Some Quick First Impressions: B-Project, Love Live! Sunshine!! and Orange

B-Project

Short Synopsis: An idol show about a group of male idols.

I guess they are still trying to create the male equivalent of love live aren’t they. Well I say you should take pointers on what made it work. For one you should never introduce all your characters in one fell swoop, especially if you have a lot of them. Out of the ten characters introduced I can remember four at best but I can recall that pretty much all of them are utterly one dimensional stereotypes. This may be just me, but it feels like reverse harems tend to rely heavier on stereotypes than regular harems. I mean of course harems make use of stereotypes to a massive degree but at least they somewhat try to differentiate them(Obviously not always successfully but still.). Whereas here, I am fairly certain I have seen all these characters before under different names. So a completely amateur is thrown into a manager role despite having no previous experience or any idea of what the job entails. Luckily she has the power of plot convenience as she is able to spot small details and is able to vaguely explain them though ridiculously silly metaphors. The music is terrible but the series is certainly trying to distract you from noticing it by having the singers sparkle and shine which just looks very silly. I may be judging this a bit harshly as while my expectations of what this would be were not wrong, it’s still at least watchable. If you are a fan of this sort of show I think it might do the trick but I will pass on this.

Potentail: 20%

 

Mario’s thoughts:

A typical Idol show, and story-wise the story about rookie manager learning her job is nothing new as well. This episode starts the rookie manager up with a group of 2 guys, so next few episodes we could see her taking more challenging job with the other teams of 3 and 5 people, respectively. While the music is nice I’ll say that I’m not in its target demographic because I can’t stand 10 male characters that all manage to have different hair colors here. At least one thing I learnt was that in recording sessions, singers had to be separated, because I always assume they had to sing together in order to have a chemistry together. We do learn new things every day hey?

Potential: 20%

Love Live! Sunshine!!

Short Synopsis: An idol show about a group of female idols.

Well at least they captured the essence of what made the first show so watchable and it certainly does have that bubbly optimism that is contagious. We have a brand new cast but I must admit that some of them don’t feel all that new. Our main heroine feels like another Honoka in that she’s a happy go lucky person that doesn’t think things through. There’s a girl who plays piano who’s likely to become the music composer for the group. There’s a student council president who is deeply opposed but will likely join the group later. but there are some new faces giving a different dynamic though one is pulling a rather stereotypical Chunni act. One big worry on watching this series is that it may be just a retread of the first show with slightly different characters. Ultimately if you liked the first season this is bound to give you the same things you liked about it. What will be a challenge of the rest of the series is providing something beyond that.

Potential: 55%

 

Mario’s thoughts:

Here is another idol show, but this is the one that I can actually can get behind. Love Live has been one of the most successful idol show, and this new installment promises to be on a right track. This episode makes so many things right: a colorful set of characters, all the characters get introduced here and within its short time they all make an impression. But the biggest success is in its thrills: the sense of fun and exciting to form a group, to start something they passionate about. In that sense this is not unlike a sport show. While Idol show again is not my cup of tea, this first episode so far sold me on giving it another watch.

Potential: 50%

Orange

Short Synopsis: A 16-year-old high school girl received a letter from her future-self telling her to keep an eye on the new transfer student.

Theres still a possibility of me blogging this as the summer preview poll is open till the airing of the second episodes but if that’s the case then I am not looking forward to it. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with this episode, in fact the animation is quite expressive minus some still frame montages. But this really isn’t my kind of show. I have no love for my mundane memories of school so I can’t relate to stories that romanticize it. For if I wrote a letter to my previous self, I would tell myself not to be a dumbass and make good use of my time knowing full well that my over egotistical previous self wouldn’t take it into account in the slightest. When I watch this all I can think of is how utterly bland this main character is and seeing the telltale signs of a love triangle. We already have confirmed that Naho loves transfer student and that her friend is her husband in the future so we all know that’s coming to a head. Plus it looks like Naho’s female friend has a thing for Transfer student as well so it looks like it’s a love square with likely more incoming. It’s been too soon since Kiznaiver and I am too old for this shit. Plus that soundtrack is so melodramatic that it makes me retch, that piano is so sappy that it makes me embarrassed just to hear it. If this can control itself and keep the drama down to earth I say this could have some worth. However if this goes full Okada then well…watch Relife instead.

Potential: 50%

 

Mario’s thoughts:

This show really sets itself up for a melodrama here, but I do really hope it doesn’t get too overboard. Other than that, I happy with the entire episode. The cast is well defined and the dynamic between them is all natural. I actually care a lot about the main girl, more than any other main character this season so far, simply because I know exactly what she thinks. Timid, a bit shy and don’t want to be a bother to others, while only allow herself to get hurt. I understand that feeling all too well and I know this train of feeling could bound for many regrets later, on what things she could do better. All that to say this resonates to me on the personal level. The realistic settings and more mature character designs also help to make it look like a live-action series (indeed, Orange has adapted to live-action film last year). I’m afraid later on this show will get into tear-jerking territory, but at least for now, it has my full support.

Potential: 90%