#aikatsu og

[your-dead-european-ancestor]

I love how when you're in small fandoms you follow literally anybody who even mentions something related to said fandom

like,,, it doesn't matter that they're probably 10 or only made posts about characters you hate or has long since moved on from the fandom

idk idk I just find it hilarious how I see the exact 5 people in every notes whenever I check out the tag for the show, movie, book, etc

[weirdw33b]

My very not so inspired by Aikatsu and it's fanfictions Enstars au

Giving credit to Natsuki Sawada on AO3

So uh, meet Madoka Sakasaki (Japanese last names are weird, I'm just going with what's nice), the idol obessed 13 year old ready to apply to Yumenosaki Private Academy's Middle School Idol course with her friends Chiharu Mashiro

Why is she so obessed with idols you ask?

Simple!

Ever since she was a kid, she knew a secret about her parents that they were part of the legendary idol groups Fine and Eccentrics

At the height of their popularity, they were constantly fighting for the top spot so often that it was easier to simply make them share the top spot, to a lot of fans, they were even able to outshine Godfather!

But at some point, no one really knows why (not even her!) both units seem to disband at the same time, there were way too many baseless rumours floating around it was simply impossible to find any useful info

If anything, they're final performance (which was a joint performance between them) was completely deleted from the internet! She's sure that her parents hid it somewhere, but come on!

Hell! They even cut contact!

Ok, ok, there's another reason why she's so desperate to be an idol (and by extension, surpass her parents), she wants to find the truth on everything!

Her parents always seemed so happy when talking about their idol days, so why are they so against her becoming an idol?

(It took a lot of begging and powerpoints on why she should be allowed to be an idol)

Anyways, unimportant right now because to even start investigating, she has to become the best of the best!

Let's join her as she starts her adventure of reaching top idol!

[bamboozledchaos]

Im lisgening for more about the a-word vc i dont know that but i am Interested

Glad ye ok!!!

LIKE GIRLS. PRETTY IDOL SCHOOL CONCEPT! With a lot of fashion design uwu🌸

I want to see the Mondstadt girlies in that AU so bad, I was so into it and only stopped because the show stopped airing + the game machines were moved farther away

[just-a-gl1tch]

ICHIGO & KAEDE THE CRACK LORD

Ichigo had finally finished her training at starlight academy for idols for the day. Now she could go apeshit on her favorite crépe at the school’s cafeteria. But to her surprise, Kaede, one of her closest friends AND rival was occupying her seat…. and instead of eating and spending time with her girlfriend Yurika, She snorting crack cocaine!! 😱

”Heya Strawberry!” Said Kaede the red haired druggie. Her bloodshot eyes looking directly at Ichigo’s confused face.

“What’s that?” Ichigo asked, getting closer to Kaede and the white powder in front of her.

“I dunnoooo… but Otome said… amazin’ things about it!” Kaede replied right before AGGRESSIVELY, VIGOROUSLY, FEROCIOUSLY snorting the rest up. Ichigo was now curious. How in the living fuck would Otome, an idol, get her hands on something like this? Did Johnny bepp know about this?

the following day, Ichigo struggled with her gayness for her best friends, Aoi and Ran. No wonder Kaede was so focused on crack. Who knew being gay was so hard? As soon as she went outside, she was greeted by a familiar face. Otome and her drugged up friend Shion.

“UwU! Hewwoo Ichigo-Tan!!” said Otome.

“Hello!” Ichigo responded, she would have said more but Otome had begun doing the carmaldamsan dance. Shion just fell to the floor with a pleased expression on her face.

“Look at er go….” Shion said before passing out gayly.

“YAYY! Ichigo-Tan, wanna bond by smoking weed with Otome?! OwO”

“Weed? I thought you were dating cocaine?” Ichigo asked confused.

“Teehee! UwU Otome luvs all drugs!”

ichigo could not argue with that.

“Sure! We can… do dat thing!” Ichigo agreed.

Otome was so pleased she turned into a furry. “Woah!” Ichigo said.

