Queendom Puzzle
Queendom Puzzle is a 2023 South Korean reality competition show created by Mnet. It premiered on Mnet on June 13, 2023, airing every Tuesday at 22:00 KST. The show concluded on August 15, 2023.
The show serves as a spin-off series of Queendom, however it does not share a similar format with the previous seasons, only taking the name of the series.
Concept and format
On January 26, 2023, it was announced that the Queendom series would have a third season, but would be different from the previous two seasons.The show will focus on forming a global project girl group by taking members from currently active girl groups as well as solo female artists and piecing them together like a puzzle. It will take on a completely new format from the pre-existing Queendom series, with individual competitions taking place rather than team competition.
Out of the initial 28 contestants, they will compete through performances to finally become a 7-member supergroup, El7z Up.
Promotion and broadcast
On April 10, 2023, Mnet released the first teaser video on their YouTube channel. In the teaser, iconic girl group songs play in the background as well as the silhouettes of seven female celebrities are shown. Along with the confirmation that the first lineup will be revealed in May, the teaser includes the mysterious code on the bottom, "IURP WZHQWB HLJKW WR VHYHQ", which deciphers "from twenty-eight to seven".On April 24, Mnet confirmed that Girls' Generation's Taeyeon will host the show. The first six contestants were also revealed, as well as Weeekly, and H1-KEY where its agency, GLG, confirmed two of their members' participation in the show.
On April 25, it was revealed that WJSN's Yeoreum would be a contestant in the show. On April 26, it was revealed that members Jiwon, Chaerin and Bora from Cherry Bullet would participate in the show. On April 27, it was revealed that Yuki from Purple Kiss would also be a contestant.
On May 2, the remaining member of AOA, Chanmi, now known as Dohwa, was revealed as a contestant in the show.
On May 9, Mnet released a second teaser to officially announce the program's premiere date of June 13, 2023, at 22:00. In the teaser, silhouettes of the cast members are revealed as well as Taeyeon standing in the center.
On May 18, Mnet released teaser photos of the first 13 contestants in silhouettes, as well as two teams created, Pick on the top and Pick-Cat. The two teams also released two theme songs titled "Charismatic" and "Snap" respectively on the same day, accompanied by two performance videos shown on M Countdown. It was also shared that the rest of the contestants would be revealed the week after, and that they would be releasing and performing the same two songs on M Countdown in their own versions. On the same day, Lee Chae-yeon and Haein were reported to have withdrawn from the show. They would not be replaced and the show would continue with 26 contestants. On May 19, Mnet released individual teaser videos and posters previewing the first 13 contestants revealed.
On May 25, Mnet released a second set of teaser photos of the remaining 13 contestants in silhouettes, as well as the two teams, Drop The Beat & Athena. The two teams also released different versions of the two theme songs on the same day, accompanied by performance videos shown on M Countdown. On May 26, Mnet released individual teaser videos and posters for the remaining 13 contestants.
On May 29, Mnet released a group poster containing all contestants and MC Taeyeon, as well as the profiles of the 26 contestants. On June 2, Mnet released the first teaser trailer.
On June 6, a behind-the-scenes video was released, showing the contestants meeting each other for the first time. An exclusive preview, also known as Episode 0, was also released, showing the first hour of Episode 1 that was to be aired in the following week.
On June 8, a special stage of the contestants was aired on ''M Countdown.''
Cast
Host
- Taeyeon
Contestants
;Color key
| Final members of El7z Up | |
| Contestants eliminated in the final episode | |
| Contestants eliminated in the second elimination round | |
| Contestants eliminated in the first elimination round | |
| Contestants that left the show |
Contestant Progress
Voting
The final group will be decided based on votes through the Mnet Plus and Twinkple applications, where each voter choose 7 contestants to vote as an ideal final group.First Voting Period
- The voting period for every week began from the start of the episode, to 2 hours before the airing of the following episode. The entire voting period started from June 13, 2023, during the broadcast of Episode 1, and had concluded on July 25, 2023, 23:00.
