The Ghosts in IDOLiSH7 are a Literary Device, Mostly
(an essay by me)
People are always asking me, "Robin, what the fuck is up with those ghosts in IDOLiSH7? How come this otherwise completely non-supernatural universe randomly has these two ghosts that show up and then never get acknowledged again? Is it just canon that ghosts exist and only Riku and Momo can see them?" and I am always telling them that I have an analysis about this I just haven't written it yet. But that ends today, as do all of these very pressing concerns about the i7 Ghosts™, because here I am, finally writing the analysis. This essay will have two sections, the first on the training camp ghost from part 3/third beat, and the second on the Re:vale house ghost from Yuki's third chapter of Re:member. So, spoilers for all of part 3/third beat in both sections, Re:member in section 2, and there's one extremely minor spoiler for part 4 in section 1 but it's honestly so predictable I don't think it even counts. Also, I'll reiterate this once we get to it, but just a warning that section 2 will contain discussions of depression, suicide and suicidal ideation, and a brief mention of self-harm, so please stop reading after section 1 if you don't want to see any of that! Another less important disclaimer about section 2 is that I am going to spend an entirely unecessary amount of time talking about Yuki. I am normal about Yuki. Okay. Without further ado, let's watch my spiral into ghost analogy insanity unfold!
Game translations: @seigyokus Re:member translations: @ takara_time (+ scans and editing by @ waitamomoment) Rabbit chat translations: @osakaso5
Section 1: The Training Camp Ghost
This first point applies to both ghosts, but I wanna start by noting that I think superstitions and beliefs like this are more common in Japan than a lot of other places, so yeah it is entirely possible that ghosts are just a canon and accepted thing in Idolish7's universe and this isn't really that strange of a detail for the series to include. However, I don't have any real background knowledge about if ghosts are normal in non-supernatural anime/etc. and I am not committing to that kind of research, so we'll have to leave the specifics of the ghost canonicity issue to someone else. But regardless of how canon they are, I think we've established well enough by now that the i7 writers don't put much of anything in the series without reason (re:vale band name you will always be famous. to me), and that definitely applies here as well - both of our ghosts are doing a LOT of potential symbolic work in their brief appearances, and that's what we'll be unpacking today, starting with the TCG.
The infamous TCG (training camp ghost) of Atami needs no introduction, but I'll give her one anyway. During the filming of the Friends Day special, upon following the shopping group home, she offers her services to Riku (inexplicably the only person capable of communicating with her) for the evening entertainment group's test of courage, terrorises several cast members throughout the day, and finally brings us Soma Saito's incredible cover of Dis One before probably being sent back to idol fan purgatory forever. Who is she? Where did she come from? I have several theories.
1.1: The TCG is the audience
While the 'ghosts are real in i7' possibility is there, I think it's also important to note in this case that the whole training camp is very explicitly being filmed for TV, and the biggest vibe I get from this episode of the anime is that the ghost is a part of the show, and we're seeing that show through the eyes of its in-universe audience. This happens pretty often in i7 (for example, when we see the groups talk to their fans during concerts), and generally the line between the real fans and the fictional ones can get pretty blurred (which deserves its own much longer analysis but I Am Not Writing All That), so everything with the in-universe audience here kind of naturally extends to us as the real audience. The TCG would probably be easy enough to manufacture with special effects as long as Riku and the driver guy were in on it, and it would make sense for the Friends Day producers to include it to keep things entertaining and be a stand-in for their viewers/fans of the idol groups - the ghost is specifically a female fan of male idols (Zero), and a lot of her interactions with the cast would qualify as self-insert material (e.g. Tenn singing for her and Riku looking directly into the camera to smile at her). And speaking of Tenn and Riku,
1.2 The TCG is Nanase twins angst
I think this connection is fairly obvious in their exchange here. You could make a case for the ghost representing either one of the twins. Like Riku, she's being pushed away by Tenn before she's ready to leave, told that it's necessary and for the best that they stay separated - after all, they live in different worlds. Like Tenn, she's leaving despite Riku's protests and part of her not really wanting to go at first, because she believes it's for the best that they stay separated - after all, they live in different worlds.
There's also the association with ghosts of being ignored/invisible, and Riku being the only person able to see or talk to her. Maybe it's because he's the only one who's able to reach her. Maybe he can see her because he understands her on some level - she was torn away from life like he was torn away from his brother, and she's now practically invisible to everyone else around her, like Riku probably feels to Tenn (and arguably the rest of his family in some ways). Maybe he wants her to feel seen, and he can make Tenn acknowledge her in the way he wants to be acknowledged by him. I might actually be going somewhere with this so bear with me for a second.