Otome unfurried. “Woah!” Said ichigo again.

ever since that day, the two idols shared a bond like no other, sharing drugs with one another under the moonlight. Aoi and Ran soon found out about this but both agreed that Otome was just another member of their polycule.

NOT THAT ICHIGO EVEN KNEW THAT THEY WERE IN A POLYCULE.

the end.

———

@chaotic-on-main

[chiisana-lion]

anyways. rinmado

[ace-frog]

Okay so this is just copying down me ranting about Aikatsu cuz it has taken over my mind recently-

Within the beginning of the original series, brands were pretty important to the point Ichigo climbed a whole ass mountain just for a dress for, if I'm remembering correctly just an audition, and later on in the series Yurika was pretty down in the dumps and restored her sense of like self worth by earning her new dress for her performance

In the later seasons from what I've seen, which is the original and stars cuz I haven't gotten around to friends, planet or parade, they do still include sembalnces of the brands from time to time

However Stars is, seemingly at least, seen as the best season and/or the fan fav other than the OG. But I have my gripes with it and it ties into the whole brand importance/special one thing

And it's with two things: the Planet Wings and Yume's Specialness

First off the Planet Wings

I really didn't enjoy how these wings were seen as oh so special by everyone in the show when they had a crossover episode during the very arc with the original trio. In the original series the designer of the brand was the one who decided whether or not a coord would contain wings but like point is that they weren't special in the way Stars made them special

Rather it was a sign that the idol in question had proved themselves to that designer and had deserved to wear that specific coord and it just had made it feel so much more personal and so much more deserved in my opinion

Which why I feel like the writers had just looked at the Constellation Coords in one of the previous arcs and decided the what if instead of designers who worked hard af to create those coords we just make it magical~

I'm sorry but WHY?!?! I get that they couldn't just repeat things from the original series except they kinda can?? Like having to earn your dresses from the main person leading the brand or designing a brand of your own can be pretty intereting?? It was interesting when they did that?

Like it was such a huge part of them being idols and yet it was basically swept away except for some minor parts. Also like some thing but it's pretty cool to think about how if the show didn't just focus on the main cast we could've seen more idols wearing the same brands and who knows see some competing for the same coord? Like hell maybe it has happened because the idea isn't exactly new

But there was nothing like that from what I've remembered and I think that's just a shame

Now onto my next complaint: the whole idol aura/Yume"s specialness

AURAS WERE NEVER SPECIAL!!! They were just a measure of an idol growth or potential. The whole flashy rainbow thing Yume had was just a no from me. I'm pretty certain that at some point one of the girls from the original cast had rainbows but it wasn't seen as special

The only one who ever had that was Mizuki and that was early on in the series. Also the reason why it was considered special was because she had the same aura outside of her performances and showed how advanced of an idol she was and how good she was in general. Like that was a whole episode that we had?

Also the whole "Yume was a better singer/performer/idol". I'm sorry but that doesn't translate well when we only have visual clues that don't even make much sense to prove that

I'm certain this is just a lot of personal biases and preferences speaking but like idk it just made the original series so much more enjoyable

AND TO ADD ON BECUZ YES IM VERY SALTY

Shion deserved better!! And if you don't remember her well guess what?

THE SHOW BARELY DID EITHER? Like I am forever salty that Star Anis never included Shion from what I remembered. I found her so cool and we rarely saw things like her acting career and it felt like she was just thrown into Powa Purin Power just to complete another trio with Sakura and Otome. And the reason we were given for that was because "she wanted to focus on her acting"

Listen that is valid and all but have we ever considered ya know that being in a unit group with some of the most and the most popular idol would boost your chances even more?

Kanzaki Mizuki was literally the Starlight Quuen and current top idol from that point??

Maybe I just don't know how that industry works but it seems to me that if you are popular enough you'd probs get casted even if you weren't that qualified for a role. And guess what she would be qualified!!! Because she was like a prodigy or something and she still busted her ass off to improve her and her skills!!!

JUSTICE FOR SHION!!!

