The marketing team for Oshi no Ko have to be in on the joke right?
Right?!?!
Part of me understands that the insane premise is required in order to narratively justify an adult's perspective on just how exploitative and gross the entertainment industry is from the ground level... the other part is still going "WTF who wrote this and how can I get a restraining order".
(Written by the guy who did Kaguya-sama, of all people.)
I feel like it holds a mirror up to the internet.
On the one hand it criticises otaku and the culture they support and love, as well as the behaviours it manifests. It openly criticises their attitudes and the extremely gross behaviour that they engage in while demanding perfect pretty fake idols.
On the other hand it openly panders to every single gross Otaku shock-factor thing you can think of. And it makes the grotesque a central point of its entertainment in the very first episode,
spoiler
focusing in and prolonging the death scene in a disturbing and highly uncomfortable way.
Then it criticises the internet for enjoying that, for encouraging it, for being a bunch of disgusting otaku.
As you would expect, the internet has completely ignored that and instead celebrates it for its "removed" (word beginning with D).
This has been the standard approach for self-reflective industry and audience criticism in the anime scene since Evangelion and it simply does not work. Otaku still argue over Asuka/Rei without irony. They take these things, praise it as masterful deconstruction, then integrate it into industry standard regular content without commentary.
A lot has been said about how satire doesn't really work but it super extra doesn't work on otakus.
"Capital has the ability to subsume all critiques into itself. Even those who would *critique * capital end up *reinforcing * it instead..."
A lot has been said about how satire doesn’t really work but it super extra doesn’t work on otakus.
:10000-com:
Otaku culture has been built around lionising removed, using that exact d word. They revel in it. They are self aware and have created a culture of being ok with it. This also somehow captures completely normal people and brings them into it because "memes". With no pushback at all.
Satire kind of requires the target to have a sense of shame, or at least an idea that they could be doing better in order for it to actually do anything I think.
Yeah, I get ya, that Game of Thrones shock factor. I think that might be an unfortunate side effect of the medium though, I'm not sure how else they could have done that scene filmic-ly, and skipping past/flash-forwarding might not work for the story either. But you're right, maybe the show was trying to have it's cake and eat it too.
Also, like, internet nerds not being media literate isn't exactly news sadly. :deeper-sadness:
(I'll be honest, the only D word I can think of is Deconstruction, which probably says too much about me lol)
I think in this case it's more from a misplaced sense of directorial priorities... like the show is really messy and definitely has problematic elements, but it doesn't come across as insincere in its criticism of idol culture/the entertainment industry. I get the feeling it was "how do I make this death scene as impactful, dramatic and narratively satisfying as possible?" rather than "let's feed the hogs the suffering porn they crave", but when the subject is the murder of a young woman... well, yeah, idk what the right way to portray that on film is. (And, well, fucking internet weirdos will read the former as the latter because art doesn't mean anything to them unless they can jack off to it. Fuck. Otaku delenda est.)
but when the subject is the murder of a young woman… well, yeah, idk what the right way to portray that on film is
Cutaway. Don't show the wound. Don't spray blood everywhere. Don't specifically focus on coughing up blood.
Cutaway shot of the attacker making the blow. Reaction shot of the witness. Then do death scene without a focus on the injury itself. You can probably get away with having the light fade from their eyes without it being grotesque because of everything else, which is a shot that honestly works well with the sparkle eyes utilised in the art style to signify the aura she gives off. That shot has a reason to exist. The others don't other than to make porn out of suffering.
I dare to suggest, from my position of not having watched it, that it may be possible that both goals were intended, and both were met. The entire point of the product was profit, or else it wouldn’t have been made, after all.
Yeah, that's entirely fair. :deeper-sadness:
I dare to suggest, from my position of not having watched it, that it may be possible that both goals were intended, and both were met. The entire point of the product was profit, or else it wouldn’t have been made, after all.
This is precisely what I think.
Disclaimer: I haven’t actually seen it and I have no intention to see it because it certainly sounds like an otaku focused (criticism supposedly, but also pandering for profit, sounds like) version of the kind of entertainment I already dislike and have been saturated with in previous years against my will because it was sort of impossible to exist in public and participate in conversations without hearing about the latest on Gambo or the like.
It's mostly a show about the two kids working in entertainment and being actors on reality shows, singers, etc. Then later on a mystery progresses.
spoiler
There aren't any violent shocks like what is in the first episode. It critiques otaku culture and the entertainment industry by showing the characters navigate those things (online harassment, paparazzi, having to maintain a certain public image, etc). Not a violent shock factor program like Gambo
More spoilers
Like for example the manga does not have a part with Ruby being taken advantage of by a man in the industry. She goes to someones house to talk and is photographed on the way out so the narrative arc is trying to prevent that story from being published. But here it comments on the state of the entertainment industry and what happens to young women without making us watch Ruby go through that
On the one hand it criticises otaku and the culture they support and love, as well as the behaviours it manifests. It openly criticises their attitudes and the extremely gross behaviour that they engage in while demanding perfect pretty fake idols.
On the other hand it openly panders to every single gross Otaku shock-factor thing you can think of. And it makes the grotesque a central point of its entertainment in the very first episode
Then it criticises the internet for enjoying that, for encouraging it, for being a bunch of disgusting otaku.
Evangelion 2 let's go
I don't know if it will keep up that criticism but it was clearly there at the end of the first 90minute ep I watched. I'm really not sure if I want to continue it though it made me super uncomfortable and the fact it is now #1 on every review site is vomit.
NGL, I kinda want that dishwasher now
Edit: to clarify, I have no idea who this character is and I just think a dishwasher the size of a microwave is neat
This is the only exposure to Vtubers I have and I’m ok with that.
