Jon Chu steps up to 3D Bieber biopic

Any news story should be factual and accurate. No matter what the topic is. Even when it concerns Justin Bieber.

Jon Chu and Justin Bieber announcing the 'big' news on YouTube. Source: Jon Chu

While countless news sites have covered the ‘Justin Bieber 3D biopic’ story, Jack Ryan’s piece
- which discloses Step Up 3D's Jon Chu as the new director for the projected movie and reveals its release date - is unfortunately innacurate, contradicting, 'old' and contains numerous typos. 

Overall, it lacks appeal and fails to immediately engage readers – despite all the commotion and excitement that has become knowns as “the Bieber fever” since Bieber’s rapid ascent to fame. 

Firstly, the lack of images creates a disadvantage for the article as it makes it harder for the audience to connect with the story. Young female teens worldwide – the principal target audience – would most likely be less inclined to click on the story link.

The adage, “a picture is worth (more than) a thousand words…” may be applied in this case. One may choose to agree, or disagree, but it seems that images are able to grab our attention much faster than a string of words can.

Secondly, the fact that Ryan affirms that Jon Chu AND then later on David Guggenheim (who was previously attached to the project but dropped out) will be the director for the biopic is an indication of poor research and editing skills. By extension, spelling mistakes including the words ‘memoir’ spelt as ‘memior’, and ‘Paramount’ spelt as ‘Paramoujnt’, only enhances and exposes the article’s weaknesses.

In terms of prose, while the beginning of the article follows the news style, the last paragraph appears to be slightly opinionated and written a little too ‘casually’, as Ryan seems “…sure plenty [of] males are going to be dragged to the opening of this film” and that Bieber won’t “…win any points with the male crowd”.

Moreover, the lengthy headline is not catchy enough and reflects a news angle that has been previously covered. Instead, it should have referenced Jon Chu as the new director. The article would have also been more effective with the addition of Chu’s YouTube video with Bieber, letting the audience know about the news.