• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Chikorita157's Anime Blog

The thoughts, reviews and analysis of Comedy, Romance, Drama and Slice of Life Anime of a College Student

  • Home
  • About
    • Commenting Policy
    • Banners
  • Ask Me Anything
  • Blogroll
  • Reviews
  • Archives
  • Guides
    • List of Suggested Manga
  • Subscribe
    • RSS Feed
    • Feedburner
    • Comments Feed
    • Add to Feedly

Wake Up Girls – 7 Idols (Movie) Review – The Rebirth of Yamakan?

March 25, 2014 by chikorita157 3 Comments

Artist: sekina

Yamamoto Yutaka failed to Save Anime after a few years of being sacked from Kyoto Animation. While Fractle was an ambitious project, it failed to live up to the hype. As expected, this failure was a big blow to his ego mostly because he stated that if the show flopped, he would retire. Since then, we haven’t heard much from him until now.

In the fall of 2013, it seems that Yutaka couldn’t stand not directing any Anime, thus he unretired himself to make a new show. What type of show did he choose to make? That’s right, an idol themed one. With that, we will take a look of the prequel that premiered, Wake Up Girls, The Seven Idols prequel feature film that premiered on the same day the first episode aired. (Image Source)

The whole plot of this film involves a slumping talent agency called Green Leaves Entertainment years after an earthquake hit the Tohoku region back in 2011. After the last person quit the job, Junko, the president enlists Kohei Matsuda to recruit 7 girls to form an idol group and then make a debut. Despite some financial problems with the agency, Mayu, a former member of the I-1 club joined after witnessing the other 6 girls being upset over the group possibly being disbanded. With her help, the group was able to make their debut.

Compared to other idol shows like The Idolmaster, Love Live School Idol Project and AKB0048 where it views the more positive aspects of idols such as friendship and the cheerful songs, Wake Up Girls takes a slightly different approach. This show takes a more realistic approach by showing the dark side of the idol industry such as girls being forced to “graduate” aka being fired as they done something wrong such as going against the management or dating someone. Mayu of course is supposed to represent how each girl’s dream of becoming an idol ends in a few years. While the premise is interesting, I felt that the overall feeling of the film was rather bland besides the performance. This is probably not the case with the actual show, but it gives a bad impression.

On the other hand, I also thought that the girls look too similar. Besides a few characters like Mayu, which receives a good amount of character development, I felt that the other girls were brushed to the side. Of course, the singing is another issue for the fact that many of these voice actresses are new, thus don’t have enough experience. I believe that this will change as time goes on.

As a whole, while I had mixed feelings for the prequel, I still believe that the premise is interesting mostly because idol themed shows tend to be cheerful. Still, for those who are interested in this show, I highly suggest watching the prequel even if it’s not that interesting so that you will have some idea of some of the characters (especially Mayu) in the show.

Overall Rating: 7.2/10, Average, C-

Will he save Anime? Well, the Jury's out on that one.
Will Yamakan he save Anime this time? Well, the Jury’s out on that one.
 ¶

Advertisements

Share this:

  • Share on Tumblr
  • Tweet

Related

Filed Under: Reviews, Wake Up Girls
Tagged With: drama, final impressions, idol, movie, music

This post was handcrafted by…
chikorita157 - who has written 2,666 posts.

Author and Owner of Chikorita157's Anime Blog. If you want to learn more about me, see the "About chikorita157" page.

Liked our content?

Feel free to leave a comment, share the post on social media, or linking back to this post on your blog post. You can also support us on Ko-fi as well.

If you want to receive future posts in your WordPress.com reader, you can follow this blog by clicking the button below. Note that the Likes system is permanently disabled.

Follow Chikorita157’s Anime Blog on WordPress.com

Also follow us on Twitter for the latest blog updates and Anime/Manga/Video Games related tweets
Follow @chikorita157

Reader Interactions

No Comments… read them or add your own.

