Soompi K-Pop Dance Madness: And the Champion Is...

And the battle is over! After a long and heated match between GOT7’s Mark and EXO’s Lay, the champion of Soompi K-Pop Dance Madness was finally crowned… and that winner is Lay. Congratulations to Lay and all EXO fans!

It was not a game without hiccups: A slew of spam votes contaminated the poll results early on, winding up in a 95-to-5 score in favor of Lay. In fact, we received so much spam that it shut down the poll, rendering everyone unable to vote. In the end, we started over from scratch, opening a 24-hour lightning round to decide the winner. Without the influx of spam, we could see a less dramatic but consistent pattern, and in the end, EXO-M’s main dancer walked away with a clean 68% of the votes.

We began this contest to see which idol might be considered by most to be the best K-Pop dancer, knowing that the definition of “best” would be somewhat subjective. Yet as the rounds progressed, even we were surprised to see how little agreement there was when it came time to judge the video clips. To us, one dancer would seem to be clearly more skilled than her competitor, but we would read well-written comments from Soompiers explaining why the competitor was superior, allowing us the chance to watch the clips again in a different light. We grew to appreciate the dancing abilities of some idols we hadn’t previously considered, as well as a few that we hadn’t even really known about. We also found it interesting that neither of the two finalists were Korean — a sure sign of the changing times of K-Pop, and some might say, proof of its growing global power.

Although most people did not predict that Lay would win, the news likely doesn’t come as a surprise to anyone who knows the fan power of EXO. Although Lay and group mate Kai didn’t perform so strongly in early rounds, the group’s comeback on April 15 may have spurred their fans to vote heavily in later rounds. There’s no doubt in our minds that Lay is a highly underrated dancer, and we’re pleased to see him getting more recognition for his talents. We look forward to “Overdose,” where we’re sure we’ll get to see more of Lay’s abilities in action! 

Still, we really have to admit that the surprise element of the proceedings was not Lay’s win, but the fan power of JYP’s newest boy band. Almost no one could have expected that Mark, the only real rookie in the contest, would rise to the finals. But with a little help from his friends all over the world (particularly in Thailand, China, and Korea!), he lasted until the very end. We’re totally impressed with GOT7’s fans — with such support, these boys will surely continue to thrive and conquer. And although ultimately Mark didn’t win, we have to say that rising to second place among the top dancers in the business is an incredible accomplishment for a rookie, and we will all be expecting even more incredible things from Mark to come!

We thank everyone for their patience during this time! We’d also like to remind everyone that a possible reward is on the way: We will be choosing the audience winners of our two K-Pop Dance Madness contests within the next week. Again, five Soompiers will be selected randomly from the comments section to receive a set of  “Stars of K-Pop”. We also held a contest to see if anyone could predict the K-Pop Dance Madness champion. If you predicted that Lay would win, you may receive a $50 gift certificate from Soompi Shop! Please remember to check your Soompi, Facebook, and Twitter messages throughout the next week to see if you won!

That’s it for Soompi’s K-Pop Dance Madness! Thanks to everyone who participated — your passion is what made the game possible!