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October 23, 2018

Million Kanshasai Tea-Leaf Reading

By omo

One thing about long-running franchises is that they are cyclic and have patterns. You can read into it and figure out what’s going to happen next to an extent. For IDOLM@STER, they’ve even started an official schedule list of events, as of 2016 onward (the event-only history goes from 2013). It makes a lot of sense as something fans need to keep track of the dozens of stuff that happens every month. Unfortunately it is not that forward-looking, so it is more useful as an archive.

The biggest news for prognosticators I think, that came out last weekend’s Million Live event, was that the next Theater election program will include the 765Pros. It’s pretty obvious that Million Live plays with the inclusion of the 765Pros both ways. It was first a booster, but now the Millions are also dragging their senpai team into the next decade. Not even mentioning the successor aspect, being a mobile game allows the Millions to do stuff all year long, where as the core 765Pro AllStars run on yearly cycles for the current gen of PS4 games, which might be coming to an end with a pattern change.

In the past, the Million elections could not have had included the 13 revered figures of 765Pro due to the need for all 37(+2) of them to get a footing in fandom by themselves. Five years in, this is no longer a necessity, and I agree.

The other thing this addresses is the fact that Million stopped having 765Pro AllStar music. The SP@RKLE line, or the latest line of character solo songs, only featured the Million Stars 39 and not the other 13 that LTP and LTH has had. I think this makes a lot of sense, for one, those early solo songs almost never gets performed. Sometimes it’s performed at 765Pro events! What would Million Ps have to do to see those performances? It’s kind of a mess.

This also means we might get a lull during which the 765Pros might not get a lot of solo activities. We know 2020 is the 15th anniversary of the franchise, so if we expect MOIW 2020 (hopefully featuring all 5 (6?) branches) then a chill 2019 makes sense. I think there will be more of a flurry of activity next year from the production side to support a MOIW level thing in 2020. Considering if the next Million election occurs towards November/December and we get the CDs released 9-12 months out, that would time things well into the 2020 hype cycle as such a big live will have a long lead-in.

The other nuggets of info I thought relevant were:

  • ML6th tour is once a month and broken out by type-teams (Angel, Princess, Fairy). No Tokyo regional stop.
  • Generations series is ongoing.

Each of the Million tour stops is 2-days over the weekend. None lands on this year’s longer-than-usual Golden Week. But the progression is obvious even before the announcement because Shiny 1st was announced to be mid March, so we know Million tour had to be after March. Here is the Lantis-M@S live scheduling like from now on out (ignoring release events):

  • October: Million Kanshasai
  • November: Anisong Premium (SideM)
  • December: Lisani TW (Million)
  • January ’19: Lisani (SideM and Million)
  • Feb: ??? (HK?)
  • March: Shiny 1st, 315Pro Promeet
  • April: Million 6th Sendai
  • May: Million 6th Kobe
  • June: Million 6th Fukuoka
  • July: ??? (AWM?)
  • August: ??? (Anisama? AWM?)

Assuming the Generations line resumes its release cadence of 1 Generations CD per month, we have D/Zeal in December, and 3 more by April–probably including April’s release makes 5 Generations CDs. It’s hard to say what this means for the release events in April though, but the release event is unlikely still going to be once a month or so, give or take.

Last year we have the SP@RKLE series during the same time as Generations series, so this might mean after Theat@r Boost 3 (due out 11/28) we will get a new run of something. This could probably play into what goes into ML6th. New LTDs? That would be swell.

Leave a comment | posted in Idolmaster

October 18, 2018

Nerd-Factual Accuracy in Fiction

By omo

Last season there was this anime called Cells at Work. It was a fun(?) story about how different cells in a human’s body can be personified into the usual anime characters and interact somewhat based on their perceived biological functions. Swallowing foreign substances and breaking them down become the equivalent of hacking at a monster with a knife, for example.

Cutting to the chase, I dropped the show because of its depiction of the digestive system as a volcanic pit of acids. There are no good bacterias the show, ever (at least at where I dropped the show half way through). And frankly that’s just not how it actually works. The way bacteria is depicted in Cells at Work suggests a particular view about the body that is a little too germaphobic for me. Plus, isn’t it just a really “derpy” way to detail, say, House? We are seeing some common human illnesses depicted in epic proportions. Maybe it’s kind of nice to see a message about cellular mutation happening dozens of times a day inside the body of an adult but, I don’t know if I dig this worldview. It puts too much emphasis on “us” versus “them”; when at the microscopic level, we’re all just a bunch of biochemical mechanisms. Mutations always will happen, and humans evolve because of it–it’s such a cartoony black & white take in Cells.

It’s a lot more offensive to my senses than, say, how in Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai’s (Senshun Butayarou (the series) henceforth) description of the thought experiment of Schrodinger’s Cat. Like, okay, you are 90% there but you miss the big fat quantum quality to it. It is the crux of countless FTL theory talk or why giant robots could be made as spoken by countless middle schoolers. I don’t really mind it that much, other than I wish mass media would at least get the science right. If the idea was observation affects the experiment, then that point was made, which is why I’d give Senshun Butayarou at least a passing grade.