  1. Moonlitasteria says:
    March 26, 2014 at 6:59 pm • Magical Level: 34

    Not that familiar with Yamamoto’s directorial work, but the only one that I liked and remember well enough is Kannagi. Others that I have seen, didn’t like them too much…even Lucky Star. I do agree that the prequel movie is somewhat bland, but glad that it decided to get the groundwork out of the way in this fashion, rather than do it in the TV series. The movie could of did a whole lot more narrative wise than focus on getting Mayu on board, but was quite a nice bridge to the series. As previously stated, the TV series is actually going quite well and better than the movie (expect for a few critical points in my own opinion), but doubt it will be anything that “saves Anime”.

    Reply
    • chikorita157 says:
      March 29, 2014 at 7:17 pm • Magical Level: 2508

      I have mixed feelings towards his directing although I did enjoy Kannagi. Still, the blandness is expected mostly because this is basically serves as an introduction, but I agree that they could have done a bit more besides focusing a lot on the character that will have a lot of focus on Mayu since she has a dark past. Besides the complaints of the animation, I still think this movie is a okay bridge to the Anime and I will definitely check it out one of these days when it finishes airing.

      Reply

3 Trackbacks

  1. Wake Up, Girls! Review | Moonlitasteria

New Here? Review the Commenting Policy before adding a comment.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Previous Post: Weekly Anime Impressions – Winter 2014 – Week 11 – Sakura Trick, Nisekoi Episode 11 and Nagi-Asu Episode 23
Next Post: Chuunibyou demo Koi ga Shitai Ren – Episode 12 (END) – Making the Higher Lover’s Contract

Primary Sidebar

Categories

Archives

Current Season

  • Show by Rock!!
  • Uma Musume
  • Urasekai Picnic
  • Yuru Camp

Episodic Blogging Schedule

Monday – Urasekai Picnic

Tuesday – Umamusume 2

Thursday – Yuru Camp 2

Friday -Show by Rock!! Stars!!

Non-Episodic Content

  • Editorials
  • Japanese Self-Study Progress
  • Let’s Plays
  • Podcast
  • Project iM@S
  • Reviews

Subscribe to Blog via Wordpress Reader

To follow this blog via WordPress Reader, click the button below.

Follow Chikorita157’s Anime Blog on WordPress.com

Follow us on Twitter for the latest blog updates and Anime/Manga/Video Games related tweets
Follow @chikorita157

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Recent Posts

  • Show By Rock!! Stars!! – Episode 3 – Mashumairesh in Midi City
  • Yuru Camp 2 – Episode 3 – The Surprise Stay at Nadeshiko’s Grandmother’s House
  • Uma Musume Second Season – Episode 3 – A New Year, A New Rivary
  • Urasekai Picnic – Episode 3 – The Cold Truth Behind Sorawo’s Attraction To Toriko
  • Show By Rock!! Mashumairesh!! – Final Review

Recent Comments

  • chikorita157 on Yuru Camp 2 – Episode 3 – The Surprise Stay at Nadeshiko’s Grandmother’s House
  • Show By Rock!! Stars!! – Episode 3 - Mashumairesh in Midi City - Chikorita157's Anime Blog on Show By Rock!! Stars!! – Episode 2 – The Almost Kangaroo Court Trial
  • OG-Man on Uma Musume Second Season – Episode 3 – A New Year, A New Rivary
  • OG-Man on Yuru Camp 2 – Episode 3 – The Surprise Stay at Nadeshiko’s Grandmother’s House
  • Yuru Camp 2 – Episode 3 - The Surprise Stay at Nadeshiko's Grandmother's House - Chikorita157's Anime Blog on Yuru Camp 2 – Episode 2 – New Year’s Camping

Community

  • OG-Man
  • Karandi
  • ukrom
  • chikorita157
  • PocketMista
  • terranceacrow
  • Keni
  • Mallow
  • Hikari
  • boogeyman

Support Us

Advertisements

Footer

Follow me on Twitter

My Tweets
Advertisements
Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy

© 2009–2021 James M. All rights reserved.
All text on this page is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0.
This blog uses Genesis Framework and WPTouch Mobile Suite. Source Code
72 queries : 0.177s espeon

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Tumblr
  • Ko-fi
  • Youtube
  • Twitch
  • AniList
  • Kitsu
  • MyAnimeList
  • Privacy Policy