(From left to right)
Akali, Kai'sa, Seraphine, Ahri, and, Evelynn
Akali, Kai'sa, Seraphine, Ahri, and, Evelynn
Introducing K/DA! An unconventionally-flaired, but explosively popular music phenomenon who arrived onto the pop scene with their hit song "POP/STARS", Ahri, Evelynn, Kai'Sa, and Akali look forward to taking their music and their message internationally.
K/DA was introduced as a parallel universe in League of Legends focusing on the in-universe titular pop group. The virtual group was originally made to coincide with "The Afterparty" of the Worlds 2018, the opening ceremony for the finals of which premiered the group's live performance of "POP/STARS", headlined by Madison Beer
, Soyeon and Miyeon of (G)I-DLE, and Jaira Burns.
In the lead-up to Worlds 2020, the group made a comeback sporting new looks along with the pre-release single "THE BADDEST" for an upcoming EP. Also included was a comic series titled K/DA: Harmonies, following the journey of a young, aspiring musician named Seraphine who finds a chance to join the group. On October 2020, K/DA eventually released another single for the EP, titled "MORE", in which Seraphine is featured as a guest artist. They officially revealed their upcoming EP's title, "ALL OUT", and released it on November 2020.
In 2022 "POP/STARS" was certified Platinum by the RIAA, making K/DA (and simultaneously by extension, (G)I-DLE) the first Korean girl group to ever accomplish this.
Their promotional website can be found here.
Tropes:
- Audience Surrogate:
- Seraphine is this in the comic tie-in. All the readers know about her backstory via her Twitter account is that she was a barista who aspired to be a singer-producer and releases covers of songs on Soundcloud. She's otherwise an average girl who's a fan of K/DA — as many who follow the lore are — who becomes an Ascended Fanboy when she's offered the opportunity to collab on a song with them after being invited by Ahri. She's just unremarkable enough in the comics for the players to imagine themselves in her shoes as a newcomer that gets to work with their favorite girl-group.
- The self-proclaimed Evelynn "Stan" from the volume #3 of the comics counts as this as well, largely from her anticipation of K/DA's return after appearing then quickly disappearing for over a year after the release of "POP/STARS".
- Bilingual Dialogue: Their songs frequently switch between English and Korean, and most of the group is multilingual — Akali fluently speaks English, Korean, and Japanese, Kai'Sa speaks Chinese, Afrikaans, Korean, and English, Eve knows at least enough Korean and English, translating for the monolingual Ahri (who speaks in Korean during their group interview), and Seraphine speaks in English and Chinese.
- Boastful Rap: Pretty much the entirety of "POP/STARS" is the group boasting about how unstoppable they are, but special mention goes to the bilingual rap verses by Akali/Jeon So-yeon, which starts with "I'm a goddess with a blade, 소리쳐봐 내 이름 잊지 못하게note ". The Baddest does this as well.
- The Cameo: In issue 4 of Harmonies, a young Kai'Sa is seen with her (faceless) father, which the writer confirms is supposed to be a counterpart to Kassadin. This is amusingly the only time Riot has firmly established him as being Kai'Sa's father, as opposed to playing coy with their canon versions.
- Canon Welding: One of Evelynn's trivia facts lists Karthus as an artist she takes inspiration from, referring to Pentakill Karthus. Scenes of the subway train in the "POP/STARS" video also feature posters of both Pentakill and DJ Sona's logos, and it was later confirmed that they all exist in the same universe, or at least certain incarnations of them. This tweet alludes to Pentakill on the cover of one of Evelynn's magazines, further confirming that Pentakill exists.
- Continuity Nod: In 2019, Akali dyed her hair platinum blonde for True Damage, and with her 2020 K/DA ALL OUT skin, she appears to still be growing it out alongside her natural black hair. Harmonies also shows Prestige Edition True Damage Yasuo serving as their sound engineer.
- Costume Porn: Several Rioters are in agreement that the K/DA line were the most challenging skins they've ever designed (on par with Elementalist Lux, whose difficulty stemmed mostly from alternate forms and volume than sheer quality), with over 70 iterations in development (Kai'Sa alone had around 40!). This totally paid off, as the final products are simply gorgeous.
- Darker and Edgier: When compared to Popstar Ahri's much cheerier and colorful theming. Her starting K/DA was her breaking off from her cutesy teenage look to establish her as a stylish, more mature icon, with the group itself having a sleek, glamorous, and at times aggressive aesthetic to it. During one of her segments in the "POP/STARS" video, which are mainly set in a laundromat, there's a lingering shot on a laundry basket which has her old Popstar and Star Guardian outfits in it, showing how she's moved past that image.
