Thursday, June 23, 2016

Show Me The Money 5 Half-way Review

I planned to do a full review, but there is a lot to talk about and I probably won't be able to fit everything in one whole post. I'm no expert on rapping, but I love watching Show Me The Money because it's entertaining, mainly because of the producers. But all in all, I just find it really fascinating because I can't rap or sing myself. Thus, I don't think I'm in any position to criticize any rappers on the show because I can't do any better.

Before I even get into anything, I just want to address Mnet's "evil editing". As viewers, I feel like we actually don't understand the evil editing all that well because we aren't the victims of it. It's only after contestants or producers address it that we actually know what is going on. But, I guess we can see a bit of the evil editing, especially after watching the teaser for episode 5. I thought that C Jamm and BewhY were going against each other, but it was just the editing that made it seem like that. In fact (this is no spoiler), they didn't at all. C Jamm and BewhY knows that they should go against each other in the finals and not so early in the game. And sometimes the editing just makes the show go so slowly because of the false cliffhangers and it does get frustrating when things are shown a certain way when it's really not the case. I think the most frustrating thing for me is the censorship. I understand that it's because kids watch the show, so they're not allowed to have tattoos and curse on TV, but just blocking out words and bleeping them is just so annoying to me.

So to start with the producers, my favorite producers are obviously the AOMG and Illionaire team. These two are my favorite hip hop labels and I've been following them for a very long time because I just like the music they produce. Gray is an awesome producer and he is so handsome to the point I started followed him on social media (aka Instagram and Snapchat) and I can't stop looking through his pictures. I also really like Simon D because he has a really attractive deep voice. Dok2 and The Quiett are also really awesome producers and they produce the best songs (who could ever beat YGGR?). I love The Quiett's voice because it sounds like he has honey in his throat all the time. I find it funny that Dok2 wears a snap back all the time and Zion.T always wears sunglasses. I'm not criticizing them or anything; everyone has their own distinct style and that's what I like the most about them.

The thing is with SMTM is that everything really depends on the producers. Last season, the producers were intolerant to making mistakes. This time, they were more forgiving and a lot of people passed even  though they had made mistakes. I think the main reason is because Mad Clown is known to forget his lyrics and it would be a little hypocritical if they weren't so forgiving of mistakes. And just because they're producers doesn't mean they're better than everyone else. I feel like many participants are actually friends with the producers and many have worked on projects together. Some of the producers have been on the show themselves, like Swings, Mad Clown, Loco, which means that anyone could actually become producers. Also, in the last two seasons, Tablo always suggested having a revival round because the third round (where they do the 1v1) is pretty harsh since one of them has to be eliminated, no matter what. This season, the producers decided that they didn't want to have a revival round, so it's pretty much up to them how they want to run the show.

I probably won't talk much about the contestants since I want to save that for the full review. From the start, I have been looking forward to C Jamm, BewhY, Reddy, Jung Sangsoo, and Superbee. I liked Reddy because I really liked his song. C Jamm, BewhY, Superbee and Jung Sangsoo have been on SMTM before, though BewhY and Sangsoo never made it into the finals and Superbee was eliminated right before the performances. Honestly, I thought Superbee's elimination last season was the most unfair because the song really fit him and he was a really good rapper. However, Tablo chose Incredivle over him (for reasons explained in the article) and Superbee ended up dissing Tablo after he left SMTM. Also, Jung Sangsoo has been on the third and the fourth season (though he didn't show a very good image on the third), and now on the fifth. He'll probably come back every year at this rate (which is also his plan) and I think that's perfectly fine because he comes back better than before, year after year. I think C Jamm and BewhY are the producer favorites, as well as everyone's favorites because they have such great potential to win. Even the producers say that Bewhy and C Jamm are honestly here just to "play" since they don't need the money or the fame.

Since I decided to write a half way review so late in the game, I might as well talk about the teams. Just for reference, I just watched episode 5, but I do have an idea on what happened in episode 6. As you predict, I'm pro-AOMG and Illionaire, and I think they do have really good people. After watching the producer stage for YG team (Kush & Zion.T), I was really impressed and I really liked them. YG does have a solid team, and so does Illionaire. AOMG has good people, but I hope they don't favor one rapper over the others and just end up messing up their own team like last season (though on a second thought, that might also have been a result of evil editing). I'm not saying the Gil & Mad Clown team has bad people on their team; I'm just unfamiliar with them so I can't make good judgements. Since I'm no expert, and I can't predict the future, so I'll talk more about it in a few weeks!

In the meantime, I feel like I missed a lot of good releases because I never followed anyone on SMTM, until now. So here's C Jamm's recent release from last year. Peep at BewhY in the background (I had no idea that they were in the same crew and didn't even notice that BewhY was featured in C Jamm's performance on SMTM3) and all the references C Jamm makes. I do believe that some references refer to previous seasons of SMTM and how unfair it was because the many producers played favorites and politics (see above). Even when I watched the third season, I thought C Jamm was carried into semi-finals because he was under Swing's label, but all that is kind of blurry for me so I don't remember anymore. But yes, I do realize that after SMTM ends, many rappers sign onto their fellow producer's labels or just other labels, which may be one of the benefits that come with the fame that SMTM brings.

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