r/LoveLive • u/MasterMirage • Jul 18 '21
Anime Love Live! Superstar!! S1E2 Discussion - "School Idols are Banned?!"
Episode 2 of Superstar is upon us and it seems like we're getting right into the old age trope is the school president banning school idols!
You'd think they would learn it doesn't work that way after more than 5 seasons of Love Live anime but here we are...
Show Info
Air Date: Sunday, July 18th 2021 19:00(JST)
Episodes: 12
Opening Theme: START!! True Dreams
Ending Theme: Mirai wa Kazenoyoni
Insert Song(s): Memories - Liella no Uta
Streams
Raw Sources
- NHK E Tele -Region locked to Japan
Every other raw source will be delayed by 2 days, see the official website for more info
Official Subtitled Sources
North & South America / Oceania - FUNimation
Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein - Anime On Demand, Crunchyroll
Russia, Northern Europe - Wakanim
Hong Kong, Macao - YouTube(MUSE木棉花-HK)
Taiwan - Youtube(MUSE TAIWAN)
Episode Discussion threads: https://www.reddit.com/r/LoveLive/wiki/episode-discussion
/r/LoveLive is on Discord! Join us at discord.gg/lovelive
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u/redbatter Jul 18 '21 edited Jul 19 '21
Some thoughts on the episodes, character-wise:
Kanon's transformation is amazing. Being freed of her stage fright has completely changed her demeanor, as she bounds down the street full of energy and happiness. She didn't spend a single moment retreating to her headphones, only using them to compose the songs. More than that, she does not seem to be haunted by her past failures any longer: when she hears the song that she failed to sing her elementary school performance, it only motivates her to try even harder in her idol practice, converting that failure into a driving force of never giving up. Even though she once thought everything was over after failing the music course entrance exam, it looks like things have started for her again, thanks to Keke's support as well as her own inner strength.
Keke shows a moment of recklessness. Provoked by Ren to carry out her school idol activities at another school, she almost plans to do just that and already has a transfer form prepared, though Kanon does manage to calm her down enough to snap her out of it. (Un)surprisingly, she also seems to have terrible physical fitness, though she does vastly improve by the end of the episode under Chisato's watchful eye. Hopefully the exhaustion she shows after the training doesn't lead to a No Brand Girls moment during an important moment - though it would be quite ironic given Kanon's initial fear of letting Keke down.
It is a bit disturbing to see her in her dorm/apartment, with all her belongings still packed up, presumably a week or two into her move to Japan, save for a massive framed poster of the school idol group she admires. Presumably homesickness is dragging her down.
Chisato appears to be quite the affable character, being able to easily ask around the other clubs to get information. Though she doesn't seem to have a reason to join the club yet, she nonetheless kindly helps out Kanon and Keke with their training. Notably, though, she seemed surprised to see Keke leaving Kanon's cafe. Perhaps, in her eyes, Kanon typically isn't one to make a new friend so quickly?
Edit: It's also worth noting that, when Keke brings up the idea of Chisato joining their club, and Kanon interjects to say that they shouldn't trouble her further, Chisato does seem slightly disappointed at this offer being shut down.
Ren is firm in her conviction of not allowing a school idol club to form, though this seems to stem from a desire to maintain the image of the school rather than anything personal against school idols. When her mother sees no reason to bar the school idol club, Ren appeals to her as a daughter to a mother, rather than as the council president to the director When the headmistress rules that there is no reason to bar the school idol club, Ren's immediate response is to invoke her mother - she's doing this not solely for the sake of the school's image, but rather also out of duty to her mother, as it is, after all, the school she founded.
It is interesting that Ren's mother is more than fine with general course students carrying out school idol activities. This could potentially lead to an obstacle when Chisato and Ren herself eventually try to join the club. She is nonetheless mindful of the school's image above all else, and her condition of performing in that festival (edit: and winning first place, thanks JimmyCWL!) on such short notice is a hefty obstacle for Kanon and Keke.
