Dreamcatcher Adds To Accolades And Firsts As Work Continues In December

Normally at this time of year, I’m feeling pretty calm and chill when it comes to writing about Dreamcatcher. That’s mostly because of the fact that historically, the group has taken their holiday breaks a bit early - perhaps one of the perks of not being super popular in South Korea is a rather light December schedule. But that hasn’t been the case this year. A late second comeback coupled with some end-of-year obligations has meant that Dreamcatcher has continued to work through December, and, if the fan cafe is any indication, perhaps almost all the way up until Christmas Day. As a result, it’s been a bit hectic for me, and it also means both the comeback retrospective and year-end retrospective are going to be right up against one another. For Dreamcatcher, this is honestly a good thing, especially given some of the news from last week - so let’s get into it!

OOTD era had one more stage to give us, through new hybrid variety and music show Naver NPOP. Dreamcatcher’s first appearance on the show was filled with a fun variation on the traditional Mafia game as well as another great live performance of “OOTD”. Though it certainly benefits a new music show like NPOP to have on as many K-Pop artists as possible, it was nice to see Dreamcatcher get invited to be there - if for nothing else to see another example of the memorable styling we’ve seen all around this comeback. The above video on the top has both the variety appearance (subtitled by fan channel DCVerse if you need that) and the stage performance. Or you can check out the group fancam angle as well - either way, yet another great appearance by Dreamcatcher.

We also saw one more episode of JiU and SuA’s Pure Basket series with MEN Noblesse, and an actual NBA 2k24 match between the two eldest Dreamcatcher members. Once again I’m happy to see that they made the right choices as far as who should appear - JiU appeared to improve quite a bit playing the game, and there were a ton of funny moments that made her an ideal underdog to SuA’s slightly better game awareness. I really enjoyed this series and hope that the group gets more opportunities in the future to work with new channels, as they tend to come up with some of the most fun things for Dreamcatcher to do.

Those fun things often take the form of work with partners both new and old. Musinsa, one of South Korea’s most well-known fashion brands, decided to work with Dreamcatcher with a fancy, stylish photoshoot and an opportunity for local South Korean fans to emulate Dreamcatcher’s overly confident looks with some of their own. And Immortal Songs is always a treat for Dreamcatcher - returning there after a number of years meant that the group had to leave a good impression and managed to do so with their “Balloons” cover. Lastly, fun times took the form of a leisurely road trip to try camping, as the second episode (1st part) of SuA’s individual content series “Do It With SuA” showed. I really liked this not just for SuA’s usual boisterous energy and loudness but for her interaction with the staff, who are frequently behind the camera but who had to come out from there to help SuA with her tent and camp setup. Dreamcatcher Company staff are the unsung heroes of the group’s content creation, and it was nice to see them get even a bit of recognition on-camera.

Perhaps the best new opportunity Dreamcatcher got to experience this week, however, was attending the annual Asia Artist Awards, held this year in Manila in the Philippines. The group not only put on a great and innovative dual-song stage that involved a smooth transition from B-side “Shatter” into title track “OOTD”, but also managed to win one of the show’s “Best Choice” awards, for which Dreamcatcher seemed very grateful to receive.

A lot has been made of the AAA’s as an extremely long, “attendance awards” show and certainly Dreamcatcher’s award was shared by a number of other artists who also received one. But in the face of an industry where domestically less-popular groups (especially ones as hard-working as Dreamcatcher) may not have as many opportunities to go to awards shows, much less win things at them, the AAA’s serve their purpose well as a more wide-ranging show that allows more groups to shine and be recognized for their work. In my opinion, you can’t really dismiss the value of even one trophy for Dreamcatcher, a group that has only picked up their first two in the past year or so. It seemed obvious to me that they were very thankful for what they received, and left it all out on the stage performance to show off their power and talent.

And speaking of accolades and talent, that’s exactly what Dreamcatcher plans to do at their 7th anniversary concert in Seoul, titled “Luck Inside 7 Doors”, which also served as a means for the group to announce the first leg of what will appear to be a new tour. There’s been some criticism and meme’ing about this tour inevitably involving North America, which the group chose to visit twice in 2023, but I do think given recent comments from the members of the group about making attempts to go places they haven’t been in for a while (or at all) seem to point to non-NA regions, at least for the early part of the year.

After looking at K-Pop acts up and down the popularity spectrum have a bit of a hard time selling tickets in North America this past fall, it seems logically it would make sense to give the region a break in favor of others. Details have yet to surface, but for now, it appears the intent is to celebrate the group’s 7th year since debut, a milestone by the standards of breaking the infamous “7-year curse” - a reference to the maximum contract length and commonly seen trope of groups only partially re-signing (or in some cases not at all). That Dreamcatcher is breaking this curse is great, but perhaps not unexpected given their history of overcoming the odds.

We’re going to see a bit more Dreamcatcher content before the year is up, no doubt, and more footage from their remaining schedules. You know I’ll be here to report on the latest from the group, so for all that, and more, I’ll see you next Sunday!

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