The H!P Musings/Rants Thread

[Nayoko-Kihara]

That's great for her, and after people have been saying she gives off Matsuura vibes for so long now. I really hope this movie does decently.

[Celedam]

My pointless musing of the day…

The new profile photos for MM got me wondering, what goes through a young idol's mind when she starts to get serious attention for being cute or pretty or even beautiful? Especially one who comes in right off the street, rather than through a KSS-like program. One day she's a normal middle school student who might be popular in her class but otherwise unremarkable, and then the next… Well, not the next day. Obviously there are months of training before she debuts. But after all of that, there comes the day when she really, truly sees what she has become and thinks "Wow, that's me."

We call it "the idol makeover", but we see only the external effects. The poise, the confidence, the stage presence, the personality, the talkativeness, the attention to hair and makeup and fashion and diet and so on. But what are the internal effects? I'd love to know.

(yes, i'm mostly thinking of Rio here. she had the most humble beginning — Mei was KSS, and Homare had done other work — and she has risen the fastest.)

[Shoujo Q]

Since you were talking about Rio.

Rio to me, gives off the vibe that she knows what she wants and will do what she can to get there; she's a go-getter. She kind of gives off the same vibe that Sayumi gave off when she first joined. So I can see her maybe falling into that narcissistic beauty role that Sayumi was pulling off early in her idol years. But what Sayumi lacked was the vocals to go with it. She had to work really hard to get that part to work for her, get the producers to find songs that worked for her range, etc. Rio seems like she's got that covered and wont have a problem with that if her solo fest performance is anything to go by. I hate throwing the word ace out for members of Morning Musume, but she's really got the vibe going. Not since Riho have we really seen it. But seeing how stacked the group is right now, we probably wont see her true potential for awhile and I'm okay with that. Riho got overused way too quickly, and like Goto Maki, left way too quickly.

[Tobo_Junny135]

Seeing the new profile, I understand what others mean when they say Rio had always been a member of Momusu, sure in comparison to Homatan and Panda-chan she has the least experience, and the least athletic. But seeing her perform for about a year now, she’s become a bit of a natural.

I’ll admit at first glance I wasn’t sure how she would turn out looking at audition footage, Homare shined in Only You, while she (Rio) faltered in Help Me

But now all 3 of 15th Gen is growing on me. I’m loving the Gyuusaritai profile shots.

[forgetmenots]

Weirdly I logged on with a Rio based musing/query as well.

I've realized that in youtube comments Rio is called On-chan very consistently. I was wondering where that nickname may have come from and I came across the fact that it's what Masaki calls her apparently in the K&K reaction video? It's kind of rare for a Masaki nickname to take off that way, so I wonder if that really was the original origin (though it does sounds like a very Maachan nickname). And if it is, Rio must have made an impression on Masaki in order for Masaki to give her one (or just a coincidental flub at some time haha).

But I also agree that Rio has a go-getter way about her and a drive that reminds me of Riho. That very first appearance she declared that she wanted to be the best and she's obviously been working hard at it. I don't think she's reached her goal yet, but I hope that she doesn't rise too fast and has a more Mizuki/Masaki career trajectory.

[Nayoko-Kihara]

As far as I remember, it's just a Masaki nickname that stuck. I don't know if Masaki has ever explained the why behind that one.

[Sohee]

If I remember correctly, Masaki thought the kanji for "O" in "Rio" was 音 and thus started to call her Onchan as 音 can also be read as On (for example in On-Gaku 音楽/music).

[koregaboku]

Rio is also the one that sticks out to me the most in 15ki.

For only being a year younger Mei and Homare both give off very youthful energy. Rio on the other hand gives a much more focused, self-assured energy.

And on that 15ki note, and I'm ready for the posts disagreeing with me, I could use less of Mei. I understand that the panda thing is cute but it's such a defining characteristic and everything gets brought back to the pandas with her that I find it grating.

I also can see how sticking to pandas too hard will also make it difficult to move away from pandas eventually so I'd rather see that band aid get ripped off now.

[Celedam]

Be patient. It's clear that she's a bit slow, and I think the management gave her that as an easy gag to remember and fall back on when she doesn't know what else to do. If 2020 hadn't been what it is, she would've had a couple more tours' worth of experience by now to help develop her character. (No, I'm not counting the ballad tours; she needs the full group experience, especially the MCs.)

[Zunu]

Also I think it's one thing when as fans, we regularly follow the girls and their gimmicks -- it's easy to tire of the repetition. But for casual observers who check in once in a blue moon, "oh there's that panda girl, I remember her" is a sort of mnemonic visual aid that helps her avoid being sidelined. Plus Japan seems to have a pretty strong tolerance overall for one note gimmicks. Back in the day it felt like we went through literal years of Razor Ramon HG saying "Fuuu~!" and Haruna Ai's Ayaya imitation. And that shit was annoying AF after awhile, but at the same time, it worked, because I still remember Razor Ramon HG and Haruna Ai after all these years. I don't know what they've moved on to these days, but if they showed up doing their old shtick on a comeback show, I might groan but I'd watch it all the same. Speaking of Haruna Ai, in all honesty I always thought she looked more like Chissa than Ayaya tbh.