Golden Hour: Part 3

Lemon Drop and In Your Fantasy

What we know so far: (See full recap in Ateez Storyline: Updated March 2024, Ateez Lore: The Who, What, When, and Where of It All, Golden Hour: Part 1, and Golden Hour: Part 2)

DISCLAIMER: Hi all, I am so sorry this has taken me longer than usual to post. The first issue was the double comeback for the same album which extended the original timeframe, then the tour, and the beginning of the school year which is always my busiest time at work. However, the biggest issue that I have not been vocal about is that the thumb on my dominant hand was injured at the beginning of the summer and has still not healed. I didn't realized how much pain I would be in when having to use my hand at work, so I have had to rest it when I am not working. This has caused me to not be able to work on my blog as much as I would like. This means that in an effort to publish this post I will be focusing on the two title tracks and not on the full album. I also took out some of the things I normally include from behind the scenes Ateez content. So sorry for that. A special thanks to my friend Carey who helped me type up the Diary Entries!

Not going to lie, the wait for this comeback seemed extra excruciating, I mean there was an Atiny out there removing San's facial features as a way to threaten some movement in a comeback announcement. After MANY months of waiting, it happened, a teaser for what is now the song of the summer at the end of the Towards the Light movie. Y'all!! It was bop and it was only 17 seconds long. Then a couple of weeks later we got our first guerrilla marketing.

Which jump-started the hype around this comeback and a lot of theories.

We then got a yellow vending machine with artwork from different artists dropped each day for almost a week. These works of art all held some historical, mythological, or literary meaning related to apples.

• To the Fairest: In Greek mythology, the Apple of Discord was a golden apple dropped by Eris, the goddess of strife, at the wedding of Peleus and Thetis. Before dropping it, she inscribed the apple with the phrase, "To the Fairest". It sparked a vanity-fueled dispute among Hera, goddess of marriage, women, and family; Athena, goddess of wisdom and warfare; and Aphrodite, goddess of love, lust, beauty, etc. that led to the Judgement of Paris and ultimately the Trojan War. In the picture you see an owl in flight behind the top woman's head representing Athena, a seashell handbag on the woman on the left's shoulder representing Aphrodite, and a peacock tie worn by the woman on the right representing Hera.

• Snow White: In the fairytale of Snow White, the titular character is given a poison apple by her stepmother, the evil queen, who is disguised as a witch. This poisoned apple is a magic blood-red apple which sends its victim, Snow White, into the Sleeping Death when bitten. She can only be revived by love's first kiss.

• William Tell: William Tell is a legendary folk hero in Switzerland who is said to have defied Austrian authority, was forced to shoot an apple from his son’s head, was arrested for threatening the governor’s life, saved the same governor’s life en route to prison, escaped, and ultimately killed the governor in an ambush. These events supposedly helped spur the people to rise up against Austrian rule and marked the foundation of the Swiss Confederacy, of which Tell is consequently considered the father.

• The first observation of Gravity: Legend has it that Isaac Newton, while sitting under an apple tree, was hit by a falling apple, which sparked his idea for the law of gravity. Newton himself said that the inspiration came when he was sitting in his garden and "was occasioned by the fall of an apple," though he never stated the apple landed on his head. This observation did make him begin to question why objects fall straight down to Earth and not sideways or upward, which led to his theory of universal gravitation.

• I would still plant a tree: Martin Luther, a 16th-century German theologian who is known for starting the Protestant Reformation, was quoted saying, "If I knew the world would end tomorrow [some quote this as go to pieces], I would still plant my apple tree," This signifies a commitment to hope, purpose, and continuing to do good works even in the face of despair or ultimate destruction. 

We were feeling pretty good about what KQ was trying to tell us, we just knew this comeback had something to do with apples. I mean, how could it not with all of these references, but then, KQ flipped the switch on us. All of the apples that had been ripped from the art work were not just removed but replaced! The apples were replaced by lemons!

I was not ready for this change! Where did the apples go? Why lemons? This was our first clue that all would not be as it seems in Ateez's comeback.

Diary Entries:

The original Diary Entries for Golden Hour: Part 3 were not included in any of Ateez's physical albums, but rather in their POCA album as "digital content". A lovely Atiny somehow found a way to take pictures of these digital inserts and post them on Twitter, but let's be real, we have some talented Atiny writers so I was not going to believe them to be valid until I received my own POCA album to confirm. This, of course, took a month to arrive as all things we are anxiously awaiting seem to take longer than anticipated. Once I finally did receive my POCA, I was pleased to see the Twitter posted Diaries were, in fact, legitimate, and boy the story they weaved!

