This blog was formerly used to house the Hypnosis Mic manga fan translation. This translation is no longer public access. This blog is now an archive for mixed fan content. Updates are sporadic. I take translation requests! See request guidelines here. Current request queue: 1. Torima Get on the Floor (<- in progress, stuck in overthinking hell) 2. Stella (<- also stuck in overthinking hell) 3. Star Wars ARB event (無極宇宙大戦) 4. Bomb-defusing (?) ARB event (シークレット・コードの行く先は～Yellow or Blue?～) 5. Hypmic Dream Rap Battle Pre-TDD Event + Event Cards (Back To the H Zero + relevant cards) 6. Hypmic Dream Rap Battle What a Joy to Tell Stories...Including False Ones! (temp title) Card Story【語るも楽し騙るも楽し】夢野幻太郎 7. Nobanashi by T-iD
We are removing the Hypmic manga from public viewing, effective immediately.
I have been asked to remove public access to the Hypmic manga, effective immediately. This was not ordered by King Records or any party directly affiliated with King Records. Please do not threaten, harass, or otherwise act inappropriately to King Records or those who work with them.
How can you read old chapters?
To discourage reposting, we have created a private archive to read old chapters. To access the archive, please join the following Discord: [Link was removed after the first 24 hours.]
This link will remain accessible for 24 hours. Afterwards, you may request access by privately messaging any of the Slugtranslation accounts. Anonymous asks are not private. Please do not ask for the link in an anonymous ask.
What will happen to the Tumblr blog?
The Tumblr blog is being restructured to archive asks, Twitter threads, and other miscellaneous Hypmic content going forward. This may take a couple of days; I have about 2000 posts to sort through and tag.
If you notice any translation notes, directories, or manga pages that were not removed, please contact me immediately.
What translation content will I produce now?
Manga summary threads will continue to be posted on Twitter. I may continue to translate miscellaneous content here and there. I will NOT translate all ARB content or other content wherein I could pose a significant financial risk to any potential English localizations.
The Twitter account may continue to post fan content. Likewise, the Tumblr account may continue to answer asks and post other fan content in a similar vein to what has been posted before. I am open to suggestions for types of content you would like to see.
Does this mean the manga/ARB/etc. is being localized in English?
That is not the reason we are removing public access. I do not have any information about a potential English localization at this time.
Do you know anyone who has translated or summarized the Today drama cd that came with the blu-ray of the movie?
I haven't seen a full translation yet.
I wrote a basic summary here, and Cyril (Twitter user @/quailsharks) wrote a more extensive summary here. Between the two of us, we should have covered just about everything.
feel free to ignore this if you don’t know the answer, but i’m curious as to why exactly the hypster magazine and the illustrations have to be so hush hush? i’m new-ish to the fandom and think i might’ve missed a memo
For context, this ask is in reference to this Tweet.
The Hypster fan magazine is an exclusive piece of paid content mailed out to subscribers of the official Hypster fan club. A significant "leak" of images from the magazine can be considered a copyright infringement or challenge to King Records' ability to do business, as someone who might have been interested in buying a Hypster subscription to see those images may change their mind if they can easily see them for free online.
That's a lot of "mights" and "maybes," and to be clear, I'm not saying that anyone at King Records will go hungry if a single photo of the magazine's cover goes up online.
However, Japanese copyright law and copyright enforcement culture are in some ways stricter than their US counterparts. Most IP holders--or, more importantly, the people who work for them--are well aware that all sorts of small-scale content sharing, piracy, and gray-area IP infringement (such as fan works depicting characters from IPs in non-family-friendly or brand-violating ways) actively occur, but so long as that's not in their face, they are happy to pretend that it isn't happening. Ruining the fan experience isn't good for business, and even beyond that, many people working for big IPs simply don't want to stifle fan enjoyment of the IP. However, if the copyright infringement ends up on the wrong person's desk--usually an executive's--there's no longer the plausible deniability of "Oops! We didn't know this was happening, so we didn't choose to enforce it." Unless an individual is hosting a full-fledged piracy site or some other large-scale action, IP owners tend to respond to small-scale piracy with community-wide restrictions. At this point, official restrictions may be placed on the sharing of images, much like the restrictions that once existed on posting ARB cards online, and the entire fandom's ability to engage with the series becomes more limited.
