Peninsula: After the Lights Go Out

At twenty-one, Cheng Yan, a materials science student, arrives in Seoul as a member of a joint Japanese-Korean project.

He only intends to complete the project, enter the semiconductor industry, and build up enough bargaining power to no longer be at the mercy of others. Then an old campus photo unearthed by a gossip account leads him to reconnect with Lin Zhixia, an old acquaintance who has debuted as a member of a girl group.

Onstage are carefully crafted smiles, personal growth, ambition, and public personas. Offstage are contracts, rumors, choices, and the vulnerabilities no one wants others to see.

Cheng Yan gradually realizes that he cannot prove his worth by "solving someone else's problems," nor can he treat any city or person as an answer that will let him escape his life.

And when the lights go out, it is never the cameras that decide where they will go.