Air Dates: February 6 to March 26, 2016 for eight episodes on Fuji-TV
Air Time: Saturdays at 11:40 pm, average rating was 2.73%
In this drama Next You is a struggling Idol group which has had so-so success to date. They have a single which I presume is "Next Is You" and that song hit #15 on the charts though their managers are a bit disappointed with that showing. The group's goal is to one day headline a show at Budokan, they have a long way to go before that goal can be attained. There are five members in the group, in this drama none of them use their real names and here are the starlets, their second screenshot gives a little info about the character. The "Next Is You" song was their single current single when the show aired and you hear it twice an episode.
Will use that above paragraph for all of the posts along with these pics for all of the main characters, for this second episode we didn't meet any new ones.
Akari Uemura as Aoi Dogakiuchi
Yuka Miyazaki as Rurika Tsurui
Sayuki Takagi as Mayu Adachi
Tomoko Kanazawa as Hana Sakamoto
Karin Miyamoto as Aiko Hidaka
These are the other main characters who have appeared in both episodes.
Seiji Rokkaku as 'Professor' Hakase, a fan of the group who often posts about them on the internet and attends all of their shows, also this show's narrator.
Keisuke Koide as Jun Natsume, the group's producer and songwriter.
Houka Kinoshita as Yoichi Nomura
Yuta Takahata as Haruki Maeda.... both of them are the group's managers though Nomura is the senior and seems to know everything about the Idol industry.
Ryo Yoshizawa as Daichi Mizushima, Aiko's best friend who lives upstairs from her.
Here's what the DVD cover looks like.
Most of this episode focuses on Aiko's scandal, it's not going to be as easy having it disappear like Aoi's. The show starts right off with it as pics of Aiko and Daichi have appeared in the same trashy tabloid, there were many more pics than the two for Aoi's scandal. All of the pics were taken by Eri, she's a classmate of Aiko and Daichi and is very jealous of their relationship. She did it out of spite but her plan backfired and it never was revealed she was the one who had taken the pics.
This time around the members were absolutely furious with Aiko, especially Rurika who will become the group's captain once Hana graduates. She really berated Aiko in front of the other members and their managers. The group's dream of performing at Budokan is about to happen, will this be the event that is going to smash their life long dream?
Least for now the show is still going to happen though there have been quite a few negative comments on the internet. Three other members are still mad at Aiko but Mayu seems to understand a bit and they did talk things out, Aiko really needed an ally at this point.
Their manager Nomura is thinking of not having Aoi and Aiko perform at the concert, they have recruited some second generation members who he thinks should replace the pair at the concert. Their producer Natsume sticks up for the pair, Next You are those five members and if they can't appear at the concert then it shouldn't take place.
That seems to satisfy Nomura and the show will go on but Aiko, like Aoi, needs to make a public apology via video. And the concert goes on but we never see any of the performance, perhaps because the group in real life still hasn't appeared there. However Juice has become much more popular and they will be performing their first Budokan concert in November.
The show and series comes close to ending there, just before their first ever concert at Budokan. The show takes a very fast forward, twelve years to be exact for the last few minutes. Next You is still an active Idol group and they're now on their 13th generation. It was revealed at that point that Aoi and Aiko didn't perform at Budokan with the rest of the group. Don't think it was their manager's decision, have a feeling the pair was missing living the life of a normal person and decided to quit the Idol life.
That's where the show ended, no idea what happened then at the concert or what the future held for the five members. Have mentioned this drama would have been a bit better had the episodes been about five minutes longer, this version aired on Fuji-TV. But there was a longer version that aired on SKY PerfcTV, the episodes were a few minutes longer but those shows were never subbed.
That's my only minor complaint, all in all really enjoyed the series and glad I got to know the group members a bit better as I really like their music but didn't know much about them. They have a new single coming out on October 28th, think that's perfect reason to start posting about the group.
Final grade will be an 8.5/10, no masterpiece but a really enjoyable show and much more serious then you would think. If you're a Juice or Hello Project fan then would recommend this show, if you're not a fan then perhaps this would be a nice introduction.
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