IDOLiSH7: Third BEAT! Episode 28

Eva’s Impression

SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT!!!!! PLANS ARE BACKFIRING, AND SHIT IS HITTING THE FAN!!! I AM NOT OKAY!

Oh god oh god oh god— THIS IS BAD! THIS IS VERY BAD!!!! MOMOOOOOOOOO!!! OH GOD SOMEONE SAVE MOMO!!!! PLEASE! SHIT. I AM FREAKING OUT RIGHT NOW. PLEASE, SOMEONE BE ON HIS TAIL, SOMEONE BE READY TO SWOOP IN— OH GOD THIS IS NOT GOOD! THIS IS NOT GOOD AT ALL!!!! AND I AM NOT OKAY!!!! I DID NOT SIGN UP FOR THIS KIND OF CLIFFHANGER!!!!! HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME TO STAY CALM FOR THE REST OF THE WEEK!?!?!?!?

Just when things were starting to look up— Ryo took what was an action of generosity by Re:Vale and turned it into a lethal weapon to take out both Trigger and Idolish7 at MOP.

This messy and horrifying situation came about when Trigger’s and Idolish7’s popularity skyrocketed, putting them fighting for third place. The organizers of MOP had decided to make use of the hype around Friends Day to have the top three perform at their hall for the event. So Yuki decided since they’ve already won a number of competitions, why not make room so that both Idolish7 and Trigger can perform. Sure his heart was in the right place, but unfortunately they didn’t think ahead of how Ryo would capitalize on the opportunity by pulling ZOOL (who were second place) out as well. The idea was to create doubts regarding MOP’s integrity, making it look as though a fix has been arrange to launch Trigger’s comeback.

Toma who was frustrated to learn they had been pulled out of MOP, quickly became alarmed by the fact Ryo’s plans didn’t end there. Ryo intended to reveal that Riku and Tenn are twins, and set it up so that Riku would never want to sing a Trigger song again. That was Ryo’s way of “loving” Riku– which is so fucked up. And Toma, who knows about Riku’s and Tenn’s circumstances didn’t want anyone else to get hurt, so he did the right thing of contacting Momo to meet up to tip him off on Ryo’s plans.

And just— gosh, like Yuki’s good intentions, Toma’s action to help another was punished by Ryo. SHIT!

I just– ARGHHHHHHHH!!!! Despite how fucked up this situation is right now, I just want to take a moment to be proud of Toma for FINALLY doing the right thing! I was yelling at my screen like, “TOMA, I SWEAR TO GOD– COME ON DO THE RIGHT THING! DO IT! OH THANK GOD!”  because last week… THE WAY HE WAS STUPIDLY RUNNING HIS MOUTH LAST WEEK TO THE POINT WE WERE ALL SCREAMING AT AT HIM TO SHUT UP— this certainly helps makes up for it in terms of his heart and moral compass being in the right place. But god, now that he was caught and is being punished for being the whistle-blower, it really hurts to see.

Not only did Ryo threatened to bring harm to Toma’s family, but also his former group members (NO_MAD) if he were to run his mouth to find help. This is just so terrible! And if that wasn’t bad enough, Momo took on the role of the antagonist in hopes to save Toma from Ryo’s wrath. I don’t think Toma would be able to live with himself if something terrible happens to Momo– which is a step away from happening, talk about freaking traumatic! And that doesn’t just apply to Toma and Momo, this includes Yuki because if Momo gets hurt, it will be like Banri’s accident all over again– only this time, they had been deliberately targeted by someone with malicious intent.

So really, it goes without saying this is probably the most terrifying episode we’ve seen yet from Idolish7. Ryo is out for blood, for real this time. He intends to have Momo “fall out” of a window under the guise he drunk too much- which they are going to force him to drink– oh god, SOMEONE SAVE HIM PLEASE!!!!! RYO’S TRYING TO KILL HIM! I DON’T WANT HIM TO GET HURT!!!!

SIDE NOTE: I REALLY HATE THE DRINKS HAVE BECOME A SUBJECT OF TERROR AROUND MOMO. REMEMBER LAST SEASON WHEN HE WAS DEALING WITH THAT ISSUE OF BEING UNABLE TO SING?! HOLY SHIT. AT THE TIME I HAD THOUGHT SOMEONE WAS SPIKING HIS DRINK. BUT NOW THIS IS HAPPENING. SHIT.