As an example from someone on the other side, I'm well aware that a fan community for a series I translate keeps a depository on Discord of every published English book and a smattering of raw files from the Japanese books. That's technically the intellectual property of the English and Japanese publishers, and I "should" tell the English publisher the Discord has thousands of people reading for free. But I'm no snitch. They keep it on the down low, and, officially, I don't know it exists. Now, if someone were to Tweet the Japanese author and reference that Discord depository... as someone once did... it's much more difficult for a person who works on the series (in this case, the author) to pretend they have no idea that people are pirating their work. The person who Tweeted the author was pressured into taking their Tweet down quickly enough that, to the best of my knowledge, no action was taken and the Discord still exists.
Hence the importance of the word "significant" in significant leak. There is no hard line in the sand, so what constitutes a significant leak is a matter of best judgement. Generally, anything that's private--which means it can't come up in search results--is considered fair game. Discord servers, DMs, and locked accounts are all considered private. In general, it's also not a fantastic idea to talk about private content sharing in public places, or at least not to the extent of Tweeting it directly at the author or IP holder. Posting small snippets, posting weeks/months after the content has been released, and posting to websites without an IP holder's presence are entering a gray area but are generally okay. For example, King Records surely knows I exist, but because I always posted on Tumblr weeks or months after chapters came out, they were always gracious enough to look the other way. Had I posted every single image from the JP chapter onto Twitter the day the magazines came out, I doubt I would have been afforded that same grace.
With the Twitter algorithm ignoring language barriers now more than ever, I would please caution everyone to be wary of posting images of paid content directly onto Twitter shortly after release. Tweets that receive lots of traction in the English fandom can and do show up on the feeds of the Japanese staff and executives, and it's only a matter of the wrong Tweet being seen by the wrong eyes for content-sharing restrictions to be placed on the whole fandom. Hence, I would ask for us all to please be careful with how we share paid elements of the series with each other.
hi slug, are you doing good? I'm sorry for the bother but right by the time the girls division album came out I became quite busy and wasn’t really able to keep up with the series, could you please give me a suggestion as to what order hear the drama tracks from that time foward? I know I probably should start with the one on verbal justice, but I'm not quite sure where to go after that
Anon, I feel you hard. I also fell off the map for a couple of years right around when you did. Glad to hear you're in a place where you can devote time to fun things again!
Assuming you finished the second DRB drama tracks, the order of the third DRB tracks is:
Mixed Up (no plot; assorted shenanigans)
No One Lives Forever (??? plot) <- this is the track from Verbal Justice
The Block Party (?????? plot and shenanigans)
3rd DRB first (? maybe only? Every other DRB has had two sets) of division-specific drama tracks: My Generation, Time for Heroes, Just Friend, Not for You, The Trio, Fools Gold, Stay Gold (plot and character growth; some divisions have more character growth than others)
Today (minimal plot; cozy vibes)
upcoming drama track on Trick or Repeat album (releasing in September)
hi slug!! not to get parasocial but i love your work so so much, thank you for everything you do🫶i had a bit of a quick, fun ask if you’re up for it! i was wondering if you had to assign the first DRB participants to each of the 12 main Olympian gods, who would you assign to which god and why? (I wanted to include BAT and DH but unfortunately there are only 12 main gods🥀)
Thank you for the kind words! I'd love to do a fun ask for a change, but while this may sound strange, I'm a little uncomfortable with, for lack of a better term, "fandomizing" another culture's mythos. I like ancient Greek mythology! The stories are beautiful and have made vast contributions to the English literary canon and English-speaking world's cultural norms. They aren't religious texts in the sense of the Bible or the Quran, but the figures within them were respected and worshiped for many centuries. I may not believe in the mythical figures themselves, but I believe in the weight of centuries of human care, if that makes sense. Having only a casual, non-academic background in the subject, I'd prefer to tread lightly when walking in someone else's garden, even if the gardeners have been gone for thousands of years.
Please tell me that I’m not the only one who thinks Chuoku’s outfits look boring an uncool. I know these are heavily inspired by their original outfits, but seriously? The boys are having like brand new clothes while the girls are getting a cheap upgrade of their default setting. KR nailed it with the boys and failed us by neglecting the need to give the girls the same effort and creativity as they did for their counterparts
You're referring to the 9th Anniversary Cafe designs, right?
Everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I personally like the Chuuouku designs better than the division designs. They showcase more personality--each character is dressed in something she would (or would like to) wear in canon--whereas many of the male outfits lack that degree of individuality (see Kuukou/Jirou/Hifumi and Gentarou/Juuto/Sasara, for example). I think the Chuuouku designs look more like the canon outfits because the entire set is vaguely militaristic/uniform, suit-focused formalwear, which uses the same design language as the canon Chuuouku clothes.
I don't have strong feelings either way, though. I don't usually care much about alternate outfits, but more power to the people who do.
hello slug!!! i was wondering if the chuohku ladies had signature/character colours like the other divisions do? i know that their group colour is pink, but do they have individual ones? e.g. FP’s group colour being yellow, ramuda being pink, gentaro purple, dice green. thank you!!
I'm genuinely not sure. I searched around on Twitter and looked at merch packaging/marketing on Mercari and Google, but I didn't find much of anything. I think the answer is no, or if they do exist, they're not used much because there still isn't a lot of Chuuouku merch/marketing.
I'm currently working on an interactive Hypmic project/event to be announced later this year. Unfortunately, it will only be on Discord, so it will continue to look like I'm inactive here for a few more months. I'm also not sure what the timeline will look like, as while I'm making good headway on it, my non-fandom life is a bit tumultuous at the moment...
When this project is complete, I will return to taking requests from the queue.
I'm very excited to share the project when it is complete, and I hope it will be a lot of fun for all international Hypmic fans! Please look forward to it, and thank you for your continued support.
I announced this on Discord yesterday, but I am unfortunately discontinuing this project. I'm afraid the IRL changes I alluded to in January were more tumultuous than expected, and I am not making sufficient progress. I am currently looking into alternatives, and I apologize to anyone who knows what this project was and was looking forward to it.
I will once again be working on requests or responding to longer asks, and I look forward to posting here again soon. It will take a few weeks--I'm afraid I'm temporarily working weekends and probably won't have a day off until August--but I am eager to finally get around to the items in the request queue. Thank you for your patience with me during this period of inactivity. (I say as I kept posting nonsense all this past year.)
hello slug!! w/ the recent division all stars song basically saying to resort to piracy if there’s no official release, i wanted to know your stance considering hypmic’s limited media available to fans overseas,,, do you think king records has actually recognized this issue or is it perhaps just “propaganda” to seem more relatable 🤔
Honestly, I don't read that line as an endorsement of piracy at all...
The context, for people who are confused (me lol), is a line in the official subs of the new song Diggin', a song that's about the search for identity being a non-linear process. The chorus has this bit in it:
たとえBoot盤 掴まされたとしても
We Just Diggin'
必ず掘り当てろ オリジナル正規盤
We Just Diggin'
Which is translated as:
Even if it means resorting to piracy
We just diggin'
Gotta dig up an official release eventually
We just diggin'
I like what I see in the rest of the subs--it's clear that this is the main translation team responsible for most of the official subs and the movie's subtitles--but I think the way they chose to write this line is a little misleading.
It's saying, "Even if we find a bootleg copy [at first], we have to keep on 'digging' until we get our hands on the official, original version." The stress is on the need to find that official version, a metaphor for a person's true identity. The song acknowledges that the search for one's identity is messy and multi-faceted ("What does it mean to be legitimate? What does it mean to be kind? What does it mean to be sincere? What does it mean to be true to yourself?" etc.)
I don't read the JP line with as much stress on the action of pirating as EN "resort to piracy" has. To me, it reads like someone physically searching for a copy of something, stumbling upon a bootleg version, and not being satisfied with it. Therefore, they keep searching for the original.
My assumption is that the sub team--who are, again, very, very good at what they do--simply didn't think their line would be interpreted this way. Writing authoritative subs for songs is devilishly difficult, as there's so little space. That this team does so and manages to include a rhyme scheme (which is why I think they chose "piracy" to rhyme with "eventually") is even more impressive.
An Open Letter to Anons Sending AI-Generated Messages
I have up to this point ignored that some anonymous messages I've received are obviously generated by AI. When these asks have provided an opportunity for good discussion, I have engaged with them in good faith, and I will likely continue to do so. However, I do not wish to publish AI-generated compliments or other "one-and-done" messages. I can't dictate how other individuals choose to use the technologies available to them, but I reserve the right to not host an excess of AI-generated content on my blog. I must ask for your understanding.
