This is really a first-impression piece. I’m talking about my own impression but more like how a nice meal tastes, but with the right wine pairing.

You can now catch the TV anime streaming on Crunchy, after I guess some kind of exclusivity period. I would think none of this matters given how the entire series was pre-screened in theaters in Japan already. I have this story in which I could have caught the first segment during ML10th Act3 in Fukuoka, but time didn’t allow, and due to some snafu of not his own making, my hotel roommate during that weekender wasn’t able to see the show on day one. Instead, he went to catch this pre-screening.

Here are what I think are the relevant “filters” coloring my experience after 1 episode in, some personal biases if you will. In the interest of time I’ll just bullet them.

• Miriani. Everyone likes to compare children of the same family, and while I am not any less guilty of this, I don’t really think about it. Rather, it’s an unconscious effect where before seeing the show I can see how people make these plot, writing or direction comparisons and it makes sense (to support their points about one being better or worse than the other). Or rather, Miriani is unimpeachable? I don’t think it’s that good (but I don’t 100% agree with those hankering for the A-1 days, FWIW) in the grand scheme of things, and after seeing Shinyani I don’t think it’s as bad as people make it out to be, if comparing it to Miriani is something that happens either consciously or not. Ultimately, Shinyani is not some 10-years-worth of tears pouring into something or another, like Miriani was–that is more like pulling teeth since 2015, for an anime that would have been better suited in 2018. I guess this means I’m consciously ignoring that obvious comparison.
• Visual novel anime titles from the 00s. There is one specific title I have in mind, which is one of my all-time faves. That title, ef, is taking the same vibe in which we are telling a story, mostly not with plot, but with vibes, or whatever vibes were called in the 2000s. It’s a common focus in many postmodern narratives, and visual novels tend to have this going on back when. Visual novel anime basically derives, in a figurative-mathematical sense of the term, the same feelings and storytelling techniques, in order to express emotions. I don’t know how well Shinyani will carry this concept that the OG Shinymas game kind of prides itself on, but I guess we’ll see. Generally though this takes a lot of time, and Shinyani has to deal with a lot of idols in a cour, so it’s probably not going to be a strong point. Anyways, all throughout episode one, I think of the sky, the feathered wing, the scene as set by the rhythm of the sun (note all the sunset scenes…), and all colored by simple piano chords. This is EF.
• Gakumas visuals. I realized my impression of the Shinyani visuals before Gakuen IDOLM@STER is different than after Gakumas. In fact that realization prompted this post. Looping Rinami’s 4K intro clip countless time probably made me even more damaged than I was? Joke aside, this is because the IM@S 3D art style has shifted. I would say this is also kind of a subconscious impact of Miriani, in which we are now in a new territory where the A1-licensed artwork is ancient history, that MLTD is kind of a transitional visual artifact, almost, and Gakumas is the future. Or the present. Shinyani actually pairs well with the graphics coming out from those brave folks at QualiArts. I mean, when I saw this unveiled, it reminds me of someone saying something about courage.
• Who I am as a Shinymas Producer. As someone who dips in and out of Shinymas game-wise, I’m really following it for the overall meta-story, the fandom, the songs, and the performances. Having been with the franchise since the start I know what I’m looking forward to, to put it in the same like as Gakumas as we’re doing weekly new-character-reveals, the overall progression of the franchise as new units are added to the series. The anime is not something I’m dying for–it’s clearly an onboarding for the payday pinata that is the Shinysong game that launched just months earlier. That reminds me, I should write something about it… but I guess you can guess how I feel about that game. Anyways, Your Mileage Will Vary here because I’m not sure how big my cohort size really is–probably not that much in the English-language speaking sphere.

So far, the anime is at least good enough to carry on the branding of IDOLM@STER from a production point of view. I’m not really sure how the story will take its turn at the end of the season, as they have announced S2 (completely with at least Straylight and Noctchill), but are they going to “progress” at that point on? I assume so. To say it feels kind of bad to announce and tease the new units of S2 before S1 even aired is putting it mildly. Unfortunately, speedy is the Otaku’s Sword of Judgment, errors and nuances be damned, and we know the cohort that knows Shinymas purely from zako illustrators on the internet and erodojinshi is much larger than the cohort for me, LOL. Anyways, I guess I’ll continue to watch this show, as if I had any other choice.

Here is another topic that I have a million takes and I have to time box to get this out. And I did it in only three hours. Anything is possible.

In the overall context of 21st century Japanese media-mix content mills, we have to judge things on a sliding scale. By that I mean here is a media property (the Million Live anime, or Miriani henceforce) that is probably best described as a way to on-ramp new players into one sub-brand of the IDOLM@STER family. By players I mean there’s an ongoing (F2P) mobile game which is I think best described as a way to engage with content that is regularly updated. That in its own is a major context with its own baggage, many long-winded blog posts, et cetera. You can find some of them on this very blog, for links to a thin slice of these here.

Yes, gacha games fund all these extravagances. As a Umamusume player (and fan) there’s another blog post-to-be (or a draft to be discarded) about the interaction between Uma and IM@S content and fandom, because with Million Live I see the parallels right there. There is also the oft-unspoken backdrop of children’s entertainment and just how much Aikatsu I see from Miriani, and why there was a big exclamation on top of some folk’s heads (like mine) when they said it was “nichiasa” or “Sunday morning cartoons” when they first announced it.

