Girlish Number has begun, and it’s pretty much exactly what you’d expect from Wataru Watari versus the industry. The characters and dialogue in this one are already terrific, and I was happy to see those strengths matched with some great expression work all throughout. Hopefully this one keeps it together!

You can check out my full review over at ANN, or my notes below.

“Crap, she took my comment”

We’re already beyond the facade in the first minute

Of course, shows like this run the very real threat of devolving into pointless, empty cynicism. Blind cynicism isn’t any more meaningful than blind optimism – in fact, it’s worse, because optimism can actually accomplish many things. If you rely entirely on cynicism, you become both filled with a false sense of superiority and blind to anything of value

The comments by the lead actresses are pleasant-sounding bullshit. Utterly useless, but the happy comments you expect to get. In fact, having read and watched a lot of these sorts of features, I’ve come to expect exactly that level of response

Talking about how doing events and songs is part of the actor business these days – in fact, self-promotion is necessary in all sorts of ways

Wondering if you can get out of going to cast parties

So many shots of her unimpressed expressions

Gojo is her brother, I guess Chitose is her name

Background dialogue about making sure the sponsors are happy

Talking about all the different producers

He works in audio production, she’s a vocal actress

“What the heck is a voice actor, anyway?

Her only line is “What? No way!”

“No, light novel.” omg her face

“You don’t even make enough to have to pay for taxes”

Their bickering is good

The other girl’s a diva

“Wow, this brat is snooty as hell”

Chitose Karasuma

Chitose just gets the part because she was at a random party, and the music producer happened to like her

Parts of this are more farcical, others are more grounded