It’s certainly a striking look.
South Korean pistol shooter Kim Yeji, a new internet favorite, is one of the most eye-catching stars of the Paris Olympics so far.
That’s the great thing about the Olympics. Before a game, you look forward to all the things you knew before: maybe Shakari Richardson in track and field, Andy Murray’s farewell in tennis or Simone Biles in gymnastics.
But there are some things you don’t know you care about until you see it. A very cool looking pistol shooter that definitely falls into this category.
Kim attracted attention online after she competed in the first of two events in Paris on Sunday, the 10m air pistol event.
The X account “Women Posting Ws” seems to be the source of her popularity, which reads next to a picture of Kim firing at a target, her back slightly arched, shoulders high, chin resting on them, and not firing. With his hands in his pockets, this is “the most aura I’ve ever seen in a photo.”
(Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)
The consensus on social media seems to be that Kim looks like some kind of robot assassin from an action movie, a killer from the near future who doesn’t need your clothes, boots, and motorcycle because she looks cool enough on her own, very grateful. GQ magazine wrote that she looked “straight out of a cyberpunk fan fiction.” Glamor magazine asks if Kim is “the biggest bad guy at the Paris Olympics?” Elon Musk is also involved, but we can’t let him ruin it all.
The device she wears isn’t actually a pair of glasses, but a miniature scaffolding attached to her forehead to aid her performance. There is a small black rectangle above her left eye, which is an eyepatch that blocks one eye and allows the other to be seen more clearly. There’s a small black circle above her right eye, which is actually a relatively common piece of kit with a mechanical iris that helps avoid blur and allows for better focus on targets.
Then another clip of Kim in action began to circulate, wearing the same “glasses” and the same incredibly steady hands and robotic coolness, but this time her hat was on backwards. The video shows that she finished the last shot, put down the pistol, raised the blindfold on her left eye, and looked like she was just checking the score in the audience, but to the audience, it seemed that she was Staring at some unspecified doubter.
The clip is not actually from the Olympics, but the World Cup held in Baku earlier this year. She set a world record in that event and was expected to win the 25-meter pistol title. That’s her goal at another event on Friday.
Kim, 31, is from Maepo, about 100 miles southeast of Seoul, and now lives in nearby Danyang. She began competing in 2006 and won a bronze medal in the 10m air pistol event at the 2010 World Youth Championships. On her profile on the International Sport Shooting Federation website, she lists simply “sleeping” under “hobbies.”
There is one more thing that makes it feel like she is actually a character in a Luc Besson movie. Often in highly stylized stories, the assassin has some unusual emotion. Maybe it’s a fascination with a particular type of music, or an adherence to ancient codes of conduct, or maybe they have a strange pet budgie or something.
Kim competes with a large stuffed animal tied to her belt. You could dismiss it as a personal quirk, but in fact, it’s a good luck charm that belongs to her five-year-old daughter back home in South Korea.
After the 10-meter medal ceremony, Kim told reporters she couldn’t wait to tell her daughter about her success. When asked what she thought of the medal and her newfound viral status, King said: “I guess I’m a little bit famous now.”
The one problem with all of this, if you can call it that, is that King didn’t really win. At least this time. The gold medal winner was compatriot Oh Ye-jin, who is 12 years younger than Kim, beating her by just a few points, setting an Olympic record of 243.2. Kim scored 241.3 points, meaning they both broke the record of 240.3 set by Russia’s Vitalina Batsarashkina in Tokyo. India’s Manu Bhaker finished third.
Wu burst into tears after winning the gold medal. “I still can’t believe I have a gold medal around my neck now,” Oh said. “Maybe over time I will believe it. By the way, this medal is heavy.
Kim isn’t the only one with a little calling card: While it’s an elephant to her, Wu has a tiny Purple Heart on the end of her pistol—unfortunately, not when she’s actually competing, but for Photos after the game.
(Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)
But to make the whole story healthier, Kim couldn’t be happier with Wu, who was also her roommate at the Paris Athletes Village.
“She was like a sister to me,” King told The Associated Press. “I always wanted to take care of her and always be by her side. So when she won the gold medal, I was extra happy.
“I don’t think she’s my match. It’s a big stage, the Olympics, and we won gold and silver medals. When we win these medals, we feel very proud to be Korean.
Often when sporting events or athletes become memes in nature, they gain attention after the event and then fade away, perhaps until the next similar global event and people say, “Oh yeah, I remember her.
This time, however, the internet will get a second chance to witness Kim’s shooting glory when she competes in the 25m pistol competition on Friday. And she seemed certain she would do better, too.
“I was always confident… that I, Kim Ye-ji, would win the gold medal no matter what.”
(Charles McQuillan/Getty Images)