[harufallinwonderland]

I love the concept of Aikatsu friends like you’re A idol BUT YOU ALSO PERFORM WITH YOUR BESTIE!? Like hello friendship + good music means peak idol anime imo and that’s like the whole thing with the show? IM IN

[rebelwhodoesntknow]

Aikatsu-ing again (everyone has to put up with my shit)

So the first real set of Aikatsu Academy performances came out and I have many thoughts!! I’ll talk about the mechanics first and the music next, I think. This may be a stream of consciousness I have no idea. It’s also VERY LONG so it’s under the read more for your sanity.

So the models I would say are pretty decent! I’m not sure if they’re still using the vtuber models with pre-choreographed movements or if they gave them proper Aikatsu style models, but my guess is the former. One thing that really annoyed me was that their mouths were definitely not synced to the lyrics they were singing, which definitely broke the immersion for me a bit. Like come on if you mapped all the other movements surely you could make the mouths at least mimic the vowels they’re singing! I also feel like the camera angles were really trying to compensate for the animation/choreo at points. It did its job, but I just had a feeling if we zoomed the camera out there may be some awkwardness that I don’t think you’d find in other cg performances.

They did have a bit of coord transformation, but I would say it’s very stiff. They did have the sort of sparkly bodies that come to mind when you think of og Aikatsu transformations, but the coords didn’t come on in sequence which kind of sucked. Didn’t really get the photo thing either, doesn’t feel anywhere as connected to the Aikatsu system as the cards did.

The stage itself was…fine, I suppose. I recently rewatched Idol Kiwi’s video on the Aikatsu stages and I think she made a really good point on how the fantastical Aikatsu System leads to endless stage possibilities, and i definitely felt like this one was slightly too grounded. The lack of appeals and coords that didn’t push too many boundaries definitely did not help. BUT THEY GAVE THEM AURAS!! They are extremely simple but at least we know a vestige of the old system was there!! My hope is that they’re trying to portray these girls as absolute novices (like Akari initially) and the aura showing up during the last song is a sign of their progression. Maybe they’ll do appeals soon!!

One thing that was interesting to me was the insistence on doing full song performances. Up until now, Aikatsu performances have usually consisted of a singular verse and chorus (sometimes two choruses), and sometimes a bridge if the chorus is short. So I don’t really get why they decided to lengthen it. Was it to justify the definitely simpler choreography? But if that’s the case, why did they do the full song of Diamond Happy and add a bunch more stuff? Personally, I would have liked a shorter stage if it meant there was more effort put into the animation and choreography or if an appeal was thrown in.

Okay now for songs!! We had the two songs that had already come out, one new song, and a Diamond Happy cover. I think I’ll cover songs and then go into individual vocals.

I don’t have much to say about Full Bloom Helianthe other than it’s good and it sounds like Aikatsu. I will be adding it to my playlist! It’s the same sentiment as Akogare Sky, but Sky sounds a bit more modern. What I’m really interested in is the newer songs.

The Diamond Happy cover was… okay, I say begrudgingly. I miss Ichigo, her voice really brought something to that song that is definitely missing. I also missed her expression on ‘happy’ which was not mirrored in any of the girls. Also, THEY KILLED MY HARMONY IN THE CHORUS! WHERE IS THE LOVELY HARMONIZED CHIKARA—AH-AH!! I really thought the cover was good until that point and that just killed me. They can hit those notes! Why didn’t they… why…. Aaaagh. *head in hands*

Peek-a-boo was kind of fun? Idk about the intro. It gets you sufficiently pumped but it also repeats peek-a-boo like 10 times which is going to be an embarrassment hurdle for me. It might grow on me though. The first thing I thought when I listened to it was ‘oh they’re doing Tristar with this one!’ Because it pretty much sounded like a Tristar Photokatsu song. Kind of cool, but now I wish Tristar were the ones singing it… can’t win them all I suppose. Okay onto vocals! Just a note I am a singer but I am not classically trained, so I’m saying more what I feel than Evidence This Singer Is Good/Bad.

