Tomorrow, London goes red — and after building toward it all week, BTS The City finally opens its doors. If you're catching up: the ARIRANG demand story started with ticket pressure and that massive Madrid turnout, then grew into city-scale activations around the European stops. London has already teased BTS THE CITY ARIRANG — landmark lighting, a Thames installation, Outernet screenings, exhibitions, fan routes — basically making the concert stop feel like a civic takeover before the show nights even start. This is BTS Daily. Today: a Netflix director reaching for Homer to explain the reunion, and Scooter Braun quietly stepping off the HYBE board. But first — red lights on the Thames. Aju Press, with Choi Songhee:
The BTS urban festival, 'BTS The City Arirang-London,' will take place across London starting July 4. On July 1, HYBE unveiled anticipated visuals for key locations, including the London Eye and the Thames River, which will be adorned in red, the symbolic color of BTS's fifth studio album, 'Arirang.'
Tomorrow. It's actually tomorrow. The London Eye going full red during peak evening hours — that image we've been chasing all week is real now. And the ARIRANG city rollout finally has its London map — the Eye, the Thames, Outernet, all of it landing July 4th. A 32-meter boat with the Arirang logo floating past Big Ben. Thirty-two meters, Liz. Subtle left the chat. And here's what I keep coming back to — the city lights up before a single concert note plays. London itself is the opening act. Right? Outernet's got a 16K screen across four floors playing the new MVs. You walk in and you're just inside the album. And the Korean Cultural Center's pulling the 2019 Wembley outfits for the 'Iconic Looks' exhibition. Full-circle for anyone who was there. Here's Lee Jung-joo at The Korea Herald:
Bao Nguyen, director of the Netflix documentary "BTS: The Return," likened BTS' military hiatus and reunion to Homer's "The Odyssey," describing the group's return as a modern journey shaped by separation, longing and homecoming. Speaking in a recorded interview screened Thursday at the fifth BTS Global Interdisciplinary Conference in Jeonju, North Jeolla Province, Nguyen said the comparison first came to him while watching BTS perform at SoFi Stadium in 2021, before the members began their mandatory military service.
Okay, a Netflix director looked at BTS heading into military service and reached for Homer. Bao Nguyen — the guy behind 'BTS: The Return' — says the members are Odysseus and ARMY is Penelope, waiting. And what gets me is where he said it — a recorded interview screened at the fifth BTS Global Interdisciplinary Conference at Jeonbuk National University. There's a whole society for BTS studies now. The detail I love is he says the comparison hit him back at SoFi in 2021, before anyone enlisted. So he was already seeing the epic in real time, before this became post-hiatus press copy. And he's careful about it. He said using 'The Odyssey' as a literal device would've been 'too on the nose.' He treats it as a framework instead of dressing BTS up in Greek myth. That's a Western director skipping the K-pop lens entirely and going straight for Homer. Does the analogy actually hold, though? Penelope had suitors circling for twenty years and kept unraveling that shroud. ARMY spent the hiatus organizing streaming parties. I'm not mad at it — but the yearning part? Yeah, that lands. I think that's exactly why he didn't make it literal. The homecoming, the separation, the longing — that's the emotional spine. And knetizens are going to eat this up, a documentary director framing them as myth. Music Business Worldwide, with Murray Stassen:
Scooter Braun resigned from HYBE‘s board of directors – but he is not walking away entirely. Braun‘s exit was disclosed in a regulatory filing published on South Korea’s DART disclosure system, with an effective date March 30. The K-pop giant confirmed to MBW that Braun will continue to work with the company in an advisory capacity following his departure from the board.
Okay, this is the one I've been chewing on all morning. Scooter Braun is off HYBE's board — effective March 30 — but he's not gone. HYBE told MBW he's staying on as an advisor. And we know because of a DART filing, rather than a press release. The Q1 report filed back on May 15 already listed the directors as of March 31, and Braun's name just isn't there. So the board seat goes away, and the relationship stays. That's the part that gets me — the formal seat is gone, while HYBE is literally citing the trust they've built. There's a second filing too — the shareholding report. Braun's 362,292 voting shares are no longer listed inside Chairman Bang's shareholder bloc. They may or may not have been sold; the filing only tells us the special relationship dissolved. Which is a very lawyer-y way of saying: he's out of the room where the numbers get made, but they're keeping his number on speed dial. If you follow K-pop beyond Bangtan, check out NewJeans Daily Podcast — a Bunnies briefing on Minji, Hanni, Danielle, Haerin, and Hyein, with comeback watch, ADOR/HYBE updates, music signals, and K-pop news. Find it wherever you listen to podcasts.
Next up, we're watching BTS THE CITY ARIRANG-London, which starts across London on July 4. We'll keep an eye on the official rollout from there.
Links to every story we touched today are in the show notes, so if one caught your ear, that's the place to go deeper. That's BTS Daily Podcast for today. This is a Lantern Podcast.