To find the Golden Hour: Part 3 Diaries in their entirety, please read them HERE. I am only going to list the key take aways for the purpose of this blog entry.

Diary Entries - Key Points

• The Diaries start from the perspective of Sopro (text in red) who has become aware of being alive but only existing in its world alone so began existing without thought until one day (the day Wooyoung uses it), Sopro's world began to change and it ended up in Wooyoung's body experiencing it's first feeling, joy.

• We then transition back to the Ateez story where the members contact Wooyoung saying they would like to try being a musical group again which bring Wooyoung boundless joy.

• He and San join Hongjoong at his book signing event and things start to turn strange when the people around him start experiencing extreme joy and begin laughing uncontrollably. Which confused Wooyoung since he was not as affected as the others.

• The sense of dissociation between what Wooyoung thought and felt made him nauseous, and caused a bright, ruby-red light to suddenly pour from his mouth. This ruby light floating in the air was Sopro, who then flew into San's mouth.

• Wooyoung, San, and Hongjoong later meet up with Seonghwa at a printing factory that had caught on fire, however no one was trying to put the fire out as everyone, including the owner of the printing factory, were in fits of laughter.

• Seeing this scene frustrated Wooyoung and also made him feel guilty because he thought it may have something to do with Sopro. He put his hands in his pockets and found a crumpled piece of paper which was a page from the book HongJoong had torn earlier. On the paper was the brainwashing speech Z used in Strictland.

• Upon reading those lines aloud, Wooyoung discovered they woke the rest of the members out of their stupor and allowed San to expel Sopro.

• Sopro then flew into the mouth of the printing factory owner and the people stopped laughing and began to cry as the new host was feeling despair and not joy.

• Wooyoung confesses to using Sopro and the others forgave him because he didn't know what the consequences would be.

• They then met up with Jongho who had been under Sopro's influence while in his studio but had heard a song they sang in World Z and had woken up, and then used the same method to help Yeosang.

• They began to discuss what they had been told about Sopro from Left Eye and realized it was not a stone but a spirit who must now be learning emotions by moving from one host to another and in the process also growing in strength.

• The first set of Diaries end with the members wondering where Mingi and Yunho are after discovering that Mingi's influencer social media feed had disappeared.

As an aside, my good Atiny friend hypothesized that the reason we did not get printed Diaries was because the printing factory in the story had burned down. I hadn't had that thought, but if it is true, way to stick with the storyline, KQ. Also, more Diary key points to come when we get to In Your Fantasy.

Lemon Drop Music Video:

A happy, upbeat song and music video? Oh no!! Those never are what they claim to be. This is where KQ's apple/lemon swap comes in.

Lemons often have both positive and negative connotations. They can symbolize wit, uniqueness, spiritualism, and purity; but they can also symbolize deception and defectiveness. In the States (and most likely other places, but my frame of references is the US), we have some common phrases that represent this kind of negative symbolism: "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade" [try making something good out of the bad things circumstances you are in] and "they sold me a lemon" [something that doesn't work well]. When looking at lemons in literature, their ability to represent contrasting ideas like bitterness and sweetness or difficulty and transformation makes them a powerful and versatile literary device. Dreaming about eating a sour lemon could mean you are feeling unwell; dreaming of selling lemons could mean you are feeling deceptive. I think deception is what we are getting with Lemon Drop. The images we are seeing in this music video are positive and happy but what is really going on under the surface?

Lemon Drop starts in a laundry mat. Washing clothes symbolizes spiritual cleansing, forgiveness, and new beginnings, particularly in religious contexts where it represents repentance from sin and purification. In South Asian narratives, it highlights cleverness and disguise. When thinking about this symbolism in the context of the Diaries, I am interpreting this as Ateez's desire to begin their idol careers again but also how their original reaction to Sopro's influence is a disguise for the true impact of its use.

We then move to the auto garage where we get a glimpse of some license plates that contain messages to Atiny. "LDR 2506", "ATN-1117", "GHP0003", and "IYF 2507". Let's dissect these shall we? "LDR 2506" = Lemon Drop released in June (06) of 2025 (25). "ATN-1117" = Atiny 1117 (which is our Atiny anniversary, November 17th). "GHP0003" = Golden Hour Part 3. "IYF 2507" = In Your Fantasy which would be released in July (07) of 2025 (25). This was an easter egg that Golden Hour Part 3 was not over with its first release and that a second release, In Your Fantasy, would be coming in July.

