MMA 2022 startled for a sea of empty seats, fans were nostalgic of the golden days of the award show 

Netizens argued the small crowds resulted from the lack of famous third-generation idols. 

The Melon Music Awards (MMA) 2022 officially took place in Gocheok Sky Dome in Seoul, Korea on the 26th November, attracting attention of the wider K-pop community. The award show gathered a stellar lineup including famous artists such as NewJeans, (G)I-DLE, IVE, Lim Young Woong and many more. However, many viewers appeared to be mournful for the empty seats for third-generation idols. 

A photo was passed around on social media where the MMA2022 had many seats left empty, despite its status as a top award show in Korea. The photo was said to have been taken 20 minutes prior to the ceremony, which indicated a major fall in popularity compared to the previous years. 

Despite the arguments about shooting angle, attendees at the award show confirmed that the event had a lot of empty spaces. Many speculated it was the lack of big names that led to the scarce crowd at the event. Moreover, the lineup failed to gather groups with big fan bases such as BTS, BLACKPINK, EXO, SEVENTEEN, TWICE and NCT that subsequently affected the hype of the award. 

The situation became the talk of the town on social media where netizens lamented over a top award show in Korea. Some of the comments were: 

• This is why year-end award shows must invite groups such as BTS, SEVENTEEN, NCT… 
• So reminiscent of MMA’s golden days! EXO, BTS, TWICE, Red Velvet, BLACKPINK… all attended the award. It was like a real festival with fandom filling the seats. 
• Fourth generation groups were all newly introduced groups that have not a stable fanbase with few big names enough to fill the seats. 

Source: Pann