haobin manifesto

[lackingdaze]

was going back and forth on whether there is even a point in making this primer because i feel like haobin and hao / hanbin respectively are already so popular!! but also i’m trying to manifest an ao3 user predebut fic in the ao3 tags so. #letswalktheflowerpathofhyperspecificpandering

background

if you didn’t already know, hao and hanbin were both contestants on mnet’s boys planet and are (slated to be) members of zerobaseone (zb1). hao ranked first and hanbin ranked second during the finale, which was basically the cherry on top culmination that cementetd their presence as zb1’s representative pairing. but more on that later.

🎻 zhang hao

position: center
birthday: july 25, 2000
company: yuehua entertainment
hometown: nanping, fujian
emoji: 🎻
animal: raccoon (korean fans), red panda (chinese fans)
mbti: isfp (fun fact: he’s the only i in zb1)
education: department of music education, fujian normal university (graduated)
nickname lore:

• 장하늘: his name in mandarin means “sky in the summer” so korean fans sometimes call him neul (늘) which means sky (**will find translation link)
• 짱구리: combination of his name + raccoon (neoguri)

predebut career

where do i even begin. hao (and hanbin) both have extensive predebut digital footprints. in hao’s case, he was something of a minor celebrity in his hometown/college, so in addition to his own self-posted pictures/videos, there are also a lot of um fan (?) taken pictures/videos and accounts.

hao’s a bit of an overachiever in that he originally majored in geology → hated it → wanted to pursue music so he retook the csat and ended up ranking first in his province, then enrolled in the department of music education, with a concentration in the violin. (more details in his message to his juniors)

he was approached by yuehua after some time in college, but buffered the offer to focus on graduating first and get to know more about music/kpop/idolisms before jumping in. then he graduated early (with a teaching license, specifically for teaching at a high school level) and joined yuehua as a trainee.

side quests

truly at a loss of how this man found time to do so much, but there are many videos floating around of him dancing (with his dance team and in various classes), singing (at college festivals/concerts?), and playing the violin (at people’s weddings).

as for the general subtext_but_really_overt_text of being gay (ex. wearing_itsay_shirt.jpg), i don’t really want to get into it (unless ur miss predebut reading this….) i think twitter has already milked it for more than its worth and considering the crazy ass shit that people were trying to mudsling against him post-bp finale, it feels reductive to make that his representative lore.

boys planet

hao first appeared on bp with the other yuehua trainees, leading the g group for a cover of kick it. i think from the get-go, he was already favored by the mentors/mnet (see: “i want to take away zhang hao’s passport) and even got a little violin show time in the first round of evaluations.

one of the things that i realized about hao (shoutout to dw user stoplight for the scholarship <3) is that he was so aware of the way he could be construed on camera and did everything he could to not get evil edited by mnet. he outright acknowledged this himself during the post-finale commentary, where the members were asked if they were surprised by the way they appeared on-screen and hao was the only one who was like “no i wasn’t surprised because i was constantly conscious of the way i acted.” which is just SDHJASVDHJ. this was also evident on the show by the way he wore different emoji hair pins (which were absolutely useless at actually pinning any hair), mainly to deter mnet from splicing together disjoint footage.

he was already a popular trainee early on, which was cemented by the kill this love stage, and then even more so by the tomboy stage (more on that later). also am of the popular (and cosigned by kuanjui) opinion that over me only won because of him….anyways he went from 5 > 2 > 2. for the finale, fans were doomsdaying about him being dropped from the lineup, but it all worked out in the end bc he ended up in first place! making him the first non-korean trainee to rank p1 in produce history :)

