The monster anime season continues, giving us more great anime series to watch than any I can remember in the past. No matter what genre of anime you’re interested in, from school romance to isekai to ecchi, there is an anime that’s great to turn your brain off with. We’ve also got less than five idol anime series, and the one I’ve been enjoying the most is Idoly Pride. Let’s talk about why it’s worth your time!
Note: although Idoly Pride is a cute anime about idols, it’s got some story plot twists that are best experienced through the show. Spoiler warnings below!
Idoly Pride is a Smart Idol Anime with Several Twists
While I’ve been a fan of idol anime since the OG, Super Dimensional Fortress Macross, shown around the world as Robotech, my modern introduction to the genre was the original Idolm@ster series. While it was fun becoming fans of 2D idols and watch as they worked hard to improve their singing and dancing skills, I felt that one weak part of that series were the little dramatic episodes they manufactured to move the story forward, which usually involved one girl or another announcing that she was going to quit the group for some reason, while we wait for the other girls to change her mind. Idoly Pride has a much more interesting story, with several core plot twists that make it enjoyable for fans.
Mana Nagase was a girl who was born to become Japan’s top idol, and with the help of her classmate Kohei Makino, who she ropes into becoming her manager, she nearly achieves this goal. Just as Mana about the win the Venus Grand Prix, the top idol show in Japan… she’s killed in a car accident, an event that sends shockwaves through Japan’s idol world. What kind of show kills off its most interesting character in the first episode?
Fast forward three years and Mana’s younger sister Kotono has decided to follow in her sister’s footsteps and try to become a top idol. Just as Sakura is walking into Hoshimi Productions for her interview, she bumps into a girl named Sakura who also decides to become an idol because “her heart told her to.”
#IdolyPride is a fun idol anime with some interesting story twists. #SpoilerWarning
To start with, the main character dies in the first episode and becomes a ghost, who watches over her sister who tries to follow in her footsteps. pic.twitter.com/EwfCNsDk7W
— Peter Payne (@JListPeter) March 1, 2021
An Idol Anime with a Ghost?
The sudden death of super idol Mana Nagase three years ago devastated her fans, but Makino gets to see her every day because she appears as a ghost and floats around the room while he’s managing the new group of idols. Having the ghost of Mana to provide advice is helpful for Makino, though she’s surprised when her own sister shows up for the audition.
A Mysterious Heart Transplant?
In a recent episode, the girls put on their swimsuits and play by a pool, and the girls notice that Sakura has a scar on her chest. “I haven’t told you yet, have I? This is the scar from my heart surgery. It happened three years ago.” So Sakura, the girl who “followed her heart” to becoming an idol, and who sings just like Mana Nagase, got a heart transplant at just the time that Mana herself died? That’s very interesting…
Where will it all go? Will Kotono and Sakura lead their two idol teams to win the Venus Grand Prix? Will Kotono get to say goodbye to her sister’s ghost in an emotional “Menma, we found you!” moment as in AnoHana? Tune and watch along!
There’s another dimension to Idoly Pride because the three main seiyu — Sora Amamiya, Momo Sakura, and Shiina Natsukawa — perform as an idol unit, so if you love the 2D characters, you can become fans of the girls who provide their voices, and follow their idol career! Sora, Momo, and Shiina all entered the seiyu world together at an audition in 2011, so it’s logical that they come together for the three main roles in this show.
Thanks for reading this post on Idoly Pride. Hope you will check the show out, as it’s quite a lot of fun!
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