"The Astronaut Has Landed": Finding Comfort in Jin’s Space Imagery

“The Astronaut” concept was so important to fans during Jin’s military service. I'm grateful for everything it sparked

“The Astronaut.” The song that Kim Seokjin (aka Jin of BTS) released before leaving, a special gift for the fans—ARMY—to remember him by. It was also the nickname we all naturally gave him while he was away. Did he know how much we would come to treasure that song and its concept? Could he have imagined how it would take over the fandom’s collective imagination? How it would influence our art, our ways of expressing love and longing?

I’ve been wondering about it lately, ever since he came back and we all collectively felt our hearts lighten a little bit.

June 2024: When Seokjin returned to civilian life after 18 months of mandatory military service, my social media feed was bursting with celebration. “Welcome home, our astronaut,” wrote fans from around the world. “The astronaut has landed”. It felt so right. There was so much joy, and the words rang thick with meaning. It was so perfectly fitting that for his first return performance, held the very day after his military discharge, was the stage was gorgeously designed to look like the inside of a spaceship, headed back fro Earth after completing its mission.

The themes evoked by the character of the astronaut—departure and arrival, distance, the solemnity of a mission requiring bravery and skill—they all resonated so strongly with the fans, making it the perfect overarching metaphor to help us re-imagine the new separation that military service brought upon us.

It is only now, with Seokjin finally back, that I can begin to examine this space traveller theme more closely, and realize what it meant to me over the past year and a half. When I look back on how ARMY faced Seokjin’s departure in 2022, I shudder at the memory of overwhelming emotions I felt from fellow fans: Sadness. Melancholy. Frustration. Worry. Ours is a fandom that has never known anything but constant (and often real-time) communication with the members of BTS. This is no small thing. When we faced adversity, we always had each other; such has been the enviable strength of our fan-to-artist relationship. To disrupt that connection for the first time in 10 years, as even the pandemic could not fully do, was and remains a major challenge for both BTS and ARMY to experience. I think that, given the circumstances, it was easy and natural for us fans to adopt the imagery of an astronaut’s journey as a kind of euphemism for enlistment. It emerged quickly, back in December 2022, as the dreaded day of goodbye approached and the language of space travel could be seen in fans’ messages to Seokjin:

As a lover of BTS’ lyricism, I treasured having this metaphor in our language. It added a softer, more poetic layer to an experience that was otherwise quite jarring to me in many ways. Military service for the band was first and foremost a culture shock to me (speaking as a Canadian fan, the sight of the required military uniform for my favourite singers was visually striking), but it was also a highly mediatized affair, and the source of intense online debates. Most of all, it was a new kind of “distance” settling between BTS and ARMY. This is why, looking back, I’m so grateful that Seokjin, ever the smiling mood-maker, offered us the language and imagery to speak of his absence in soft tones. It felt like he was indirectly telling us how he wanted to be thought of and spoken about during his time away—a way of taking charge of the narrative, in his own gentle way. As BTS songs often do, “The Astronaut” inspired many writings, artworks and fanletters, which I believe came to play an important role in uniting and comforting the fandom. Below are just a few of my favorites.

“an astronaut’s send off” by petaljimi on twitter (2022):

i’ve never been good at goodbyes

i was hoping to see you
one last time before you went
and here you are.

you’re as good as every promise
you’ve ever made to me,
and i wonder if there will be anything that can live up
to the curve of your honest smile.

you let my hands go and i keep them pressed together,
a quiet wish for your safe landing,
and for your return.

“the earth’s notes for an astronaut” by syubtraction on twitter (2022)

Fanart by fluffie_duckie on instagram (2023). Created for Seokjin’s 31st birthday.

Fanart by lovemaze on twitter (2024). Created as part of the homecoming celebrations.

For a year and a half, all the fandom converged around a single, symbolic figure and wove it into our lexicon of love. I will forever be fascinated by how much beautiful art and writing The Astronaut inspired, and how there emerged a much needed gentleness that tempered our sadness and frustration. It was escapism, perhaps, but not as a replacement for real, hard discourse. Just a complement to it, like a touch of colour on a grey day.

Now, our Seokjin has been back for over a month, and I don’t see a single tweet using the nickname these days. I suppose we simply don’t feel the need to use it anymore. His mission is complete.

So I will say it one last time: welcome home, our astronaut. I eagerly await the day that BTS will reunite as 7 onstage.

— Lucía