For a high school romantic comedy revolving around supernatural mysteries, though, framing the inquiry with a thought experiment is a classy take. I always liked those X-Files episodes. The wiggle space of a different, unexplained phenomenon makes using a thought experiment to explain how the protagonists figure things out makes a lot of sense as long as they don’t rely on it too much. One could say Senshun Butayarou crossed that line, but maybe not far enough.

PS. Slowly unpacking new anime of Q42018, but I’m getting there. I left a lot of Q3 shows in the dust because of my trip to Taiwan and Hokkaido in late September. I’m not sure I’ve recovered from that yet (thus a 30+day gap on blogging). I only learned about “Thunder Thigh Takarada” the other day but I did not know canon fetishism baked into the design could spur this kind of outpouring. Gridman is coincidentally good, so maybe that contributes.

Leave a comment | posted in Hataraku Saibou, Modern Visual Culture, Seishun Buta Yarou

October 17, 2018

IM@S MUSIC ON THE RADIO & The End of IDOLM@STER STATION

By omo

The long running IDOLM@STER mainline seiyuu radio program, IDOLM@STER STATION, has ended this week with a farewell live stream on Nico. To be very technical and fair, it never ran that long, as the weekly program would change cast periodically and rebrand itself slightly (like, IDOLM@STER STATION!!+). It was originally the IDOLM@STER Radio which morphed into this program as other weekly streams started, in 2009. Today, there are 5 weekly broadcasts for the franchise, covering the different sections. The name perhaps more so refers to the program concept that spawned a series of its own spinoff media products, such as all the radio cover songs, the radio original music, and the handful of live shows they put on. The Aisute weeklies would feature some segments that involved characters acting out viewer-submitted scenarios often (a characteristic in other IM@S radios today as well) and other more seiyuu radio-style segments. But if you were just counting the brand, the show falls a bit short of its 10th year! That’s very long for a tie-in seiyuu radio.

Aisute ending means the main 765Pro franchise no longer has a seiyuu-focused radio. In its stead, IDOLM@STER MUSIC ON THE RADIO takes its airing spot (really, it’s produced by the same Nippon Columbia crew that produced Aisute, and it takes over Aisute’s Nico channel) and is going to be a music-oriented program. Its main host is Numakura Manami, with a co-host rotating probably every 4 weeks. The first co-host is Takahashi Rie. For sanity’s sake I’ll call the program MOR for short (based on the official hashtag #アイマスMOR).

Over the long 9 years of Aisute, there were a pretty overt effort to interview Columbia composers who worked on the music, especially the stuff that graced the later Playstation games. And it makes a lot of sense–music is arguably the most noteworthy and radio-worthy thing that IDOLM@STER generally offers. Cinderella Girls, Million Live, SideM and even Shiny Colors are churning out many songs every year. A lot of it is from Lantis, which naturally doesn’t get as much coverage on a Columbia program focused on the original 765Pro, but Aisute always had crossover coverage with guests from the other branches (at least more than a few Million and Cinderella guests).

What has been left behind with the departure of Aisute is still pretty regrettable–it was almost its own thing during the peak years, and maybe MOR can get its own live show. It certainly will be more cross-franchise than before, so we will see how things swing on a month-to-month basis.

Overall, it is probably overall a good thing that there is now a show to highlight the stories and personalities behind the music. MOR should be a good time and generally this is a positive vibe going forward. Hosted by two cast members, MOR should also remain fun and neta-heavy enough for the usual and core listener types into seiyuu radio-type programs. Two-personality shows dominate this landscape anyway.

PS. Wish they’ll cover some Aisute music down the road!

Leave a comment | posted in Idolmaster, Seiyuu, Idol, Pop

September 14, 2018

Reviews of North American Cons, 2018 Summer

By omo

Going to do some personal reviews of North American anime cons, obviously only from my point of view:

  • NY-region based – defines what is local (Northeast US, East Canada), what is expensive (flight-wise), and what I think is expensive (not a lot)
  • 20+ years going to anime cons in the US and Canada. And nowadays flying to Asia for events but anyways…
  • Mainly for JP guests – Is Learn2Offkai still a thing?
  • Not that poor anymore? lol – Time is arguably more valuable to me than money.
  • Some cons I have not been in recent years. I’m limiting this list to only cons I’ve attended in the past 5 years.

Goal is to be concise and easy to compare, largely as pros/cons listed. Why? Because cons lend themselves to long-form write-ups as I’ve done on this blog thus far, but I want to change the framing to see what yields from this exercise with short form writing. I’m breaking general estimate on “JP guest count” by “few, some, quite a few, a lot” in incremental amounts.

Notes: I break out cons by small (<10k), medium (10-20k) and large (20k+). Just about all anime cons are < 35k in the US and Canada. Anime Expo is the one exception at over 120k in 2018. (Fanime may be the other exception…) I generally only go to larger cons because of the guest issue–hard for small cons to bring guests, except the very dedicated ones… Anyways.