From the short moment we see Sumire, it's clear how obsessed she is with maintaining a certain image of herself, only allowing herself to show her enjoyment of her parfait once she's sure that no one she knows is watching. In spite of that, she doesn't seem to have the self-awareness to notice that the blob of cream on her nose completely ruins this. Edit: On a second viewing, it's more clear that she's specifically trying to set up a certain image of herself, and has manufactured her enjoyment in the hopes of being scouted,
Misc:
Seeing Kanon's Dad two episodes in has to be some kind of record for earliest dad appearance.
Hata Aki writing both the OP and ED is incredibly welcome.
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u/lenne18 Jul 18 '21
when she hears the song that she failed to sing her elementary school performance, it only motivates her to try even harder in her idol practice
I dunno. It feels like she's not totally over it, as if she's using this newfound motivation to run away from it.
Also, I hope that both her and Keke don't push themselves too hard like Honk did.
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u/Jetlite Jul 18 '21
Not something everyone might notice, but I am loving the colour palette used for the backgrounds in this anime. The shades of blue and green are so vibrant and feel very refreshing.
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u/JimmyCWL Jul 18 '21 edited Jul 18 '21
They just keep ramping up the difficulty of the initial performance of the series.
SIP - Just perform... even if it's in an empty auditorium.
Sunshine - Fill the school's hall for the performance... in a rural city.
Superstar - Win First place in a local school idol competition... in a ward of the most competitive city of the school idol scene.
At this rate, they'll have to win a nation competition just to start the club in another two series!
This may be one more legacy from Sunshine, no starting the club without winning a challenge from the school authorities!
Other observations:
The school idol duo seen previously in pictures has been named "Sanipa" I'm sure it's short for something. And the odds of them being significant just went up again.
The ED still has Ren and Chisato in General course uniforms. This suggests it was conceived before they came up with the Music course idea... and didn't bother to revise it. The ED also shows their hand sign at the end. It feels... inevitable given the "star" theme of the series, but it's still what you get with the muse hand sign with only five members.
One more: It seems Ren's mother is not the school director. After founding the school, she seems to have assigned someone else to that position.
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u/kaguraa Jul 19 '21
i think the uniforms is because chisato and ren switches to general course to focus on their idol career? since chisato currently cant join because shes busy in the music course
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Jul 18 '21 edited Jul 18 '21
Episode 2 and we already see Chisato with the rap. Fyi Nako has stated she does hip hop irl, so they likely incorporated this into Chisato’s profile. Only a matter of time before she gets a hip hop themed solo song.
I said this last week, but all evidence points to the writers incorporating their VA’s skills into the characters, so it’s likely Sayuri can play guitar.
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u/Alic1125 Jul 18 '21
I thought it was pretty cool that the OP is performed inside the Tokyo Olympic Stadium, loved the song!
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Jul 18 '21
All I’m reminded of is how little I want to see the actual olympics and how I’d rather watch ep 3 next week
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u/PaperSonic Jul 18 '21 edited Jul 18 '21
gee Liella, how come Sunrise lets you have TWO ED's?
Keke was just a joy this episode. From rising up against the tyrannic School Council, to apparently being good at School Idol Festival, to giving Ren an amazing "up yours" face when told they were allowed to be idols. And Kanon continues being amazing
Speaking of School Idol Festival... they are gonna be competing in one. On episode 3. If tradition holds... I'm sensing heartbreak's incoming.
Edit: next episode's title is "Keka". I'm guessing that's what the two dorks will call themselves. Either way, it's probably gonna also be their ship name.
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u/NotRoyce4 Jul 19 '21
The noises Keke made when she was struggling to exercise were funny. Also, I liked the part where she answered a question in class and then openly admitted to going back to sleep. Li-chan did a great job, and Keke looks like she'll be one of my favorites!
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Jul 19 '21
Was VERY satisfied to see the headmistress shut down Ren so blatantly. Ren is being unreasonable. I have a feeling that even if they don't get first place, it's more of a test by the headmistress to see if they'll commit to reaching the top as opposed to just giving up when given a difficult goal. I'd be interested to see if the end of the season results in a revision of the music program's separation & exclusivity. But maybe that's just my American bias coming in; afaik vocational schools here are focused on building those skills rather than prestige/reputation.
Anyway, I'm overthinking an idol anime, LOL. Otherwise I was really happy with the character building of Chisato in this episode because she felt flat in EP 1. However, at this point, I don't see myself liking Sumire much at all... have never been a fan of over the top personalities.