🐹 sung hanbin

position: leader
birthday: june 13, 2001
company: studio gl1de
hometown: cheonan
emoji: 🐹/🐱
animal: fans are divided if he’s more hamster or cat, among other less right contenders (bunny?). so they’ve just resorted to calling him 햄냥이 (hamster cat)
mbti: enfj
education: kpop studies, dongah institute of media and arts (still attending)

predebut career

hanbin’s whole thing is that he was a pretty active dancer in the industry prior to being a trainee and boys planet! it seemed like he started dancing at runpeople dance studio in cheonan when he was in middle school, mainly focused on waacking and then growing into other urban dance genres (you can watch this 141 video playlist of pretty much all of his dance videos here.)

he originally wanted to be a teacher, and he wasn’t interested in becoming an idol at first, despite getting offers from some agencies. but then eventually became curious. he was briefly a cube trainee (training at the same time as seok matthew, who is also part of the zb1 lineup, and also i think park hanbin, who was in bp) before he ended up at his current company. he also worked as a backup dancer to bts, wanna one, and a few other artists prior to debut.

because of his dance career, he has an immense digital footprint. and the narrative around that, of course, is largely fixated on him doing stuff like dancing rupaul’s call me mother.

also he goes to college! which has brought out some cute/funny anecdotes like this video of him climbing out of a car trunk and so many accounts of people who know him being like wow he is so nice and kindly and perfect, etc. and also vlogs of him doing homework for kpop class lol.

boys planet

another person who has his idol persona completely ironed out! tbh i really didn’t want to like hanbin at first because he was just /so nice/, but over time i realized he was just kind of built like this…

he was an mnet pick from the very beginning, being one of the trainees who was chosen for the pre-release promotional pictures, and then acing his first round with a solo performance. in terms of ranking trajectory, he consistently ranked 1st, up until the finale when he came in 2nd place.

while i don’t think he was overt as hao about maintaining his image on the show, he seems to be the kind of person who is very careful about the things he says. i guess it helps that he’s literate/likes reading books, which lends to a rather eloquent way of speaking that fans find very thoughtful. on the show, i think he maintained a good balance of being extremely kind and also rightfully ambitious for screen time and performance (see: i will never forgive you sung hanbin tweet when he shoved out jay to jelly pop nugu position to be main vocal in hot summer). tbh i’m still in the process of trying to unearth sung hanbin personality hidden depths… which might come out best when he’s interacting with hao tbh.

relationship lore

let’s see. i think from the early episodes, they were kind of in each other’s orbits, mainly as in hanbin was p1 and hao seemed like he wanted to get to know him?

when the show was airing, the first instance they seemed close was when hanbin and hao exchanged the hallmark tutting/flying kiss. from there on, they respectively did well on their stages and seemed to get a lot closer (exhibit b: hao walking into hanbin’s room to find kuanjui, hanbin going “wow we have a lot in common”). the amendment to this is later we got a reveal of hao and hanbin practicing for the stage lift part of here i am stage #1, and hao doing [this insane shit]. so they must have gotten close prior to the dance battle scene!

then, in a stroke of genius cp strategy, the tomboy stage happened. this was the vocal/rap/dance challenge, and tomboy was the vocal team, which made hanbin’s (who is primarily a dancer) decision to join the team even more interesting. and really tomboy-gate solidified haobin.

Watch on YouTube

THIS WAS KIND OF THE PERFECT STAGE (if i don’t look at hui). and wow did we get some truly unhinged content from it.

first of all, these were their behind the scenes practice clips. exhibit a / exhibit b.not to tenderheart (in a whole ass thesis dedicated to them hm) but they were genuinely so cute 😭😭. and touchy. like wow did hanbin really have to do all that when he helped hao apply his nametag. did hao have to randomly touch his stomach. did—

then came THIS behind the scenes of the performance stage. i’ll let you witness it for yourself but um:

