AKB0048 Review | Fighting the System Through Music

Hi guys and welcome to my place!

I know, I know… I told you that I would be reviewing Gantz today (sorry Raistlin)… The problem is, Gantz has 2 different seasons and I feel like the Anime is just starting at the end of the first season… I thought to make the review by only watching one season, but there are some comments that I have that can change depending on how they develop the story/characters until the end, so I will try to watch the second season this week (no promises though). This way, I went to my watched Anime box and picked one of the Animes that I wanted to review, being the chosen one AKB0048. So, without further ado let’s start!!!!

Now, although the general rate is not that great, I just loved this Anime… So much!

Story:

The story happens in a future where an interplanetary war broke out. Humanity was obliged to flee planet Earth and start over in other planets, however these planets are led by a totalitarian government. Things that “disturb the heart” like music and art are forbidden.

However, an all girls idol group called AKB48 is resurrected. Of course this group is seen as illegal by the government and this way they need to do their concerts in secret. They are able to communicate their concerts through TV in a certain channel at a certain hour (see it like what they did in Harry Potter when Voldemort was back). Their mission is clear, to bring music to their fans wherever they are, but, since they are seen as rebels by the goverment more than singing they also need to know how to fight to protect the area where the concerts are being held. Every time a concert is happening you will have 2 groups at the same time, some of them will be singing and the others will be fighting (and you will see both of them happening at the same time).

The story starts with a group of 4 friends who have seen one of the AKB48 concerts when they were children and since then they dream to be part of the group. This group is consisted by Nagisa, Chieri, Orine and Yuuke. Chieri ends up going back to her country/planet (can’t remember) but when they are older, AKB48 communicates that they are looking for new members and the other 3 decide to go together and take the tests (they end up finding Chieri there of course). The story follows them from taking the tests, their training and finally being a full fledge AKB48 member. Although you have many characters (It is an idol group) you easily understand the most important ones are Nagisa and Chieri.

I do love the story, although a little more hmmm… Girly perhaps, it is a good story. You have all the totalitarian society happening, you have action, music, happy moments, sad moments… I mean everything you could ask from a story.

Characters:

Well, it is a Japanese Idol group, so you will have plenty of characters and let’s not forget that you will have the ones on stage and others protecting the concert area at the same time, so the number of characters is gigantic.

However, most of them have screen time to the point of letting you making a judgement about them (liking them or not), so no character is left as bland. And, although having a ton of characters all of them have their own personality and their appearance are completely different from each other, so they are all recognizable, which for an Anime which Anime-Planet says that has 9 main characters is something to be proud of.

I’m not going to talk about each one of them, I only do it when there only a few characters… For AKB0048 I’ll just say that all the characters are lovable. You will have all type of “deres”, but since each one has their strong personality and reasons to be the way they are, even if the character is a little more harsh or mean you easy forgive them because you feel empathetic towards them.

Animation:

The animation is pretty good not going to lie! I love the characters’ design, which one has their own hair colour, eye colour and features to the point that you can easily recognize them (as I said before), but more of that they all seem pretty cute to me 😀

I also love the animation done when they are in a concert. Think of it, a concert being held in an airship in the middle of the mountains with a ton of fans dancing in the floor… They could go wrong with it pretty easily, but instead they did a great a job.

I would also say that the Anime is pretty colourful, more than the hair you have all the concert lights and the thingies that people use when they are in a concert in Japan (I don’t really know the name), which makes completely sense. I mean their mission is to bring a little colour to their fans’ dull lives.

Sound/Music:

I don’t know if you know this, but there is a real idol group called AKB0048, so if they ended up doing that you know that the music is good! I’m not gonna lie, I’m not really into japanese pop music nowadays, however their music is just SO good! It really made the difference, I would love the concerts’ episodes just because of the music. Even if nothing happened (which of course always happen) I would love to only watch their concert for the music. For the mobile users who can’t see videos you can hear one of my favourite musics here, and a performance from the real group here).

The voice acting is also really good. I didn’t even noticed once something to be off or strange. They were also careful with the voice acting to further differentiate the characters. Even having more than a dozen of girl characters you will be able to know who he is by only listening to their voice.

And that’s it guys!!! Hope you liked my review 🙂

I give AKB0048 5 idol members out of 5 awesome performances!

Have you already watched AKB0048? What do you think of it? If not, tell me if you are thinking on watching it! Comment down below 😀

See You Soon! 😀