“KATSEYE: WILD HEARTS” Review: This Scene Is Gnarly & We Mean That Both Ways

There is no doubt that KATSEYE is a phenomenon. This global girl group isn’t quite like the others out there, and that’s what makes them gnarly. You know, like boba tea. Here’s where you say “gnarly,” pretty please.

But anyway, two years after “The Debut: Dream Academy” turned six strangers into a global act, the group already has its own expanding documentary-verse. First came the Netflix docuseries “Pop Star Academy: KATSEYE.” Now there’s “Wild Hearts,” landing in theatres just two days before the “WILD” EP itself, which is a crazy schedule, we must assume, even for them. We mean 24/7, more like 25/8. Like, honestly, are they okay?

Fair enough, though, because the exhaustion checks out. In two years, KATSEYE has gone from reality show hopefuls to two Grammy nominations, a Coachella slot, arena tours, and a brand deal roster that reads like a grocery list. That Gap campaign in particular is highlighted in this feature, and rightly so, since by the group’s own accounting that denim gamble is what really brought the boys to the yard.

But between those deals and the tour stops the documentary tracks, “Wild Hearts” doesn’t shy away from showing just how big the machine has gotten around six people who are all still in their twenties (minus maknae Yoonchae, who the group insists is not, in fact, the baby, even though every Eyekon knows better).

That machine, of course, started with “The Debut: Dream Academy,” the 2023 competition series that put KATSEYE together in the first place, later expanded into the Netflix docuseries “Pop Star Academy: KATSEYE.” “Wild Hearts” barely touches the academy process itself, but that makes sense, “Pop Star Academy” already chronicled all of it, so there’s no real reason for this film to retread the same ground.

What we get instead is more of a quick victory-lap flashback than a full retelling, which tracks for a film aimed squarely at people who already know the lore cold. Director Nadia Hallgren, who previously helmed the Michelle Obama documentary “Becoming,” clearly has the chops for intimate, character-driven nonfiction. What’s less clear is how much room she was actually given to use them here.

Which is exactly where the film’s biggest limitation shows up. The best artist documentaries lean into that scale to go somewhere genuinely intimate, the way James Cameron helped Billie Eilish earlier this year, pulling back the curtain on burnout and the creative process in a way that felt unguarded, or Taylor Swift’s “Miss Americana,” which used its access to reckon honestly with image and control, or even Blackpink’s own doc, which let its members sit with homesickness and pressure without rushing to the next number.

“Wild Hearts” isn’t quite reaching for that. It’s more interested in sorting KATSEYE into tidy categories and serving them up bite by bite: the origin story bite, the hit-single bite, the struggle bite, the fun-personality bite. For better and for worse, this is a highlight reel, or greatest hits with chapter breaks.

That categorising approach works best when it’s charting the group’s rise. We get the debut era and how “SIS” (Soft Is Strong) set the tone, with “Touch” proving it had, well, the touch!

Then comes the big gamble, which everyone hated at first. “Gnarly”, which by all accounts flopped on first listen before the fan camp turned it into a full-blown phenomenon.

And obviously, “Gabriela”. Watching that climb laid out in sequence is genuinely satisfying, and to its credit the film doesn’t pretend the wins came easy; we see the actual grind behind them: shoots that run into the freezing early hours of the morning, rehearsals stretched for hours to nail a single eight-count.

There’s also a nice beat around “Pinky Up,” which the film reminds us is what they opened their Coachella set with, a genuinely full-circle moment for a song that started as a hook people couldn’t stop replaying online. Watching that climb laid out in sequence is genuinely satisfying, and to its credit the film doesn’t pretend the wins came easy; we see the actual grind behind them, shoots that run into the freezing early hours of the morning, rehearsals stretched for hours to nail a single eight-count, including a good chunk of time spent drilling the choreo for “Animal” until it actually looked effortless.

Where it still holds back is any form of dispute, which is, again, very perfectly curated. We see the hours logged, but the film never quite digs into what was actually happening in some of those rooms creatively. It’s very girls-focused instead.

One notable gap in that victory-lap timeline: no “Iconic By Mistake.” Yes, we’re aware of how many times “iconic” is going to appear in this sentence, but that’s kind of the point: the collaboration is iconic simply for getting three genuinely iconic groups in the same room, and it doubled as one of the most self-aware, well-aimed clapbacks at the haters KATSEYE’s had all year. Its absence is a real head-scratcher, unless the timing didn’t line up and the collab dropped after “Wild Hearts” had already locked its footage, in which case, fair enough, but still a shame it didn’t make the cut.

That tradeoff extends to the harder stuff, too. The film does acknowledge the members’ struggles, even if it’s mostly their ups and only some of their downs, and the most prominent of those beats is Megan Skiendiel’s mental health segment, where she’s noticeably positioned as the one willing to speak up on behalf of the group, not just about her own experience, but as someone actively pushing the conversation forward for all six of them.

Whatever “Wild Hearts”, as a film, gets wrong elsewhere, at least everyone involved seems genuinely willing to sit with that one on camera. The footage itself never feels performative; it’s the editing around it that occasionally does, cutting from something raw straight into the next glossy brand beat like it’s checking a box, you know.