We also see the same blue car (I'm so sorry, I know nothing about cars. I have no idea what type of car this is, but it sure is pretty!) in the shop and also in the parking lot behind it, but in the first two shots, "No Parking" is painted on the windshield while it is clean in the shot with the group. Just another way our eyes are deceiving us in this music video.

"The summer night burns hot. Just you and me, our own little party. Yeah, I feel the heat going crazy. Cheers to this night, raise your glass."

The facade starts to crack when we see Wooyoung in the car while the lyrics are discussing partying through the night but also the heat going crazy. What we know from the Diaries is that Sopro's journey to discover emotions causes the people in the community to experience uncontrollable, extreme versions of those same emotions, often against their true feelings (remember the owner of the print shop who was laughing while his shop burned to the ground?). They are going crazy against their will with no way to stop It.

People are so controlled by Sopro that they don't even have the ability to make rational decisions. Who would lock their friend in an enclosed car while the temperature outside is rising to 40/100 degrees? Because I was interested, I looked up how hot the inside of a car could get when the temperature was 100 degrees Fahrenheit. In 10 minutes it would be 119 degrees, in 30 minutes it would be 134 degrees, and in an hour it would be 143 degrees inside of that car. This scene shows that they had no idea they were locking Hongjoong in their car. They were under the influence of Sopro.

We then move into the part of the music video that starts to connect to our memories of Ateez's past. The elevator from Turbulence, shopping cart from Wave, escalator from the Diary Film, and office building windows from Spin Off: From the Witness Epilogue are all referenced in Lemon Drop.

These references call back to moments of sorrow (Turbulence), joy (Wave), determination (San's decision in the Diary Film), and confusion/intrigue (Spin Off: From the Witness Epilogue). Emotions that Sopro has already learned and could come to learn in the future.

In Lemon Drop we also see water encroaching on Ateez while they are experiencing their fun night of frivolity. This imagery often represents a feeling of overwhelm either mentally or emotionally. The exact feeling the members go through in the Diaries when under Sopro's influence.

Lemon Drop ends with someone beginning to swim towards the surface of the pool, symbolizing Wooyoung's ability to break free of Sopro and use Z's words to wake Hongjoong, Seongwha, and San up too, while at the same time Jongho was waking up Yeosang with the music they sang in Stictland.

We get a cookie at the end of Lemon Drop where Yunho is walking towards the car, this time with the top down. He opens the trunk and sees a pair of black boots while what we now know is the beat of In Your Fantasy plays. What we didn't know is that we would not have to wait very long to hear the song the beat was sampled from.

Golden Hour Part 3: In Your Fantasy

On June 24th, while we were in the height of the Lemon Drop comeback and anxiously awaiting the start of Ateez's In Your Fantasy tour, something we never would have expected happened. ANOTHER comeback announcement! Wait, what? They only released half of Golden Hour Part 3 and In Your Fantasy was more than just a tour title? What could this mean? Were we getting just one more song in a repackage? Could there possibly be more songs? Could my original idea about unit songs based on the promo map of the original Golden Hour Part 3 be coming true? So many thoughts. So many questions!

Something just as exciting was also happening, at least to a theater kid like me. The images they were using to promo In Your Fantasy were THEATRICAL!! Are you seeing this? We have a Phantom of the Opera mask in the promo art!! The promo map was also giving underground club/speakeasy which is SUCH a vibe! I couldn't wait!!

Diary Entries:

When the album came out, not only did we get a new title track, we got solo songs from every member AND an extended diary! Goodies galore!!!

Diary Entries - Key Points

• They found Yunho and Mingi in a nearby cafe and were able to wake them up with the music Jongho prepared for them.

• This confirmed that the members, not Sopro, were reacting to the memories of World Z, breaking free from Sopro’s control.

• They hypothesized that the memories of people close to them awoke emotions buried in their unconscious that fragmented Sopro’s control and allowed them to break free.

• By observing the people in the cafe, they realized Sopro was learning a new emotion, embarrassment, which is why people were deleting their social media posts or deactivating their accounts.

• The perspective changed to Sopro and we followed it from one host to another. It learned the emotions of sadness, excited nervousness, embarrassment, and shame.