A certain anonymous individual wished to pass along a complimentary message to another Tumblr user and was concerned that it might not have arrived. To this individual, thank you for your concern, and please rest assured that the message was passed along privately.
I do not wish to chastise you, but I must admit that I was saddened when I received the accompanying complimentary message for me. I would very much have liked to hear your thoughts in your own words. It is difficult to feel gratified by nice, pretty words generated by a machine designed to generate nice, pretty words. I often describe compliments as "kind words," but a machine does not move with kindness. It is impossible to view the kindness behind the screen for the machine in the way.
I wish I could have experienced your human kindness.
You may not have felt comfortable expressing yourself in your own words. Perhaps there was a language barrier or a disability, or perhaps you simply felt that your words would be too halting and incomplete to express your ideas.
I do not think that it is a sin for words to be imperfect conduits of ideas. There is a charm to imperfection that makes communication a rich, fulfilling act. Over the years, I have received many kind messages in clumsy packages, and the imperfect delivery only exacerbates the kindness. It is exceptionally sweet when someone makes the effort to write in a language they are not fluent in, work around a disability, or simply push themselves out of their comfort zone. I cherish every genuine expression of kindness that I have received in this fashion.
I am writing this to you because I enjoyed speaking to you through the filter of the machine, and I am sad that I never got to read your words. You, too, have a lovely voice, even if you do not choose to use it for reasons that are unknown to me. I hope someday to hear it.
Let’s be honest here. What would Chuoku suffer from their crimes after they were actually given a chance to pay for what they have done throughout the franchise?
I mean... I'm not sure I see the point to such a discussion.
In the interest of not writing a fix-it fic over Tumblr asks (not that there's anything wrong with fix-it fics; I just rarely have interest in making them), I want to be careful about conflating the concept of "consequences" with the concept of "punishment."
Opinions on IRL justice aside (where I take a dim view on punishment anyway), I don't see a need to hold a fictional character accountable for fictional acts unless that accountability--or lack thereof--drives some element of the narrative: plot, characterization, themes, etc. The characters are narrative devices that interact with one another to tell the story. They do not need to treat each other well, as real people should, but the way they treat each other--positively or negatively--should have positive or negative repercussions. Otherwise, the actions float in a vacuum, disconnected from anything, and might as well not exist at all.
So when I say I'm frustrated that Ichijiku sentences clones to death one minute and is labeled "basically their mom" the next, I'm not frustrated that she callously disregards their personhood--a tragedy IRL, but they're not real or representative of a real life population--but that her callous disregard of personhood does not contribute to her plot, characterization, or themes. It simply vanishes. I don't need fictional character Ichijiku to go to jail for fictional crimes, but I would have liked to see her disregard for their humanity to drive conflict.
I like how 17-y.o.-Ichirou's dedication to financially providing for his little brothers leads to him neglecting them emotionally, which has the consequence of driving Jirou and Saburou away. Ichirou must put in effort to reconnect with them and, in doing so, grow as a person in accordance w/ his main conflicts and themes (hyperindependence/the need to be the provider and the MC BB hero image). I like how Ramuda chooses not to brainwash Jakurai at the end of the 1st DRB, which has the consequence of the Party of Words abandoning him, setting in motion all the events of the Fling Posse 2nd DRB arc and Ramuda's major character arc. I don't like how Jakurai agrees to help the Party of Words after much internal angst before promptly leaving, because the decision to help the Party of Words tells us nothing new about Jakurai (we already know he cares deeply about morality but will bend his personal ethics for those he cares about) and does nothing for the plot or themes. That's the distinction I'm trying to draw between actions with consequences and actions without consequences, and many of Chuuouku's fall into the latter camp.
Finally, apart from Hypmic's general reluctance to give characters consequences, I don't think the writers wish to punish Chuuouku because that would be inconsistent with Hypmic's overall theme of forgiveness and finding ways to get along across demographic lines. If we're talking reparations, the previous government and society at large is responsible for a hell of a lot of harm to women and should be getting in on that too, but that's not likely to happen either. It would be outside of the scope of a silly music project that says very little about concrete political solutions, and so too would be putting the Party of Words on trial and holding them accountable legally.
i've been a bit confused about this because since we left off yotsutsuji is apparently awake now, but do we know how he woke up?
