As a Cassie, I’m fuming over Riize covering Hug

This is purely rage directed at SM Entertainment.

For those who may not know, in 2009 three members on the group TVXQ filed a lawsuit against SM Entertainment alleging mistreatment and various other contract violations.

Eventually the group would split, leading to the two members who stayed in SM to re-debut in a duo in 2011.

Ever since, SM have functionally ignored the groups pre 2011 history. Including entirely leaving them out of their YouTube Documentary about kpop history and all official content.

Even their 20th anniversary special merch left out much of their pre 2011 history in its timelines and throwbacks.

SM essentially act like TVXQ did not exist until 2011 with the release of Keep Your Head Down.

So, seeing Riize be given Hug to cover, TVXQ’s true and ignored debut song, is disappointing.

It feels like SM is trying to sever TVXQ’s history from them by giving it to a younger group while not allowing it to be acknowledged as TVXQ. The official cover teaser doesn’t even mention TVXQ.

It’s not the same as Candy or Dreams Come True, it’s a debut. It’s special to TVXQ. It doesn’t sit right with me and I wish they’d picked other song for Riize to cover.

Update: it was released as a single and I feel worse. Thanks for a lot of understanding 😭