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Red flags in Takarazuka

I’m late getting to this, but @zukanerd asked me to explain the science behind my foreshadowing abilities regarding things like taidan, transfers, etc. This is by no means REAL or OFFICIAL, just a collection of signals that have tended to fit into some kind of pattern over the years. Feel free to add your own if I forget something!

TAIDAN SIGNS

For top otokoyaku/top combis who are definitely going to leave together, sometimes they hit you over the head with a big flashing neon TAIDAN!! billboard by putting references to the star’s name in the title of the production. The most recent example is Dramatic S; it came right at Chigi’s 3 year mark and they tend not to name shows in that way unless it’s a sendoff. Sometimes it’s less obvious or they use/reference one of the star’s kanji somewhere—for example, Misty Station (the “Kiri” in Kiriya Hiromu means mist). References to eternity/things ending or starting over are also sometimes a tip off (”Twilight” in the title of Soragumi’s next show, Phoenix Takarazuka, Takarazuka ∞ Mugen, Forever Love, etc). That one is not as reliable but can spell taidan around the 3 year mark. Solo shows can also be an indicator. A Motion in Umeda main hall (which is huge), Chie’s Budokan concert. Masaki faked us out by taking two.

Bonus top otokoyaku NON-TAIDAN sign: only 23% of top otokoyaku have ever retired on a 2-act performance. So while it’s not impossible for a top star to retire on a 2-act, the odds are definitely against it. There was speculation that Mirio might announce her retirement after Yamataikoku wraps up in Takarazuka, but before that Poe no Ichizoku, a 2-act, was announced, so chances are she will not be retiring until the FOLLOWING Grand Theater performance at the earliest.

For top musumeyaku who leave separately, it’s harder to say and sometimes there isn’t a clear sign. It’s reasonable to look for this to happen when a top musumeyaku is on her second+ partner and gets an iconic role that would boost her OG career opportunities (for example, Ranno Hana and Otori Rei both left on Elisabeth and Misaki Rion left shortly after). I also don’t know a single top musumeyaku other than Chapi who has ever gotten a music salon and NOT retired.

For non-top stars, it’s not really about signs so much as it is categories of candidates. Anyone ken-10+ with no star track potential is a candidate to leave with any Grand Theater show, and their chances increase a bit when a top star is retiring and the new top star is their junior. A lot of forever background types choose to leave early to pursue families/other careers before they get “too old.” 

TRANSFERS

It’s really hard to predict exactly who will transfer where, but there are indications that transfers might happen. For example, here are some things I see currently: After Bakumatsu Taiyouden, Yukigumi will have 8 fewer people than Tsukigumi, the next smallest troupe, and 15 fewer people than Soragumi, the largest troupe. Soragumi has too many people who appear to be star tracked. Hoshigumi has kind of a messy hierarchy after Coto. It just makes for a general feeling of instability, and I think a shuffle is going to happen this year. 

Generally if someone is obviously star tracked and blocked, there is a good chance they will be transferred. Daimon was a perfect example; she was Mirio’s nibante, but they’re in the same class, and waiting on Mirio would have made Daimon a very old top star AND pushed back the timeline on everyone else in Hanagumi. Now she’ll be top at the end of next month and Mirio probably still has over a year in her. 

Also when a young musumeyaku who has had some shinko leads and/or is heavily sponsored transfers, often it’s to become the next top musumeyaku of that troupe. 

All of this just covers patterns! It doesn’t account for special circumstances (like injuries) or general rumors surrounding specific people, which definitely also happen (will we see a curveball named Miya Rurika????), but it’s a starting point!

