LOONA members Heejin, Kim Lip, Jinsoul and Choerry secure injunction to terminate Blockberry Creative contracts

LOONA members Heejin, Kim Lip, Jinsoul and Choerry have terminated their exclusive contracts with K-pop agency Blockberry Creative.

On January 13, JTBC News reported that the Seoul Northern District Court’s civil division had issued an injunction to terminate the contracts of Heejin, Kim Lip, Jinsoul and Choerry with LOONA’s agency, Blockberry Creative, effective immediately.

According the news outlet, five other members of the girl group, namely Haseul, Yeojin, Yves, Gowon and Olivia Hye, had also requested the same injunction as part of the nine members’ ongoing lawsuit against the agency to suspend their contracts. However, their requests were rejected as the five members had reportedly amended parts of their contracts with the agency in the past.

Blockberry Creative shared a brief response to Star News on January 13, saying: “We are currently checking [the situation]. We will share our position later.”

The status of the remaining five members’ contracts may change pending the final results of the lawsuit. Members Hyunjin and Vivi were not involved in the lawsuit and presumably remain under the agency.

After the news broke, several statements attributed to members of LOONA began to circulate among LOONA fan circles. These messages are said to have been posted to the group’s subscriber-only fan-artist communication platform Fab, in which they addressed the ongoing situation and apologised for worrying their fans.

“The news is true, and I, for the team and for myself, will try until the end, so please cheer for us lots!” partly reads one message attributed to leader Haseul (who did not have her contract terminated), as archived by fans on Reddit. “There will be long and hard fights in the future too, but if Orbits [the term for LOONA fans] are by our side I think we be able to overcome it.”

Two other messages attributed to LOONA members Yves and Yeojin – both of whom, like Haseul, did not secure the injunction – on Fab spoke of persistence and wanting fair treatment. A message said to be from Yves read in part: “Every day I’m standing on the edge of a cliff, and what I can do is I can hold onto Orbit”, and a message said to be from youngest member Yeojin read in part: “I didn’t ask for much, I just wanted to be treated fairly, but I think my dreams were shattered.”

Members Kim Lip, Jinsoul and Choerry launched personal Instagram accounts shortly after news of their successful injunction was reported. Per a notice uploaded by the platform on January 13, LOONA’s Fab service will be terminated from February 11 at midnight KST.

The nine members’ lawsuit against Blockberry Creative was first reported in November 2022 by JTBC, shortly after the agency announced the expulsion of former member Chuu. The agency denied all reports regarding the lawsuit at the time, calling the claims “groundless”.

LOONA were originally set to release a new record titled ‘The Origin Album: 0’ on January 3, which would have marked their first release without Chuu. Blockberry Creative later shared that its release would be “postponed indefinitely,” as “various concerns about the members’ situation are not resolved.”

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