Mnet has announced a male version of their hit show, Girls Planet 999, titled Boys Planet, and the internet can’t get enough of the news!
MNet’s audition survival program Girls Planet 999 aired from August to October, with female participants from all over East Asia, specifically South Korea, China, and Japan. The contestants on the widely viewed show were competing for the ultimate prize - a chance to debut in an all-girl idol group, later announced as Kep1er.
Hosted by Yeo Jin Goo, the “Planet Master” and mentored by Sunmi and Girls’ Generation’s Tiffany, the nine finalists of Girls Planet 999 made up a brand new group called Kep1er, which is gearing up for their debut in January 2022.
In light of the show’s success, MNet has announced an all-male version of it amidst several controversies.
Mnet's Boys Planet will air in 2022
On December 11, while broadcasting the 2021 Mnet Asian Music Awards aka MAMA 2021, MNet announced a brand new show, titled Boys Planet, scheduled for 2022. Through a video of planets in space, Mnet cryptically stated,
“A signal from a new planet. We await the boys who will go on a global journey together.”
Like Girls Planet 999, it appears that Boys Planet will also have a celestial theme and a space connection. Mnet announced that they were open to applications for the show from any contestant born between December 11, 2021, and February 11, 2022.
Boys Planet is open to applicants from any part of the world, not only South Korea, Japan, and China, as long as they are born before January 1, 2009, and can travel to South Korea for the competition. Girls Planet 999, on the other hand, only had participants from the aforementioned three countries. Most importantly, they should not already be a part of any agency. Potential contestants on the upcoming show must be proficient in any two of the following categories:
Vocal, Dance, Rap, Acting, and Producing.
Boys Planet’s announcement has taken several netizens by surprise, and the internet is full of speculation about whether the show will follow the same pattern as the original show.
Several jokes have also taken over social media, with edits of the Kep1er members as boys doing the rounds.
Some Kep1er fans are upset that Mnet is promoting a different show even before the winners of Girls Planet 999 have made their debut.
Meanwhile, the Girls Planet 999 winners Kep1er were forced to postpone their debut in light of a Covid-19 scare, but now they are all set to take the K-pop world by storm.