I’m labeling this episode as a series finale but make no mistake. This era of Bandori is far from over. There’s the sequel series, Ave Mujica, and a third series got greenlit while I was covering MyGO. The story certainly feels unfinished, with this last episode feeling less a finale to MyGO and more a backdoor pilot to Ave Mujica.
There’s still a little bit of MyGO content at the beginning of the episode. Following the success of the recent live show, the girls decide to hold an afterparty. At different parts of the episode, Anon and Soyo each remark that committing to the band their whole lives is still unfathomable to them but they’re willing to chip away at it for as long as possible. I kind of did forget that some of the characters didn’t give Tomori a definitive answer. With all the drama that happened throughout this series, it felt good enough that the band was sticking together at all. I guess Tomori doesn’t get the answers she wanted but they’re reassuring enough so she accepts them.
While Taki is normally the one to walk Tomori home, Soyo volunteers for the job so that she can have a private chat with Tomori. Soyo admits that she used to feel uncomfortable with Tomori’s writing, feeling that they hit too close to home for her, though she’s of course gotten over it by now. Realizing her lyrics must’ve had the same effect on Sakiko, Tomori writes something down and she tries hand it over to Sakiko the next day. Sakiko however rejects the olive branch and while she does wish Tomori well, it’s clear that she’s bitter towards her former friend now. I’m starting to think I was right about Sakiko feeling Tomori replaced her with her friends in MyGO. Anon hangs out with Tomori to cheer her up and the two get to meet Uika by chance, allowing Tomori to thank the idol for her advice. Anon notices that Uika knows Tomori by name, which Tomori finds odd as she didn’t introduce herself before. Apparently, Uika deduced Tomori’s identity after searching up CRYCHIC. I don’t know what the significance of this is but it may factor into the next series.
The rest of the episode is dedicated to the debut concert of Sakiko’s new band, a gothic metal-themed group called Ave Mujica (and yeah, it’s the same name as the next series). I must admit now that I was playing dumb this whole time. I didn’t really look at Ave Mujica‘s promotional materials all that much but since I knew about the sequel in general, I figured out many episodes ago that Sakiko would create the band and all the recurring supporting characters we’ve ran into so far would fill its roster. There’s definitely an unevenness to this development, in regards to the characters involved. Nyamu feels like an afterthought and while I’ve enjoyed Umiri’s scenes, her inclusion feels just as random. Still, it was fun connecting the dots. Plus, I imagine the next series will better flesh out the cast.
Ave Mujica debut themselves at a theater, where they first perform a play of sorts before moving onto the actual concert. All five members of the band wear a mask and assume an alias, each named after a lunar maria. Sakiko leads the band as “Oblivionis” while Mutsumi, Umiri, Uika, and Nyamu are known as “Mortis”, “Timoris”, “Doloris”, and “Amoris” respectively. In the play, Doloris attends a masquerade, in which the others welcome her and reveal that they are all actually dolls given life by the moon. The subsequent concert is explained by the play to be the dolls commemorating their “resurrection”. Honestly, it’s a bit silly and I don’t know if I exactly got the gist of it. But as far as I can tell, it does denote Sakiko’s intention with the band, to start anew from her “former life”. The doll element also serves as a bit of foreshadowing to how Sakiko may treat her bandmates in the future. As for the insert song, it’d be bold to call it the best one in the show but it honestly is up there. The inclusion of Sakiko’s keyboard and the more gothic metal tone to the song really makes it stand out from the rest of the soundtrack. I also dig the large space and the thematic backdrop that goes along with the performance; it really makes Ave Mujica’s debut feel grand.
Throughout all this, I noticed that Sakiko is being awfully secretive around everyone. The main purpose of the masks and codenames is to conceal the band’s identities. That seems counterinitiative since Sakiko’s main criteria for recruiting members is that they’re famous in some way, with Umiri being the only exception. Kind of hard to bank on the prestige if no one knows who you are. In a number of scenes, Sakiko is shown to be at an arm’s length with everyone else and being stingy about how the band conduct themselves. At the beginning of the episode, Mutsumi explains she wants to join Ave Mujica out of concern for Sakiko’s wellbeing, which Sakiko scoffs at. Before the concert, Sakiko ells Nyamu not to record anything. Afterwards, she gives the band specific instructions on how they should leave the theater and she doesn’t bother to join them in a proposed afterparty.
I was puzzled at first but it all starts to make sense when you get to the very last scene of the episode. After the concert, Sakiko heads home and rather than the big mansion she appeared to live at in Episode 3, we instead see her at a small and disheveled house. On top of that, we learn that she lives with her father, who appears to be an alcoholic. So what gives? Was Sakiko lying the whole time about her wealth or was she actually wealthy and it somehow went down the drain? Whatever the case may be, it’s clear that Sakiko’s living situation is something she’s embarrassed about. Perhaps Sakiko is so secretive about the band is because she doesn’t want anyone to find out. Chances are, this is elaborated more in the sequel series.
On that admittedly inconclusive note, I am done with BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!. To be honest, I think I still prefer more lighthearted CGDCT music anime. This one goes pretty hard with the drama and I don’t know, I go into this genre to have fun. While I wouldn’t call the first season of OG Bandori a masterpiece or anything, I kind of do miss the goofy shenanigans with Poppin’Party. That all said, I still enjoyed this series a bunch and I get why it appealed to a lot of people. It’s a fresher take on both the franchise and the genre. More importantly, it has the writing to back up the change. Other than Rāna, who is absolutely the weakest link in MyGO, the show does a great job fleshing out everyone. No matter how questionable or unlikable any of the characters get, I almost always understood where they’re coming from. And when the characters finally do grow and resolve their differences, it was extremely satisfying and even a bit emotional to watch. The music kind of suffers from some long gaps between insert songs but when the show finally delivers, it’s a banger. I’m not the biggest fan of the CGI but Sanzigen does make great use of it at times, particularly during the concert scenes where they utilize it to replicate the look and feel of a recording.
As per usual with retroactive coverage, I commit to one season or series before deciding on what to do with anything that comes after it. Seeing as I enjoyed MyGO!, I’m down to keep the coverage going. There are compilation films for MyGO that offer new scenes, particularly for Rāna, which sounds neat to me because that girl desperately needs more screentime. Unfortunately, the movies still aren’t out on Blu-ray or streaming so I don’t know when I’ll get to those. For now, I guess I’ll move on with Ave Mujica.
Watch BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!! on Crunchyroll
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