Dear Gossips,

Six out, one to go!

Yesterday it was RM and V’s military discharge, today it’s Jimin and Jungkook who enlisted and served together in the same unit. Like RM and V they were greeted by media and fans. Unlike RM and V, who put on a show upon their re-entry, Jimin and JK were adorably shy both at the greeting location where they gave remarks but also during their joint livestream afterwards. It’s the contrast between extrovert and introvert.

Here's a video of their first appearance during which JK said, “It’s been so long since I’ve been on camera that I didn’t wear any makeup. I’m embarrassed and don’t know what to say.”

But this is the photo that probably best illustrates how awkward it was for them, LOL.

BTS members Jungkook and Jimin are discharged from their military service in Yeoncheon, South Korea, June 11, 2025

It’s cute but also fascinating. Because of course, like for a decade before they began their service, these young men regularly performed for thousands of people at a time, and they were constantly in front of cameras. The BTS archive is deep, everything was filmed – from training sessions to rehearsals to meal times to travel, sometimes even when they were sleeping. They are among the generation of superstars who directly engaged with fans through the internet, with weekly or sometimes even daily livestreams, on messaging apps… it was proximity from a distance as, obviously, they were protected, increasingly so as they became more and more and MORE famous, but performing a certain version of themselves on camera was their normal, until it wasn’t.

Each of them, for at least 18 months, has been living in another normal. Celebrities are not given special treatment in the army in Korea. First of all, reputationally, it would not play well if it ever got out that they received privileges and advantages that other citizens didn’t. But also, it’s simply not safe. If they were called to action alongside their unit, they’d be a liability to themselves and to others if they weren’t prepared.

But my point is that for a year and a half, they got used to a low profile existence, where fame was not a factor. Even when they kept it real quiet – so to go from months and months of relative obscurity behind the guarded boundaries of military routine, Jimin and JK seem like they fully acclimated to that life. Which is why, perhaps for them, it may have been jarring, even overwhelming to whiplash from near complete privacy to full-on public life. And, in a way, become famous overnight all over again. To experience anew the complicated phenomenon that is fame when you already know what fame is…what must that be like?

Each of them will process all of it differently. Some of them seemed very well suited to life in the military, making friends, adjusting comfortably, all things considered. Others have said they struggled with the experience, like RM who during his solo livestream yesterday candidly shared that it was a really difficult time for him, that he developed insomnia and anxiety so serious that it had to be treated. And that he was working through an identity crisis because they tell you when you’re in there to let go of who you are on the outside while you’re on the inside but as an artist, and especially an artist as introspective as he is (much of his writing on BTS’s album Map of the Soul: 7 was based on Carl Jung’s study of self) of course someone like Kim Namjoon would have had a hard time reconciling that advice with his own reality. This explains, in part, his emotion yesterday when he was officially released. And perhaps his determination and declaration yesterday that their next album would be “huge”.

And then there’s Jin. Jin was the first to enlist and the first to be discharged. It’s been exactly a year since Jin completed his service, he’s been promoting his album Echo, so it’s been an abundance of BTS updates – which is fitting because it’s also Festa week, leading up to their proper anniversary this Friday.

Jin did the Buzzfeed puppy interview and took the Vanity Fair lie detector test. Jin, in my opinion, as the oldest member, is also the most easygoing. His nickname is Worldwide Handsome but he could also be called the instant mood lifter – Jin is the comic relief, the big heart, easygoing and joyful; it’s why he’s best suited to be the gameshow host, because he can pick up on moods, understand what energy to bring in any given situation, and be the vibe conduit that connects the others. Every member of BTS adds a unique flavour to the whole. Every member is essential for their superpower, their special skill. RM’s gravitas is often balanced by Jin’s buoyancy. And in ten days, all of their individual attributes will be brought together again. Seriously, I could cry!

Yours in gossip,

Lainey

BTS Gossip

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