1.3: The TCG is monster Riku foreshadowing
So my first thought when I watched the Nanase twin angst portion of this episode was 'well obviously the ghost isn't real and Riku is just using it to talk to Tenn indirectly' because they are always having indirect conversations like this and it makes me insane, and I do still think that's the idea here, just not quite in the sense that Riku is making things up. Going back to the whole 'ghost is a stand-in for the audience' thing, and assuming that she's saying the things that Riku wants to say and Tenn is telling her the things he wants to tell Riku, then we could say that rather than Riku purposefully having the ghost speak for him, this is an extension of the monster effect. I guess in this scenario the TCG is a real ghost (and a figurative representation of the audience), and Riku is having the same effect on her that Iori says he has on everyone else. He unknowingly projects his desire to connect with his brother onto her, and she tries to help him. Really, the only times we see her after she follows the shopping group to their cabin are when she's helping Riku, with the test of courage and then with speaking to Tenn. This gets convoluted so I kinda doubt it's intentional? But it's fun to think about.
1.4: The TCG is the friends we made along the way
Riku spells this out a bit more explicitly in the game here, but the TCG represents the each of the groups in the series in a couple different ways. I guess one way you could interpret this is that the ghost is meant to be there to emphasise how extraordinary it is that they're all together, but I don't think that really holds up considering how often they end up working with each other throughout the series anyway. What's important here is the idea of the ghost itself, something that can be present and felt even when it isn't physically or actually there. Again, the ghost is the audience - a constant influence for better and for worse on these idols even when they aren't watching, even in their personal lives; and vice versa, the ghost is the idols being able to reach their fans without ever actually knowing them. More relevant to what Riku says, the ghost is the groups to each other - friends, mentors, rivals, pushing them forward even when they aren't standing side by side. You could even say the ghost is ZOOL, friends who aren't here right now but will be someday. Re:vale and Idolish7 as groups don't especially fit the ghost description, but they have their fair share of ghosts - Banri, Haruki, Tenn, Aya, Sougo's uncle. Zero. The list goes on, for Trigger and ZOOL as well, but I think the most important way the ghost analogy applies to this section of the story is with Trigger. Because during the imminent Arc Where Trigger Gets Cancelled™, despite leaving their agency and disappearing almost entirely from the public eye, they're still very much there to their fans and to their friends. So. I kinda forgot what I was saying but to sum it all up the ghost here represents everything that stays with you even when it's far away or after it's gone from your life. Mikanseinabokura and all that. And now that I mention it-
Section 2: The Re:vale House Ghost
Once again, a warning that this section has a brief mention of self-harm, as well as in-depth discussions of depression, suicide and suicidal ideation (which I'm gonna be talking about pretty bluntly the entire time), so please don't proceed unless you're comfortable with all of that!
Like most things in Re:member, the RHG (Re:vale house ghost) makes me insane. Today I am going to attempt to form coherent thoughts about it and it is unlikely that I'll succeed, but try to bear with me. Though it isn't around for as long as the TCG, we have a little more info about the RHG - it's the ghost that haunts the shitty apartment Yuki and Momo live in together in their early days as Re:vale. Supposedly. All it actually does is slam the door of one kitchen cabinet and I don't think that this is definitive evidence of paranormal activity because most houses are just like that. It's all a little bit vague, but according to Re:vale, their house is definitely haunted by the ghost of someone who died in the kitchen, because when they move in there is a mysterious black stain on their kitchen floor. Momo introduces himself to the floor stain while Yuki stares at him in awe and blushes and shoujo filter flowers appear in his eyes. God I hate them. I think the RHG is just a figment of their collective imagination or maybe they're having one of those shared delusions or something. But that's really besides the point because this ghost exists for one very specific thematic purpose: the RHG is Yuki.
And on that note, let's go back and talk about Yuki for a few minutes (potentially hours) before we get to our actual analysis of the ghost scene. Mostly because I just wanna talk about him, but also because I do understand why some people think the 'Momo starts talking to ghosts' part of Re:member is kinda weird and random, and I think at least some of this is important to go over before we unpack it.
A consensus has already been established among Yuki scholars that our subject has autism (Kei et al. 2024). Today, I would like to propose an additional diagnosis: Yuki has depression.
2.1: "I lost my dreams, friends, and passion as well."
So, Yuki pretty clearly gets depressed when Ban leaves him. He loses interest in everything he used to care about, gives up on his dreams, blames himself for Ban's injury and disappearance, he's constantly sad, tired and irritable, and he lashes out at Momo (and Kujou, though there are some other pretty strong reasons for that one) and presumably everyone else he knows (I doubt he had a particularly good relationship with anyone else in the first place, but still).