I pray to God that Momo had the foresight to let someone, Yuki, his manager, ANYONE know where he was going, and who he was going to talk to. At the very least, we do know that Yuki had overheard that Toma had called Momo, and Toma knows that they are going to Momo’s apartment. So maybe Yuki might be waiting there in the dark with his metal baseball bat ready. However if he doesn’t know where Momo is at, then it’s up to Toma since Ryo had no concern of hiding the fact they were heading to Momo’s apartment. The problem is that Toma has no way of knowing where Momo lives, so he’d need to contact someone who does. Perhaps Trigger if he happens to have any of their numbers (so as long as they haven’t changed it- which would be surprising if they didn’t) after the last stunt Ryo pulled, though I’m not even sure if he was involved in that at all to even have their numbers in his contacts. Either way, he’s clearly overwhelmed by the threat, so it’s hard to say whether he will actually be able to do anything, or if he’ll even return to the agency or leave the Butler Cafe at the moment. There’s no way in hell he will be able to keep a straight face in this situation.

If there’s absolutely no one else who knows what’s going on, and should Toma return to the agency, I hope– though I honestly don’t know if anything will come out of it–that at least someone in ZOOL, maybe it will be Minami of all people would notice that something is amiss since he seems to be the perceptive type. Though whether he’s willing to do anything about it is an entirely different matter altogether. I also wonder what Haruka’s and Torao’s reactions and response would be if they were to notice too. Toma has always been the sole person to try and unify the group, so it shouldn’t go unnoticed if he starts acting unlike himself.

Should the rest of ZOOL get up to speed on what’s going on at the moment, this would put them at a crossroad of whether they are willing to continue turning a blind eye to Ryo’s crimes. Toma already did his part (which was a brave thing to do), and is now facing the consequences because his friends and family are now in danger. So that leaves it up to the rest of ZOOL, of whether they are willing to step up and show us that they have a moral compass of their own, and find a way to stop this crime from happening without tipping Ryo off before it’s too late.

Shit man, we got two episodes left… oh man, I can’t even think about how this is going to play out. Will we see a rescue attempt even happen, or will Momo be dropped out of the window?! Please not the latter, I don’t want Momo to get hurt!!!!! This would be so traumatic for Yuki as well— SOMEONE SAVE MOMO!!!!!

AND YOU KNOW WHAT’S CRAZY? THERE’S STILL MORE TO TALK ABOUT BUT THIS WHOLE SITUATION IS MAKING IT REALLY HARD TO THINK ABOUT IT! DEEP BREATHS. DEEP BREATHS!!!!!

[BREATHE] OKAY! So lets shift gears and begin with the hype that has generated around Idolish7 since Friends Day. Their popularity has skyrocketed to the point that not only have their albums been selling out like hot-cakes, they flew up in the rankings of MOP and are now tied together with Trigger for third, but they even now have fans turning up to their dorms screaming Riku’s name… Oh boy.

Compared to the rest of the episode, this bit was would be considered the ‘calmest’ part, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t have its moments that made me very uneasy about the way things were going. It really rubbed me the wrong way to hear the fans thanking Riku (and not so much for Idolish7 as a whole) for performing Trigger’s Secret Night. It’s not like he was the only one who sang it, they all did. And the way they really honed into basically only showing Riku during that performance symbolizes in a way how the audience has been enamoured to the point of focusing solely on him. And I expressed my concerns of the potential consequences of this back in episode 16.

Like Shadow, last week I too was very troubled by the development between Riku and Iori. So when Iori brought up the promise again, I just wanted to scream and shake some sense into the two! I desperately hope that Sogo and Yamato, who were behind them overheard it and tucked that brief conversation in the back of their heads, I highly doubt it (though I’d be glad to be proven wrong). The biggest problem at the moment is the fact Iori and Riku have a habit of discussing the subject of their promise between just the two of them. Worst off, I have no idea who would be the best person to intervene, unless either Riku or Iori come to realize the disaster and consequences ahead of them on their own. Well… actually that would be some form of the character growth we’d hope for, especially on Riku’s part because he really needs to learn how to be more independent and respond to difficult situations in a cautious and mature manner.

Though for this instance, I understand where he was coming from when he decided to defy Ryo, and sing Secret Night— because they were going to be put in a bad situation no matter what they did. It was a pick your poison moment: Face the wrath of the fans by betraying their expectations, or brace for Ryo’s revenge. Though after this episode, it certainly made the case that it’d be better to face the wrath of fans as there’s a chance to clear the air VS dealing with a guy who has no qualms of resorting to murder.

Anyhow this week we saw how Ryo planned to fire back: He intended to hurt both Trigger’s and Idolish7’s integrity by framing that MOP has a fix in place, and then drop the bomb on the public revealing Tenn and Riku are twin brothers. The whole point of this is to create guilt and trauma so that Riku would never be able to to sing Trigger’s song again.

