WThe Web Series: Hen Run BTS The variety program was launched in Korea on V Live’s 2015 streaming platform. Seven members of the South Korean band promised fans a lot with lofty promises. “It’s going to be hilarious,” J-Hope pledges in the series’ inaugural episode. “I hope you can enjoy it when you feel sad,” Suga tells the camera. After six years of running the series and over 150 episodes, it is now on hiatus.
Run BTS primarily consists of the members of BTS playing various games for reward or punishment, a premise that shines thanks to the stars’ chemistry and the show’s editing style. Although the episodes are often hilariously absurd, there is some humor. Run BTS‘ best episodes include heartfelt moments and serious reflection. Plus, there’s competitive betrayal that makes for genuinely impressive plot twists.
If you’re looking to laugh, there are Run BTSThere are episodes for this category. If you’re more interested in insight into BTS’ musical ability, there are episodes for that. If you’d just like to see the seven band members get drenched, there are episodes that deliver.
These nine episodes cover everything you need to know about cooking, sports and time travel. Run BTSThere is so much to see. You can watch them all for free at V Live.
“Taste of Korea” (Episode 20)
Run BTS’While cooking contests become more complicated as the series goes on, there’s a simplicity to this episode about food that makes it a series highlight. With Jin acting as MC, “Taste of Korea” divides the remaining band members into two teams and gives them one hour to create a menu for Jin to judge. BTS is a seven-member group that grew up performing and specializing in music. However, it’s not possible for all members to cook. Jin, Suga and Jungkook can cook well, but J-Hope, Jimin and Jimin only know basic cooking techniques. V and RM can be dangerous to others and themselves.
Lack of culinary prowess isn’t a problem. A lot of entertainment in Korean variety shows comes from celebrities being forced to step out of their comfort zones, and making it possible for them to share their laughter with one another. Plus, “Taste of Korea” demonstrates how good the band members are at identifying and accepting each others’ strengths and weaknesses—a skillset that has been instrumental to their group success on the stage and in the recording studio.
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“The Variety Show of Memories” (Episodes 30-31)
“The Variety Show of Memories” structures an entire episode around BTS playing Korean variety-show games from the naughts, while wearing “retro-style” outfits. It’s a hilarious episode, which gives viewers an overview of variety-show traditions and allows Suga to show his abilities as a MC. A particular highlight arrives in the final game of the episodes, which sees the members napping for 30 minutes before having to successfully recount and perform the lyrics of a children’s song called “A Stylish Tomato.”
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“BTS Picnic” (Episodes 53-56)
“BTS Picnic” was released after the first two seasons of BTS Bon Voyage, the group’s travel show, and has a similar structure. This four-episode series sees members of the band depart Seoul to go camping. They eat, shop and sing karaoke. (“BTS Picnic” gives insight into another subgenre of the series: BTS failing at sports, including foot volleyball, which becomes a recurring, hysterically funny activity.) They end the arc by sharing poetry they had written together around a campfire. This shows how genuine and sincere their friendship is. Run BTSHow important friends and colleagues can depend on one another, and just how amazing it is. “Though we dreamt of a high sky, it is high here, and cold, and so hard to breathe,” Suga writes in his poem. “It is true that the more light that burns upon us, the more shadows appear. We are seven! What a relief, that we are together.”
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“BTS School” (Episodes 63-64)
Run BTSIn its first season of the series, Suga was heavily involved in skits. However, they eventually abandoned them for other formats. While “BTS School” is not primarily a skit episode, it does have the members embracing certain roles: Suga as the exasperated teacher, and most of the other members as eager-to-please students. They vote for class president before diving into a variety of school subject-based games, with a challenge to play “Chopsticks” on handbells offering viewers a chance to see them engaging with music in a very different context than as chart-topping artists. The episode culminates in a school debate over whether or not mint chocolate chip is an acceptable ice cream flavor, during which the members get sprayed with water if they use pre-selected, “off-limits” words or phrases. “BTS School” features deceivingly complex, highly entertaining game mechanics and scenarios.
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“Photo Challenge” (Episodes 104-106)
The members of BTS know their way around a photo shoot, as it’s a regular part of a star’s working life. “Photo Challenge” allows BTS to produce their own photo shoots, with the additional task of crafting a unique outfit from thrifted clothes, hot glue guns, fabric paint,And a variety of party-store accessories. It’s as if Project Runway and America’s Next Top Model decided to form a super-competition show with the members of the world’s biggest pop band as its only contestants. “Photo Challenge” also presents one of Run BTS’ most memorable rewards: a framed photo of one of the shoot’s rejected photos, an image of Jimin in a polo, looking like a student posing for a school photo. The company that runs BTS, HYBE displays the work of art on its wall.