He's grieving here, and it would make sense for him to react this way because of that fact alone. But I really don't think that's all there is to it, because he exhibits these symptoms (among others) long before Ban leaves him. He can't get out of bed in the mornings, he rarely leaves the house if he can avoid it, he has days where he can't eat or sleep, he's underweight and always tired and generally known to lack energy and be slow (or 'lazy') and in some cases listless and despondent. Ban even says that he wouldn't put it past Yuki to start slitting his wrists. And it's subtle, but there's one more really big one that really never goes away for him, even after he finds Ban.
2.2: "I don't need anyone to love me."
I'll get straight to the point. Yuki hates himself. Maybe only a little bit, maybe only sometimes, but it's there. Especially when he struggles with composing - he even says it himself in part 1 of his birthday photobook rabbit chat, almost immediately after saying that it made him want to kill himself but we'll get back to that part.
But it's really everywhere on what seems to be a mostly subconscious level for him, if you know how to look, even from the very beginning:
On paper, this line is just his frustration with being judged by anything other than his music, because it's something he cares a lot about and puts a lot of work into and he wants that to be acknowledged. But I think that if you take it in conjunction with some of the other things he tends to say, there's a little bit more to it.
I dont need anyone to love me. Yuki's songs are worthy of love. Yuki is not. There is nothing valuable about Yuki other than his songs, he has nothing else that deserves any sort of praise, and without them, he's just a useless burden with nothing to offer. He doesn't need anyone to love him - he doesn't understand why anyone would. And Momo does, and he's a good person, and Yuki doesn't deserve that when there's nothing he can actually do for him. And when that starts to change and he starts getting better at showing kindness to others and being there for Momo, he doesn't see it as learning to better express his feelings, he sees is as learning to feel affection and be a good person, because he believes that he is inherently not. As far as he can tell, Yuki is just naturally a bad person and a bad partner who isn't kind and isn't capable of love or compassion, not unless he tries to be. He knows, because he's heard it god knows how many times - even Chiba Shizuo blatantly tells him that neither of them can become good people - and maybe things are different now, but on some basic level it'll always be who he is.
Ok breaking character for a second, imagine you show up to your acting side gig and on the first day Keanu Reeves comes up to you and gives you $300 cash and then later he indirectly tells you that you're a nasty lonely egotistical failure. Now imagine you're Yuki and you have no fucking clue who Keanu Reeves is. He also shows you pictures of his top secret illegitimate son after talking to you for like 10 minutes and you have to lie to him about being straight. I think this is objectively the funniest situation to be in ever. Chiba Shizuo and Yamato both probably have depression also, but I'm not gonna spend any time on it, because every three months a person is torn to pieces by a crocodile in Northern Queensland. I forgot what I was talking about. Anyway
2.3: Hey remember that one time Yuki just straight up tried to kill himself
Yeah, that one. As far as I know this is really never addressed or acknowledged again, so we're just gonna take the page-long gag from Re:member at face value and say that after Ban's disappearance, Yuki (almost) attempted suicide, and the only reason he didn't go through with it is because he couldn't find anywhere to hang the noose. And like, yeah you could say it's just because he thought Ban might have killed himself and he's always been the kind of hopeless romantic to be waxing poetic about how "I can't live without you," but at the same time, he had no apparent reason to believe this (even if Ban did have suicidal tendencies I doubt Yuki would've really known), and he was planning to go through with it (I know it's probably just for comedic effect but he left a will. He left a will. He's, like, 20, and surely not the kind of person who would just have something like that in order already). This is also emphatically not the last time or the only reason he thinks about it.
I told you we'd get back to the photobook chat! I think there's also a lot you can infer from all the times he says he'd probably be dead by now without Momo and he wouldn't be able to handle losing him, what with the whole "when you jump, you'd better take me with you" thing. But regardless, this really isn't just that one time that Yuki tried to kill himself. It's suicidal ideation, and it's something he consistently struggles with especially in the few months after Ban leaves him. It even comes up in how he sees the 'paranormal activity' his new apartment:
2.4: "It seemed as though someone had hung themselves there."
Yeah it's the ghost I'm finally gonna talk about the ghost. I'm done with my Yuki has depression rant we can talk about why the ghost is Yuki now. I guess it might be more accurate to say that the ghost is Yuki's depression/suicidal thoughts/Banri trauma/whatever, but either way I think it represents him and he might also be semi-consciously projecting onto it, and I'm gonna go through line-by-line and try to explain my interpretation.