I assumed the True Hypnosis Mic which, having been perfected, no longer kills its user. But at the end of Not For You, Jakurai says he'd rather use medicine than the Mic to wake up Yotsutsuji, so... Maybe his super doctor powers? The Today drama track doesn't say either way, so I'm afraid I don't know for certain.
THIS IS NOT AN ORIGINAL POST. Twitter user lily_hpmy recently combed the entire series--we're talking song lyrics, drama tracks, the anime, the movie, the manga, the live shows, the Spotify radio podcasts, the stageplays, and both video games--to discover the two things Hitoya can't stand. Sorry, did I say two? Make that one hundred forty-seven.
This is that list translated into English for ease of reading. All credit for the massive amount of work involved goes to lily_hpmy, who posts quite a lot of other funny Hypmic content. Please give them a follow! Also, please do not use this post as a jumping off point to harass them or overwhelm them with complex English-language comments. I do not know if they would be comfortable with a random surge of attention from non-Japanese accounts.
The author of this list categorized the list by subject matter (food and drinks, people, places, and miscellaneous) and expression used (can't stand, dislikes, rubs the wrong way, is inexcusable). Because I can't make a table on Tumblr, I've collapsed this into four lists ordered by expression used.
Items that appear more than once are bolded. Occasionally, Hitoya uses different wording to refer to the same thing. When the meanings are functionally identical, list items may appear to be featured twice. Other duplicate items contain footnotes if a meaningful (or just amusing) distinction exists.
I'm writing everything in fairly clinical tones, but Hitoya sounds annoyed as all get-out a good 50% of the time. Determining when to mentally insert the word "fucking" is an exercise left to the reader.
The 81 things Hitoya can't stand:
Bad coffee
Watery coffee
Over-extracted coffee
Mornings without coffee
Nattou without Japanese mustard
Fruit in salads
Pineapple in sweet-and-sour pork (repeated 3 times)
Pineapple on pizza
Strawberries in shortcake
Bad osechi
Ice cubes made from tap water
Drinking cheap sake
Warm beer
People who water down champagne
People who put soy sauce on sushi rice
Pickled plums in mackerel stewed in miso paste [1]
People who don't listen [2]
Procrastinators
People who run their mouths saying nonsense
People who say good luck without meaning it
Students who don't listen to his lectures (from a school AU event)
People who look down on him
People who bother him
Dumbasses who bother him at work
People who litter
Bartenders who make a show of pouring whiskey
People who don't wear socks
Adults who squabble like kids
People who can't read the room
Audience members who don't cheer loud enough [3]
Dumbasses who fall for scams
MCs who run away
People who diss his Nagoya fam
Dumb kids who charge in headfirst without thinking
People who talk too loud at coffee shops
People who make too big of a commotion in coffee shops
People who just stand there without ordering anything in coffee shops
Openly opinionated people [4]
Monks (or a monk, presumably) who make fun of his hair style
People who don't put the TV remote back in its designated spot
People who flaunt their wealth
People who wear cheap, bad perfume or cologne
People who ignore the local rules and customs
People who swear sneakers with suits
People who can't mind their own business
People who use their pets as their phone background
Hitoya when he lacks the vocabulary to properly compliment a client on their beauty (from a host club event)
Hitoya when he is rendered helpless by a client's beauty (from a host club event)
People who do whatever the heck they want with someone else's body (from a body swap event)
People who pull faces or do pranks right as the picture is taken
People who poke their noses into every room in someone else's house
People who camp out in his office uninvited
A pair of dumbassess who barge into his office for the purpose of feeding him nonsense
A certain young, red-haired hooligan
A certain monk-in-training who insists upon calling Hitoya up and having him come over for no stated reason
A certain red-haired monk-in-training who pretends to be busy when he's actually not busy at all
Bars that play classical music
Places with way too many people packed into them
Concerts that play bad music
Lukewarm baths
Losing
Losing at the DRB
Losing
People licking each other's wounds
Being forced to do anything
Being told what to do
Other people writing a script for him [5]
When Jakurai looks down on him
When Jakurai shows him up
Women crying
Reckless behavior
Stewing over conversations that are over and done with
The kind of clothes worn by posers in rock-and-roll subculture
The smell of asphalt on rainy days