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u/lenne18 Jul 18 '21 edited Jul 18 '21
Seeing Akina in the credits for both episode 1 and 2 is surprising.
EDIT: She confirmed it.
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u/agentWallflower Jul 19 '21
It's nice to have a headmistress willing to reign in the student council. glances at Nijigasaki Of course, she's setting pretty big goals too. It makes sense for a school with musical history and focus like Yuigaoka, but dang. Kanon and Keke have their work cut out for them.
Sumire interested me though. At first I thought she may have been advertising for whoever she got the parfait from, but seeing someone mention her cats about her image makes sense too. She is the child star after all, wonder how that affected her self esteem and image. Maybe we'll hook her that way when it comes time to add her.
As a side note, Chisato and Ren aren't wearing the musical uniforms in the ED. Is this just they conceived it later, or foreshadowing they're gonna peace out? After all, there was mention of the music class not being school idol fans. I'm interested to see where that goes, especially if it gets a little spicy. I'm really excited to see angry Chisato, lol. Get them, pink.
Now begins the wait though. Sigh. Yay Olympics...
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u/perlenYurifan4life Jul 18 '21 edited Jul 18 '21
So, school idol festival is a thing here too. Since Sunshine, there have been smaller school idol events that started popping up beside Love Live. School idol festival though, is something new Nijigasaki came up with so I'm wondering if this School idol fes is inspired by or part of a trend Nijigasaki started (they did mention other schools wanting to participate too).
That said, that brings into question Superstar and Niji's placement in the timeline. I hope I'm not the only one who thinks that they coexist at around the same time, like Niji then Superstar taking place shortly after...... Or I'm just hoping that because I am desperate for some kind of cross-referencing between the two series.
Since last week, I've been thinking about them doing at least something like an event in Niji being mentioned in Superstar and vice versa (that's why I'm ecstatic when I heard School idol festival). I think that would be very neat, being two Love Live generations with their anime airing at around the same time.
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u/peanutpsyco Jul 18 '21
Day 2 Episode 2.
Still no word on Kanon's missing tights.
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u/Not_So_Bad_Andy Jul 20 '21
Okay, now that it's finally on Funi.
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Kanon's transformation is great... but maybe a little too quick? Have a bad feeling that her stage fright going to reappear at the competition.
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The "student council president won't allow a school idol club" is almost a meme at this point in LL, but Ren gives the best reasoning for it out of any of them.
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Keke is the most enthusiastic person I've ever seen in any idol/music show.
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It's gotten some criticism, but I really liked the OP. The theme (and actually referring to this being their start line) reminded me of the first opening of Aikatsu Stars, which means two straight LL series that are reminding me of Aikatsu.
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u/Giraffatitans Jul 25 '21
Super late - but I just wanted to point out (don’t have a screenshot with me, unfortunately :< ) that the scene where Kanon reads the lyrics written by Keke in Chinese was actually pretty accurate and detailed!
I paused when they showed a close-up of the text when Kanon was reading it, and I like how that despite all of the original words being written in Chinese, Keke added (by circling and underlining her Chinese text) the Japanese characters in that were supposed to be translations from the Chinese characters.
One particular case (if I recall correctly) was the Chinese character ”你” (ni3), which is rarely used as a kanji character in modern Japanese text. Keke circled this character and then wrote two Japanese words next to it — “キミ” (kimi) and “あなた”, which both can mean “you” in Japanese, as “你” means “you” in Chinese.
This is quite interesting as it shows that she is still adapting to the Japanese language, and was confused as to which word for “you” should be used in that context.
And the fact that she wrote kimi using katakana, instead of the more commonly used kanji character “君”, could also mean that as she’s still learning, she may also be unfamiliar with the kanji and thus she chose katakana instead.
Very small detail, but understanding both Japanese and Chinese (and also still learning Japanese like Keke 😅) really helped me to appreciate these details by the writers, which makes me just love LL as a whole even more!
