If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan, I Would Die

ExemplarCayman★ 10

- I thought I'd make this my last visit. Sorane-chan was my hope. She was all that I had. But apparently, she doesn't need me. Then there's no point in me coming here anymore. - Could you sum all that up in a haiku? Stories about socially unacceptable hobbies/subcultures/lifestyles too often fall into one of the two extremes. Type 1 is a true believer’s exercise in self-celebration, saccharine feel-good tales that gloss over any negativity, which you can take as either irresponsibly naive or maliciously whitewashed (e.g. Shirobako). Type 2 is “look at these dweebs” hot takes made by an outsider with the authenticity and subtlety ofa minstrel show a la The Big Bang Theory. What both these types share is having little to do with reality. The beauty of OshiBudo is in how it manages to balance itself. OshiBudo is a show about the idol otaku culture. It’s a celebration of this culture, and it’s an exposé of this culture. It does not shy away from the fact that idol otakus are troubled maladjusted people manipulated and exploited by performers whose entire business model is bleeding dry a small group of obsessed lunatics. And yet it does not diminish the fact that idol fans do indeed find meaning, fulfillment, social fabric and, ultimately, happiness in their lifestyle, i.e. they actually pay for tangible value they wouldn’t be getting elsewhere. This nuanced portrayal (along with some other things like the superb character writing) is what makes this show “deep”, but that alone isn’t enough to deserve the 10/10 rating. The other necessary half is being “hella fun” and what makes this series fun is its jaw-breaking humor. Because don’t let the above paragraph mislead you - OshiBudo is pure, unadulterated satirical comedy. It’s actually worth elaborating, because going into this show with wrong expectations can easily ruin it. It’s not an idol show, a romance show, or a yuri show - while it has all these elements, they’re nothing but props to set up comedic situations. No, there won’t be any romantic progress. Yes, they will run into the face-palm inducing misunderstandings that can easily be solved with saying things out loud, but won’t ever be solved. No, they won’t show girls kissing. Why? Because it’s funnier this way, that’s why. Likewise, it’s not the type of comedy very typical for the anime medium. No reaction faces. No setup-punchline or boke-tsukkomi structure. No easily memeable cuts. Instead, the humor is low-key and, in a way, “methodical.” It’s a constant build-up of dozens of tiny chuckle-worthy fragments that just keep and keep snowballing into the all-out hilarity. Things are funny in the context of everything that happened in the show so far, both in the same episode and in the previous ones. Plenty of gags are split-second, like jiggle physics that rival the Konosuba’s boobs - for the fat guy’s double chin. You end up unable to suppress a permanent grin without properly realizing why. Looping back, the drama of this show also exists mainly to prop up the comedy. Take the exchange from the epigraph for example. The guy is going through a genuine heartbreak/existential crisis. His friends are being callous dicks with their reply. All of it is no laughing matter. Which is exactly why it is funny. To sum it all up: OshiBudo offers a clever and sophisticated portrayal of the idol otaku culture, and a hilarious one at that. Incidentally, it has its idol dance sequences hand-drawn, which I've been told is a big deal. 9.5/10 for “tangible value you wouldn’t be getting elsewhere.”

Tardivex★ 2

When it comes down to it, this anime is nothing really special, just another standard seasonal show that was forgotten a few weeks or months after its release, your typical 5 out of 10. However there's something that kept bothering me about it, which is what prompted me to go back and write a review in the first place. Oshi ga Budoukan Ittekuretara Shinu is absolutely horrifying, not in your typical horror curse type of thing, but in a much more psychological and real way, because it glorifies some of the worst aspects of otaku and general consumerist culture. You have these main characters that are crazyabout this one idol group, and they each have a favorite girl they want to support, to the point where they destroy their lives doing so, and I don't mean that lightly, they're well into their twenties but have zero regard for stability or their futures. There's this conversation where they mention they work part time jobs (which they're shown to be miserable in) and not full time ones because it's more flexible schedule wise so they can go into every single one of the idol group's shows, and spend every penny that they earn in CDs or other merch related to their favorite girl. The show portrays this twisted sense of duty towards their favorite girls, where they must consume, they must be loyal "supporting" fans to the detriment of everything else in their lives. The highlight of their day is dumping their hard earned cash on their favorite idol from the group, even getting a glimpse of them is somehow considered an astonishing accomplishment. Now don't get me wrong here, I'm all for people doing whatever they wanna do as long as it's not illegal, I'm all for people having hobbies they love, but the utter levels of insanity shown in anime go beyond that, to an unhealthy degree, the main character openly ignores their financial obligations in favor of working overtime so they buy multiple boxes of their precious idol's CDs to "support" them, but it's cool because their best girl smiled at them! Look how happy they are seeing that! Or getting their timed 10 second handshake session! It's all characterized in a happy light while their lives are a few scraps away from falling apart altogether at any given moment. I can't help but think about all the parasocial relationships some people have with streamers, or even worse, the rise of sites like OnlyFans for instance, and how the behavior displayed in this anime is exactly the same for those with these clear issues that need to be worked on, instead of getting a "quick fix" at their symptoms, it would also not even be a stretch to include the gambling addicts, which are also now frequently portrayed in anime nowadays as a "cool gamer" character that plays a ton of gacha on their phone. Finally, it's certainly not lost on me how the movie Perfect Blue managed to portray this in a much more realistic manner and show the problem for what it really is, while simultaneously tackling a bunch of other related themes in its 80 minute runtime, more than 20 years ago. If nothing else, I hope whoever is reading this takes away a recommendation for that movie if they haven't watched it already. Ultimately I know Oshi ga Budoukan Ittekuretara Shinu wasn't going for a "realistic" depiction of these habits, I'd like to believe media follows human behavior, not the other way around, nevertheless the way it glorifies them only serves to make my stomach churn, as it perpetuates these stereotypes and validates unhealthy life choices which the longer it goes on, will only make the "hit" worse whenever they do wake up and see the fallout from the years wasted of their lives and thousands spent on what amounted to nothing but a quick path to the dopamine receptors in their brains.