BATTLE ARENA

I do consider Renacchi and Juri as half-pushed though (maybe call it an under-the-radar push? lol)

Renacchi fell a bit behind of AnRi last year (they could have put her in the Mecchaike thing too and I still don't get why they didn't), while Juri... well, I had not noticed much of her until last year, tbh. But they gave them some things here and there and they made the most out of their chances.
Somehow they gathered more fans doing small things here and there than doing everything in a matter of months.

The Three Musketeers are getting a monster push, with Naanya having the ultimate push, IMO. And at least the first 3 are getting some results out of it. I was really surprised that Naanya didn't get to rank at all with all the opportunities she's been given, but I won't be next year if she jumps straight into UG ala Ricchan/Annin/Renacchi/Juri.

 

I think my problem with the pushes in new AKB as opposed to old AKB is that before they pushed a lot of different people fairly equally, which is how we ended up with the Kami8 who are all staples in Senbatsu. Now it seems like they're focusing the energy of their pushed onto fewer girls and pushing them as aces. Of course they're still pushing other girls, but they're not as easy to see when you have a few people who are being glorified as the next ace. Yui suddenly becomes obscured in Team K because it's all about the aces Jurina, Sayanee,Harupii and Mako. I mean, of course they still had aces way back when but they weren't all clustered in one spot and they didn't overshadow the other girls.

 

uh, that was a reply to wingsofangel comment of how Jurina should improve her singing skills if she wants to be center

that was a mock ya know, it basically means that vocals are never the reason for a girl to center, the mock is to counter that vocal = center statement

it's like, yeah right kind of stuff, if ya know what i mean

 

Thanks for explaining.


Btw never did I say anything like vocals = center. I simply stated I'd be a bigger fan of Jurina if her vocals were better. If you're going to attempt to make a decent counter argument (not you in particular kk127) you need to actually read the opposing argument.

 

about juri.. i remember she one of nextgen front girl in early shinoda team A with ricchan and popular member in ori team 4. but seems management forget her in 2013 & come back with big push in 2014. same with renacchi, management seems not give huge in 13-14 push like in 2012.. but i glad both can rank well in election.

if I see a trend promotion, they still give big push for ace of unit/group.. like 3 musketeer & anrire, they now still focus give monster push for mako & ricchan.. but seems give half-push for naachan,miki,renacchi,annin.

 

I don't get the appeal of Kaotan. She's not good looking at all and I know that looks are in the eye of the beholder, but I honestly can't get past hers. It really, really distracts me. She can't sing that well either so it's like, what is her charm? The fact that she chose to stay in KKS? Her camera shtick is getting old too.

I'm sure people think she's funny or whatever, but I don't get it. Maybe I just don't understand "busu idols".

 

The point I was making was that she isn't that attractive and she can't sing well. Sometimes an idol can't sing and that's okay because she's pretty and fun to watch. Sometimes idols can sing and aren't pretty and you know what? I love nice voices so who cares if they aren't good looking.

I just don't think she has any of those traits. Saying she is an anti-idol is kind of strange because she's leading the SKE48 KKS and is a mentor. If she isn't taking the idol thing seriously why should her underlings?

 

For me the problem with Kaotan isn't her looks or singing, there are many girls in the 48G who are not gifted in either but are still great at their own things. The thing is, when she showed her will to stay as an kenkyuusei despite being offered a promotion, didn't she say that she wants to lead the kks, help them to improve themselves, push their backs and try to get more people get interested in the kks? Has she done that? I really want to believe she did, but I haven't seen anything like that, which sure might be just because of my pure ignorance. The only thing I've seen is her 1 komeda videos featuring the kks. Despite having a girl whose strongest trait is her personality being their "leader", the girls haven't really developed their character since the beginning IMO. Kaotan, Asana (4th gen) and Risa (5h gen) still lead the MCs among them. I'm not implying Kaotan didn't do anything for the sake of kks, most likely she did. It just seems like instead of trying to reach a momentum as individuals, they (6th gen, 9/11 of the current kks) are only staying behind Kaotan's back known as her disciples. And yeah, they sure are comfortable with her, but is it really beneficial for them to depend on Kaotan?

Plus the thing which made me dislike Kaotan the most was during the sousenkyo when she filmed another girl's crying face next to her while smiling herself. Sure it's okay to be competitive, but enjoying someone's sadness and filming it is just cheap IMO. I don't understand who wants a girl with that kind of behaviour to work as a role model for the kks.

 

^ To be fair, I'm sure she wasn't enjoying it more than other cameramen did. She was just playing her Kaotan filming thing that she has been playing for year(s), I don't think there was any malice there - although I guess someone may say that smiling while doing that was being tactless.

My issue with her isn't her looks, either (although I admit her looks kind of turning me off), but her attitude. Borrowing Cristafari's words, the

attitude, to be clear. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong since I don't really actively follow her but mainly saw her posts on the SKE fans' tumblr I visited - she used to complain about various management decisions / treatments on G+, didn't she? Maybe because I'm also on the management side in real life, but to me, an employee openly oppose his / her employer / organization is a big NO-NO. I'm not saying she has to take all the things she complained about without saying anything, but if she want to complain, how about do it behind the scene with the management? Aki-P? What is the point of posting it publicly other than trying to get some attention (while making the management look bad in process)?
I don't understand why the management let her off with those, to be honest. The only reason I can think of was that her "complaints" are half-scripted / allowed by the management to maintain her unique character (same thing as making her the forever KKS). However, if that was the case, all the forums / tumblr posts accused "the evil management" based on Kaotan's posts suddenly seem stupid . Well, that is another unrelated issue.

 

@Starshard: Whoa, can you link me to her posts?

