Rain and Colbert: The dance(Dance Revolution)-off
Dance Dance Revolution! HA!
Anyone who’s watched The Colbert Report for a while now will probably, like me, have anticipated some kind of shenanigans to come of Stephen Colbert’s reported dance-off challenge with Rain in a battle to assert his kpop idol supremacy. After all, Colbert’s the guy who cultivated a mock rivalry with indie rockers The Decemberists and finally challenged them to a “Guitarmageddon” shred-off — at which point he took out a guitar, faked injury, and called in a “last-minute” replacement. Good thing Peter Frampton was on hand to step in, right?
So what better way to cheekily circumvent his own dance challenge — short of calling in Justin Timberlake to pinch-hit, er, pinch-dance (as I only half-joked about earlier) — than to conduct the challenge on Dance Dance Revolution consoles (with the refrain of his Rain parody song altered to sing, nonsensically, “He’s dancin’ in Korean…”)?
Rain did show off some dance moves before the Dance Dance Revolution portion, and although I don’t think he showed himself to his best advantage (he dances more impressively in his music videos, imo), he acquitted himself reasonably well. Perhaps in keeping with Rain’s self-consciousness about his English, the segment was pre-recorded without a live audience and his speaking was kept to a bare minimum (a mere, “I don’t think so” as he made his grand entrance). Plus, the burden of the humor (and the brunt of the joke) was borne by Colbert himself, who countered Rain’s flashy moves with his own laughably dorky ones (but performed with complete gravitas, of course).
Colbert was also the one who was “outmaneuvered” by Rain on the DDR console — which, if you watch The Colbert Report regularly, you’ll note is something of a rare concession, since Colbert never makes his character out to be the loser of anything. In fact, despite all the faux-trash-talking he’s done, I’ve been surprised (pleasantly, actually) at how deferential Colbert has been to Rain. I mean, he frequently makes his guests appear silly and does his best to push their buttons with his obnoxious, self-described “willful ignorance.” But then again, I also think Colbert only pushes his aggressive character as far as his opponent/guest can handle it, and Rain might still require some special handling. In any case, Colbert has always been careful not to place Rain at a disadvantage.
All in all, the segment was hilarious and Rain’s participation — despite barely talking — showed him in the best possible light, which was as an It-Getter who’s in on the joke and knows how to laugh at himself. (Which, I suppose, is helped when the joke is really about him laughing at someone else.) The appearance can only help.
SONG OF THE DAY
Rain - “태양을 피 하는 방법” (How to Escape the Sun). This version’s different from the version I posted earlier; this is the one in the music video, and is the song used as the basis for Colbert’s “Singin’ in Korean” spoof. [ Download ]
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Tags: Hollywood, kpop, Rain, ranty/ravey, singers, Stephen Colbert