- Doing It for the Art:
- Eve's ongoing involvement with K/DA is attributed to this. Her issue of Harmonies reveals that she's been pressured by an agent to ditch the "experiment," seeing it as stifling her already standalone success, and especially since it was on a brief hiatus anyway. She refuses to sign off since at long last, K/DA was finally coming out with new material again.
- Ahri created K/DA for this specific reason due to her stress from her evoked "Popstar" persona, and wanting the group to create what they love and feel passionate about, but not tied down and allowed to pursue their own interests.
- Four-Temperament Ensemble:
- Sanguine: Ahri, the passionate and highly proactive de facto face and lead vocalist of the group.
- Choleric: Akali, the hot-blooded and aggressively energetic rapper from the streets.
- Phlegmatic: Evelynn, the haughty, domineering born-superstar of the group, the foundation of their overall aesthetic.
- Melancholic: Kai'Sa, the highly methodical, yet passionate lead dancer and choreographer of the group.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation: K/DA ALL OUT Seraphine's skin variants are largely representative of her rise from an online indie star to a full-blown member of K/DA, but while the "Indie Star" and "Superstar" forms get solid coverage, the actual lore makes no mention of the middle "Rising Star" phase. The variant's description and some of its dialogue suggests that it represents a period where she first joined K/DA and is building up traction leading up to the release of their ALL OUT EP, but this isn't shown in either her Character Blog or in Harmonies.
- Girl Group: Of an especially edgy, Korean Pop Music variety, inspired by real-life groups such as 2NE1 and BLACKPINK.
- Golden Super Mode: During the Afterparty event of Worlds 2018, K/DA Kai'Sa had a "Prestige Edition" (the first of its kind) that decks her out in flashy white and gold colors. Over the course of the next several months, very likely due to popularity and fan demand, the rest of her group received the same treatment.
- A Good Name for a Rock Band: Or rather, Girl Group. Similar to Pentakill, K/DA gets its name from the game's "Kill/Death/Assist" ratio.
- Idol Singer:
- Ahri used to be a much cuter and Girls' Generation-inspired variety in her teenage years, now having evolved into her more mature and dark-lit design with K/DA.
- Seraphine is this outright, both her real world persona and her in-game persona being the classic bubblegum pop idol and a Rose-Haired Sweetie, but on "MORE", to match with the members of K/DA, she takes on a persona more akin to a siren.
- Image Song: Each member of K/DA save for Akali has received one with a concept video to go with it. Evelynn's image song is "VILLAIN", Kai'sa's is "Drum Go Dum", and Ahri's is "I'll Show You".
- Kaleidoscope Hair: All the members of K/DA have gone through multiple hair color changes over the course of their appearances. Seraphine has also had multiple hair colors, as she starts out with pink and purple hair as an Indie singer. As the a rising star, her hair is half and half blue and pink. As a superstar, her hair is blue with a purple gradient.
- Lower-Deck Episode: Issue 3 of Harmonies differs from other issues as its protagonist is not a member of the band, aspiring or otherwise, but a random, previously-unseen fan. Through her perspective, we're given a distant observation of the group's mystique (especially of Evelynn), as well as the varying levels of adoration they receive among audiences.
- Ms. Fanservice: Ahri, Akali, Kai'sa and Evelynn in 2018. Kai'sa and Evelynn have this turned up in 2020, with a lot of Kai'Sa poses focusing on her attractive... assets.
- Singing Voice Dissonance: Invoked with the entirety of the K/DA EP as almost every song on the EP has a different singer take on the role of the respective K/DA member. Even Seraphine doesn't escape this, as her singer on the EP is different from the one that does her character blog song covers.
- True Companions: All the members of K/DA are depicted as this, especially in the comic. Seraphine eventually becomes a dear friend to them as well.
- Virtual Celebrity:
- Unlike Pentakill —who was originally just a theme of cosmetic skins that were Defictionalized much later— K/DA was made specifically to coincide with a real collaborative release following Worlds 2018's "Afterparty" event, with the girls appearing front and center in their music video (and among the real artists behind them during their live performance).
- Seraphine was added to the lineup in a very different rollout that took advantage of her "virtual"-ness. She was first publicly established through Character Blogs grassroots-style and with nary a confirmed connection to League of Legends, and through word-of-mouth, she started to gain a legitimate following of her own original music and posts before the tie-in was officially announced.
- Vocal Tag Team: Both Ahri and Evelynn are the main singers of K/DA, though Ahri is considered the leader of the group overall.