 

Sorry, I can't . As I said, I neither hate nor actively follow her (in fact, I don't even follow SKE that much besides Jurina / Rena-related stuffs), and I saw those posts a long time ago (0.5 to 2 years) on tumblr so they aren't fresh in my mind anymore. I guess if I can find them if I dig through my followed SKE tumblrs, but an SKE fan can probably find these much faster than I can.

 

When it comes to Kaotan, I feel that no matter what you think about her, however negative, she's still someone to be respected.

When it became obvious that the management was pretty much not going to promote her at all, what does she do? She goes onto G+ and uses it to its fullest potential. She communicates with the fans and makes videos promoting the other members, as well as showing rare footage that the fans would have never been able to see. And, overtime, she's become someone that the fans can depend on, (like warning them about fake autographed items, etc.), no matter if they like her or not.

Is there anything in particular you were looking for as proof? I willing to try offering some examples if you want.

Well, I guess there's always the possibility that management is ignoring her, right?

And, to be honest, while I'm also not one to immediately jump onto the "management is evil" bandwagon (the world is not so simple, after all), I'm curious as to why you think taking the opposite extreme is a better choice.

I'm guessing Starshard is mentioning something like this (it's a more recent example though)?

http://mahoushoujoari.tumblr.com/post/64488574924/from-matsumura-kaoris-gugutasu-19-10-2013

 

Well, I notice Kaotan, more like payed attention to her this SSK. I just did not like that she is making the KKS into a cause where there is none (that's what it felt like when she made every KKS stand up)... In 48G is more like a phase she refused to leave...

And I agree that any problems you might have with the management you do not do it in a way that might hurt the organization like making it public... Because they are working as well to keep the 48G going... She is lucky that she is in a organization where the emotional capital is strong with the fans....

 

She doesn't. She's only ever mulled over her own situation. Fans and anti beat it up blaming management

The only time was the poster incident and attention is the point. The situation was already public to a degree before the post anyway. The eventual outcome was positive and the situation was sorted out, which she posted about also and I think was not translated because I guess its not important.

 

I remember once in AKBINGO! it was said that in the beginning they didn't know what type of girls would be popular so the early generations had a wide mix of ages, abilities and personalities with many unique characters. In later generations management have refined the criteria of what they are looking for and exert more control over the members image. This is a mistake. 1st gen had 21 members with an age range of 10 years while 14th and 15th gens combined have 18 members with an age range of 6 years. In the last 4 generations (12th-15th), out of 42 girls, only Mitsumune Kaoru was past her 18th birthday when the generation members were announced. Of course characters take time to develop and come to the fore, but I just feel that the NG lacks something compared to the OG and i'm convinced that intra-generation variety has something to do with it.

 

I Completely 100% agree. I also think that a cause of the result you mentioned is that it feels like the way they're doing pushes is different. It seems like they're ultra pushing a few girls instead of just regular pushing a large variety of girls.

 

ROFL. I'm surprised that this post took off all the way to 22 pages. The "current" arguments are somewhat interesting but the OP made it clear from the get go that he/she meant war with poor choice of words and attitude. Of course there was somewhat a disclaimer but then again that doesn't give you a free pass to do whatever and say whatever you want.

 

With Kaotan, I really don't see how people can blame her for anything. I mean, there's only so much you can do. You can't force girls to shine and get noticed. In the Idol world, when you're caught in a sea of hundreds of other girls, there's a lot going on. She has her own character and her own shtick, so she's doing her job to promote that.. and her position is one that has several implications as well, and it's like people are expecting her to balance everything perfectly. She's not a superhero. She's most definitely an acquired taste based on her personality, so I think that's the root of the discussion.

As for the generation discussion, I have to agree that the NG lacks what the OG had. Especially in image. There were a lot of cute girls in the early days, but there were plenty of other personality types to balance it out. The original Team K is the best example. From the get go, there was so much diversity when you compare members like Sayaka to Tomomi. Then had vocal stars like Yuka, silly Sae, jack-of-all-trades Yuko, etc.

These days, it's like they've got this specific idea in mind, and all of the girls are all about it. Like look at the 13th, 14th, and 15th gens.. I'm STILL having trouble learning them all, because they're all so similar. The only reason I know as many as I do well enough is because some of them have emerged into the main front lines, like Owada Nana, Kojima Mako, Okada Nana, etc.

Regardless of how different some of the girls may be, there's not ONE that could effortless pull of the Sayaka-type roles. And I'm not saying that the new AKB should copy or reflect what existed with the old AKB, but I'm just saying that the diversity is a different kind of diversity these days.

And even putting ori Team K out of mind, I can't imagine ONE girl of the "new gen" of AKB that would fit songs like Junjou Shugi, Itoshiki Natasha, Itoshisa no Accel, Blue Rose, etc… Haruppi really tried with Blue Rose, but it just fell flat. Yuihan's attempt at Accel was devoid of the intensity it required. Okada Nana's Itoshiki Natasha just didn't feel right..

And it just doesn't work to have all these young girls attempting songs that just don't fit. And it certainly doesn't help that members like Nishino Miki and Aigasa Moe are basically copying Mayu and Tomochin. It doesn't feel genuine.

It's essentially like management has learned that twin-tailed, sugar-coated, fake-smiled diabetes is what would sell in the most reliable fashion. Case and point? Team 4's surge in popularity. Team 4 is easily the best example of what AKB is going for, these days.

Not that that's necessarily bad, because I think it's definitely enjoyable.. but it doesn't offer something for everyone, in the way that AKB used to. Try to picture Itoshiki Rival, WITHOUT Jurina and Sayanee… Like.. I really don't think the newer girls are primed to do songs like that at all.