If nothing else, though, this film is a testament to the girls’ strength and stamina. More than once, members admit they’ve wanted to give up under the sheer weight of it all, which, fair, when the number of eyes on you only keeps climbing as the stages get bigger. And as the performances get more elaborate, so does the pressure riding on every single one of them.

What’s genuinely great is that “Wild Hearts” as a film lets them hold both things at once, the nerves and the ability to push through them, without pretending the nerves weren’t real to begin with. They’ve embraced the weight rather than hidden from it, and more than once, they turn around and thank the fans for helping them carry it.

The lighter stuff lands better, mostly on the strength of each member’s aura. Yoonchae gets one of the film’s more quietly moving arcs here, talking about how she used to give basically one face in every photoshoot, a practiced poker face, because it felt safer than actually expressing anything.

Watching her talk about finally being able to show more now, tied to her simply feeling more confident in her own blonde look, is a small moment that says a lot without overselling itself. It shows across the board, really, the members’ energy and charisma come through as exactly what you’d expect if you’ve followed them at all, and a few of them carry themselves with a maturity that reads as earned rather than coached.

Sophia’s segments make her leadership status obvious without the film needing to spell it out. She’s consistently the most well-spoken of the group on camera, to the point where you can watch it happen in real time, a question aimed at Megan will land, and Megan will visibly sidestep and hand it off to Sophia instead, who takes it without missing a beat. What’s more telling, though, is how little she seems to care about being the center of it. She doesn’t treat screen time or extra lines as something worth chasing, because as far as she’s concerned, KATSEYE is a group first, and that’s the part that actually matters to her.

Lara Raj pitches an “The Office”-style mockumentary bit at one point, breaking the conversation to turn and stare at the camera, and it does not work, which somehow makes it funnier, a rare moment where the film seems genuinely unscripted rather than assembled after the fact.

It’s also nice to see the film give her room to talk about writing “Unloveu” herself, proof that heartbreak clearly makes for good songwriting material even from the inside of a group this busy, and it’s around these moments that her own comfort being the group’s go-to voice really comes through.

Daniela Avanzini gets the film’s most quietly emotional beat, geeking out over finally getting to represent the Latin community on this scale, and clearly moved by the chance to sing in Spanish on “Gabriela”. She talks about it with the kind of gratitude that doesn’t feel performed, like she’s still a little in disbelief it’s actually her doing it. She also gets the single best line in the whole film without even trying, deadpanning “ojo de gatos” in her segment, which is just KATSEYE’s name in Spanish and still lands like the setup and punchline in one breath. Small moments like these do more to sell the group’s actual personalities than any of the tidy category segments around them.

Not every member gets that kind of room, though. Manon Bannerman appears in “Wild Hearts,” but barely as a speaking voice; most of her screen time plays like archival footage, as if she’s a ghost now rather than a current member sitting down alongside everyone else. That’s understandable to a point; she’s on hiatus and isn’t doing promo or group activities right now, the same position Sophia is currently in.

That editorial caution only gets harder to ignore in hindsight. Just last week, Sophia announced her own monthlong hiatus for her mental health, which retroactively recolours everything you just watched. The film couldn’t have known that was coming, obviously, but watching her carry so much of the group’s emotional weight on screen now plays very differently than it probably was ever meant to. It’s the kind of unplanned dramatic irony that no amount of careful editing can account for, and it ends up saying more about the toll of this industry than anything the film consciously set out to say.

Still, at the end of the day, “Wild Hearts” does exactly what it set out to do as a marketing tool. It runs through the greatest hits, gives each member their moment in the spotlight, and moves on before anything gets too heavy, basically the “Suicide Squad” title-card treatment, if we’re being generous – we’re kidding, there are no actual title cards, but imagine the chaos if there were: Megan’s segment flashbanging you with Candice Dances and full brainrot faces, Lara’s slapping on something like “rising global pop superstar” in bold red text. It’s polished, it’s fun in stretches, and it’s clearly not trying to be a warts-and-all exposé.

Funny enough, we got a small taste of that fandom energy firsthand at the screening. Some Eyekon in the audience came up out of nowhere and passed us a set of Lara photocards, the kind of spontaneous generosity that usually only shows up in Weverse comment sections and fancam replies. And we’re reminded of the power of this fandom, honestly, and KATSEYE clearly knows it, because the group takes every opportunity in their doc to thank the Eyekons for getting them here, for the support along the way, and for whatever’s coming next.

Which, in the end, is really what “Wild Hearts” is. It is a tour through KATSEYE’s past, a snapshot of their present, and a trailer for their very near future, all in service of getting people in seats for “WILD.” Whether that’s a disappointment or exactly what an Eyekon needs forty-eight hours before the EP drops kind of depends on what you walked in wanting, and honestly, most Eyekons will probably walk out generally satisfied at seeing Ojo de Gatos on screen regardless.

“KATSEYE: Wild Hearts” is currently playing in cinemas.