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Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts

September 4, 2018

Anisama – Animelo Summer Live 2018

By omo

It’s not an anime con, but it can feel like one. To me Anisama is a music festival but also kind of like a Japanese festival where people come and hype it up to have a good time. Anyways, thoughts and such ahead.

What dominated my thoughts 12 hours after Anisama day 3 ended and taking this photo were:

It was HOT. Like, the weather. I was talking to some friends while waiting for other friends before going into the venue (~3pm) Sunday afternoon. It was hot all weekend but Sunday was the hottest. Just take a look. There were 2 days in July and 1 day in August that had a higher high temp, during this heat wave. Saturday was hot too, at 95F (an undetectable difference compared to 97F that was Sunday). I didn’t land in Japan until Friday night so I had no comment on Friday’s weather, but the high temperature coupled with the usual high humidity in Saitama meant life was pretty hellish if you were under the sun. As someone pulling a weekender from the comparatively mild NYC weather, the hot weather had a visible impact on my enjoyment of Anisama this year.

I did buppan on Saturday. I was “taking it easy” in that I got to the line at around 7:45, but I already have sweated out about a liter of fluids by then. That was pretty crazy, and it was not just me–everyone in line was in some form of hazard management mode. There was one big guy near me and he was just as drenched as I was. When the sun came out it got tormentingly hot, as a good chunk of the lineup was not in the shade. At some point I did get used to it, but it was draining my energy just by being under the sun, even when I was doing nothing. I had to deal with this until ~3pm, when I went into the venue. And that made day 2 a real chore.

Imagine if you were going nuts at Keiyaki Hiroba because oshijumping at 97F weather really means you like your oshi? I don’t know, maybe that is why things were not as crazy this year compared to last year? LOL. I was talking to Rop about this during the aforementioned Sunday afternoon wait, and we talked about how Animax Musix had proper anikura and I was like, LOL people are gonna die if you do Anikura at Anisama, because this weather is deathly. Shortly after he spotted a guy who has succumbed to heat stroke and had to be taken out of the Keiyaki Hiroba on stretchers. It was bad.

This was a huge contrast to my buppan experience last year in 2017, where a balmy 80F temp with 100% cloud cover meant actually good nap weather. Yeah it was still 80+% humidity, but it did not threatened kill anyone. I got to hang out with Ken P last Sunday, in contrast of this Sunday where he bolted from Station to Inside the Arena because it was hot as all heck, LOL.

The usual eventer oshi whine always come up. Last year’s Anisama was the exception than the norm–it was epic and really freaking great. This year was more of your standard Anisama with the usual hits and misses. For people like me who appreciate anisong in general, it was still an overwhelmingly good time. But if you were at Anisama mainly for a group or two (or even five or six), there will be a bunch of misses you gonna sit through. Even for me, day three’s farewell to Milky Holmes were mostly a miss, although I liked the songs they did and the way they went about giving them the farewell treatment. Yeah, if that rubs you the wrong way (and it does–given how I am into WUG and they too, had a farewell thing), it doesn’t always leave you with a good taste in the mouth as you go home from the venue.

But that’s not the point of events like Anisama. Actually, for the discerning people, you would even realize the Big Three anisong fests in Japan–Anisama, Animax Musix, Lisani–all have their own niches and approaches. I would legit enjoy going to them as their own things and to enjoy their signature strengths. Of course the issue is more that we all have limited time and money and energy and attention span, so we can’t go to all of them. Some of the artists who perform at anisama do a much better job during their one-man lives than as a fest-style performance. The venue sometimes don’t cooperate. The stage presence of some of these artists are completely different in a live house versus at a big arena. The list go on. So yeah, pick and choose what works for you, but realize just because you see so-and-so at Anisama, it might not mean you’ve really seen that artist.

The same can be said of those who go to Anisama for certain artists only–you’re not getting why Anisama exists in the first place. Or why people move to tears to see The MONSTERS jam to Snow Halation. Or many other things that makes me go to Anisama, actually. Anyways, that might be a topic for its own post.

Is Anisama the place to be? I don’t know. Of all the “places to be” in Japan for general western weeaboo-dom, like Comiket or Wonfes or Cosplay Summit or Chokaigi or TGS or whatever, Anisama never gets talked up as one of them. This is the change I want to see. For the longest time Anisama is probably the most directly related thing to anime otaku fandom outside of actually celebrating it in the comiket style or via cosplay. But those expressions of fandom have long since came into their own. Anisong, on the other hand, is still a classic, top-down, pro-to-consumer style cultural distribution and export. Without the marketing there is not much of a scene, and much of the western scene involves importing the marketing (besides, of course, importing the music–which is also becoming marketing itself more often than ever). Unlike video games, anisong is this unknown and not-thought-of category outside of Japan. I guess it’s also a precious thing inside of Japan, which is partly why Anisama exists to begin with.

Because ultimately this is a new genre of a thing. It’s not like we can do anime conventions with just music, like how you can do a show with just a dealer’s room or artist alley or just cosplay meets. Anisama actually fills this gap in its 2018 rendition. Maybe this is why I (and some others) feel the need to import anikura to the west, because it also fills a similar gap.

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Leave a comment | posted in Conventions and Concerts