“Feels like 20 years ago” netizens were cold
Repeated criticism of reliance on star comebacks·specials
Also noted is the loss of capacity to develop original formats
Precedent: Hong Kim Dong-jeon canceled with ratings in the 1% range
Broadcaster Lee Hwi-jae deep in thought. Photo by Lee Sun-myung 57km@kyunghyang.com
“Sir, please sort it out.”
This was what waiting-room MC Kim Jun-hyun said to Lee Hwi-jae on the April 4 broadcast of the KBS2 program ‘Immortal Songs’. At that, Lee took the MC seat, and the production added a caption reading ‘Lee Hwi-jae sitting in the MC seat for the first time in four years’. Lee set the tone by saying, “Three claps, start,” and the cast responded, “This is where he belongs. Clean.”
The reaction from viewers was different. The scene was circulated on online communities as “a scene that shows the downfall of network variety shows.” Comments such as “Blatant,” “Feels like 20 years ago,” and “Since KBS is known for making the most old-fashioned variety, doing that makes it look even cheaper,” received hundreds of recommendations.
It was the ‘Immortal Songs’ production team that gave Lee Hwi-jae, who had disappeared from broadcasts for years, a chance to return. Right after the broadcast, Lee said, “I anticipated the response to my return, and the production team gave me strong support.”
On the April 4 broadcast, broadcaster Lee Hwi-jae displayed MC hosting skills for the first time in about four years. KBS broadcast screen
The ratings were unsparing. Based on Nielsen Korea nationwide households, the March 28 episode featuring Lee recorded 4.8%, and the April 4 episode recorded 4.7%. Compared with 6.8% for the Lim Young-woong special and 6.4% for the Seol Woon-do special, the buzz effect of bringing Lee back did not appear in the numbers.
The planning slump in the KBS variety division has been a cumulative trend. At KBS2, ‘Hong Kim Dong-jeon’, which was canceled in 2024, never broke out of the 1% range during its entire run. At the time, the head of the KBS Entertainment Center countered, “Low ratings are a channel issue, not a program issue,” but that claim lost force as newly scheduled variety shows subsequently struggled one after another.
Reactions that drew strong agreement on online communities, such as “Are the producers in iron rice bowls?” and “Since young people do not watch TV anyway, they tailored it to the main customer base,” read as direct criticism of an approach that leans on star comebacks or special programming.
Commentary is emerging that it has now become awkward even to ask when KBS last succeeded, through in-house planning, in creating a new format that attracted young viewers.