It is a long journey from the smokey Japanese arcades of the 00s to Sunday Morning TV Tokyo 10am time slot in 2023, but that’s not what this post is about. That said, being a Sunday Morning Cartoon means more than just the time slot, but also that the show fits that time slot. This is to the detriment of many English-language internet viewers that you can find, like this reviewer. These are the (cloth in which you cut a ChihayaP from, but I digress) type of people you’ll most commonly see. To them idol anime is not just Love Live and IM@S, but things like Selection Project or (I shudder to think) Chance Triangle Session. Those are fine shows, but on this “sliding scale” those are all the way at the other end of the scale, the irrelevant otaku bait end of things. Where are all the Precure, Pripara, and Aikatsu people? Do the average proto-ChihayaP understand there’s more to IM@S than emo-emo vibes?

Which is to say, unfortunately you can, and should, still square Million Live with the original IDOLM@STER TV anime and the subsequent Movie, both which are celebrated and officially marketing material used to promote the Million Live anime before it started the theatrical run (what). And as someone who was able to enjoy that “golden era” e? tempore… I don’t think it is the best decision, but it still made all the sense in the world.

Which is just to say, a Million Live anime in the nichiasa form with its 3D anime style (lovingly crafted I might add) completes the rehabilitation of the property from Mami singing Agent Yoru o Yuku on NicoNico Douga to, uhm, Asterism singing dear… It may still be performed by someone U149, but it’s actually rehabilitated? All I am trying to say is, the more things change, the more it stays the same. It’s like the IDOLM@STER stuff, but in a different packaging, probably one that’s less suitable for the average adult anime viewers from the west.

Over the years since Million Live Theater Days has gotten from this weird “baton-passing” game where the 765PROAS team getting to chill off from their 10 years worth of hard work to the 37+2 kouhai members, it has gotten more, I think anyways, female-player friendly, more trendy, and more mainstream-sensible. Maybe that also alienated more players who liked the older stuff, and players who might find one of the other IM@S franchises more to their liking, but that carved out the niche for Million. I think this will come to the fore even more when Shiny Colors anime come out very soon… But comparing that with the U149 (as in the unit) anime which stuck closer to the original animas formula (because there are few enough of them) it’s pretty obvious Million Live anime is going somewhere else.

Unfortunately, this means unless you are already on the bandwagon for awhile, Miriani might be surprisingly not-your-taste. And that’s fine.

Again, to zoom out a bit, IDOLM@STER as a franchise is going to be 20 years old in about 2 more years, which by any reasonable measuring stick, is way too long for an otaku property given that it is active this entire time. Do you consider Gundam an otaku property? Or Macross? We are getting to those franchises’ level. Million Live is its marquee “glue” that connects 765Pro to, uh, Profit, I guess, so it really has to walk a high wire act that is the high road.

I have a lot to say about the Million Live TV anime, as you could imagine. I think the thoughts will not make it as blog entries unless there’s some way to get that angle and tackle just a part of this iceberg piece-wise. And yeah 90% of this opinion is underwater, and all of it is not-so-hot-takes. Maybe part of it is wet, I don’t know, but there ain’t any large boats to ram into.

The main thing I want to address that has more of an expiry-time nature to is the vastly asymmetric distribution of the media content. As you may know, the Million Live TV anime, all 12 episodes, was screened publicly in Japanese movie theaters about 8 weeks before episode 1 aired properly. Some countries also got screenings of the first 4 episodes, before episode 1 aired. Some fans could, and did, watch all of it before other fans watched even 1 of it, just due to regional availability. It has been a hot minute since an anime like this existed for a property that is contemporary, current, and I’m into. In fact since the dawn of speed subbing and simulcasting, it only really happens for theatrical works. But you know, Miyazaki Hayao’s latest film screened in Japan only about 2 months before it screened in the USA, so we’re working with about the same time lag I guess.

What’s bad is not just that now talking to fans in Japan means wading into spoiler territory, but they fundamentally see the series in a different light than those who haven’t seen the anime see the series. Granted, I am more like, I don’t know, waist deep, in spoilers myself as not only I’ve seen eps 1-4 already (I guess it’s a perk of going to Japan multiple times a year), I also am not particularly mindful of reading spoilers.

The worst, however, is that the main point behind screening ML anime in theaters is that they can make some additional revenue from selling theatrical merch tie-ins, aside from actual theatrical run revenue. It’s also market validation. It’s in-game tie-ins for the hardcore players and fans. I get it. I know why they want to do this. But as an oversea fan it sucks because there are entire swaths of my twitter that I can’t really access, LOL–not because I want to dodge spoilers, but because they talk about things I won’t get until I see the show.

Anyways, it’s time to put that aside for the next 11 or so weeks and figure out if I can travel to Fukuoka for Million Live 10th Tour Act-3 and still enjoy the show. I will have all the new songs (another thing forced on us while we are info-asymmetric, CD releases) by then, but if my math is right we will only be on episode 4 or 5 at the time. I’ll need to find a local theater showing the rest, like how they’re doing it at Toyosu, showing all 12 episodes right now. (Did I mention the tie-in with ML anime at Toyosu all this time? Another way to part money from the locals I guess.) Isn’t it nice to watch an episodic series and decided you had enough of waiting and just binge the rest in a theater? I digress.

The new units and units songs seems pretty swell as the second batch of them are now previewed on Youtube. I can’t wait to see the rest of this. First batch at this link.

PS. As someone who occasionally have a pair of binocs at concerts, I know how this feels.

PPS. Just some related thoughts on concerts. We all know that formally, ML anime actually was delayed. It probably meant that we are a year late or so, that the end of the series translate into the start of 10th tour. Putting aside that 9th was in January and 10th Act-1 was in April, this would be a natural lead-in. At this point, the ML anime Blu-rays are too late (Volume 1 comes out Jan. 10) for the lottery for Act-4 in late February. I guess they can always put something special in there (I fully am expecting it) but I guess we’ll see.