Now you know my name, I'm anti-fragile, anti-fragile.
Le Sserafim (르세라핌) (often stylised as LE SSERAFIM in all caps) is a five-member K-pop girl group under HYBE Labels. They made their official debut in May of 2022 as six members with the Fearless EP, but lost one membernote two months later. They made their first comeback in October of 2022 with the Antifragile EP. Two of the members (Sakura and Chaewon) were previously members of IZ*ONE. Additionally, Yunjin participated in Produce48, finishing in 26th place.
The current members of Le Sserafim are:
- Sakura (Miyawaki Sakura, born March 19, 1998)
- Chaewon (Kim Chae-won, born August 1, 2000)
- Yunjin (Jennifer Huh Yun-jin, born October 8, 2001)
- Kazuha (Nakamura Kazuha, born August 9, 2003)
- Eunchae (Hong Eun-chae, born November 10, 2006)
Former member:
- Garam (Kim Ga-ram, born November 16, 2005)
Discography:
- Fearless [EP] (2022)
- Antifragile [EP] (2022)
- Unforgiven [Album] (2023)
- Easy [EP] (2024)
Now you know my tropes, I'm antifragile, antifragile:
- Album Closure: Fearless and Antifragile are capped off by the soft R&B ballad "Sour Grapes" and the chill pop "Good Parts" respectively.
- Animal Motif:
- Chaewon describes herself as Le Sserafim's 'cheetah'.
- Kazuha is also often compared to swans because of her natural grace.
- Eunchae seems to have a lion thing going on, from one of her lines in Antifragile to introducing herself as a baby lion in a collab stage with NMIXX's Sullyoon, IVE's Leeseo, and NewJeans's Minji and Hyein.
- The Baby of the Bunch: Eunchae, who has large age gaps with all the members. She's so adorable and the members can't help but dote on her and and are highly protective of her well-being.
- Badass Boast: The lyrics of both Fearless and Antifragile see the girls proclaim that they're not afraid of anything, and that they grow stronger through adversity.
- Ballet: Before her debut, Kazuha was a professional ballet dancer. She was scouted during a performance at the Dutch National Ballet Academy. The choreographies for Blue Flame, Antifragile and Swan Song also
incorporate Kazuha's background in ballet dancing. - Butt-Monkey: Yunjin. Whether it's getting the punishment food first, unknowingly eating spicy food, accidentally bumping heads with someone, or even getting the short end of the stick with the editors of the video, she's usually on the receiving end. She's also notoriously bad at games.
- Call-Back: One of Kazuha's lines in the song "No Celestial" is "F-F-F-Fake wings/Tear them off with my hands". What does she do during one of her scenes in the "Unforgiven" music video?
- Dissonant Serenity: The "Antifragile" music video depicts the world about to end thanks to an imminent asteroid... and the members of Le Sserafim going about their business as usual, despite everybody else rightfully panicking around them.
- Establishing Character Moment: Each of the girls' pre-debut teasers. Chaewon's and Sakura's served as a re-introduction to their new image after IZ*ONE, Garam's signified her as the visual of the group, Yunjin's emphasized her Singer-Songwriter image, Kazuha's established her as a ballerina-turned-idol, and Eunchae's signified her as The Baby of the Bunch.
- Female Empowerment Song: In "The Great Mermaid", the girls declare they don't need "no golden prince", in reference to the The Little Mermaid giving up her legs and independence to be with a man.
- Gamer Chick: Sakura has run her own gaming channel on Youtube since her days in HKT48. She was also gifted a PS4 and a Nintendo Switch by fans during IZ*ONE fansigns. She gets to show off her skills when all the girls went to a gaming café, even telling the members how people in this place usually act and do.
- Gemstone Motifs: Each girl was assigned a gemstone during the Antifragile era, as seen in the "Iridescent Opal" concept photos. Additionally, each member-specific version of the album features the color of that member's gemstone, which was also carried over into the Unforgiven era.
- Sakura's is the pink diamond.
- Chaewon's is the diamond.
- Yunjin's is the emerald.
- Kazuha's is the sapphire.
- Eunchae's is the ruby.
- Genre Roulette: Let's see: they've done alternative pop
, reggaeton, funk, electro-pop, pop punk, UK garage, Latin pop, soft rock... - Glacial Apocalypse: Some of the dance scenes in the apocalyptic "Antifragile" video features the girls in fuzzy winter clothing, which is apparently meant to represent an icy post-apocalypse. Same goes for the "Frozen Aquamarine" concept photos.
- Gratuitous Spanish: Some lines in "Fire in the Belly" from Unforgiven. Somewhat justified by that song being in a Latin style.
- Helpless with Laughter: Eunchae has been known to sometimes go into uncontrollable fits of laughter at random moments.
- Irony: Even the members lampshade how the choreography of "Easy" is anything but.
- Light/Darkness Juxtaposition: The Fearless era made use of a lot of visuals like this. Perhaps most apparent in the album cover (especially when compared with the Japanese version, which is just like the Korean one but color-inverted), as well as the "Black Petrol" and "Blue Chypre" concept photos, with the former having the girls in black leather racing suits and the latter in white/nude flowy clothing meant to make them resemble mermaids.
- Lighter and Softer: The Japanese music video for "Fearless" features the girls in cutesy, pastel clothing and interiors akin to something from TWICE, which is a far cry from the minimalistic, fashion model-esque Korean version.
- And then there's the fact that Yunjin's clothes are exactly the same as Momo's in the music video for "Celebrate" - which, coincidentally, is also a Japanese song.
- Love Hurts: "Sour Grapes" is about the hesitancy to act upon romantic feelings, due to the perception that love is "sour" — in that it only serves to hurt the people involved — rather than sweet like one would imagine.
- Made of Iron: In a jarring moment at the end of the "Antifragile" music video, the girls get hit by the asteroid that had been hurtling towards Earth for the music video's duration. As the smoke from the impact clears, we find out not only were they unharmed, but also totally unbothered. Well, that's certainly one way to depict resilience.
- Mama Bear: All the other girls when it comes to Eunchae, especially Sakura. As she is the youngest of the group, they all feel a responsibility for making sure she is able to live a normal teenage life alongside her idol life.
- Minimalistic Cover Art: They seem to be a fan of this, just three releases in.
- Multinational Team: As is typical for K-pop, but the group emphasizes the members' different nationalities by having them speak in their native tongues for album intros.
- Precision F-Strike: Some of their b-sides have swear words, which is surprising for a K-pop girl group.
- The chorus of "The Great Mermaid" starts with "I don't give a shit!".
- It's censored in the streaming version, but "No Celestial" contains the line "I'm no fucking angel/I'm no fucking goddess".
- Recurring Element: Their songs usually reference classic stories, mythos or folklore, whether in the title or the lyrics themselves (i.e. "Blue Flame" mentions the will-o'-the-wisp). This most likely spun off from their group name having a type of angel (seraph, or seraphim) in it.
- Singer-Songwriter: Yunjin seems to be carving out this type of image for herself, having already penned and released a few solo songs of her own. She is also the member with the most co-writing credits on Le Sserafim songs.
- Significant Anagram: Le Sserafim is an anagram of "I'm Fearless".
- The Western: The concept of "Unforgiven", which samples the theme from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and shares the name of another Clint Eastwood-starring western.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: Garam, who has the shortest K-pop career in history, only having two weeks total of performances and her contract revoked barely two months after debut.
