#or in Ai and Kana's case STUNNING

[1010ninetynine]

honestly i think this is the worst possible read of everything oshi no ko so I'll just address all your points, and depending on whether or not you respond, it'll probs be the only post i make about the show (no, I have not read the manga. I agree that it feels so fucking pandery actually so i don't really want to read the manga. not that you referenced it - just pointing out we saw the same show.)

I want you to know that despite everything I'm about to say being limited to being mostly critique just because it was long enough with just that and I think that's the more interesting thing to do, I do actually agree with a lot that you've said, especially the points I just...didn't talk about because I had nothing to add.

And I was excited for Oshi no Ko at first! I've always struggled with idol anime because they can never seem to drop their packaged, plastic facade of perfect little angels chasing their dreams to address anything resembling real emotion.

I actually haven't watched a lot of idol anime because this was my perception. Happy/sad to see that it seems to be accurate...

But I too came from having this series hyped to no end by friends and the anime community (even the female side) at large!

For a show claiming to portray the dark reality of the entertainment industry, there isn't a single thing dark or real about Ai. She is a relentlessly perfect plastic mannequin of a person, never once showing herself to be anything less than upbeat, bubbly, and inoffensive. Not once in the three years we spend with her before her death do we see her sulk, throw a tantrum, or express any emotions besides peppy and cheerful. If there’s anything resembling a real girl underneath her facade, we don't get to see it, not even when she's alone with her babies with no one to judge her.

Here's the thing - we get to see Kana Arima and Akane Kusogawa and even Ruby Hoshino to some extent break down under the pressures of living in the public eye...so I think this decision was a conscious choice. There's the obvious read that Ai was made to be someone with endless forgiveness to pander to a male audience.

But there is a real effort from the author to explain why Ai is so desperate to pretend to love her fans, even when they hurt her with no regard for humanity. In her eyes, lies are love. She thinks that she cannot honestly love anyone, and in the idol industry, that's not what her fans want anyway. They want her to say the words regardless of whether or not she means them. They're likely fans because they can't get love irl imma be fr...they view her as a performance, they don't want her true feelings.

Ai was a girl thoroughly unloved for most of her life according to Saitou, who used to be a bit of a recluse according to Kaburagi. The image of her is clear - she's not someone who was able to connect with others easily. Rather than growing out of this by getting some fucking friends, she ends up in the throes of an adoring audience, and desperately pretends to love them despite the twisted nature of their relationship. And even though she did this for a while...it never grew to be anything more than that. So she tried to have children to love them instead, and uh, that turned out not so well. She did love em in the end though?

Now, I wish that just once Ai got mad at her fans ANYWAY. I wish that Ai's anger wasn't retconned just because she's supposed to be the ultimate idol. Because no one gets flamed online for the tiniest shit and doesn't eventually get mad and take it out on SOMETHING. But there's a reasonable-ish reason for why Ai's so fucking devoted to not being seen as angry even in front of her kids/managers. She wants to pretend that it could be love, in some form.

The biggest issue, sadly, remains Aqua himself. Even after you get over the whole reincarnated pedo baby angle, he is just the most miserably emo edgelord to be around. He's a mopey, brooding bore who looks down on pretty much everyone around him, but the show constantly insists on portraying him as cynically honest,  the one clear-eyed adult in a cast full of kids. Which, considering how female-heavy the rest of the cast it, gives the whole show a creepy, paternalistic vibe.

I don't agree he's that boring of a character like he's fine imo. Has a bit of a complex cuz his idol mom died so now devoted his life to finding her killer, but unfortunately makes friends along the way.

But the fact that this show is basically a harem anime always got to me. I love female characters taking center stage and all but oh...my god. I wish if they were going that route just cut out the middle man. Make him a female doctor who's a bit envious of the way Ai lives but loves her all the same only to discover the harsh truth of the industry. Cmon. It's not like Sarina's entirely straight anyway, you can keep her puppy crush on the only person who's in her life when she's dying and have the extra dimension for the protagonist fearing True Social Death.

Like I'm so serious I don't see why not. If the whole point is the hot girls for the male fanbase...just give that to em.

