The decline of ITZY made many fans feel confused.
ITZY, once the leading girl group of the fourth generation, is progressively losing its goodwill. ITZY made two comebacks in 2022, but none was as successful as anticipated. Even compared to their ‘younger sister group’, NMIXX, the group’s track record isn’t as impressive. What happened?
Once a leading Gen 4 girl group
ITZY, the first JYP girl group in the girlcrush style, made their debut in February 2019 and swiftly had their first hit, “Dalla Dalla.” Dalla Dalla is the song with the highest digital score among Kpop girl group songs in 2019.
Following their first success, ITZY released Wannabe in March 2020, establishing itself as a monster rookie right away. It took Wannabe just over 5 days to collect 50 million views, setting a record for a rookie group. The song’s message of self-love and Ryujin’s shoulder dance were well received. 2019 became ITZY’s successful debut year. It can be argued that ITZY was the leading girl group of the new generation when they made their debut.
Now in crisis
Following Wannabe, ITZY’s series of products, including In the Morning, LOCO, and Not Shy, cannot be regarded as the generation’s most notable songs. ITZY began to show signs of slowing down in the middle of 2021. The JYP female group was forced to hand over the top spot to aespa.
2022 can be named “the year of girl groups”, seeing that not only female “monster rookies” debuted this year, but artists from the 2nd and 3rd generations also make grand comebacks. Amid such a glorious period for female artists, however, ITZY received little attention despite being active. In July 2022, they released the album “Checkmate” with the title song “Sneakers”, which took a long time to make it high on music charts, before dropping again. In fact, the song soon lost out to other girl groups, and also did worse compared to ITZY’s old songs
Recently, ITZY made their comeback with “Chesire”, but the song has been largely overshadowed by the ongoing stream of award ceremonies. If “Sneakers” still got its peak moments in the music charts, then “Chesire” did even worse, even on Spotify – the music platform where ITZY normally does well. On YouTube, the “Chesire” MV only recorded 6.6 million views within the first day, which is not a bad number, but is a huge fall for ITZY, which has always been known for high YouTube views.
The cause
Over time, long-term fans of JYP Entertainment start to realize that JYP does a bad job at maintaining its group in the long run. For ITZY, their MV, concept, choreography, and even music is starting to receive less care and investment from JYP, especially when the company is focusing on its new girl group NMIXX. With the competition amid 4 gen idols growing more and more heated every day, such lack of care is extremely detrimental, and if continues, will harm ITZY’s career in the long run. In addition, ITZY has debuted for a long time, and against rookie artists, they need a “refresh” in image and better strategy, so that the public will not grow “bored”, thinking that the group has used up all their cards.
There is little difference to be seen in the concept between ITZY’s recent comebacks, with similar “chic” teasers”, similar “girl crush” clothes, and even similar “boxed MV”. In addition, ITZY has not managed to release new title songs with impact as huge as “Wannabe” or “Dalla Dalla”, and against IVE’s “Love Dive”, (G)-IDLE’s “Nxde”, NewJeans’ “Attention” and “Hype Boy”, and LE SSERAFIM’s “Antifragile”, leading to the public not appreciating the production quality of the rest of their music.
In addition, JYP severely limits individual promotions and individual growth of each ITZY member. For example, other girl groups would send different members to attend events and TV programs to gain attention, but JYP only catered to group activities, making it impossible to see each member in their own light. If JYP is not changing its way in the future, either in the music, concept, strategy, or promotion, ITZY will be having a tough time surviving in the 4th gen battle, despite their remarkable start.
Source: k14
