NewJeans ended 2022 with an outstanding song that ranked #8 on Billboard Global 200 and #4 on Billboard Global. Ditto, the second song on their debut album, was pre-released December 19, 2022.

The song was released with two music videos: Ditto Side A and Ditto Side B. The MV (music video) titles imitate the sides of a cassette tape and add to the music videos’ nostalgic ambiance. The MVs include footage taken with an old camera to evoke a sentimental feeling in the audience. The song is light and bouncy which contrasts to the MV’s deeper meaning.

Side A

In Ditto Side A, we see old-fashioned footage of schoolgirls who are played by the members of NewJeans. In one of the clips, a member talks to someone behind the camera named Heesoo, but none of the five members are named Heesoo. Who is the sixth girl?

In another clip, we see again that Heesoo is recording the girls, but her camera blocks her face. We see Heesoo move the camera frame away from the girls to a male classmate. When the boy looks over at Heesoo, we see Heesoo quickly turn away. This is to foreshadow that Heesoo is moving away from her friends and towards a crush.

The rest of the MV switches between the main video and Heesoo’s footage. The clips are of the girls in school, dancing, or hanging out after school. The clips are playful, childish scenes that make the audience feel fond towards the girls. Throughout the MV, we never see Heesoo’s face because she is always behind her camera.

In one scene, we see Heesoo and the members in front of the school. Heesoo stands under an umbrella in the rain, and it looks like she is leaving them. The scene seems to foreshadow a sad ending for the girls and Heesoo.HeeHe

As the song ends, we see three important scenes: the girls sleeping on a couch, Heesoo looking at deer, and then Heesoo sleeping alone on the couch. The final scenes are footage from earlier in the MV except we see that Heesoo is recording nobody. It’s as if the girls were just her imagination and never existed. The last shot shows Heesoo walking away in the rain. She holds an umbrella in her hand but makes no use of it.

Quick Thoughts

My first theory at the beginning of the music video was that Heesoo was a sixth member of the group who didn’t debut with the other girls. I quickly discarded this theory as the MV went on.

Side B

Side B begins where Side A left off. It shows clips of the girls in the hallway or a classroom, and then shows the same hallway and classroom with no one there. This is to remind the audience that the girls aren’t really there, and Heesoo imagined them.

The MV continues to show moments of the girls together, but we see that Heesoo is beginning to distance herself from them. We see Heesoo staring at the same boy from Side A. In the next scene, we see her watching NewJeans dancing from far away. Instead of recording them, Heesoo walks away.

Later we see Heesoo drop her camera from a roof. Before the camera falls, the scene cuts to more footage of the girls. The purpose seems to be to show the value of the camera that Heesoo is throwing away. The scene cuts back to the camera broken on the ground. The broken camera represents Heesoo leaving the girls. This is confirmed later when we see Heesoo walking away from the girls under an umbrella.

The last three scenes: Heesoo looking at the deer, Heesoo walking away with the boy, and then the deer walking away from Heesoo.

Other details

Throughout both MVs, Heesoo is seen wearing a cast. We see clips of the girls signing and decorating Heesoo’s cast. But when Heesoo wakes up on the couch in Side A, the cast is blank.

In Side A, one of the members makes a mistake in the choreography. Typically, the scene would be redone because the kpop industry is extremely strict about perfection and appearances. The approved mistake is to say that NewJeans is different from other groups.

Final thoughts

Theory 1 – Heesoo is meant to represent NewJeans’ fans. She represents the audience because she is always on the other side of the camera watching. She thinks the interactions between her and NewJeans are real, but they are just her imagination. When she wakes up on the couch, it’s as if she woke up from a dream and into reality – a reality where she is not really friends with NewJeans. That is why her cast is blank. When Heesoo wakes up, we see a blank cast to remind that it wasn’t real.

Another detail is the name Heesoo. It was officially announced that the mysterious girl’s full name is Ban Heesoo. If you say Ban Heeso quickly, it sounds like Bunnies which is what NewJeans calls their fans. (The problem with this theory is that the boy and the deer aren’t connected.)

Theory 2 – Heesoo is a fan/friend of NewJeans. We can see that she spends time with them and is happy with them. But we see Heesoo distancing herself in Side B because of a boy. Later, we see Heesoo walking away from NewJeans, and we see her walking away with the boy. This seems to represent that Heesoo grew up and moved on from her childhood interests. We all have our favorite music groups, TV shows, and actors, but we aren’t going to watch them forever. As we grow up, we will lose interest.

Also, a fawn represents innocence and youth. In the end of Side B, we see the deer walking away when Heesoo walks away with the boy. This is showing how Heesoo is leaving youth and childhood. (The problem with this theory is that the cast isn’t connected.)

In conclusion, I demand the director for these music videos to release an in-depth explanation.