• The members used a "spirit scanner" provided by Yunho to track down Sopro inside of the body of a woman who was ashamed on a date. They used her phone to show her a video of her and a puppy and being reminded of this memory allowed her to expell Sopro.

• When Sopro was released, Wooyoung stepped on it to trap it and ended up pushing it into the ground, so Sopro decided to run away...down...

• During the peaceful days that followed, the world tried to make sense of what happened. Some groups viewed the event as a religious phenomenon, and others thought it might have been something similar to the instinctual group reactions right before a disaster.

• Yunho stayed in the library looking for similar legends and artifacts recorded here in World A. He found a book by a scholar specializing in legends and myths based on the theory that the universe is composed of multiple dimensions, the author looked like Left-Eye!

• Yunho had the rest of the members meet this Left-Eye look-alike scholar, who also had one daughter but she will still living. He explained that there could be even more dimensions and universes than just the two worlds.

• The scholar told them about a tomb of an ancient king who was believed to be a legend that was discovered and its artifacts stolen before they could be researched. He showed them a picture of the king and he was wearing a necklace with a ruby stone that looked like Sopro. The legend says that it was a stone with the ability to move the hearts of all things that was given as a gift to the king by a huge bird―a spiritual creature.

• As they were looking for additional information on Sopro, Yeosang found a live clip of a video creator searching for true ghost stories. A statue that didn't exist until yesterday suddenly appeared in a graveyard overnight, and monsters were rising from the ground. With a shriek, its eyes shot open it looked enraged. People watching the live video called it "the resurrection of Frankenstein." It was Sopro who did not disappear but was only hiding.

• Not long after, a war broke out over there.

In Your Fantasy Music Video:

Welcome to Club Lucifer an exclusive underground club/speakeasy that requires an access card to enter.

Historically, underground clubs or speakeasies were secret bars or nightclubs, that operated illegally during the Prohibition era in the US to serve alcohol since the 18th Amendment outlawed its sale in 1920. They were often located in basements, attics, or behind false facades and required passwords or secret codes for entry. Today, the term also describes modern, retro-style bars that replicate the exclusive, hidden-entrance concept, focusing on craft cocktails, dim-lit intimate settings, and a lack of public promotion.

Upon entry into the club, we are introduced to our vocal line representing different parts of or ideas behind a speakeasy.

Yunho is with a woman at a bar filled with prohibited alcohol, Seonghwa is imbibing on red wine, Yeosang is laying on a member of the club as these are often places for clandestine romantic meetings, Wooyoung is seen through the eye of a mask meant to cover one's identity, San is standing before a door with multiple locks representing keeping the establishment a secret, and Jongho is presiding over the theater where he can see all of the things people are trying to keep secret down below.

"Release your inhibitions; There ain't no point in fighting; Don't need no good intentions; So why you tryna find it?"

An underground club/speakeasy is not a place for you to hold back. There is no point in fighting it, just release your inhibitions.

And then we get to our rap line. Y'all, Hongjoong was wearing his captain's armband again!

He rips it off and throws it away. In Club Lucifer Hongjoong is not the captain, he is under the influence of the club and now has a new goal...

"I'm getting in your head"

Up to Mingi's scene, we have been inundated with red. Red as a color represents passion and desire but it is also a color of caution and danger. Club Lucifer is both a place of desire and danger.

"Ice cold with no chaser" 

Mingi's scene starts with this line and gives us a short reprieve from the oppressive red heat. We get a quick glimpse of blue; a short calmness with ice to alleviate the heat. But it doesn't last for long.

"Give in to desire"

That quick reprieve causes us to experience a false sense of safety and makes us fall even deeper under their spell.

This leads us to discover the truth behind Club Lucifer...

"Come take a seat In your fantasy. I'll set you free From your sanity. Heaven is in my stare Ain't gonna take you there. Read between the lines, look here, Lucifer. Devil in disguise, we know how this works. Come take a bite Like it's what you need. I pull you in closer 'Til it's hard to breathe. Heaven is in your stare Not gonna take you there. Read between the lines, look here, Lucifer. Devil in disguise, we know how this works."

Club Lucifer is really Sopro, and of course Wooyoung is the one with it because he is Sopro's "mother bird". Sopro presents itself as a fantasy, luring you in to use it. It is the devil in disguise. Ateez was told using it would allow them to bring other's hearts in line with their own and technically that is true. It promises to set you free but the fallout from that process is far to much to bare.