Annoying New Year's celebrations [6]
Body swapping (from a body swap event)
Not giving something his 100%
Photos where he's blinking
Staffs that look cool but have bad stats (from a video game AU event)
Monsters that get cocky (from a video game AU event)
The 58 things Hitoya dislikes:
Room temperature rum
Green bananas
Soggy, untoasted baguettes
Lemon water
Bean sprouts
Dry sashimi
People who don't listen
People who do whatever they want despite how it might affect others
A certain perceptive brat [7]
Dumb kids
Impudent kids
People who overestimate their abilities
People who bother him at work
A certain dour-looking office worker
Men who physically abuse women
Cheating, cowardly SOBs who sneak up behind someone and attack them
People who make money the easy way
People who buy band T-shirts without knowing the band
People who walk into restaurants that don't display their prices just to see how much things cost
Obnoxiously excited tourists
People who lack manners and butt into other people's conversations
Low-ability chumps who band together
Certain obnoxiously excited dumbasses
People who don't care enough about anything
Two-faced people
People with the audacity to openly take other people's stuff
Seeing a certain monk give up
A certain obnoxious monk-in-training on April Fool's Day
A certain disagreeable doctor
Drunk Jakurai
Crowded, hard-to-walk-in bars
Restaurants that don't display their prices
Romance novels
Trashy necktie pins
Trashy suits
Outstanding documents
Lack of self-reliance
Damp cigarettes
Failure to properly consider a man's resolve
Jobs that don't pay well
Trials that don't pay well
Defending a terrible person in trial
Bullying
Bullying the weak
Being looked after
Low energy concerts
When fun experiences are over
Trashy neon signage
Taking photos of people doing lame poses
Wasting time
Bullshit
Self-serving bullshit
Cosplay
Being forced to undergo ascetic training on his day off
Trains
Buses
The 4 things that rub Hitoya the wrong way:
Dumbasses who don't listen
People who ask dumb questions
People who think it's funny to ask dumb questions
People who jump to conclusions
The 4 things that are inexcusable to Hitoya:
Warm beer
Cocky chumps
Assholes who can't recognize when they've done wrong
Dumbasses who go wild and trash the beach at night
[1] A common dish. Hitoya isn't being ridiculously specific, as the length of this line in translation might suggest.
[2] A more annoyed sounding version of the "people who don't listen" in the "dislike" list. Presumably, this one is directed at Kuukou.
[3] Said at a live show.
[4] Said with zero shred of self-awareness.
[5] Said during a Spotify radio podcast. I would assume, although I've not checked, he doesn't want to read a piece of scripted content on air and would rather speak for himself.
[6] This line is light on context, but as New Year's is Japan's largest holiday and celebrated with family, I assume he's referring to the annoying aspects of large family gatherings. Think "obnoxious Thanksgiving dinner" for a US analogy.
[7] From Harmonious Cooperation when Hitoya is upset that Kuukou noticed him being out of sorts.
Thank you to you and anon for the interesting reads on Chuohku! I had some probably tangential story thoughts to add, since I think Nayuta in particular is a really interesting addition to the cast of characters, even with the very limited information we have about her (I'm not actually sure if they ever explicitly say what happened to her, but at least in No One Lives Forever, Otome and Rei's conversation implies she's alive but comatose).
Hypmic's small female cast in the drama track storyline (not personally familiar with Hypstage though I know they have additional characters there) means that Nayuta's kind of an outlier for being so heavily involved in the creation of the mics and predating the Party of Words, and she's presented as Rei's equal-footing research partner and someone he genuinely cares about rather than someone he's stringing along. In the one scene we get of her speaking in her own words in The Trio, she also knows full well that in trying to negate any need for weaponry, the mics could easily just become weapons on their own; she basically foresees the whole tension of the mics' existence, which highlights the tragedy that (a) she has no control over the current situation and (b) her family is so deeply entangled in it.
There's also something narratively striking about how the comatose body of the co-creator of the Hypnosis Mics ended up being used as a bargaining chip between Otome and Rei, two characters who maybe initially genuinely did share her ultimate ideal of a world where words are more powerful than weapons, but fell into the exact pitfall she foresaw in their struggles for total power and control. I would have liked it if they ruminated more on that moment.