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fuckin au revoir by malice mizer

songs i can’t stop listening to in 2017:

hekkushun by radwimps

jirettai by anzen chitai

robinson by spitz

pure amore love from pripara

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i wanna fucking know if you remember that rubber band shooter you git at a fucking vending machine that was the BEST THING you ever got out of a vending machine and you KNOW you need another one

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this would be dumb to kind of censor and idc about being cringey because I want to document this

im gonna watch utena because it seems to be entirely me but

i just finished harlock 

not ALL of the harlock but 

i realized that i literally spent this entire series wallowing in my own worries

and i havent fully experienced it in all its glory. i sit here worrying about if its gonna be as good as rose of versailles but i cant do that that’s dumb, and i keep wanting it to change my life or some shit because of destiny

but i think that’s what makes this anime so important to me. it helped me sort things out by giving me a time in my day when i could brood and let those thoughts fester, but also look at the screen and pay attention. there was something wonderful in front of me. there was always something that reminded me to think, but to calm down. 

i kept trying to force myself to feel something, and it wasn’t that nothing was happening, but it was that i was too busy worrying about whether it was. 

amidst all the pew pew pew i would sit and worry and worry and try and make harlock special and try and make this an out of body experience and try and make it an obsession and I didn’t realize it was becoming something for me on its own, just in a very different way. it was becoming not something that made me feel better with distraction and comfort, but somethingWOW I HAVE A NOSEBLEED  THERE MAY HAVE BEEN A LITTLE TOO MUCH NAKED MAZONE TIDDIES FOR ME TO HANDLE something that made me think, take the time out of myday, and self actualize.

daiba was a really big dumbass and i related to him. miime was so chill and i related to her. harlock was so brave and i related to him. and yuki kei was strong in a way i think a lot of people overlook. a subtle badass female. its a shame that she’s looked at likea  pair of tits. 

i will never forget episode 11 when kei fuckin blasted that guy with no regrets or emotional ass speech. she didn’t let the past get to her. I keep a memory collection, I kind of have a problem with talking to my younger self or something. and i’ll always  look at daiba like he wasn’t that dumb, just weaker and interrogative. he’s a boy who is still growing. and we need to protect the weak who are growing.

the message of freedom in this would hit me on bike rides when the arcadia was my bike and i was like a stupid little boy pretending to be captain of a spaceship. that model ship still isn’t even moderately done, but that is going right next to my little harlock.

the thing that hit me the most in the last episode was when harlock told mayu that her mission was important and her mission was to fill the world with flowers. it hit me right in the 1st grade anthology lupine lady story and right in my shitty artist heart. or maybe it’s st therese too. maybe she did this to me. maybe i shouldnt look for animes to change my life, because everything every day has signs from above. 

i don’t know what it was specifically about the flower line, maybe the roses aspect, but i guess it made me feel like as long as i keep making things, i’m here making the world beautiful. i don’t have to be a big bad guy in a space shipt o have an important mission because... he’s on a ship drinking his wine now. 

i think his whole concept of creating a good place for himself to die, whether he was lying to the spy about that or not... is really great. because all we do leads up to our death. we shouldn’t be afraid to focus on death, because really, it’s a long term goal. suicide and shit like that should never be glorified but... when you live, prepare the world for when you die. that’s what you should focus life on. how do you want to leave your home when you die? the world? because you’re only alive for a very short window in time. so plant flowers i guess. 

i mean if you plant a tree, you start a whole generation of trees, technically. 

what else is there to say

i miss looking at my dad like a hero. 

i really miss looking at my dad and wondering why nobody else had a scary dad. i miss having my scary hero dad. and you know... i don’t think even harlock can fill that void. but looking at him and mayu makes me feel just so happy that even someone who isnt real gets to have the dad that I shouldve had

i just dont think anything in this show hit me in a way i wanted it to, but it hit me in a way that i know it hit me, and it came to me to coexist alongside me peacefully and not become the ballet bar i gotta lean on. 

i really want to see what more this man is, because I can’t accept that he’s just a stoic image.i want to see harlock suffer and cry. i love people so much. i only hope that one day i could be as brave as harlock. i really do strive to look at life as much smaller than it really is. in middle school, that was a fear of mine. mortality and aging was something to be feared. and it still is. i still wake up in the middle of the night like holy shit... im gonna turn 19. but all i want is to accept everything, accept my own mortality, and live lifein a way that makes my happy. 

