PGSM — Aino Minako’s Music Themes of Warmth, Life, and Smiles
As a huge music nerd, I’m a big fan of Aino Minako being an actual pop star in pgsm. This gives another means to analyze her character — her artist music.
One thing I liked tracking when watching the show was how her lyrics use light or warmth imagery to track what’s on her mind:
C’est La Vie — Deceptive Warmth
Many songs we see on Minako’s albums aren’t brought up in the series but are easter eggs or references on her album covers for her storylines. For this post though, I’m gonna look at the ones highlighted in the series and their lyrical contexts as one continuous story that aligns with Minako’s growth.
The first song we hear from her is her hit song, C’est La Vie. Everybody knows about the show’s whimsical pun, C’est La Vie being pronounced like Sailor V. But taking that even further, the lyric in context is also meant to be deceptive:
Atsui kimochi wa C’est la vie
(This warm feeling is C’est la vie)
Watashi ga watashi de iru kagiri
(As long as I am me)
C’est la vie anata wo aishitsuzuketai
(C’est la vie, I want to keep on being in love with you)
Me no mae ni aru kono shunkan ga ikiru basho
(Running through the place where this moment lives)
Kakenukete
(Right in front of me)
“C’est la Vie” is French for “That’s life.” or “Such is life.”
So all of the phrase’s uses could be replaced with life. The warm feeling Minako gets comes from living. This alludes to her mindset from before the series with her storyline of her impending death due to terminal illness.
However, the double entendre is the pun that makes it sound like Sailor V. So another interpretation is that the warm feeling is Sailor V, the warmth comes from being a Senshi and her mission.
This is the conflict within Minako’s mind: Aino Minako, the modern day pop singer who wants to live despite a shrinking future and Sailor Venus, the Senshi living in the past who only cares about the mission. As we meet her in the series, the deceptive Sailor V interpretation is winning the battle in her conscious. The entire song is telling her to live her life and be herself as she grasps onto life despite her impending death, but the change from “C’est La Vie” to “Sailor V” twists it.
Venus Over My Shoulder and Romance — Inner Turmoil Continues
The next songs we get to focus on in the series are Venus Over My Shoulder and Romance. The first is, of course, representing the Sailor Venus persona being Minako’s focus now — it’s the presence over her shoulder influencing her.
I bring this up briefly because Romance almost feels like it’s trying to oppose Venus’ influence. More than any other song in her discography, Romance is the most in your face about love and, well, romance. It talks about a growing, almost euphoric, love. It’s trying so hard to grasp onto Aino Minako’s original idea of love as if it’s trying to fight the appearance of love that comes from Sailor Venus and its love connotations. It’s overly loving and euphoric like Minako trying to pretend she isn’t sick or distracted by her Senshi mission.
Kiss!2 Bang!2 — Remembering True Warmth
At the end of Act 40, Minako is finally inspired to focus on the present for a bit and records Kiss!2 Bang!2.
We get the return of the warmth lyrical theme in this one and introduce a new theme about smiles:
Egao dake ja nai koi o
I want a romance not just about smiles.
Itami o koete mamori nuku no
I’ll overcome my pain and protect you.
Anata no koto omou to attakaku naru no (‘Cause anytime…)
Just thinking about you makes me feel warm. (‘Cause anytime…)
Sore dake o (Rainbow in my soul)
And that is what… (Rainbow in my soul)
Shinjiteru I’ll be here
…I put my faith in. I’ll be here
This chorus is a throughline connecting to both C’est La Vie and Romance. It starts by talking about Minako not wanting a Romance that’s just about smiles. Smiles can be deceitful. They can be an easy way to suggest happiness without making much effort or truly being happy. This feels like a response to the song Romance. Romance can be deeper and Minako truly wants something deeper than just the in-your-face love imagery she had in the song Romance. She also wants more than the idea of love imprinted by memories of the past life and the idea of Sailor Venus. This is how the warmth theme returns in the lyrics by saying “you” make Minako feel warm.
As a ReiNako shipper, I like the idea of “you” being Rei, especially given the context of Rei inspiring Minako to give her music career more focus and record this song.
But besides that, the way Minako uses warmth coming from another source unrelated to anything suggesting the past life is ultimately what the song is about. Aino Minako’s warmth, from within her own “soul”, is coming back after only caring about the Sailor Venus persona for so long. It also finishes with the line “I’ll be here”, alluding to her song I’m Here, which releases on her final album post Act 47.
Sayonara ~ Sweet Days — Gone, but Alive
Now we arrive at Act 47. With her death comes Minako’s final song, a goodbye letter to the Senshi in Sayonara ~ Sweet Days.
A key part of this song is a theme of smiling and crying. Throughout the song, Minako encourages the Senshi to smile instead of crying for her. In the first verse, it talks about Rei’s smile and how it encouraged Minako:
I don’t really have a particular reason, but
Somehow, I was able to be myself around you.
Why are you about to cry?
Sorry for always teasing you so much.
But you have no idea just how encouraged I was by your sure smile
If I had been able to smile innocently with you, we would have sweet days forever.
The lines about Minako “being able to be myself around you” and apologizing for “always teasing you so much.” Refer to Rei and their dynamic where Minako is more playful and true to herself around Rei.
For the second verse, the smiling and crying theme are about smiles and tears of joy as Minako recounts her memories with Usagi:
Your smile even got me to eat something I don’t like – whipped cream.
After all, our relationship was kind of unconventional.
But you know, our hearts will always be together.
If I ever get to see you again, I promise I’ll party with you more.
The view from the ferris wheel where we once sat
Makes tears softly swell in my eyes.
I leave this city without saying goodbye.
I cannot ever return to that time again.
The lines, “Your smile even got me to eat something I don’t like — whipped cream.” and “the view from the Ferris wheel where we once sat makes tears softly swell in my eyes.” Are callbacks to when Usagi and Minako first bonded on the Ferris wheel and ate strawberry shortcake.
The chorus focuses on two final things Minako wants to tell her friends. Using a sun analogy, she brings up the idea of reincarnation again. However, unlike before, she thinks about it in terms of who she is now. The past she brings up is not the past life of Sailor Venus — it is the life of a now gone Aino Minako, friend of the inner Senshi.
Just like how the Sun sometimes shows his face through the clouds,
I’m sure the day will come when we can relive the past
With a small bag on my back, I depart on a journey with no end.
I cannot ever return again.
Having reconciled the past life with her life now, Minako ends the song with a chorus as one last reminder to smile. However, this time, Minako speaks of a true smile that carries real feelings. A true smile that shows one is alive — Looping all the way back to C’est La Vie with a focus on life.
Sweet days
Just like how the Sun sometimes shows his face through the clouds,
I’m sure you’ll see me again and keep smiling, even if things get tough.
When you’re sad is the best time to smile.
Because it shows you are alive.
As Minako’s arc bookends with her remembering the importance of who she is now, she conveys this growth as her final message.
I still think the choices the live action made with Minako were strange, but I loved them all the same.