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“Photo Story” (Episodes 118-119)
Each episode Run BTS, no matter the subgenre, could include spycraft—more specifically, a member (or members) chosen to sabotage the game in some way, usually only revealed after the fact. “Photo Story” gives viewers one of the best spy reveals in Run BTS history. The first part of this two-parter sees members of BTS running wild around Samsung Electronics Café Camptong for an hour. They’re tasked with collecting Post-It note messages to form sentences that describe various scenarios, and then taking those photos, usually with the help of other members who may or may not be inclined to pause their own mission to take a photo. Unexpectedly, Jin discovers that he is a spy and any photos he takes will not be counted towards the point totals. Jungkook, a low-key photographer who is often obtuse, begins to destroy his photoboard after realizing most of them include Jin. Run BTS’ funniest and most unexpected moments.
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“77-Minute Debate” (Episodes 131-132)
As Suga puts it at one point in this very wet episode: “The debate isn’t what’s important. The water is more important.” Run BTS has a variety of water-centric episodes, including a memorable arc at a water park in Episodes 83-85, but “77-Minute Debate” is arguably the best installment in this competitive subgenre. They debate silly topics for 11 minutes. soft peach vs. hard peach), under the constant threat of being drenched should they use one of the round’s off-topic words or actions. If this sounds familiar, it’s because Run BTS conducted a similar experiment in “BTS School.”
Comparing these two water-driven arguments gives insight Run BTS’ growth over the years. On a game-mechanics level, the producers make the clever choice to link the members’ punishments together this time. In other words, if a team member says their team’s off-limits word, the CompleteThe team is hit with water. Any member who does something that isn’t allowed by the rules will be punished. AllBTS members get soaked with water. The members then shout across the stage, at each other, as they try to communicate the prohibited actions.
On a budget level, it’s clear how much Run BTS has evolved since “BTS School.” It’s not easy to film an entire episode around water. The acoustics are noticeably affected in “77-Minute Debate,” as the boom operator has to hover a safe distance away from the members as they sit next to a pool, where sounds reverberate. The execution of this episode scenario is impressive, which is why it’s so fitting that, at the end of the episode, the director volunteers to get water-bombed too.
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“BTS Collaboration Variety Show” (Episodes 140-141)
BTS is created Run BTS in part so they wouldn’t have to rely too heavily on other variety shows for promotion, which makes “BTS Collaboration Variety Show” an outlier. The show invites Game CaterersNa Young Seok will host a range of classic games. Na’s appearance surprises the band members, who are endearingly starstruck. BTS also provides insight on American celebrities in Korea by playing a game where they have to quickly identify different stars. This leads to the viral moment when J-Hope misidentifies Conan O’Brien as “Curtain,” a mistake O’Brien later goodnaturedly responded to on his show.
This four-episode series (two episodes only available on the web series) consists of four episodes. Game Caterers’ YouTube channel) is consistently great. However, the best part is in BTS x Game Caterers’ Episode 2, when the members are given secret challenges—such as peeling 100 quail eggs or inconspicuously slipping coins onto the other members’ persons—that they must complete in 30 minutes. The game quickly turns chaotic as members simultaneously attempt to complete their missions and sabotage the other members’ missions, without actually knowing what those missions are. It’s a reminder of how entertaining Run BTSBTS members have so much fun together after being in existence for eight years.
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“BTS Village: Joseon Dynasty” (Episodes 145-147)
This is one of the most popular subgenres Run BTSAmerican television viewers may be familiar with Mafia as a social deduction game. BTS plays Mafia many times throughout the series, but “BTS Village: Joseon Dynasty” may be their most elaborate, aesthetic example, as it sees the members dressing up in traditional hanbok to wander around a living museum folk village in search of pieces of a broken MacGuffin. This episode concludes the series. Run BTS’ larger “BTS Village” arc, which began in the present day in “Protect the Town” (Episodes 47-48) and continued in the 1970s in “Reply BTS Village” (Episodes 120-121) before sending the members even further back in time to the Joseon dynasty—yes, Run BTSSometimes arcs involve time travel. Two episodes have been spent searching for clues. The BTS members then commit to different degrees to Joseon-era characters. A third episode is spent trying to figure out who they betrayed. It is one of most intense Mafia accusation conversations in recent memory. Run BTS history.
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