'I Live Alone' is raising alarm bells with an all-time low rating of 4.4%.
On the 28th, TV ratings company Nielsen Korea reported that the 640th episode of MBC variety program 'I Live Alone' (abbreviated I Live Alone), which aired on the 27th, recorded a nationwide household rating of 4.4%. This drew attention as the lowest rating for I Live Alone not only this year but in the past five years.
I Live Alone boasts an average nationwide household rating of around 5%. Even when it has dipped into the 4% range, it had held the high end of the 4% range at 4.6% or 4.7%. A 4.4% rating is a figure that has been hard to see on I Live Alone in about the past five years. Previously, I Live Alone recorded a nationwide household average rating of 4.2% for its 422nd episode broadcast in November 2021.
At the center of this I Live Alone crisis theory is the departure of core members and the absence of successors to fill their roles. In fact, on I Live Alone, starting with comedian Park Na-rae in December last year, SHINee member Key also left in succession. Park Na-rae was embroiled in various revelations amid disputes with her former managers, and among them allegations arose that Park Na-rae and a beauty entrepreneur known as 'injection aunt' A were involved in illegal medical practices.
Even SHINee member Key, who had known A through an introduction by an acquaintance and believed A to be a medical professional, halted activities after suffering harm from illegal medical practices. As a result, I Live Alone suddenly lost two key fixed members, Park Na-rae and Key. Additionally, claims that A accompanied Park Na-rae on I Live Alone's overseas shoot led to questions about the production team's need to explain.
Despite the unease, I Live Alone hit a peak of criticism with Kian84's episode. Kian84 met his lifelong role model, Japanese manga artist Junji Ito, while in Japan. With singer Gangnam's active efforts making the unprecedented meeting happen, a publisher and works that had been controversial even in Japan appeared on I Live Alone.
The meeting took place in the building of Japanese publisher Shogakukan, which published Junji Ito's representative works, but the problem was that the publisher was facing strong criticism in Japan for allegedly concealing the return of a child sex offender. In addition, the appearance of the imperial rising sun flag 'Rising Sun Flag' as one of the publisher's representative works and the poster for the Detective Conan film The Mystery of the Sunken Ship, which has not even been released domestically, drew further criticism from Korean fans.
In the course of events, I Live Alone responded swiftly by removing Park Na-rae and Key and by editing the VOD segment that introduced Shogakukan. However, the 'explanations' that viewers were genuinely curious about or demanded remained silent. As a result, rather than dispelling suspicions, one-sided or partial communication repeatedly left regular viewers disappointed.
The result appeared as a 4.4% rating, the lowest in five years. Nonetheless, I Live Alone's newsworthiness still remains. The 20-49 demographic rating, a core indicator of channel competitiveness, was 3.1%, the highest among Friday variety programs for I Live Alone.
However, the record of the lowest rating in five years is not something that can be viewed lightly. In response, the production team is working hard to find new faces such as chef Kim Si-hyun, nicknamed baby beast, and actor Bae In Hyuk. Whether I Live Alone can soothe viewers' uneasy view of the program amid the instability of its core fixed members is attracting attention. <
[Photo] Provided by MBC, OSEN DB.
[OSEN]