Reviews of anime are SUBJECTIVE.
If you cannot come to the table on why people have differing opinions of anime, please reset expectations when reading this review and please be more open-minded. There tends to be people who immediately dislike anime unfairly based on first impression due to the contents or its fanbase and associate them together. Don’t knock something until you try it. No matter the opinion, you should try to form your own.
This is particularly true of Idols. There seems to be an unfair vehement disgust towards it and I think that’s really unfortunate because they’re creating unfair impressions on something they haven’t experienced. Kind of ironic because anime is unfairly discriminated against by people not familiar with the hobby/medium and some anime experience the same treatment.
Again, don’t knock something until you try it, seriously.
Setting expectations:
This review is being written under a subjective lens and mainly enjoyment. If you come to expect opinions from a very critical sense, wrong place. A lot of people online come to expect reviews as such, this review ain’t gonna be like that. I just like to talk about anime I enjoy. And so this review is about such things. Sorry if this ain't what you're looking for.
I’ll try to keep spoilers to a minimum!
Also, sorry for the amount of notices beforehand, it’s just to cover my bases because a lot of people like ‘objective’ reviews online and considering idols is so popular plus gets a really bad rep, I want people to properly read my review with an open mind.
My background when going into Love Live Sunshine:
I’ve already seen: Love Live School Idol Project (LL SIP) Season 1 (Rating = 7), Season 2 (Rating = 8), and the Movie (Rating = 9). I’m a fan of this series and of the Muse School Idol group but I’ve had some issues with its production, story, and presentation at points. They’ve clearly improved as they went along so you see it trending upwards.
There will be people who go into this review and haven’t watched the previous Love Lives. Let me tell you that is a mistake.
You’re skipping out on important background episodes that help flesh out the world more in Sunshine. It’s like skipping JoJo Part 1 & 2 and then going into JoJo Part 3 asking why certain characters are so significant and brought up so much. The characters from the original Love Live series and how they impacted the world is essential before going into Love Live Sunshine.
I’ve seen multiple people skip into Sunshine and I think it doesn’t allow you gain the intended enjoyment from the creators. It’s very clear that they assume you’ve seen it and if you haven’t, you won’t get why certain characters behave like they do. Hell, you’ll probably never understand why the Muse School Idol Group is such a main point in the show at all.
Now for my overall series rating: 8.5/10
If you disagree, we’ll have to agree to disagree, fam. People hold certain points as negative and I hold them as positive.
Why did I like it?
I think in my case, I’ve related to a lot of the scenarios placed among the characters and the group throughout the show. Anime is subjective after all. I personally felt, understood, and related to the characters throughout the show. Almost every single one. This influences my rating majorly, if you cannot get invested or relate, I think this show won’t work for you.
It was set to a 9 - 9.5/10 actually from Episode 1 - 11. I genuinely felt like they were a very very strong representation of the topics and themes displayed. It felt close to the home in terms of the way they presented it.
What made it drop was Episode 12 and 13. The way they presented the messages and themes was actually confusing. I wasn’t sure if the translations were able to convey it correctly from the FFF fansub group, but assuming it was, there was clear confusion in what they were trying to say. This confusion can make or break you, to be honest.
The way this show treads upon the past and Muse from SIP can be a benefit or negative. It’s quite thin ice on how they do things and that might be the reason why the ending of this season is not looked fondly on by certain individuals. Regardless, for me, I was able to finally understand what they were trying to say and do by the end but it ruined some enjoyment despite the huge highs it had.
And the ending - it was good. I liked how it ended and felt it was appropriate for how it went. SIP TV’s ending execution didn’t make me happy so seeing how Sunshine Season 1 ended, I was satisfied with how it went. The final performance and song was genuinely great and entertaining.
This was handled really well. I was very impressed from Episode 1 - 11 in terms of how they retread the same steps as Muse in SIP and refined their messaging while also showcasing subtle differences. They’ve paid a lot of close attention to detail to the world, characters, and the effects of the world on the respective societies. My attention was more focused on the world mainly.
From Episode 1, you’ll see they’ve re-implemented the formula from SIP. In Sunshine, you see the formula on full-display but they learned from their past mistakes and refined it much better this time. You see how much they take and put in elements from before into Sunshine, plus added in their own fresh spin to it.
Aqours is like the spiritual successor to Muse and you can feel that every step of the way. And this is honestly a storytelling offense for a lot of people.
Why talk about their legacy when it’s not necessary? Because it’s like real life. People follow their heroes and follow in their footsteps. People mimic their heroes/the top dogs and what worked, it’s more common than you think. To Aquors, Muse are heroes to them and it’s natural they want to be like them.
If Aqours was set in a similar environment like Muse, I don’t think this show would’ve been as strong. The subtle differences in rural vs. urban society sold it for me personally.
Ever since episode 1, I’ve sort of felt that underlying tension of seeing these teenagers out in the sticks wanting to win Love Live. While it was played up as jokes, it was still seen as Chika’s character motivation. This naivety in behaviour, I understood and sort of forgave when they made mistakes that most people would question. They’re teenagers and I sort of saw them as unreliable narrators sometimes. When their educational standards are lower than the average and heavy nepotism because of being in the rural area, it would make sense why certain things happened.
The rural vs. urban difference is a huge issue in society. I think the show displays a realistic portrayal of its differences in the idol context quite well. Though the issue could clearly be explored more succinctly, but… they’re teenagers trying to save a school.
The adult supervision is very minimal and in comparison to SIP, the missing pieces are apparent. In SIP, A-RISE and Kotori’s mom are the voices of adult reasoning. For Sunshine, they just have themselves and so that’s why I’ve given it a pass.
The transition between 3D to 2D was seamless at times. It didn’t feel jarring to me like it did in SIP which was a plus. Also, the music was great and I really liked the camera work. They’ve really upped the performance scalability and how it looks in general.
I was convinced by a lot of their performances and were sold by what they delivered. Nothing felt out of the ordinary to me excusing Episode 12 & 13.
My main gripe with SIP Season 2 was where the quality of animation started to dip really fast by the end. With Sunshine, I was completely satisfied with how it looked from Episode 1 to the end. Sunrise did a great job of animating this production.
And that concludes my review of it, thanks for reading!
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