And yes, in case you even needed to ask, of course the majority of these girls fall in love with him...There's even, believe it or not, his sister Ruby, who in her past life was a terminally ill child in love with Aqua's past life, her physician at the time. He even jokingly promised to marry her when she turned 16, which could have passed as a tragic, knowingly futile promise to comfort a girl who had no chance of living that long, but considering how things ended up... yeah, let's just say I am dreading what happens when Aqua and Ruby discover each other's previous identities.

i have nothing to say to this except i think that it's not like aqua is a never ending chick magnet for no good reason. kana arima's obsession with him makes sense from a professional angle - guy managed to be creepy due to difference in mental and phys age and that made him a bit of a star. Of course she's going to think about him a lot, and that can grow. Akane falling for the guy who saved her from unaliving makes sense to. Mem-cho doesn't fall for him neitehr does Sama Yuki, nor just ANY girl really - he has some fans for his looks but it's not like stupid. It is not ye typical harem in terms of how unbelievable it is.

(im on copium, i know)

the Sarina thing though - it's not like he wouldn't know when she's gonna die, he is the doctor. of course he'd say "i'll date u when ur 16" since he does, yk? I think Sarina just had a puppy crush, because old man Gorou was the only guy in her life, and this gentle letdown was a good way to handle her stubbornness about the matter. I havent read the manga - so maybe i'm just proven wrong chapter XX but yk.

I do agree that this reincarnation thing with a 30 year old (at best) being lusted after by 16 year olds...makes you question the motives of the mangaka. Because really, does much change about the story if Aqua was just a pretty smart kid instead of a whole ass doctor? Besides what you lose from the previous life thing? Like realistically, he could just do his own investigations. It doesn't take an adult mind to figure that some random student couldn't possibly figure out where Ai lived, just a pretty intelligent one. He'd still follow a lot of the same story beats probably, he'd just be like. 16. instead of 30 (at best). I definitely agree the mangaka is probably fantasizing about...this. On some level.

It also doesn't help that the dialogue is pretty uniformly terrible. Characters speak in tangled, overwritten declarations and explanations that never read as something a real person would say but also aren't stylish enough to pass for the kind of purposefully exaggerated back-and-forth exchanges that define, for example, the Monogatari series.

i found most things said abt the idol industry in the show to be like that, but given how normal the dialogue can be at times i am choosing (choosing) to believe that it's just translation. That this sort of thing sounds more natural in Japanese or the translation just was bad. That said I really don't know how they could let you know from the get go how dark it is without the lengthy explanations of the ways contracts can snare people and all.

There's a moment where Ruby and her aspiring idol group exclaim that a collective dressing room they share with a bunch of other bottom-tier idols is "packed like sardines," except the room we're shown has plenty of breathing room and empty space. This show flat out lies to your face, in contradiction of the visuals its showing you, to make the girl's situation seen worse than it actually is.

I mean honestly I don't know much about idol lifestyles - not even a fan of idols anymore - but the room did seem relatively packed. I know it could be very challenging to get used to changing in there, even with that much room. If it really were smaller...that'd just be inhuman. Still if that's the reality of it, I think that should have been shown.

Akane's suicide attempt, as gut wrenching and heartbreaking as it is in the moment, only exists to give the reincarnated pedo protagonist another teenage girl to fawn over him. And considering how much inspiration this plot line draws from a real-life suicide tragedy in Japan, to call it nauseating and disrespectful would be the understatement of the century.

I don't think so, personally I think it serves to set the atmosphere. Like the effects of her attempting suicide was also to present the internet as a veritable threat in our eyes - there's naturally people who watch the show thinking "meh who cares about the internet lol if ur an idol u just get used to it" and having seen a girl nearly driven to suicide over it is just plain NECESSARY to that audience. For them to understand the horror of being an public figure with eyes on them, and what motivates characters like Kana to be so aware of them.

This all said, you're right about it being the only way that this affects the plot. It is a special kind of ew. Couldn't her suicide attempt being released by aqua be brough to kana's attention or something and cause her to think of him as a manipulative psycho? Please? Character conflict in my idol anime?

Oshi no Ko is not deep, it's not complex, and it's certainly not challenging. But it IS good enough at superficially appearing to be those things to attract a fan base that wants the ego boost of being seen as liking Mature(tm) stories about Serious Issues(tm) without actually being challenged to leave their comfort zone of pandering wish fulfillment.