thanks harlock, i might not be crying and thanking you obsessively like oscar. and im not in a place in my life to be using you to hush my panic attacks like mitsunari or raguna, but every time I look at my father and feel hate, I can see your image, what he used to be. and in some strange way all i wanted this entire time was to see myself in you too. and though im not stoic and cool and yknow, a fictional fucking space pirate... i hope i change a bunch of peoples lives, and i hope that once i do i can die happy.

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even if you dont win that cosplay contest you have a sick ass raguna cosplay

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hello future me this is rosie at 18 and i am freaking out over a plastic pirate ship i dont wanna talk to anyone else about what im thinking about because im too early in,my harlock obsession to have a sob story about it already but i do... in the making. my life is really just a series of drama stories. not that my life is sad, because i dont think it is. but also, it's dumb bc life now is probably nothing compared to life in the future. before i start i wanna say please get off your ass if youre still sitting down binge watching pointless ass videos and at least watch something cool. ok time to get emo and im gonna try not to get cringey but tbh the word cringey is cringey enough but anyway do u remember when u were little and you thought that dads were supposed to be intimidating and that all dads were basically pro wrestlers who could fight ANYTHING and you felt really protected by your dad? wooooah dude that was wild because you looked at uncle eric like... woah why is this dude such a pansy.... like why is he making these model trains and not punching fuckin sharks in the face or crime fighting in nyc and why are his biceps smaller than my dad's and WOw i just remember my dad being like... the ultimate protector anyways to get to my point im once again relating fiction to my problems, and harlock is like... JUST like how i used to view my dad. mayu is SO lucky to have harlock. harlock is my dad without sociopathy. he's got the whole seemingly invincible thing but without the terrible sociopathy and drugs and yknow he's like all my dad couldve been but he isnt. i hate sigmund freud why do i wanna fuck captain harlock but also go on a fishing trip with him and bond with him like he's my father and listen to his tall tales of space? end of rant i love harlock

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everyone left when u performed jirettai fuck that noise im not letting that song get ruined for me bc its fucking jIRETTAI

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u just saw your name w nolan and i dont care how many years pass that movie will always be a masterpiece

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scissor cut by r shitei a little pain by olivia (from nana, insp trapnest)

songs i can’t stop listening to in 2017:

hekkushun by radwimps

jirettai by anzen chitai

robinson by spitz

pure amore love from pripara

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fridge's faceclaim is martin sensmeier

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prince crescendo????? oh my god??? i have just discovered this cutie pie???

also remember your twin flame whos a weird kenshin clarence crescendo snow prince lookin motherfucker

your taste in men in 2017:

toshizo hijikata from hakuoki

ford from story of seasons

mitsunari

okita souji from hakuoki

kojuro katakura

beethoven <333

chopin (real and eternal sonata)

kamijo

ruki 

gackt (who is a complete slut on insta)

yoshiki 

tsuzuku

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current role models of 2017:

oscar francois de jarjayes, for the rest of my damn life

kamijo

akira

yoshiki 

david bowie

freddie mercury

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your taste in women in 2017:

very selective!!

viola from eternal sonata

oscar i guess

aigis

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your taste in men in 2017:

toshizo hijikata from hakuoki

ford from story of seasons

mitsunari

okita souji from hakuoki

kojuro katakura

beethoven <333

chopin (real and eternal sonata)

kamijo

ruki 

gackt (who is a complete slut on insta)

yoshiki 

tsuzuku

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important characters (not in order, do u expect me to do that?)

raguna

mitsunari

aigis

oscar francois de jarjayes

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songs i can’t stop listening to in 2017:

hekkushun by radwimps

jirettai by anzen chitai

robinson by spitz

pure amore love from pripara