I think Nayuta's appearances, as limited as they are, highlight that the theme of hypocrisy is really compelling through Hypmic's overarching story and could have used more fleshing out, with just one example being to add depth to Chuohku. They claim to uphold the same principles as a woman they treated as a bargaining chip and threatened to kill, while engaging in the exact kind of violence she wanted to avoid. It ties into other instances of their actions hurting people in the name of their ideals, which just doesn't really feel like it's explored very deeply. I totally agree that the story just feels unwilling to dwell on anybody facing consequences for their actions, which is all over the place but feels especially egregious with Chuohku's particular position as the architects of the entire DRB premise.
I'd also just generally like more information on Nayuta; it'd be nice to hear more perspectives from women who aren't tied to the Party of Words. Like, come on! She's the co-inventor of the literal plot devices! Tell us more!
Cutting myself off here before this gets any longer; sorry if this was kind of meandering!
Not at all! These are excellent points. Thank you for contributing to the discussion!
That was an incredible read! Thank you so much for such an incredible, eye-opening response! Your breakdown of the real-world Japanese hip-hop industry and the "female rapper" trap completely recontextualized Chuuouku's music for me. It makes perfect sense that Hypnosis Mic inherited those structural flaws directly from the actual music scene it’s trying to mirror. I also completely appreciate your translation lens of "intent vs. execution," and your point about the project being "better than it needs to be" really changed how I view it. It's heartwarming to hear that despite the clumsy writing, it has genuinely inspired real-world women to stand up for themselves.
I completely agree with your macro-analysis, but I wanted to loop back to one specific thing you mentioned about Otome, just to dig a bit deeper into that character writing.
You noted that Otome has realistic weaknesses and psychological issues, even if they don't translate well into her actions. I would absolutely love for you to elaborate on that! Because her flaws are so poorly translated on screen, I feel like we never truly get to see her deeper insecurities.
To me, a character's plot weakness and their internal insecurity are two entirely different things. Perhaps her structural weaknesses as a leader are evident, but her personal vulnerabilities feel completely shielded from the audience. Because those internal insecurities were never shown, I still find it incredibly difficult to empathize with her or the rest of the Chuuouku members. Ichijiku is really the only one whose insecurities were given any authentic depth, and we briefly caught a glimpse of Nemu's inner conflicts in the manga, but Otome remains a total fortress.
Since you look at this through the lens of the author's intent, what do you see as her realistic weaknesses and psychological issues? I’d love to hear your take on what the writers intended to show with her, even if the execution fell flat!
Sure, I'd be glad to talk about this. Thanks again for having this conversation with me!
This isn't an exhaustive list, but here's what I'd consider her major personal conflicts that make her an empathetic main character (which may not be perfectly synonymous with her weaknesses or psychological issues; rather, these are conflicts the narrative wants her to grapple with and/or overcome):
Per The Wind Comes First to the House Before the Storm (as an aside, it's a little odd that such a crucial part of Otome's character is basically supplementary material, as this was a sales bonus for a guidebook. Hypmic rarely releases much of substance in sales bonus drama tracks, instead focusing on goofy or heartwarming slice-of-life moments--fan service, basically. However, looking at the release date (Sept. 2020), this drama track predates Chuuouku being marketed as a group; their first song, Femme Fatale, wouldn't come out until over a year later (Nov. 2021). It feels like Otome and Ichijiku were still intended to be side characters, making these drama tracks more "fun backstory" than "core plot content," until Hypmic was like "Wait, we kinda cooked there" and pivoted the Chuuouku characters into a marketable unit of main characters.), Otome chafes under the expectations for Japanese women of her and her mother's generation. She refuses to accept that women act merely as accessories to men or should continue to suffer abuses--both personal and societal--at the hands of men. She does not believe that women should be disenfranchised in politics and society, and she makes it her life's mission to change this. I call this an empathetic conflict because her frustrations are reflective of reality. Women are disenfranchised in Japanese (and global) politics, and the struggles Otome faces with her parents and spouse (her father's open and demeaning misogyny, her mother only valuing her as a wife and upper-class "lady" (see the insistence on training Otome to recognize niche varieties of tea by taste, essentially a party trick with little value other than impressing upon a visitor the classiness of the individual), her father dismissing her opinions and ability to participate in political discourse, her mother's reluctance to engage in political discourse or share original thoughts on the basis of it not being "women's business," her inability to choose her own spouse, her inability to choose her own place of living (as she is found and brought home against her will every time she leaves her father's house), her mother's insistence on "throwing away all [Otome's] dignity" by "[enduring] any [and all] pain, fear, shame, and humiliation," and her spouse's physical and verbal abuse) are all real and realistic struggles of Japanese women in Otome's generation and--to a lesser degree--Japanese women today.