I think if you want to there's definitely room to take the 'usual paranormal activity' super literally and say that Yuki was having outbursts and slamming doors at the time (which would also match up with him being startled by it). I think it's also important to note that this is happening around the time he mentions feeling suicidal and not being able to compose in the photobook chat, but the main thing here is that second line. Even though Momo is always so nice to him, he can't stop himself from getting mad and being difficult and depressed, and he can't return that kindness - he can't even be useful to him.
I've already mentioned how I think Yuki's conclusion about the stain here plays into his suicidal ideation, but let's look at it a little more thematically. It's the way that even though it's glossed over earlier in the manga, Yuki's suicide attempt and everything that accompanied it still follows him, and it hangs (lol) heavy in their house like a ghost. To Yuki, it's startling and eerie - it scares him, and he's expecting it to scare Momo once he sees that side of him too. And it probably does scare him a little, and he hesitates, but he doesn't scream. Again, there's room to interpret this more literally as Momo finding out about his attempt/ideation/depression, or just as him inevitably seeing how he gets on his worse days, but either way the outcome is the same. Momo is starting to know Yuki as a person instead of an idol, flaws and probable mental illness and all, and his first reaction isn't to shy away or start to hate him or want to leave. It's an introduction. He makes it clear that they'll both be staying here from now on, that he's willing to live with the 'darker' sides of Yuki, and to help him do the same. Another point on this that's up to interpretation (because let's be real they're probably never gonna deal with this stuff explicitly in canon), you could see the whole ghost thing as neither of them really being able/wanting to accept that Yuki's symptoms are actually a part of him (and this is veering completely into fanfic territory but now I'm just imagining both of them silently agreeing to blame the things Yuki does on bad days on the ghost) but we've had enough angst for one day.
Everything else lines up well enough with the ghost and Yuki, but it's really his reaction here that sells the whole thing for me. It's a simple gesture, but just by Momo greeting him, being by his side, waiting for him when he comes home, that constant reminder of all his darkest thoughts becomes just another mark on the floorboards. It's not gone, and it probably never will be. But at least now, he doesn't have to face it alone. And it doesn't look so scary anymore.
2.5: "Now I know joy, and the meaning of a smile."
I must confess that I lied to all of you earlier. I'm actually not done with my Yuki rant and also there's a good reason I've been ignoring all the parts of Re:member where he isn't being self-deprecating or trying to kill himself. The end of the ghost scene is only the beginning of the end of this analysis, and the end of this analysis is pretty much just me having a meltdown about Yuki. Also I'm running out of space for images so we're doing some of the quotes like this instead.
After losing Ban, I lost my dreams, friends, and passion as well. I could only feel a sting as the wind passed through an empty, gaping hole in my chest. But I breathed as best as I could, and he tried to clear the dirt out of that hole, filling it with his earnest words instead.
Yuki still exhibits a lot of symptoms of depression all the way through the series, like the low energy and the trouble eating and sleeping, and [redacted part 5 spoilers] makes me think there's definitely some sort of connection between his writers' block and his depressive episodes. He still mentions feeling guilty towards Banri in second beat, the suicidal ideation doesn't really come up explicitly but he kinda hints at it on a few occassions, and he's very adament that he was a bad person and still isn't really a good one. But it's like. I don't really know how to put this, but I guess it's not his default state anymore like it was right after Ban left (and possibly before that, too). For the most part, he really does get better, and these things become less intense and fewer and farther between. He would probably say that it's all thanks to Momo, and it is, but he also very much does it of his own volition. Momo refuses so desperately to give up on him, and because of that he makes that choice to keep going by restarting Re:vale with him.
Yuki allows himself to let someone else in and start to love again - his partner, his music, his life. Even while he's thinking that he's just a burden to those around him, he doesn't resign himself to his fate like he might have done in the past. He's determined to become a better person, someone who can be a source of strength for Momo just like he was for him. And in the end, he does, but it's not just that. Now he knows joy. Now he can genuinely smile. And now,
I want to hear them scream my name. The voices that called out had annoyed me in the past. But now, I'll smile, together with Momo, who'll be by my side.
Going back to what I said about some of Yuki's subconscious self-hatred coming through in the way he wants people to look at his music and not at him, I. Cannot finish a sentence. Do NOT think about Yuki learning to love himself and see himself as worthy of love because Momo loved him just that much in a way that he could accept. BAD IDEA. Okay. So. It's Ban's advice and Momo's fan letter that get Yuki to accept that his fans do genuinely love his music in the first place, and I think it's here that it really starts to turn into him accepting the idea that they love other things about him too? Or that he really starts to want it and be happy about it instead of just accepting it? Whatever. I give up. I don't even like Re:vale anyway
That day, I would play the guitar I'd almost thrown at Kujou, because I now knew the power of a song that could not be silenced. I would dry my tears, open the door, and say, "I'm home."