• the fact that hanbin was walking away but hao called him back for the two shot
• hao being like “only do this to me” re: hanbin doing tie tie
• hanbin being like “this is when hyung started to like me” re: them becoming close on the way to the here i am recording
• hao: to be honest you chose tomboy because of me?
• hanbin: haha….yeah i chose it to be on stage with you
• hanbin feeling the need to have one hand on hao’s shoulder the entire time

and of course the infamous “chinese sung hanbin, korean zhang hao” quote, provided by sung hanbin himself. LIKEEEE we don’t even have to project the twin optics onto them, they (read: sung hanbin) are doing it by themselves (see: 1st look interview where hanbin reiterates the fact that they went a restaurant and someone asked if they were twins.) like ok…what’s that meme about siblings or dating.

wow i’m realizing as i’m writing this that tomboy-gate was an iceberg of content. like just watch this whole ass clip. noteable points:

• hanbin: thank you (reaches out to hold hao’s hand)
• hao (while brushing his mfing teeth): you’re thankful? then you should give me a massage
• hanbin’s entire ment about how he’s grateful that hao is there to comfort him
• hanbin: i don’t know, you’re kinda like my crying button [i.e. every time i see you i burst into tears out of gratefulness]
• more insane handholding disguised as a bro-shake

oh what else, well they were practically inseparable during the entirety of the performances (see: holdings hands at any possible point in time).

and then this clip of hao putting hanbin’s arm around his waist for the mnet-sponsored cp shot.

honestly at this rate you can just go through the thread that i’m taking most of the links from (girl who is too lazy to hyperlink everything).

they did their 2nd elim introduction together (note the insane chin grab by hao to hanbin…..we are literally 늘빈 optic-ing). also one of the ments during this episode was where the whole “zero cola” thing came from.

• minhyun: what’s something you want to say to hanbin?
• hao: let’s debut together and drink zero cola together every day.

which is like SHJDBASHJBD. ok i guess ur both just gay men who like diet coke. fulfilling stereotypes to a t.

more moments, per the twt threads:

• them being glued to each other during the next challenge performances (where hao took over me team to 1st place!)
• hao tucking hanbin into bed. (note: in this clip, hanbin is sleeping in his own bed, but there was another clip where someone pointed out he was sleeping in hao’s bed? i need to track it down).
• this weird ass little prince/fox musical challenge they had to do (can we talk about the insanity of “would you train me” and also the fact that jo kwon was there to judge @##@#$)
• pajama party moment where hanbin was like :)) when hao was doing aegyo and then was like wait there's nothing to smile about in my life.
• more insane mnet sponsored cp vcr shots

AND THE FINALE!!!!!

never in the history of produce has a p1 and p2 been so glued at the hip the entire time. when they were both announced as candidates for p1, both of them were so relieved and then hao practically made out with hanbin’s neck. and when hao was announced and he was like what ?? and hanbin was like you won!! and hugged him (multiple times) TT-TT. and the staff begging them to separate for solo shots when they walked up to the seats but they held each other’s hands and walked up together. losing my fricking mind putting this together tbh…..

zb1 predebut content:

• jelly pop tiktok / hot summer tiktok
• kcon interactions [1] [2] [3]
• mcing together for #feminism
• trailer
• tiktok from bts of trailer

my projections

i think people are split on whether its 늘빈 or 빈늘, with the former having a much higher postype count (given hao’s predebut hair and the few cms of height hao has on bin), but the latter is also developing a steady twitter crowd (hanbin chest tattoos and solid pecs or whatever). personally i don’t have too many opinions on left/rightisms but i do think i’m predisposed to 늘빈…..

the nice/interesting thing about haobin is that i don’t think i have a very niche take on them, nor am i unearthing dynamics that are otherwise nonexistent to the naked eye. they’re very expressive and the content is like, right there, so i think everyone generally has similar perceptions when they’re not busy criming them in the ao3 tags (not that i’m an exception).

my main take on them rn is:

• twin-isms
• corporate mandated cp members who may genuinely like each other
• hanbin super touchy extrovert, hao as slightly more reserved but maybe even more unhinged introvert
• hanbin as the one who is facilitating a good chunk of the obsession by constantly mentioning hao
• two individuals who are extremely aware of the way they position themselves, are perceived by others, and take overt care of their image, to the point where you wonder how much of their relationship is orchestrated and also how they manage to make it feel So Real and how they’re negotiating it between themselves beyond the camera

which could lead to fun things like

• hating each other down the line
• not hating each other but having dependency issues / what’s for the camera and what is real / if i am you and you are me then who am i / [the entirety of the bbb board]
• love_scenario.mp3 edit when they divorce in 2.5 years (side note i think it’s funny how so much of kfan postype/twt content is breakup/transit love au)

and in terms of personality....idk i like that they're both ~similar~ but not quite, because hanbin is somewhat transparent with his affection (re: all of the overt pda) so you would think that he's the one who is way more into this company-sponsored relationship. but then hao occasionally comes along to add fuel to the fire (i.e. "only do [tie tie] to me" / the interpretation of "i was always aware of the way i acted on camera" > doing unhinged shit with hanbin like MAKING OUT WITH HIS NECK) and ur like wow u guys are way worse than i thought... it seems like they're usually on the same wavelength and get each other in a way that others would have a hard time syncing with. coupled with the fact that they only got to know each other through boys planet and wow do i believe in soulmates or what. i don't even have to because they're doing all that branding by themselves. i also like that they're both extremely ambitious and capable people, which brings out the question of what lengths they would reach to achieve what they want...

anyways if you got to the end of this, thank you!! i can’t believe they’ve dragged me back into the trenches but i’m also grateful to not be stockholming myself into orchestrating elaborate spiteful ex scenarios between straight men who hate each other 🙏 maybe this will have convinced u to add to the haobin ao3 tag…… to more content in the near future with their debut!!

also if i got anything wrong feel free to let me know TT-TT

Comments

[stoplight]

what a beautiful thing to wake up to on my dreamwidth reading page :') thank u for doing the work of writing a primer and hoping that ao3 user predebut is successfully gotten!!!

also did not know u were 늘빈 fan... unfortunately i prefer 빈늘 just because i like younger 1 older 0. but at this point it does feel too early to rly say

just want to add some things:

for zh's predebut stuff he also ran a silly little food blog on xhs (chinese social media site) that was basically just him going around eating food from various places and then reviewing it :') extremely endearing to me...

also in terms of his education he never actually "majored" in geoscience or whatever he just took the gaokao, got an offer, and decided to not take it to pursue music instead. this timeline is only possible because he took the gaokao two years earlier than one usually does (usually it's taken at the end of spring semester in 12th VS he took it end of spring semester in 10th ie first year of high school). since he switched to do music instead, that means he has to take the yikao, not necessarily that he took the gaokao twice (the yikao is essentially the gaokao but for arts).

to get into any arts school you need to take both the gaokao and the yikao anyways, but the timeline matters because the yikao is administered in the winter and the gaokao in the spring, so typically people take the yikao end of fall semester (february - march) and then the gaokao end of spring semester (june - july). and he ranked 1st for the yikao, but specifically for the liankao, which is like... the general yikao exam that everyone takes. i mention that because he went to fujian normal university for music as opposed to say the big 3, which he would've needed to take xuekaos for (ie winwin) and also the record of him ranking first says liankao i think.

ummm i can't find a good link for this so source: just trust me but he also only learned violin for three years before pursuing it which makes me think that he picked it up for a year, took the gaokao, decided to switch paths, and then furiously studied like crazy for the two years leading up to the yikao (which is insane because the yikao's acceptance rate is crazy low... somewhere around 0.3% iirc)

and then lastly re: shb eloquency i feel like it's not just that he's well-spoken but also that he's always very careful/considerate with what he says and how it comes off. like during the top 9 commentary thing when he got asked about why his hair looked like a coconut he was like "oh well another trainee helped me style my hair prettily but i was the one who moved too much and messed it up" (something along those lines) which is touching bc he took care to frame it so that he wasn't the other trainee's fault (rip ichan) but more so his... little things like that rly add up bc he's so consistent with it that it's just his personality :') like if zh is mostly careful with his actions then shb is the one who's careful with his words.... ah.