The black cloud that exudes from Sopro and turns the club into black and white is a visual representation of the true nature of Sopro. For anyone who has seen Sin City or Schindler's List, you know the power of color (especially red) dropped into a black and white movie. This cinematic technique is used to evoke specific emotional reactions, highlight thematic elements, and direct the audience's attention.

While Club Lucifer is washed in black and white we are again shown parts of the club but this time the stakes are raised. The red used is more than a symbol for desire and danger but is now highlighting the silhouettes on stage, the masks that are hiding true intentions, how the people are impacted through the portrayal of red eyes, and the destruction imbibing can bring.

We also see the Ateez members both watching the performance on the stage and being the performers themselves.

To me, this represents the feelings each character felt as they were forced to experience emotions against their will. Almost like dissociating and watching themselves go through something that is not true to their feelings.

The images of looking through the peephole and the keyhole to see what is happening on the other side also gives us a sense of "outside looking in" and seeing what is lurking underneath the surface. Which brings us to the theater with the chandelier and a certain theatrical production, The Phantom of the Opera.

The Phantom of the Opera is about a young chorus girl at the Paris Opera House, who becomes the obsession of a mysterious, disfigured musical genius living beneath the theater who she thinks is her “angle of music”. Known as the Phantom, he presents himself as a music teacher and almost ghostlike figure, but beneath his mask he is manipulative, dangerous, and often described as a “devil in disguise.”

In Your Fantasy ends with the masks of the people in Club Lucifer falling off to two very different reactions of Ateez members. Yeosang stands stoically amongst them while Hongjoong laughs. This could represent the dichotomous feelings of the members when they discovered how to be released from Sopro's control. They experienced a sense of relief (Hongjoong's laugh) but also a sense of ownership and duty (Yeosang's stoicism) because their actions were what caused this mess to begin with.

Final Thoughts

We have now arrived at my favorite part of this post, how the double title tracks of Golden Hour Part 3 are related. Ok, so go with me here. I think these two scenes are showing us how to view Lemon Drop and In Your Fantasy by using the silhouettes behind the screens.

I think Lemon Drop and In Your Fantasy are happening at the same time with Lemon Drop acting as Ateez's perspective of the events at the beginning of the diaries and In Your Fantasy acting as Sopro's perspective (and Ateez after they have broken Sopro's control). In Lemon Drop we see the outside of Sopro. The boys are actively under its control and all about restarting their idol careers. They don't know it yet, but Sopro is messing with their bodies by making them hot, messing with their emotions by making them experience uncontrollable joy, and messing with their minds by making them forget everything other than what Sopro is feeling. In In Your Fantasy we see the inside of Sopro. We are now behind the screen from Lemon Drop and have entered Sopro's forbidden depths. IT is the one asking them to let go of their inhibitions. IT is the devil in disguise. We see the silhouettes but now we are inside with them. It is only after Ateez has been able to break free that the masks finally start to fall and they can leave Club Lucifer.

This leads me to my "final" final thought of Golden Hour Part 3. I have no idea if this is where the story will lead, but I need to write it down in case one day I may be on the right track. The Left-Eye look-alike scholar's theory that there may be more dimensions out there is an exciting prospect, but there are just TOO MANY clues that World A and Z are on a Möbius Strip, so I still think that World A and World Z are connected and past and future. Which leads me to wonder, why did the people of World A chose to willingly give up their emotions in order to prioritize productivity in the first place? Why did Z steal people's memories and burn them as fuel in World Z? So many questions that could start to be answered by the events in Golden Hour Part 3. If people's emotions start to go haywire again (now that war has broken out) and they get to the point where they can't get anything done, they may find a way to reach out for anything that may help them. Enter Henry Jo with his Scienslaver theology and BAM, a solution to their problem. People willingly may give up their emotions for some peace and the ability to live their lives with some semblance of productivity.

Ateez aren't under Sopro's control because Wooyoung and Jongho had broken them out using their memories of World Z. They also use the woman's memories of her dog to expel Sopro which shows them the value of memories. Maybe that is why Henry Jo/Z starts to steal them and use them in different ways. If the people can break themselves out of Sopro's control on their own with their memories, Scienslaver's theology isn't as valuable and Z loses his control. Ateez also can withstand Sopro so will most likely not fall under his control again and will see Henry Jo's rise as the start of Strictland. They may start to work against him which could be the origin of Halateez. So Golden Hour is both the aftermath of their experiences in World Z and the beginning of World Z. It is the time in their “day” that can represent both the setting and rising of the sun. It is a Mobius Strip.