Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club (REVIEW)

I’ve said it many times and I’ll keep saying it, I’m a huge fan of the Love Live Series. For those who don’t know what Love Live is, it’s an anime about a group of schoolgirls becoming school idols for whatever reason. I’m an absolutely massive fan of both Love Live and Love Live Sunshine. I’m such a big fan that Aqours was my number one group on Spotify this year (2020). So, obviously, I’ll be excited about the third group, and also super excited for their anime, so let’s jump into it.

To start off, it’s different from the other groups. This group seems to be about a group of people who have come together for no reason other than their love of music, and because they have no reason, they are all solo idols. There’s no issue with their school closing down so they don’t need to become idols for any reason other than their own, which is the first problem. There is no goal, and that’s where it feels disconnected from the main series and understandable why people call it a spin-off. The other’s had something to work towards, but the first 10 episodes of this show is about each member and them becoming an idol, always ending with them singing a song. The songs are great, but we’ll get onto that later. But this formula that lasted for 10 episodes could easily be skipped. If you knew the basics about the members such as their names and looks, you could skip the first 10 or so episodes and go straight to the final few. It’s only in the last few episodes that we get the idea of something that is being worked towards.

Ok, let’s get into some spoilers. This is your spoiler warning. I won’t be using the names of characters and will try and be as vague as possible. 

The conflict, every Love Live has something happen that causes issues for the group that they need to overcome, and, as typical as they are, this one was by far the weakest.

The whole issue was caused by one person’s selfishness (which is surprisingly the most realistic part about 9 girls who are great at singing and dancing all meeting by fate). The problem feels so weirdly executed and frustrating and how it was handled. It’s basically your typical student love drama.

I’m gonna be real, I really didn’t like the main episode of the drama. The episode where it all starts felt really strange to me, but the following episode was the opposite. The repercussions felt so real to me and I just wish the entire thing could have been that good. 

Overall, the story was interesting. It’s refreshing they are doing their own thing and some of the character episodes are really sweet. Just seeing the characters mess around with each other is always a great thing in any genre. It helps us connect to these characters.

I won’t get into it anymore, spoilers are over from here on out, as there are other things to talk about.

Animation. It’s a massively different animation style, and it’s great. The animation overall just looks so much nicer. The character designs look so cute and slick. It’s easily the best looking Love Live show. But, it comes at a price. Terrible walk cycles. The walking is laughable at points with how bad it is. It’s clear the focus was on the still shots rather than the actual animated parts. There’s also a lot of weird frames that just seem strange to me for some reason. BUT, let’s talk about the music videos.

As I mentioned, there are 9 character songs (and a few others), and this is where the animation shines. The 3D CGI has come a long way. The character models move so smoothly and the 3D mixed with the 2D dances are so well blended. It makes you forget about the bad faces of faraway characters that you see in the normal shots and the weird-looking running.

Let’s wrap this up,

Overall, Love Live! Nijigasaki high school idol club is different from the others, In both bad and good ways. There’s a lot the series had established that they should have kept.  µ’s (Muse) and Aqours should have been mentioned. Taking 10 episodes to establish all the main characters could have been handled better. I think whereas Sunshine and the original had a lot of struggles and issues with their group, often making it more serious and relatable. Whereas, Nijigasaki are more of a happy-go-lucky group with few trials that would make it more interesting. I don’t want to say it’s aimed at a younger audience but it feels that way.

One way I rate if something is good or not is if it made me cry (it sounds weird but go with it.) I cried during the first Love Live group and cried during Love Live Sunshine. But, I didn’t cry during this one

I do look forward to the group’s future and will support them with whatever they do next.

Finally, I want to talk about some personal annoyances.

First, avoiding spoilers was a pain, as it’s based on the story of a mobile game (the one I reviewed), which is way ahead of the anime. Although there are some differences, the main content is the same. 

Obviously, males do not exist in the Love Live universe out of fear that adding a male into the mix would make the story too interesting, but the character’s parents or siblings are exceptions.

There’s a 4th Love Live Group that are getting their own anime, which in my opinion, is such a terrible move. There are currently two active Love Live groups and they wish to bring in a third? Aqours still have 5 years left (according to them), and Nijigasaki will probably go just as long. They’re basically saying they’ll never be another for the next 5+ years. Of course, I’ll watch it. It’s 5 members instead of the usual 9 so it’ll be interesting. Terrible business move, but still could be interesting.

Although I said “finally”, once already, I believe that as Idol trash I should rate all the solo songs from the series in order of my favourites. (only including the first 9 songs)

THIS IS ALL MY OPINION AND OPINION CAN CHANGE. ALL THE SONGS ARE GREAT BUT SADLY WE HAVE TO RATE THINGS.

8) Vivid World (Karin Asaka) & Butterfly (Kanata Konoe) (I couldn’t decide on 8th and 9th they are both good)

7) Solitude Rain (Shizuku Osaka)

6) La Bella Patria (Emma Verde)

5) DIVE! (Setsuna Yuki)

4) Dream with You (Ayumu Uehara)

3) Saikou Heart (Ai Miyashita)

2) Poppin’ Up! (Kasumi Nakasu)

1) Tsunagaru Connect (Rina Tennoji)

Honestly, this is the weakest one yet, but it’s the first season, it could get much better. The first season is always the worst as it has to set everything up and establish everything.

But sadly, the final score I’m giving it is 7 out of 10

It may sound high, but this is a super low seven.

It’s almost at a 6.

I had a post some time ago about how I rate anime and Manga so go find that if you are interested in knowing my thoughts. It might even be outdated so maybe I’ll rewrite it.

Thanks for reading.

I was harsh and I had trouble giving it a number score. I didn’t want to give it a 6 but struggled to justify a 7. I would like to say the anime and this review doesn’t represent my opinion of their music and the voice actresses as people. I love some of their songs. Some of them deserve 100 out of 10, which is why they didn’t have a major influence on my final score.

One last note:

I noticed that the reason I’m not too keen on this is because of how different it is. Sunshine and the original use the same formula, which I think is fine. Perhaps I was expecting a bit more drama that Sunshine gave us and a bit more grit, but it is what it is.

I never understood the hate for Sunshine’s story. Even if it is just a copy of the original’s story, I believe it was executed in a more interesting way and was much more interesting. Also, in my opinion, it had much more likeable and interesting characters than any other Love Live anime (not talking about the voice actresses just the characters).

Sorry if I’m repeating something I said above, but just in case I didn’t, this is here.

As always, my links are below:

My links: https://linktr.ee/FabledByte

Arbitrary Echo: https://linktr.ee/ArbitraryEcho