- One new vote would be provided at the start of each episode, for 7 weeks. Hence, each voter would have a maximum of 14 votes throughout the voting period.
- All votes cast to each contestant would be accumulated throughout the voting period and will be reflected in the eventual ranking after this voting period. The voting results would be based on 50% for Korea and 50% for all other global regions.
- The votes in the first voting period would not be carried over to the second voting period.
- The voting period would begin from after Episode 7, to during the broadcast of the Episode 9.
- Voters can vote once every day. However, on August 8, which is the live broadcast for Episode 9, voters can vote twice on this day: once before 20:00, and once during the broadcast of the episode.
- All votes cast to each contestant would be accumulated throughout the voting period and will be reflected in the eventual ranking after this voting period. The voting results would be based on 50% for Korea and 50% for all other global regions.
- The votes in the second voting period would not be carried over to the final voting period.
- The voting period would begin from after Episode 9, to during the broadcast of the Episode 10.
- Voters can vote once every day. However, on August 15, which is the live broadcast for Episode 10, voters can vote twice on this day: once before 20:00, and once during the broadcast of the episode.
- All votes cast to each contestant would be accumulated throughout the voting period and will be reflected in the eventual ranking after this voting period. The voting results would be based on 50% for Korea and 50% for all other global regions.
Episodes
Round 1: Up-Down Battle (Episode 1-2)
The 28 contestants are split into four tiers, based on the following criteria :- Number of times the contestant has won first places in music shows
- Largest number of first week orders among all physical albums released
| Tier | Contestants |
| 1 | Dohwa, JooE, Kei, Lee Chae-yeon, Yeoreum |
| 2 | Haein, Jihan, Soojin, Soeun, Yeeun, Yuki, Zoa |
| 3 | Bora, Chaerin, Jiwon, Juri, Jiwoo, Suyun, Yeonhee, Seoyeon |
| 4 | Elly, Fye, Hwiseo, Miru, Nana, Riina, Sangah, Wooyeon |
Each contestant would then have a solo performance, and the remaining 27 contestants would each vote for the contestant. "Up" would be pressed if the voters each think that the performing contestant has performed better than the voter, and if otherwise "Down" would be pressed. After the performances, the contestants would be rearranged into their new tiers based on the results of the performances.
After Performances
| Tier | Contestants |
| 1 | Bora, Yeoreum, Jiwon, Hwiseo, Chaeyeon, Nana, Yeeun |
| 2 | Kei, Jihan, Zoa, Fye, Soeun, Soojin, Yuki |
| 3 | Suyun, Yeonhee, Sangah, Dohwa, Riina, Juri, Jiwoo |
| 4 | JooE, Miru, Haein, Elly, Wooyeon, Chaerin, Seoyeon |
Round 2: 7:7 Team Battle (Episode 2-3)
For this round, each contestant would choose one of the 2 signal songs, "Charismatic" and "Snap", in order of the number of Ups received from the Up-Down Battle, and there would be 14 contestants per song. In the event when there are already 14 contestants in one of the songs, the remaining contestants that have not chosen would be automatically allocated to the other song. Each song would consist of 2 teams: "PICK" and "DROP". After the contestants choose, in the Puzzle Room, Jiwon would form the 2 teams for "Charismatic", while Bora would form the 2 teams for "Snap". The formed teams would practice and then record performance videos for the songs.- A panel of 13 expert judges will watch the performance videos and evaluate them. The panel of judges consist of the following:
- * Seo Eun-kwang
- * Lee Min-hyuk
- * Hyolyn
- * La Chica: Gabee, Rian, Simeez
- * Choi Young-jun
- * Ryan S. Jhun
- * Kim Do-yeon
- * Lee Gi-seok
- * Park Hee-a
- * Kim Yoon-ha
- * RyuD
- In addition, the 14 contestants of "SNAP" would evaluate both teams of "Charismatic" and vice versa.
- For each song, the team with more votes wins. The contestants under the winning team of each song would get a benefit of 10,000 points.
- There would be 1 MVP for the winning team of each song, based on the selection of the expert panel. The selected MVPs would have the right to arrange the teams for the next round.