And what makes this so worrisome is that even though Momo had warned him, Riku doesn’t have a clue how unhinged and dangerous Ryo is, and he’s about to find out once he learns what Momo is about to be subjected to. Who to say he wouldn’t try to kill Riku next if that wasn’t enough to stop him from singing Trigger songs? Actually no scratch that, he’d look to kill Tenn or hold him hostage under the pretense he’s doing Riku a favour. Yup, I can definitely see that. That’s just how unhinged he is. He just goes full blown yandere mode when it comes to things he’s obsessed with. If they betray his expectations or is pulling attention away from him, his response is to just break it/kill it.

Which leads the next point, the root of Ryo’s hatred towards Idols.
Can you guess what that possibly could be?

If you guessed, Zero, BINGO! No surprise there, as this series loves circling back to him!

So when Ryo was younger, his parents had once taken him to Zero’s concert, and he didn’t really care much but then when he got there, he had hoped that Zero look at him, but much to his frustration he didn’t and immediately a grudge had formed. He declares the Idols betray people’s expectations so easily– and yet, the truth of the matter is: it wasn’t actually Zero’s fault. Ryo was imposing his own expectations, and was met with disappointment when they were not met.

I think this does point to the danger of fans, though can you really call Ryo a fan of Zero after saying something like that? I wouldn’t. But the bigger issue at hand, is the fact Ryo is constantly looking for people who will meet his expectations and give him the undivided attention he so desperately desires. Ryo has told Riku that he felt ostracized by his family from and early age and was looking for other means to get that attention, or this is just how he is wired. But the fact this kind of resentment towards Idols started off from one instance of disappointment, just further highlights what we already knew: Ryo imposes his own (and at times delusional) expectations onto others, and when they don’t meet his expectations, he lashes out onto them.

As it turns out, the reason why Ryo became attached to Momo was because the one time when he was drunk, Momo had shared his time with Re:Vale will expire in five years, and he wouldn’t be able to be an idol anymore. At the time, Ryo suggested they’d do something together and Momo had agreed. So of course when the fifth anniversary passed and Momo is still an idol, Ryo was thrown into a fury because it was yet another betrayal of a broken promise. He claims he is using ZOOL to teach the world that lesson, by setting them up for disappointment  for the moment they disband in three years time. He considers all idols to be con artists because he couldn’t get what he wanted from of them.

Momo was in the right to call Ryo out for being a coward and giving up so easily because he was afraid of getting hurt, claiming Ryo was rejecting the thing he loved was his way of protecting himself from disappointment, and tried to talk some sense to him.

The problem with Momo’s response however, was that unfortunately this was not the right time. If anything, he should have tried to appease him in a different way to buy time. Now because he poked the bear, and he challenged in him a way where Ryo turned to the moon and basically said he’ll kill the thing person he loves (Momo). I don’t think Momo actually expected him to get to this point, and while he’s putting on a brave face, it would be an understatement for him to be absolutely terrified right now.

And finally, the unexpected and yet what turned out to be the first chilling bomb drop of the episode:

The hidden message within Sakura Message’s lyrics.

At long last, we finally see Minami go on the attack against Nagi. Up until this point, this guy been this big ball of mystery and because we haven’t seen a lot of him, so it made it difficult to get a read on what’s going through that head of his. The only time we really got a better grasp on his hatred towards Nagi was the hint he dropped in Episode 17 with,“How dare he forget what he did and proclaim himself your friend…“. And now this week, Minami showed us just how much he knows about Nagi and his relationship with Haruki… and boy does he know the specifics to an eerie degree. He went as far to describing a certain Second Prince, bringing up the tale of a certain musician he had favoured. He even dived into the specifics, of how “the prince believed the musician left due to an illness, but never suspected the departure was out of fear of being used for political means.” He saw the opportunity to plant the bomb during the photo-shoot when Nagi was humming Sakura Message, and then detonated it during the interview, leaving the a bitter warning of his own, suggesting Nagi was naive and too slow to understand.

I thought it was very interesting but also no coincidence that Minami decided to apply pressure on Nagi about the restoration of the monarchy just after Nagi declared Northmeir is a nation that values democracy. Noticeably, Minami made the point of how the Crown Prince has made many allusions, going as far as suggesting sovereignty would be returned to the royal family. Nagi however firmly denied that, but Minami pressed on to say Northmeir’s moderates only hope is the internationally beloved second Prince. Interestingly, it has been brought up over the course of the season that there is some sort of political turmoil happening back in Northmeir, which was significant enough for Nagi to have made a trip back home at one point, and now here he is again feeling like he needs to go back to check-up on things.

