Note: This post is considered an episode review and it dives into spoilers for the movie.
This Love Live! series is pretty great. They should make sequels to this show. I’m kidding here; I know there are a lot of sequels to School Idol Project. Hell, that’s what I covered first here on the blog.
Here I am with the final installment in the original series, The School Idol Movie. I was curious about what this movie entailed. Just to recap: μ’s won Love Live, the third years graduated from Otonokizaka, everyone agreed to disband at the end of the school year, and they all spent the last episode putting a bow on their tenure as school idols. There doesn’t seem to be any loose ends left to address. My best guess was something completely out of left field but while the movie does make some surprising turns, it is fundamentally a retread. The plot boils down to the girls contemplating on the fate of μ’s, something that they’ve discussed to death in the final stretch of Season 2. As for the third years’ status, the school year doesn’t actually end until the end of the month so by a complete technicality, they’re still school idols. I feel like this story is on life support or something.
The movie takes place right after the graduation ceremony. μ’s receives an email from the organizers of Love Live and they learn of plans of holding the next Love Live at Akiba Dome (basically the equivalent to Tokyo Dome in real life). Seeing as μ’s is the most recent champion, Love Live enlists their help and the organizers arrange for the school idols to travel all the way to New York City and meet with an American TV agency for a news report and a televised concert.
Frankly, the trip to NYC is the weakest part of the movie. It is fun seeing these girls be a bunch of silly and confused tourists but the fact that they travel all the way to NYC feels over the top and a bit random. Frankly, I just see this as an excuse to have the characters in somewhere other than Tokyo. Love Live! later does a similar scenario in the Sunshine!! movie though that one has a better, more interpersonal justification and a more fitting location.
When the gang returns to Tokyo, they discover that their concert has made them enormously concert and a lot of people hope to see more from them. The organizers at Love Live also want to keep them as publicists and the director of Otonokizaka (Noriko Hidaka) asks they continue for the sake of the school (which seems unusually selfish for her but to be fair, who knows how long Otonokizaka will stay open). Realizing that they never publicly announced their intention to disband, the girls find themselves at an awkward crossroad where they could either go through with their original plan or continue their idol careers for the sake of their supporters.
I have to hand it to this movie. The whole discussion about what μ’s should do after Love Live and after the third years graduate has been done to death at this point but the movie manages to give it one final spin. Everyone in μ’s figured they were done after Love Live and graduation but what they haven’t accounted for is catching people’s interest and gaining a large and supportive following. Logistics aside, μ’s has a strong incentive to keep going. When you think about it, the issue of μ’s future goes far beyond the group themselves.
Eventually, the group decides to go through with their original plan. They settle on one final concert with various other school idol groups, including A-Rise, to give Love Live and school idols one big boost in publicity. Later, they accept an invitation from Love Live to perform at the Akiba Dome as guests. After those events however, they’re disbanding for good. I knew from Sunshine!! that this is what ultimately happens to μ’s but even so, it is pretty bold of the movie to commit to this ending. Seeing as it was revisiting this thread, it feels like there’s a good chance that it might reverse course.
I really like the reasoning behind the girls’ decision. Discontinuing their operations will no doubt disappoint some people but at the end of the day, the girls became μ’s simply because they wanted to be school idols. If they keep going for some incentive other than their own passion, μ’s ceases to be fun and special to them. It’s for the best that they quit now and not risk dragging μ’s through the mud. I suppose μ’s could continue on by going pro. In fact, the movie acknowledges this as a possibility. I get why the girls decide against it though. They intended to be school idols, not professional ones. It’s meant to be a hobby for them and not a job.
You don’t really see μ’s vote on which path to take. They just sort of come to an agreement as time goes on. To be fair, it wouldn’t really make sense for them to vote. The girls have been very insistent that they need all nine of them to be μ’s so as soon as one person says they’re out, it’s pretty much over for the group. I find it a little funny that Eli (Yoshino Najo), Nozomi (Aina Kusuda), and Nico (Sora Tokui) are the first to argue in favor of discontinuing μ’s. At the end of Season 2, they let the first and second years make the final call. It seems a little weird for them to change their tune but that’s more a nitpick than anything. Save for Honoka (Emi Nitta), the movie kind of brushes over everyone else’s opinion. I would’ve like to see more input from the others but it is appropriate of the movie to explore Honoka’s feelings more thoroughly. This whole journey began because of her so how she feels about μ’s future and what stance she takes is extremely important.
Definitely the weirdest element in this movie is the appearance of young lady (Minami Takayama) who helps Honoka a couple of times. The first is when Honoka gets lost in NYC and the second is when Honoka contemplates on the fate of μ’s. This character pretty much likes Honoka if she was older, is a singer like our main protagonist, and what backstory we do get for this character mirrors what is currently happening with μ’s. Honoka is seemingly the only character who runs into this mystery lady and said lady has a habit of disappearing. There’s also one peculiar moment where Honoka tries to invite her to her house, only for the mysterious lady to keep her distance.
