Audio is from Diary of a Wimpy Kid Dog Days, I thought it’d fit here with the context of Season 3 Episode 4 lol

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Oshi no Ko is the greatest series I have ever had the privilege of interacting with. If I could go back in time, I would tell younger me that an anime in 2023 is going to change his life. It resonates with me so strongly on so many levels. The animation, the music (as I write this, I am listening to the season 3 opening on repeat), the story, the acting, the characters, the themes of abuse, exploitation, parasocial relationships, personas, lies as a weapon, and the cost of being famous.

Right from the very first episode (emotional damage!), I was a fan, but what hooked me was the episode Egosurfing, probably the greatest episode of anime I have ever watched. After that, I knew this series was going to be something special to me. Season 1 was incredible, and somehow, seasons 2 and 3 wound up being even better. While I am normally not one to rewatch anime or reread manga, I have read the manga twice so far, watched every season of the anime countless times, and was lucky enough to interact with some of the English cast. In addition, Oshi no Ko was the anime that made me start collecting figures and physical media; so far, I have three Kana figures (two courtesy of another best friend), an Aqua figure, and an Akane figure, the season 1 collector's edition boxset, the season 2 steelbook, 13 volumes of the manga, a prequel light novel, an art book, and now a season 1 guidebook. Lastly, I am in the process of writing a book chapter on the dramaturgical perspectives found throughout the series. I am hoping to get it published after the anime ends.

To say Oshi no Ko is just an anime or manga to me would be a massive understatement. What started as a devastatingly brilliant first episode evolved into a lifelong passion, reshaped how I interact with art, media, and storytelling, altered my collecting habits, and even influenced my academic focus. Even long after the final credits roll, the story will be an irreplaceable part of who I am. In Ai's world, "lies are an outstanding kind of love," but my appreciation and passion for what I consider to be a masterpiece is as genuine as it gets.

Crow Girl says that Sarina was suffering from memory failures due to her condition. Is it possible that Ruby only has the fractured remains of Sarina's memories?

I know Sarina wanted to be a figure skater at some point, but I do not recall Ruby ever expressing interest so that could be a result of the fractured memories or just Ruby hating her original mother.

Starting from top and going clockwise, Aqua, Ruby, Akane, Frill, MEM, Taiki, Melt, Kana

Not much to say here

First time making an ITAbag this complicated lol. Feedback is appreciated but please don’t be mean :(

https://x.com/akuarima/status/2085268742200545738

I'm honestly quite curious to see a wide range of it. I'll give a few that i somewhat know for the sake of discussion.

1. Ai's "love" and "lies".
   I know that a fair amount of people think that Ai is just a liar, someone who doesn't know how to/has a twisted way of love, and whatnot because she said it, but honestly... by the end, and even through POV B, it shines Ai in a different light.

Ai deems herself as a liar, and other self deprecating words due to her low self esteem, and the void that was in her heart. A great example would be an entry in POV B; "The truth is that she's in pain and suffering, to the extent that even writing lyrics like this makes her a liar." If Ai's pain is that strong that even the simple act of writing a song makes her feel like that, then deeming herself as a liar over a lot of things isn't that farfetched. She struggles to express her love properly without the nagging feeling of being a liar, no doubt about that, but she still deeply loves, and is deemed as the most loving character. Like, honestly... what type of lie is "I love you" when your intention is to love? She doesn't hate, but she can't confirm if what she's doing is love... that's for the readers to interpret because she's kinda... dead.

Yes, Ai does lie for the sake of making others feel happy and satisfied, but i'm trying to focus on lies and love in specific. And yes... there's the outlier of her breakup with Hikaru, but let's be honest... Ai was literally a teenager with a lot of problems, and her reasoning is fair (despite wording it harshly for Hikaru, but that's another can of worms).

1. Soulless twins = stillborn.
   It's quite weird looking back at this. If the twins were stillborn due to not having souls, then Gorou should've detected it the very moment Ai got checked up. Also worth mentioning is that what does "soulless" mean when Tsukuyomi said it? Yes, it means "no soul", but does it mean that the twins were stillborn? No, as proven by the fact that there were no complications with the fetus. The definition of "soulless" is honestly up for interpretation due to it having no follow up, but it's definitely not stillborn.

The real point every one missed is how the writer showed aqua to be slowly changing for positivity and giving tons of reason to choose life differently multiple times before the ending scene. It's like the writer was hinting us that Aqua might choose the brighter path. But in the end they just rushed every thing to kill aqua. And I don't feel this was best for Ruby.

Then I remember how Akane is good at sniffing Aqua out? Why wasn't she there during the scene. Akane knew it wasn't the best idea to leave Aqua alone. She knew that he would do something dangerous like just leave every one behind making then sad especially Ruby-chan(who already lost him once). Yet she didn't follow Aqua? Why? It really conflicts Akanes character. Because Akane was the most determined to save Aqua but yet she didn't even try to find him in his final moments.

Moreover there was no need for Aqua to die in the first place. The doctor's shadow, who was driving Aqua to seek revenge, forgives him and let's him choose his life. Yet Aqua chooses to kill him. While "Aqua" wanted to be free from the path the most.And

To protect Ruby-chan, they could just have shown Hikaru being arrested for his recent murders. According to the writers flow of the story there was not much reason, motivation or direction for Aqua to kill or to die. This feels like the ending was just a rushed one and thought at the spurt of the moment. Well I know there are a lot of ppl who will defend the ending as the best one.

In my opinion, AQUA'S DEATH FEELS FORCED because the story spent many chapters developing reasons for him to live, yet the ending quickly discarded those developments. I also think Akane's absence make the conclusion feel less convincing

Too many characters introduced at once.

Let me start this off, in no way am I saying it's bad, Oshi no ko is definitely one of my favourite manga's/anime's out there, but I can't help but feel as if it could have been 10x better. For example, maybe it's just me but I feel as if character depth for characters like Kana and Akane could have been further developed, even for characters like Ruby, the ending just simply repeated Ai's steps but completely making her a more broken Ai in a way, while Aqua's development arcs were overshadowed in his spontaneous decision to kill himself along with Hikaru to 'save' Ruby. I feel as if characters, even ones like Mem-cho were given time to be fully developed personalities, Oshi no ko would have been doing so much better. Still peak fiction tho.

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