It's challenging to the idea that idols are just naturally happy all the time, and the idea that idols and actors only need be pretty and poof everything happens swimmingly. It is complex, the many motivations of each character intersect to make a webby interesting sort of chaos. It's at the same damn time - pandery as hell. Everything lines up perfectly to get a whole lot of ladies fantasizing about Aqua. It's both complex and so utterly disgusting.

And that makes it so much more difficult to swallow.

Short Reflection: Oshi no Ko

I have a serious bone to pick with Oshi no Ko.

To be clear, I don’t mind that Oshi no Ko is s bad show. Bad shows are a dime a dozen, its not special in that regard. I don’t even mind that it’s a bad show that got absurdly popular. Again, not an uncommon occurrence, I’ve learned to live with the popular consensus among anime fans being very hit and miss. No, what chaps my hide about this misguided misfire is that it’s the worst kind of bad show: one with delusions of grandeur. It’s a self-indulgent piece of pandering wish fulfillment that’s convinced itself it’s a Deep, Complex masterpiece telling Hard Truths about society while perpetuating all the sins it claims to be criticizing. And while it may have somehow pulled the wool over the eyes of everyone else, I’ve watched enough anime to see through its plastic facade to the squirming rot underneath. This show is lying to you, and unlike the thesis statement it makes in its first episode, this lie is the lowest form of love I can think of.

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Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – 25 – Chestnut Flower Drop

Tanjirou intensifies his Constant Concentration Breathing, asking the three little girls (named Naho, Kiyo, and Sumi) to slap him with carpet beaters if he breaks the breathing in his sleep. I love how the girls are rooting for him all the way, and will gladly do what appears to Zenitsu and Inosuke to be straight-up torture.

It may be torturous, but it goes a long way toward Tanjirou making progress. He’s definitely getting closer and closer to tagging Tsuyuri Kanao, who we can be quite sure isn’t going easy on him, while he’s eventually able to break the Lv. 1 Gourd with his breath.

Soon Inosuke and Zenitsu grow weary of falling too far behind. Also, Shinobu knows exactly how to motivate each of them: in Inosuke’s case, talking down to him and saying it’s okay to be weak; in Zenitsu’s case, batting her lovely eyelashes and saying she believes in him.

Shinobu also asks Kanao to get more involved in the boys’ intensifying training, but seems weary of approaching them, leading to her taking out a coin to flip. We learn how she came to rely on that coin for most of her decisions, but first we learn where she came from: nothing, as she was abused by her parents until she one day snapped and could feel no more pain.

One day her parents sold her off, and her buyer is preparing to sell her into slavery when they cross paths with Shinobu and her big sister Kanae (Kayano Ai). Disturbed by the sight of the young girl bound by rope, Shinobu tosses all of the cash she’s carrying up in the air and runs off with the unnamed girl.

Eventually Shinobu learns that Kanao was so horrifically traumatized by her life so far that she’s unable to do anything without being told to do it, even eat, resulting in her stomach grumbling far longer than it should. Kanao (so named by her new sisters) is given a coin so she can make decisions for herself. Back in the present, she gets tails, and doesn’t join the boys.

However, as a result of Tanjirou’s intensive training, one day he’s finally able to not only grab Kanao’s hand during tag, but win the cup game, all without splashing tea on her. It’s a stunning victory, and while Kanao never actually speaks to Tanjirou, you can tell she’s impressed by his progress.

After Haganezuka and Kanamori arrive at the mansion with Tanjirou and Inosuke’s reforged swords (and Inosuke re-chips his up with a rock, enraging the swordsmiths), Shinobu declares Tanjirou’s jaw healed and training complete. All that’s left is actual combat, and she tells him she’s expecting great things. As we saw back when she rescued Kanao to how she’s guided Tanjirou, it’s clear by now that Shinobu is definitely one of the good ones.

Interesting, she doesn’t know anything about the “fire breathing” Tanjirou brings up, only the distinct flame breathing in which Master Rengoku specializes, though he’s away on a mission, so more info on that will have to wait. Meanwhile, we see a Twelve Kizuki demon aboard a train eating its occupants—an apparent preview of the hugely popular October 2020 feature film Mugen Train.

By: braverade