Which leads us to the next point, uncovering the secret message hidden within Sakura Message– which now blows my mind to think even the title itself is literally saying: This is a message about (Haruki) Sakura! Just not in the way we expected…

So before the shit hits the fan with Ryo making arrangements to have Momo killed, but really there was another major bomb drop this episode, which involved Haruki. AND BOY, I did NOT see this coming in a long shot!

After doing the photo-shoot and interview with Minami, Nagi sensed something amiss and called Banri to say he’s going to return to Northmeir. However while doing so, he wanted to look into Sakura Message. Banri revealed that Sakura Message was the first time they were told not to make any changes, to which Nagi thought more deeply into the lyrics and made a harrowing discovery. Turns out there was a chilling message concealed within the lyrics:

TWO LETTERS
ONE WEEK LATER
BACK TOGETHER
WE HAVE HARUKI SAKURA
OBEY

SHIT. WHAT IS EVEN HAPPENING?! WHAT DOES  “TWO LETTERS, ONE WEEK LATER, BACK TOGETHER” EVEN MEANS?!?! WAS HARUKI KIDNAPPED?!?!?!?!?!?!? ARE THEY DEMANDING NAGI TO BEGIN COMMUNICATION TO SHOW HE’S OBEYING THEM?! THIS IS ABSOLUTELY INSANE. And gosh, when Nagi finally figured that out, he just broke, and his laugh gave me the chills! Also now that I think about it, even the title itself can now also be read in a more literal sense of: This is a message about (Haruki) Sakura!

But this begs the question: If Haruki really has been kidnapped to be used as political pawn against Nagi, how long exactly has he been in this predicament? Banri has told us all their songs has come from the same person, but when they received Sakura Message, that was the first time when they were told to not tinker with the song and leave it as it is. So is this something that has only recently happened?

Does this mean Minami is aware of the secret message? Or heck– was there was a crazy twist where he responsible for writing the song, or even tinkered with it to plug in that message? Or is he cooperating with those who are trying to apply pressure onto Nagi by supposedly holding Haruki hostage in order under the conditions to save him? Perhaps the timing of which Minami ended up joining ZOOL may have been factored into that as well. Either way, it’s impossible to say at the moment, and hopefully we’ll get some answers to clarify that, possibly as soon as next week given it’s shown that Nagi will be confronting him once more in the preview.

In any case, whatever Minami’s relationship is with Haruki, if the current predicament proves to be true (and not a bluff) it would really put into perspective as to why he hates Nagi so much. But one thing for sure, when he came back from the shoot, he was plenty satisfied with putting Nagi on the edge, and that the weight has been lifted off his shoulders. So I’m curious to know exactly whether that weight is Haruki himself, or simply because he wanted to get back at Nagi, or he just finished the job he was supposed to do.

All that said, I feel like after this discovery, Nagi is never going to be able to see that song the same way ever again. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if he even had a hard time singing it. This is going to be haunting him for a while… Oof. I wonder how he is going to respond to this crisis… Sheesh, actually add Nagi to the list of people who are being subjected to traumatic ordeal of being threatened with those they care about being held hostage.

Good grief… this was such a crazy episode that it had me screaming and my head is still spinning! Actually scratch that, I thought I was going to combust. I was just so overwhelmed, this has to be the most intense episode to date. The way it just started slow, but you can just hear the thunder rumbling in the distance and then the lightning strikes you when you least expect it and you’re like SHIT @!(#*!@#()*@!*)(#!!!!!

Apart from the shitstorm, I have to admit,  Re:Vale pulled out of MOP with good intentions, I was a bit disappointed that they did. I did hope to see Trigger and Idolish7 duke it out for third place. Hell, who to say that either one of them wouldn’t have pulled themselves up to second, pushing ZOOL down to third? For that reason, while I did have a moment of “aw that’s so sweet”, right after that I realized, oh… wait a minute… isn’t this just too much favouritism? Would they had done the same if it had been say, any other artist competing with either Idolish7 or Trigger for third place had ZOOL not been in the picture? Even if Ryo wasn’t around either, I think we can all agree that unfortunately Yuki’s good intentions were not well thought out. Sadly his manager and Momo didn’t think ahead about that either as both readily agreed to it.

Next week oh boy… The preview looks intense. I actually almost missed it, but man it’s not everyday you see Ryu looking that furious! With only two episodes left, who knows how the hell this season will end. They wouldn’t be insane enough to end this season on a cliffhanger… would they?!