LogFAQs > #968147698

132. Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club
https://myanimelist.net/anime/40879/Love_Live_Nijigasaki_Gakuen_School_Idol_Doukoukai
Fall 2020 (13 episodes), Spring 2022 (13 episodes)
My Score: 5/10, MAL Score: 7.52/10 S1, 7.73/10 S2
Best Character: Nakasu Kasumi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mefHQA2fGzg
Bonus, favorite song from the mobile game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pzzFg13Xyjk

Premise: Second spinoff series from Love Live. When Takasaki Yuu and Uehara Ayumu see a performance, they fall in love with idols. However, the idol club at their school has disbanded!

The Good: Nijigasaki is easily the worst Love Live anime (I still havent watched Superstar), but it has a lot of good points. Its a solid idol anime with lots of great songs and fun characters. Kasumi is the best girl in the whole franchise, and Ill talk about her in the write-up below. Yuu was an interesting character too. None of the other Love Lives have a manager help everyone out without wanting to be an idol themselves. There's also had a good story with the girls working with everyone to put together a school idol festival all around the city.

The Bad: My favorite thing in both Love Live and the spinoff Sunshine was how all the girls came together and interacted as a group. Nijigasaki had a bit of that, but the twist with these girls is that theyre a bunch of solo idols who occasionally collaborate, not one cohesive unit. In some ways thats a good thing, such as allowing for focused character episodes. Sadly, with so many of them being absent while other characters were in the spotlight, a lot of the girls wound up feeling underdeveloped. The first season also had a dramatic Ayumu arc that I absolutely hated.

Overall: Nijigasaki may be the worst Love Live, but I enjoyed the other two so much that it still lands almost exactly in the middle of my ranking. As much as I disliked some of the drama in the first season, it didnt ruin the anime for me. While Id have preferred it if the girls were all together more often, it was still nice seeing them act solo. Overall, this was a fun idol anime.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/5/2/4/AABz_zAADsNk.png

CHARACTER: Nakasu Kasumi (Love Live: Nijigasaki High School Idol Club)
https://myanimelist.net/character/176603/Kasumi_Nakasu
Voiced by: Sagara Mayu
TOP 100 RANK: 80th

My Kasumi Figure: https://imgur.com/hHli1Z7

VIDEO LINK (no spoilers, just a song): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUv2QSYEdhk

SPOILERS FOR LOVE LIVE NIJIGASAKI

I really enjoy that song that I linked to above. If you look up the lyrics in English, the whole thing is Kasumi quashing her doubts and hyping herself up as the cutest and best girl ever, which I think describes her in a nutshell. Unlike a lot of top 100 characters, Kasumi doesnt have a big dramatic arc. Theres character growth, sure, but mostly I love her because shes so much fun.

In the beginning, shes the only member of the School Idol Club remaining after it disbanded. She refuses to let the drama between everyone destroy her dreams. She steadfastly holds onto the club room and even steals back the clubs sign from the student council room. When Yuu and Ayumu join, theres a brief storyline where Kasumi tries to mold the new idol into her own image of what an idol should be (ultra-cute), rather than letting Ayumu do what works best for her. Thankfully, Kasumi realizes what shes doing quickly and stops. They win back the clubs old members, gain some new ones, and put on a wildly successful School Idol Festival.

Like most of the girls, Kasumi only gets the occasional focus episode. However, as the clubs leader (on paper) shes present for all the big decisions. Even when shes just an extra in a scene, shes always a joy to watch. Kasumi believes that idols must be as cute as possible, and she strives to maintain that image. However, shes also competitive and a sore loser, which gives her a hilariously unearned ego. Its a lot of fun watching Kasumi try to rise above the others, mostly because shes hilariously terrible at it. I mean look at this short video of her trying to win games.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpt1ayj20ks

In conclusion, Kasumi is a fun character because she strives to maintain a cute image, but her huge ego and attempts at being devious always undermine it. As much as she hates the nickname Kasukasu (which apparently translates roughly to not quite), it is fitting. She wants to be the cutest, to be number one, but she cant quite get there. Even in failure, however, she manages to be cute and hilarious, so in a way she achieves her goal, at least for me. She may not be my number one character, but Im sure shes happy to at least be my favorite Love Live character.