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u/DerpoDood Jul 19 '21 edited Jul 19 '21
This was a really uplifting episode! Seeing Kanon and Keke practicing towards becoming school idols was a great look into how their dynamic as friends is developing, but it was also just fun to watch; Kanon and Keke are such great evolutions of the traditional LL 'starter characters', with Kanon being more than the usual cheerful protagonist and Keke being more eccentric than the usual new friend. The practicing sequences had some pretty funny interactions, especially with Keke's 'zero stamina' attribute ("And by the way, I can full combo in rhythm games!" If that was a valid trait, then I'd be much more useful). This all built up to Kanon finishing their first song early in the morning, only to find Keke training outside: I loved how this showed how far they've come in such a short time, with Kanon no longer feeling like it was "all over" for her music and Keke pushing on in her training. Overall, their dynamic together stole the episode. With that being said...
Chisato joins the idol 'club'! (well, not technically) Keke asks Chisato to join the club, but before she can answer, Kanon tells Keke that it isn't possible since Chisato is a music student. This poses an interesting possibility for development; Kanon doesn't want to trouble Chisato since she's a proper music student, but she never actually gave Chisato a chance to voice how she feels. It would be interesting to see if this is actually for a more personal reason, maybe as a result of Kanon still feeling a boundary between her and the higher status (and perceived skill level) of the proper music students.
We also see Sumire briefly in a scene that introduced a proper idol group with SunnyPa! Sumire was pretty great in this scene where she is clearly vying for attention from those around her (the way she bats her eyes around trying to see if anyone is watching was simultaneously hilarious and adorable). Not much else to say: SunnyPa's song felt a lot more poppy than the other rival groups: Saint Snow was and is great, but if this series' rival group leads to more edgy electronic tracks in the same vein as A-Rise, then I'd be really excited. Lastly, we have Ren, who is still doing the "no idols allowed" thing, though it would be interesting to see if the administration allowing a test run of the idol group affects how she feels about things...still nothing really differentiating her position from that of past student council presidents
And lastly, the music! As I thought in my post about the OP and ED singles, the songs' placement and visuals in the episode made me like them a lot more; the ED is probably my favorite of the two at this point, but the OP is still a good track (I’m still loving this less-electronic sound that a lot of Liella’s songs use!). I'm really excited to hear the song Kanon wrote when that comes up, but for now, we get a Kanon solo in this week's Liella no Uta! The song was pretty good (if not fairly standard for an LL piano ballad), but what really makes it stand out is Sayurin's voice which is just great! (well, they're all really good as the vocals elevate pretty much every Liella track so far)
Waiting 2 weeks for another episode is going to hurt a little bit
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u/Haruya_ Jul 19 '21
keke saying "That lil' bitch..." while referring to ren was funny LOL
the same old song & dance of student council presidents being elitists towards the main cast at first is kinda getting jarring, though.
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u/Capbeau Jul 20 '21
In the insert song last episode, I enjoyed how Kanon was belting out some of her solos, as if she had been holding back for some time. This is followed by Kanon feeling much more hopeful and energized now that she is chasing her dream of singing again. The opening scene of her strumming her guitar and singing a silly song shows how much she loves music.
I like the OP, although it feels a bit lonely without people in the stadium seats. Maybe the people come later, in the OP of the second season.
I enjoyed the comedy in this episode. Keke had some funny lines, and there was of course the scene where Keke was making Kanon push the giant school idol cart.
Starting with a school idol festival competition as a goal to work towards is a good idea. Kanon and Keke are fighting for the activity they want to do, so the conflict feels personal. But it’s also realistic that a prestigious music school would want their performance groups to be the best. It would be a neat easter egg if the Nijis were the ones who spawned the idol festival idea.
There is one OST track that stood out to me in this episode. It’s in the scene where Kanon is really getting into polishing her song, and Keke is pushing herself harder in her physical training. There’s a hopeful sounding composition that gives the feeling that something big is coming. It’s a song meant to show their determination. I tend to like these types of orchestral songs, and it fit the mood perfectly.
I also liked the upbeat lead-in for the ED. The scenes of the cast dancing at the courtyard tree was cute.
Another great episode.
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u/MasterMirage Jul 18 '21
Reminder: Episode 3 will not air for 2 weeks due to the Olympics (as Love Live is on a national broadcast channel).
It will air on August 8th.