Mieru’s voice has definitely grown on me! I was a little bit nervous that she was too quiet of a voice to really stand out, but I ended up quite liking her in the songs, even though she didn’t seem like the main character in them. Her voice actually fits great in Peek-a-boo, so much so that I almost wished she was a sexy-type idol. I hope we see that mature tone again!

Pairin is still my favorite for having the most amount of sheer power behind her vocals. She feels like the main character to me, which is funny because I’m pretty sure it’s definitely supposed to be resident cute-type Mieru. But I can hear Pairin the most on the songs and she’s really what gives them impact. She sounds more like Ichigo, Akari, and Yume, so my brain pegs that down as the main character. She can definitely play up the pop typing when singing like she did in Diamond Happy, but I like it better when it’s just clean pure vocals from her.

I feel really bad for Meh, because it seems like she’s struggling with singing the most. She’s obviously supposed to be a Sumire-type cool idol (and she sounded great in Tarte Tatin on a livestream) but she doesn’t hit this sort of butter-smooth vocal pocket that Sumire does. She just doesn’t have the same richness in her voice. In fact, I think she has real trouble switching between head, throat, and chest voice, since I hear these little vocal splinterings that I recognize from my own singing endeavors. I think she has potential, it’s just… not being tapped into, and it’s sad!

Anyways yeah those are my thoughts! I at least like that old Aikatsu stuff is still being engaged with in this new time. But I’ll keep on keeping tabs on Aikatsu Academy!

[lunawings]

So for the past few years I've had two reoccurring nightmares.

One of them is that I have to teach but I have no lesson plans. (I have not been a teacher in a long time.)

The other one is I'm somehow in Japan unplanned and I've forgotten all my arcade stuff.

(I remember one specific one where I was in a tall circular arcade with machines on different steps and... man I wish I could take pictures of all the liminal spaces my mind invents. Anyway.)

So, as far as I know, the only idol arcade games I might be able to play in Japan in March (if ANY) are PriPara (I think Prism Stones are still running machines?), Pretty Rhythm (if the Tokyo Prism Stone's machine isn't broken?) and PriMagi (if I'm lucky and manage to find one with cards that hasn't been removed yet?). Hopefully I can find and play at least one of those three.

And yet.

I'm having a hard time convincing myself to leave my PriChan and Aikatsu IDs behind. I just miss PriChan terribly and I mean, I know Aikatsu is dead, and all the original shops have closed but...

What if I just fall down a hole and end up in front of an OG Aikatsu machine just like in my dreams!!?!

[hikaru-hoshina]

upset vtuber stan sends you 3 asks in a row all with the exact same spelling mistake which makes it apparent it's the same person and then tops it off with a "i'm japanese btw" lmao classic tumblr never change.

anywayyy what's your favorite season of aikatsu and who is your fav character? 🥰

Didn't notice that but anyway my fav series is OG Aikatsu's Akari gen. but I also like the Ichigo gen. ofc, it's just that they made my girl Sakura dirty in the second season and I was really upset at the time (but I was really young when that happened and I need a rewatch tbh). Thankfully then Sakura had her time to shine in Akari gen. season 1! My favorite idol from the whole franchise is Hinaki (I cut my hair very short when I was 16 so I could look like her and Azuki Shibuya from the idol group Iris ahahah) but I also like Sakura if you couldn't tell. :3

I don't have a favorite from AiStars because I wasn't sold on it during the first season (I remember I didn't like all of the drama around Yume and the M4 interactions) but I enjoyed season 2 a lot so I always changed my favorite between Mahiru, Kirara and Aria. But in the end I think I like Kirara the most because she's a little dumb (affective) and she likes to paint like me. I feel like Aria didn't have enough time to shine since she was the very last idol to join and right after her debut the big climax happened. Need a rewatch so bad.

AiFriends (/AiParade) has my second favorite idol from the overall franchise which is Aine! I fell in love with her from episode 1. Wakaba is also cute because of the aesthetic and the lyrics of her song are something with which I could describe myself.

In AiPlanet I liked Hana the most, I love her singing voice and her swing type, but obviously I need to mention Ann for giving me inspiration on various things.

