The banana incident: how j-hope threw a banana at Jungkook

Some of BTS's most famous fights have nothing to do with music, choreography, or serious disagreements. V and Jimin have their legendary dumpling incident, and j-hope and Jungkook have a banana. And yes, it really did end with the normally impossible-to-anger j-hope throwing a banana at the group's youngest member.

The story goes all the way back to BTS's very beginnings, around the time of their debut. Jungkook received a fruit basket from ARMY. Today, after years of the members receiving incredible amounts of gifts, it might be hard to understand why an ordinary fruit basket meant so much to him. But Jungkook later explained that in those early days, gifts were rare, which made them especially precious. He was overjoyed about his fruit and, naturally, shared it with the others.

That's where he made one small mistake. He was sharing food with six young men who lived and trained together, and were, apparently, very hungry.

The fruit started disappearing at an incredible rate. Jungkook watched his precious basket empty out and, at one point, decided enough was enough. He told the others to stop eating, since the fruit was his after all. That statement didn't exactly land well with the other members, and j-hope happened to be holding a banana at that exact moment.

Years later, during a BTS appearance on You Quiz on the Block, Jungkook told the whole story in detail. As he explained how much that first gift had meant to him, j-hope recalled his side of it. He'd been eating a banana when Jungkook started complaining about the fruit disappearing. He got annoyed, threw the banana at him, and told him to just eat it all himself then.

What shocked Jungkook more than the banana itself was that j-hope had gotten that angry in the first place. He later recalled that it was the first time he'd realized his always-smiling hyung could genuinely get mad. j-hope, for his part, admitted years later, laughing, that he regretted reacting that way.

The best part of the whole story is that ARMY didn't even know what had really happened for a long time. The banana first became part of BTS lore when j-hope and Jungkook brought it up in the documentary series Burn the Stage. While the members were talking about their old fights, j-hope casually revealed that he'd once thrown a banana at Jungkook. Naturally, you can't drop information like that on ARMY and expect there to be no follow-up questions.

So over time, they told the whole story. During their 2021 appearance on You Quiz on the Block, the two of them revisited the incident again, this time with Jungkook explaining why he'd started guarding the fruit in the first place. What looked, from the other members' perspective, like the maknae suddenly refusing to share food was, for him, actually an attempt to hold onto something from one of the first gifts he'd ever received from ARMY.

And then the banana took on a life of its own.

When BTS Island: In the SEOM was unveiled in 2022, a scene appeared in the game's trailer that ARMY immediately recognized. Animated j-hope throws a banana at Jungkook, with the same line about eating it all himself. An incident from their earliest days had become an official inside joke in a BTS game, almost a decade later.

It came back again that same year, in a special episode of Run BTS! called Telepathy. The members were trying to match certain words to shared memories, and when the topic of anger and sulking came up, j-hope's mind went straight back to the banana. A man who claims he almost never gets angry at the members still remembers the moment Jungkook threw him off balance enough to send fruit flying at him.

That's why the banana incident has stayed such a good little story from BTS's beginnings. It's funny today, but it also shows just how young they were back then, and how different their lives looked. Jungkook wasn't trying to be selfish, he just wanted to hold onto something that meant a lot to him. j-hope didn't have some big issue with him, he just lost his temper for a moment out of frustration. They fought, got over it, and years later laughed about the whole thing together.

And ARMY got one more piece of proof that some BTS legends aren't born on stage. Sometimes all it takes is one fruit basket, seven hungry members, and one banana in the wrong place at the wrong time. 🍌