Seriously, who the hell is this woman? Is she actually a future version of Honoka? That would certainly explain why she avoided being see by Honoka’s friends and family (though screwing up the timeline is something I can see Honoka doing). But then, how that does work? I know Love Live! can take some logical liberties but even for this franchise, throwing in time travel would be insane. I could just assume she just happens to resemble Honoka but the similarities are too coincidental and it doesn’t explain her ability to vanish from the frame. Maybe she’s just a figment of Honoka’s imagination. Knowing Honoka, I’m surprised she hasn’t imagined people before. However, we see Honoka hold onto a microphone that belongs to the mysterious woman so either Honoka is also imagining that object or this theory doesn’t work at all.
Oddly enough, I’m more baffled that this character only appears twice. She vanishes entirely from the plot after her second appearance. I thought for sure that she’d show up a third time, either at the joint school idol concert or at Akiba Dome, to congratulate Honoka on committing to her decision. If not that, then maybe the movie would cut to the future and we see Honoka look exactly like the mystery lady (and hop into her time machine). But no, this character disappears after two scenes and we never see her ever again. Go figure.
There are some neat touches to the ending. The joint concert is the first and only time μ’s and A-Rise collaborate with each other. Anju (Ayuru Oohashi) and Kotori (Aya Uchida) team up to create the costumes. Erena (Maho Matsunaga) and Umi (Suzuko Mimori) work together on the concert’s logistics. Tsubasa (Megu Sakuragawa) helps Maki (Pile) with a song she’s working (resulting in a very jealous Nico, which is really funny). I wish there were more moments like this. I like the back and forth between μ’s and A-Rise but other than Honoka and Tsubasa, there’s hardly any one on one interactions like these. It also would’ve been nice to know more about Erena and Anju. Compared to Tsubasa, they barely do anything in the story. I wonder if the writer(s) noticed this as both Sunshine‘s and Superstar‘s second seasons try to inject more interpersonal drama between a main character and a rival.
Also cool is seeing Yukiho (Nao Toyama) and Alisa (Ayane Sakura) participate in the joint concert, even wearing matching outfits with the various school idols on stage. I’ll forever find it really funny that these two never get to sing. Both Toyama and Sakura can sing so it amazes me that their talents are not once utilized. Still, it’s nice seeing them included in the event. Not only is the joint concert supposed to give Love Live and school idols publicity, it’s also μ’s way of passing the torch to future generations so having Honoka’s and Eli’s own sisters here feels right. By that same token, I really like the flashforward where Alisa and Yukiho are third years running the Idol Research Club, showing that μ’s’ legacy lives on.
Surprisingly, it takes about 23 minutes for the first insert song to kick in. That felt odd to me. You’d think a musical movie would get to the first number as soon as possible. As for the music itself, none of the insert songs currently strike to me as among School Idol Project‘s best but they’re all pretty good. One thing I really appreciate is that μ’s’ first-years, second years, and third years each get to sing their own song. It’s not just an ensemble performance every single time and that really helps keep the music from getting stale. I’m shocked that there is no collab song between μ’s and A-Rise. Like what the hell, these two groups are actually teaming up for once, the characters themselves say they’ll perform together, and the movie doesn’t even capitalize on that. Maybe the collab is supposed to be the joint concert song, which I do think is a highlight in the soundtrack, but only μ’s is credited as the singers so I call bullcrap on that.
The last concert scene did feel very bittersweet to me. Part of it is the song itself. It’s less happy go lucky sounding and more sentimental compared to the usual μ’s song. One particular detail that’s very heartwarming is that everyone’s names is incorporated into the lyrics. Part of it is also context. As far as the anime is concerned, this is the last song performed by μ’s. School Idol Project has its ups and downs, all the Love Live! series do, but in spite of that, it had a really charming bunch at its helm. I’m really going to miss this group of characters.
With that I reach the end of the original Love Live! School Idol Project. It’s been a good run. I don’t know if this movie is the best “episode” in the series but I enjoyed it and I’m kind of impressed that it manages to keep the show’s final plot thread going despite it being run into the ground. I do wonder if the franchise will one day revisit μ’s. School Idol Project is getting to the point where it’s become nostalgic for its fans and with the franchise turning 15 next year, I’d be shocked if it doesn’t bring up the group that started it all. That said, there obviously hasn’t been a μ’s anime for years now. And in real life, the cast stopped actively performing in Love Live! concerts in 2016, with their final performance being the 9th Anniversary concert in 2020. I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing μ’s again but it isn’t looking likely. That’s fine however. I’m happy with the two seasons and the movie we got.
You probably can’t tell since I’ve been covering this franchise completely out of order but this post is actually my last Love Live! episode review for the time being. After a little over a year since I restarted Nijigasaki, I’m all caught up now and I don’t have to cover this franchise anymore until Love Live! Superstar!! returns this Fall. I counted and I’m at 118 episode reviews, the most I’ve ever done for any anime franchise. It has been quite the undertaking and I doubt I’ll cover this much for anything ever again (and if I do, it’ll probably be at a much slower rate than this). That said, it’s been a lot of fun and I hope someone out there enjoyed reading me lose my mind over this franchise. This is of course subject to change but unless Love Live! ends or I die, I plan on continuing these episode reviews for the foreseeable future.
Watch Love Live! The School Idol Movie on Crunchyroll
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