English Dub Review: If My Favorite Pop Idol Made It to the Budokan, I Would Die “Not as a Wota, But as a Person”

Overview (Spoilers Below)

New Years’ means a time for celebration. Getting the idols together is an opportunity to celebrate with the fans together. While subtle hints are foreshadowed, we learn more about Maki and Yumeri’s relationship. While in a separate sub-plot, we get to know Eripiyo’s family during a new years reunion and how little she matters to them since in Japanese culture, despite attaining multiple jobs to fulfill her desires to get merchandise and possibly pay the bills, her family still looks down at her for being an Otaku.

Our Take

It seems out of all the show’s that have been delayed by Funimation, who knew one the most overly colorful anime equivalents to a flaming bag of dog shit since Akiba’s Trip turned out to be one of the few simuldubs that were safe from being delayed, though I wouldn’t be surprised if Funimation added this show to the delay-list sometime soon. But despite the chaos of our current situation, there is something slightly commendable to the staff and dub cast for providing enough effort to crank out a new episode, even with everything getting closed and delayed in the real world.

If I found anything slightly relatable, I think it would have to be the pressure and douche-baggery of Eripiyo’s family because despite how obsessive and borderline stalkerish she is towards Maina, the shit she gets from her family is something I had to deal with in my youth and later my adulthood. I was never taken seriously as a gamer or an Otaku, especially from my Dad who was such a judgmental prick when he was alive and wasn’t much of an inspirational figure as he constantly shamed me for my lifestyle despite rarely getting into trouble, graduating high school, never doing drugs and always paying my taxes.

Overall, for a New Year’s special, this was a very average episode. There were a few nice moments but as a whole such as an implied reveal of an LGBTQ relationship between two particular Idol members that felt organic and less annoyingly forced, but Eripiyo’s storyline was what stood out to me the most. We all walk our own paths and live lifestyles that nobody is going to accept or support, but what should matter the most is that as long as the specific lifestyle you embrace never causes any kind of harm to yourself or others, it shouldn’t be a crime.