First Impression Review and Thoughts: TV5’s “Be the Next: 9 Dreamers”

It may not be Produce 101 Philippines, but TV5 has finally premiered their similarly premised Be the Next: 9 Dreamers. I was looking forward to checking out. And… well, I’ve got a couple of thoughts. So let’s go down the list here.

The Premise
Since I first put together my Produce 101 Philippines pitch in 2019 and then finally dove into P-pop in 2022, I’ve been hoping for an audition/survival program that would find the next big pop sensation. But this time, one that was all-Filipino. Audition programs had been hugely popular in Korea, Japan, and China. And the winning groups have gone on to become global stars. So why not give that winning formula a Filipino try?

I thought TV5 and Cornerstone’s Top Class was going to be that show. But while it was a solid production, the eventual winning group has gone through an unfairly tumultuous time. And the remnants of that winning group, the talented ECLYPSE, have just announced that they’ve separated from their current management.

ABS-CBN’s Dream Maker, meanwhile, was more in the vein of its Korean predecessors. But the winning group is essentially a K-pop group with Filipino members, rather than a purely P-pop group. If that makes sense. That’s not a knock on HORI7ON at all. They are very talented and have done a good job so far both in Korea and in their various activities in the Philippines. But they’re not necessarily releasing Filipino music like a JO1 or INI of Produce 101 Japan releases Japanese music.

Be the Next: 9 Dreamers, also produced by MLD Entertainment, is essentially a second season of Dream Maker. Again, trying to find a K-pop group featuring mostly non-Korean members.

That’s fine. And it’s absolutely awesome to be able to provide a platform for talented Filipinos (and in this case, talented young guys from other countries as well). But I still wish there were a Produce 101-type show that would help elevate P-pop in the way other survival shows have done to their respective pop music scenes.

Lack of Promotion, Focus, and Accessibility
This seems to be a common occurrence with TV5. Almost no buzz for the series ahead of its premiere. Despite its pretty solid line-up of Korean mentors, including having Sandara Park as its host.

There has been no hype for the show itself or its contestants. The 75 hopefuls were introduced by TV5 posting their photos in an album and a brand-new Twitter account posting the photos just days before the series premiere. No bios. No self-introduction videos. Just name, birthday, country. And that’s it. And again, all this posted just days before the premiere with zero fanfare.

I think TV5’s Popinoy had more pre-show hype than this has been given. And that says a lot.

But aside from TV5’s inability to properly promote its original, homegrown programs (this dates all the way back to The Amazing Race Philippines, to be honest), this show seems to have a lack of focus. Or at least has had a bit of confusion, which certainly doesn’t help it.

Originally, the show was called Be the Next: 99 Dreamers. I assume hoping to have gotten 99 finalists similar to the aforementioned survival program which would usually have 101, barring any last-minute withdrawals.

Even in the weeks leading up to the premiere, TV5 still referred to the show with “99” at times. So did they mean to have 99 contestants but only found 75? Or was it supposed to be “9 Dreamers” all along, which then calls into question why the discrepancy in the first place?

Now, that’s a nitpick since the title, now that it has premiered, is set.

A more pressing issue is the fact that the show is inaccessible outside of the Philippines. Unless you’re finding other, roundabout ways to watch the show. Which means I, being a Filipino-American in the US, have to do just to be able to see any clips of the show, let alone the full episodes.

TV5 has been quite stingy with making its homegrown, original content available outside of the Philippines. Really for inexplicable reasons. But for a show like this, it’s even more perplexing. Wouldn’t they want the show to draw in international K-pop fans? Especially for the eventual winning group? Really makes no sense.

Shaky Start
Perhaps it might be for the better. Because the series has had a bit of a shaky start. Especially its premiere episode. Thankfully, the show has steadily improved across its four episodes/two weeks so far. But not before the show’s perceived subpar production has made headlines on K-pop blogs already.

The premiere episode was, to be blunt, kind of a mess. Poor graphics. Uninspiring title card. Choppy editing. Barely legible and inexplicably Tagalog subtitles. Tedious comments from the host and mentor-judges. Really giving off the vibes of a production that wasn’t ready for the world stage.

And the contestants? We’ll get to that in a bit.

The second episode was a tiny bit better in terms of editing, but still nowhere near the kind of production that perhaps K-pop fans and regular audiences of survival shows are used to.

Thankfully with the second week episodes 3 and 4, there was a marked improvement. The on-screen graphics looked like they were not made in 2001. The editing and flow of the performances were smoother. We actually heard from some of the contestants themselves. Straightforward English subtitles instead of subtitles using the deepest and most proper Tagalog you’ve ever read. Sandara was a bit more relaxed as host. And we actually heard a bit more from the mentor-judges.

But about that. It was a bit head-scratching trying to reconcile the mentor-judges comments with the actual scores the contestants would end up receiving. Critical comments=higher scores. Praise=low scores. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason for the scores the contestants received.

Now that the level test round is over, we don’t have to worry about the comments-scores disconnect. That is, until we reach the next shuffling of ranks or elimination rounds next. But we’ll see.

The fact that the show seems to have taken the criticisms and responded to them is a good sign. But you still have to wonder why the show wasn’t as clean and smooth as it could have been from the start.

That said, I appreciate the episodes being of reasonable length. (Thank you Philippine TV norms!) Because the 2-3 hour episodes of the Korean or Japanese shows have been the barrier for me to ever truly get into those survival shows. Or at least, get me to actually finish them all the way through.

The 99 75 Contestants
I admire the contestants. Every single one of them absolutely has more talent and confidence than I ever wish I could, that’s for sure. So I applaud them for not just getting up on that stage and performing, but even just auditioning. It’s already a worthy accomplishment to have made it this far.

That said, many of the contestants are certainly a bit more raw than you might expect. But of course you can’t expect to find the “9 Dreamers” immediately after one performance. They have a lot of training and workshops to get through yet. And that’s just during this program. Even more of course after they eventually win.

But in addition to the choppy editing the show did when presenting the performances, it was a bit rough trying to appreciate the contestants’ efforts. And it’s hard to even connect with any of the contestants when you don’t even hear them aside from their live vocals during the performance. (Which, admittedly haven’t always been that strong or solid.)

Again, this is only the first round of the competition. So no one is going to be perfect. But when the rest of the show is on shaky ground, the contestants’ performances leaving a bit to be desired will only be amplified and critiqued even more than they might otherwise deserve to be.

As an aside, being a fan of Kingdom, I was pleasantly surprised to see Yuseong/Ivan and Yunho/Arthur.

Overall
My humble suggestions to TV5 and MLD Entertainment:
-Make the episodes available worldwide, unrestricted.
-Establish a social media presence. Post clips onto TikTok and Twitter and Facebook and YouTube. Unblocked. Unrestricted.
-Build up the hype. Use social media to share content, especially about each contestant.
-Continue to work on the rough edges. Keep smoothing over the rough parts. Make it a show (production-wise, visually) worthy of being on the same level as other popular survival programs.
-Introduce the contestants more. Let the viewers and potential fans see their personalities.
-More opportunities to showcase their talents, both on and off the show.

And for now, that’s it from me I guess. I’m certainly going to continue watching the show. Again, the episode lengths definitely help. But I also want to see the show and eventual group succeed of course. Hoping the show continues its upward trajectory after these first two weeks.