okay sorry for long insane rambling here i hope everything i said made sense (esp the gaokao/yikao stuff...) but if it didn't then im happy to clarify! centerz/mirrorz/twinflamez/etc let's walk the flower road together or whatever... :')

[lackingdaze]

CRYS my fellow enthusiast thank you for this comment srsly appreciate the intel bc as i was making this i definitely felt like i was missing a lot of stuff/didn't have the language/cultural access TT-TT will amend the things you pointed out in the primer!

you mentioned the diff between the gaokao and the yikao, out of curiosity what are xuekaos — performance exams? and liankao?

omg hao's xhs food blog is soo cute 😭😭 dying at this self-inflicted pov btw...

hate to tenderheart in public but i'm so gotten on the daily by how smart he is. smthing about people who are just crazy ambitious and good at whatever they do...also his full-send attitude towards career switching is so personal to me 🥲

like if zh is mostly careful with his actions then shb is the one who's careful with his words.... ah. wow this went straight to my brain THE INHERENT CONTRAST OF ACTION VS. SPEECH? factoring in language aspects too it's so perf....

yeah i really wanted to not like sung hanbin but i can't because he genuinely has such a lovely personality 😭 like u said it comes across in the way he speaks, i also always have the hardest time understanding his ments lmao

as always thank you for your scholarship!!! i also hope ao3 user predebut is gotten....let's walk the flower path fr <3

[permutative]

hi…. this might be the only thing saving me from the horrors of an amtrak ucsb bus….
💀💀😅😅😅🤣🤣🤣

[permutative]

as person who is currently dating their clone i will say i am Gotten by twinisms and People Who Like Each Other. im ngl some of these links are not loading super well but pls anticipate my prebedtime reading to be clicking into hyperlink and sharing thonks… also i just like hao’s face… Ok anyways

[permutative]

livereacting from dw user lackingdaze's couch:

- re: hao — didn’t know people were still 00liners in kpop these days… love a lil hagdol (affectionate). VERY IMPRESSED BY HIS ACADEMIC WEAPONRY / FORAY INTO EARTH SCIENCE I GUESS?? also i already texted u abt this but not his BL fanboyisms… he’s just like us fr… ok i started watching the kick it cover and was like “wow they all suck” until zhang hao opened his mouth. I LIKE HIM I GUESS!!! also why do people like ricky… can u explain this… ok one last thing obsessed with the bbbisms of the image management/meticulousness wrt self-presentation and how he’d come across on camera!!!! when will he meet sunoo
- re: hanbin… why he lookin like… the nation’s first love… the boy next door… etc WHY IS HE SERVING CUNT IN THESE DANCE VIDEOS OH MY GOD!!!!!!! ok… go off i guess… love when a guy can read… lowkey the vibes of this ship are a little like “my fav + dude my fav likes” BUT I ALSO SUPPORT THIS
- random but who is gyuvin can u explain
- BRO THE FLYING KISS THING WHAT why are they cute… also not “this was the perfect stage if i don’t look at hui” should i be scared…. nvm i understand what u mean. is hui in bepler im gonna die if he is…
- WHY ARE THEY SO TOUCHY IM LOSING MY MIND!!!!!!! also “hao: to be honest you chose tomboy because of me? / hanbin: haha….yeah i chose it to be on stage with you” haha…. HAHA… ok
-  like ok…what’s that meme about siblings or dating. T___T <3
- dude these clips of them holding hands are legit so cuteee why are they so adorable… the finale gif is also really spectacular awwww i’m honestly really excited to get into BP and understand the true layers/depths behind this pairing… THE WAY THEY’RE JUST HOLDING HANDS AND SHIT… truluv…
- also i agree with crys im also OLDER BOTTOMS FAN. not that my opinion matters at all i just be saying shit
- also bye ur whole synopsis/“take” on their dynamic is making me lose my shit. yes i know it is 8:30am on a saturday morning and u are three feet away from me (metaphorically) applying ur lashes… but still two individuals who are extremely aware of the way they position themselves, are perceived by others, and take overt care of their image, to the point where you wonder how much of their relationship is orchestrated and also how they manage to make it feel So Real and how they’re negotiating it between themselves beyond the camera pipeline to “this could lead to them hating each other” why do i wanna see it… qsoob arc when… JUST KIDDING (unless)
- i like that they’re kinda boring marrieds but then there are ways to complicate their relationship wrt the specific setup and how they interact with the cameras and like the fact that they are so good with regulating how they are perceived by others KJDHKSJG