I think it't too soon for me to say which one of the Academy girls is my favorite since none of them left a particular impression on me but I like Parin actress's energy and voice and Meh's design.

[i-miss-music-247]

Og Aikatsu is so good. I wish it kept going lol. Would love to see how the gen after Akari's made history 🥹

[your-dead-european-ancestor]

Finally sat my ass down and watched 10th starway and the 2014 movie and YALL. YALL

Crying SO so hard rn :'( i miss them :(

[wcdonaldo]

3 12 16

3. screenshot or description of the worst take you've seen on tumblr

i'll be here for weeks if i try to find the actual worst take i've seen so here's the worst i can remember

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

i like SHIKI. not roa but SHIKI specifically. i love his one lucid moment in [CENSORED] route but also like. as awful of a person as he is and as much of a menace to the cast as he is he ultimately has startlingly little agency in the situation. at least as far as i remember in og tsukihime.

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

i'll be honest i don't really like the hyperarrogant characters in shows where all the other characters are super niceys. like admittedly i'm thinking specifically of two characters here (kokone from aikatsu and elza from aikatsu stars... who i like in spite of her personality because her music rules) that i don't think were super well received but like. it's what i got. i don't get why they made these characters nasty in shows full of really kind cast members

[mahoutoons]

i just finished aikatsu stars. i was afraid i wouldn't like this as much as the og series. but it surprised me with how good it was.

the characters are a strong point for aikatsu and that's true even here. their character arcs were all quite fun to follow. stars puts more emphasis whenever the idols are struggling. unlike in the og series where we're only told the idols were frustrated by their losses, stars actually shows them being frustrated and using that to make themselves stronger and that's something i like about this series.

the second season follows the trend of the second seasons in an aikatsu series being by favourite. i enjoyed the venus ark characters. elza especially was quite unique for an aikatsu character, being slightly more antagonistic though most of her actions come from a place of loneliness and wanting to be acknowleeged by her mother.

as for things i didn't like about the series:

-the rainbow power thing felt very pointless. it was brought up once in season two and that was towards the very end. not to mention everyone involved got hit with a severe case of "poor communication disease". seriously why did hime wait so long to tell yume the truth about her power? why did moroboshi set up these seemingly impossible tests for yume instead of simply guiding her like he did with hime?

-m4 were useless. take them out and nothing would change in the grand scheme of things. it feels like they were just added because the writers wanted to give the girls love intersts this time but they don't even have enough chemistry with the girls (and no, arguing and teasing isn't chemistry). i legit forgot they even existed at times. i may not have shipped akasena from the previous season but at least they had believable chemistry and a good idol x designer dynamic. but here? yume honestly had more chemistry with koharu and rola than she did with subaru.

-yume's sun dress was never explained. there was never any indication before this that there could be more than one sun dress.

-and lastly... koharu is my favourite character but i felt like she didn't get enough spotlight compared to the other. her going to italy was a completely pointless plot.

other than these gripes i quite enjoyed stars. it was a great season which, like the og, aleays lut me in a good mood.

[theorizer-sleepyhead]

I know there are all these memes about Aikatsu flopping or finally dying, but honestly, I still love the franchise. Yes, I’m aware of how cliche this is, but it literally got me through one of the worst periods of my life, it was a fun, silly distraction and gave me something to look forward to during the week. I binge- watched seasons 1 and 2 of OG in like two weeks until I finally caught up at the end of season 3; I skipped a university class to watch the opening of Friends when it first released; I still get teary-eyed listening to Start Dash Sensation. You get the gist of it

Anyway, even if the franchise does end, I’ll still enjoy it to the fullest like before (plus, the songs are still a bop). 

[chiisana-lion]

Low key wondering do u have any other Aikatsu ships? I just wanna know (90% because I wanna more about you 10% cause your funny when you seem like your boutta go feral)

JKSDGJKDHGH tbh i dont have too many aikatsu ships or rather im pretty open to a lot of them? if anything the ones i particularly favor are kaede and yurika from the og series and also madoka and rin from akari gen! they are sooo cute they meant a lot to me when i was younger and still do :)