In the dark grimness of the future, there is only work. If you live on one of the planets unfortunate enough to be under the Entertainment Ban, at least. But fear not, the courageous girls of AKB0048 will fight for your right to party…
What They Say:
At the start of the 21st century, an interplanetary war broke out. Earth’s ecosystem was severely damaged, and humanity was forced to flee the planet. On several planets of this new society, things that ‘disturb the heart’ like music and art are forbidden. That is, until AKB0048 is resurrected…
The Review:
Following the trainees’ successful debut concert, AKB0048’s manager, Tsubasa, makes a shocking announcement. She intends to revive the New Single General Elections – as well as the Centre Nova position, despite the history of the position’s previous holders. It gives the understudies a lot to think about – but a raid by DES forces that sees Ayako, Chieri and Sonata captured and brought before a show trial gives the girls more immediate problems to deal with…
Crunchyroll viewers have a hard time with this one. -next stage-, as the name suggests, follows directly on from the first season of AKB0048 – which Crunchyroll doesn’t have available (yet – I’m willing to bet they’ll appear soon). So a quick recap may be in order. Many worlds of our future universe are under the Entertainment Ban, aimed at making sure the workers of the future don’t have anything to take their minds of more serious things. But the pent-up demand for such things is always there, and it’s being met by idol supergroup AKB0048. Based on the world of Akibastar, where the Ban doesn’t apply, they take their songs to less fortunate worlds – often having to fight off the Ban-enforcing forces of the DES along the way, helped by their allies in WOTA.
Got all that? It’ll be a start. Even though jumping in to the world of AKB0048 as this point isn’t ideal, this episode gives a fairly good feel of what the series is about. With concerts, military raids, show trials, and the odd hint at the show’s underlying mysteries (hint: the return of the Center Nova position, and the glowing little creatures they call Kiraras, are both pretty significant things to keep an eye on), there’s a little bit of everything here, all wrapped up in the the exuberance that’s been typical of the show all along. If you’ve seen the first season, it’s a triumphant return and a sign that showrunner Shoji Kawamori isn’t planning on letting up any; for everyone else, it’s enough to say that if you enjoyed this episode, you’ll likely get a kick out of the rest of the series.
As far as real-world idols go, I have very little interest. Between the way they’re, well, idolised, the ways their popularity is milked and manipulated, and they way their fandom treats them, I find the whole scene frankly a little creepy. Put them in anime, though, and I seem to get far more of a kick out of the idea – you get to focus on the good (for the most part – season one had one episode in particular that carried as message that I really didn’t agree with) without the bad that goes with the scene. It becomes more of a feel-good experience.
In Summary:
With Love Live! focussing on the more down-to-earth side of things, AKB0048 can go for the more extreme and ludicrous end of the market – the idea is as silly as you can get, but the way it’s executed makes it simply fun to watch. Between this and Vividred Operation, winter Sundays have become a lot more fun.
Content Grade: A-
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
Review Equipment: 27” Apple iMac, 2.9GHz Core i5, 32GB RAM, Mac OS X 10.8.2