ok can’t wait to revisit LACKINGDAYS ao3 fic with this renewed insight <3 lets walk the flower path together….

[stoplight]

basically to get into arts schools there's two paths: a) gaokao + liankao, or b) gaokao + liankao + xuekao(s). yikao can refer to both liankao and xuekao, but is generally used interchangeably with liankao.

liankao is the general yikao exam. like the gaokao, it's taken in your province, and while there's a ranking based on your score (just within your province not nationally), as long as you get above a certain number you pass. this happens some time december/january.

xuekaos are school-specific exams. you take these only if you pass the liankao, so they're taken anywhere from february to june. only top schools require xuekaos in addition to the liankao, which means you only take them if you're trying to get into specific schools. and bc they're school-specific, you also travel to each school to take these (so no longer provincial). xuekaos as a whole are much harder to pass bc standards are extremely high and also they're self-selecting; really good students from all over china travel to compete for a super limited amt of spots (each major generally takes like 25 - 50 students out of thousands).

i'm pretty confident that zh's school doesn't do xuekaos and that he himself never took any xuekaos bc if he did it would've been circulating online ages ago lmfao and also bc his school is in fujian and is more known for teaching than art. though his major is still highly ranked!

to give you a basis for comparison if you look at winwin... where do i start. he ranked 1st for beijing dance academy (best dance school), 7th for communication uni, 10th for central academy of drama (best drama school), and 12th for shanghai institute of visual arts. these are all xuekao results btw... it's insanely impressive bc you can see he applied as an acting/performance major for the latter three when he literally only studied traditional chinese dance all throughout middle/high school. not only is traditional chinese dance already an incredibly competitive major amongst the dance ones (ppl tend to get eliminated just bc of their body lines) but he also did it at beijing dance academy and ranked 1st there. so for him to pivot to acting and then do so well is seriously insane. the year that he applied to the central academy of drama there were 8000+ other prospective acting majors and he ranked 10th out of all of them without it being his major in middle/high school.

sorry for rambling on abt winwin it's just that no one rly knows all this abt him bc he got shuffled into kpop (cfans almost universally agree that he's being wasted in kpop and want him to leave asap, mainly bc almost all of china's top actresses/actors come from his uni, most if not all acting recruiting is done there, and he was basically guaranteed stardom upon graduation as it was). like his xuekao results are so legendary that xiaojun knew who he was before nct/wayv bc he also took xuekaos and ppl wouldn't stop talking abt how legendary winwin was...

anyways. CONTRAST OF ACTION VS. SPEECH KRILLS ME ALWAYS!!!!!! and even more so bc hb has a reputation now for being super well-spoken (and he is) but imo zh is just as well-spoken in mandarin... but unfortunately that just doesn't come across bc it's kpop so he expresses himself through action TT___________TT

i also always have the hardest time understanding his ments lmao yeah i seriously wish i understood korean better whenever i read his ments bc i can tell im losing so much in translation. what i do understand is alr lovely though so i can't imagine what it is in full...

hope this was helpful/sorry if it wasn't/i'll clarify if u have more questions!! let's populate this tag together for real <3