Similarly, I consider her inability to condone physical violence and injustice (to the point that she wraps back around to committing violence and injustice) an empathetic struggle as, again, her concerns are founded in real-life issues. It is a travesty that money and power inform society far more than ethics, and it is unacceptable that war takes precedence over dialogue. She's not wrong when she says that Japanese tax reform of the 2010s (and beyond) is more about lining pockets of wealthy and powerful interests than improving the lives of the average Japanese citizen, and as the recent lifting of restrictions on selling lethal weapons overseas under the Takeichi government has proved, she's really not wrong that the Japanese weapon laws are "incredibly loose"! (Although even that's a continuation of a long-running trend, and Hypmic is probably speaking directly to the 2015 amendment of the constitution under the Abe government that enabled the SDF--essentially, Japan's military--to be deployed in assistance of allied nations, effectively allowing the SDF to go wherever a politician can spin "defense of an allied nation" into. (This is an oversimplification, and I am not bothering to hide my political bias. Please go read more on your own time if interested.)) Nor is she wrong to say that Japan "purchases weaponry only because other countries tell us to do so," wherein "other countries" is understood to be the US and "they tell us to do so" is understood to be the US's unspoken threat of revoking its gargantuan volume of financial investment and military assets should Japan fail to buy US weapons. The conclusion she comes to (if I put women in power, that will fix everything) is wrong, but her ability to identify issues in Japanese and global society is accurate and reflective of mainstream, majority Japanese political opinion of a certain generation. (For a whole host of reasons, including everything from WWII's devastation on Japan's civilian population and post-WWII educational propaganda to the work of leftist and progressive moments in the 50s and 60s, Japan has had a sizable political pacifist presence throughout the late 20th century and into the 21st. With generational shift and growing right-wing influence, the needle seems to be swinging back the other way. But assuming Otome is meant to be around 50 in the late 2010s, it makes sense that she would be a political pacifist and comment on the political and gender climate of the 1980s and 1990s in Japan.)
Much of Otome's life is characterized by a lack of autonomy. She escapes her father's controlling household only by marrying Mikado, a partner she did not have the liberty of choosing herself. The political party she leads is founded only with the assistance of her father, and when Mikado faces stressful pressure from Otome's father, he takes the stress out on Otome, trapping her in an abusive marriage. Rei offers her the tools to escape this marriage and parental control, but it's little wonder why Otome remains wary of Rei for the remainder of the series--in her own words, "I became a puppet in his hands." Rei often acts as a tempter in the series, providing people exactly what they want if they further his ambitions, and Otome is aware of this even while she can't resist the bait. Having lived most of her life under the thumb of one man or another, it's not surprising that she leaps on any opportunity to gain autonomy and literally shut men out of her life. Again, she reaches the wrong conclusion from a problem both realistic and tragic in its near inevitability. We know that Otome shouldn't go along with Rei (or along with her own worst impulses) but know just as strongly that, because of how she's written, she can't possibly resist.
Otome possesses a strong sense of justice and struggles to accept other people's immoral actions, even when she directly benefits from them. However, she struggles to extend that same discernment to her own actions, and it isn't until the Stay Gold drama track that Otome's sense of justice forces her to consider that there are other disenfranchised voices that need to be listened to, not just her own.
Otome cares deeply for Dice but is conflicted about openly displaying her affection for him, ostensibly due to concerns about his safety (The Wind...the Storm). She disguises her care for him in front of Rei (TDD 9 and TDD 11) or to Dice's face (FP/M+ 15). However, she keeps a photograph of him in her desk (TDD 11) and seems to be proud of her son/relieved to see him making something of himself (the sigh after Dice leaves her office and the "I hope...that you do" when he tells her "We'll prove that there is a way to save Ramuda" in FP/M+ 15). Only in the Today drama track can she openly admit that she cares for her son and wants to be a part of his life--albeit in the same controlling fashion that her parents controlled her. Otome and her need to be in control of a situation can't change overnight, it seems.
If Otome is a fortress, it's because she walls herself off to the reader as well. I don't think she's inscrutable, though. She reads to me like a character driven by her own inertia, and slowing down to examine what she's doing, even to herself, would cause her to crash and burn.
