' perspective.
This point of view alludes to the Sewol Ferry ship's windows in which the students were behind as they drowned. The students who died were very much aware of the situation and their fates (hence why they called/texted their loved ones and recorded their last coversations; refer back to the previous Sewol Ferry Tragedy documentary screenshots). Jin's facial expressions here serve to emphasize the visual acceptance and disappointment the students felt as the captain and the staff fled while they were left, or "stuck," to die.
Similar to RM's previous suitcase scene, the significance of the huge pile of clothes in these scene snippets symbolize the clothes and belongings of the victims. In Suga's scene, the pile of clothes are in the dark with him mourning alone. As the music video progresses, the rest of the members are sitting around with Suga with the pile above the clouds to signify the unification of those passed and the survivors with respect to carrying the souls of those who inhabited the clothes to a "higher place" together.
Granted that at first lyrical glance, "Spring Day" could seem cliche to some due to the overused theme of love, friendship, and longing, but looking closer at crafts created by artists like BTS can serve one's understanding of the genius and extremely meticulous details that went into creating such a masterpiece out of something so tragic. With the extremely broad platform that BTS has with respect to their diverse, global group of audience, it is important to utilize that platform to spread awareness of issues like this one, so the number of lives lost carelessly (almost "unworthy" of media coverage) in such tragedies don't perish meaninglessly.
The End.
P.S. Notice how the first slide is the bench alone, but the last slide is everyone sitting on that same bench; Spring Day came.