Week 47

In these weekly summaries, I go through the latest episodes of AKB48′s various shows. Kitarie appeared on Jinsei ga kawaru ippunkan no fukaii hanashi’s Ghibli special, but didn’t do much apart from revealing that she loves Princess Mononoke so much that she knows pretty much all the lines of the film and acted out one scene from the film. The episode itself was quite interesting for a Ghibli fan, but for an AKB fan it’s not a necessary view. Yuihan appeared on Konya kurabetemimashita as one of three female celebrities from Kyoto.

AKBingo (19.11)

Members: Maria Abe, Karen Iwata, Saho Iwatate, Natsuki Uchiyama, Ryoka Oshima, Shizuka Oya, Nana Okada, Mako Kojima, Ayana Shinozaki, Juri Takahashi, Miyu Takeuchi, Yuka Tano, Mariya Nagao, Miki Nishino, Ami Maeda, Suzuran Yamauchi

AKBingo made a refreshing return to the old Battle Burger Shop competition with mostly new members who have not taken part in it before. A few veterans were brought along to make sure it goes smoothly and the likes of Ami and Oya did their part and you could see the staff placed them in the most important spots to take advantage of their experience. However, Oya remained surprisingly quiet in overall, but there was no special need for her to butt in since the younger members did well by themselves.

Week 43

In these weekly summaries, I go through the latest episodes of AKB48′s various shows.

AKBingo (22.10)

Members: Karen Iwata, Saho Iwatate, Nana Okada, Ryoka Oshima, Yuki Kashiwagi, Rie Kitahara, Asuka Kuramochi, Mako Kojima, Ayana Shinozaki, Yurina Takashima, Juri Takahashi, Minami Takahashi, Miki Nishino, Ami Maeda, Minami Minegishi, Yui Yokoyama

This week’s AKBingo included the comeback of many veteran members, like Takamina. It was interesting to see how the younger members would react to appearing along with them after a long while and it was relieving to see that the newcomers weren’t afraid to do their own thing in front of the veterans. In the past the problem with AKBingo was often that the younger members just remained quiet in the background, but with lots of appearances recently many of them have now enough self-confidence to compete with the more experienced members. Karen continued her good streak and Ryoka showed her kusogaki side for the first time on AKBingo. Nana’s serious character is also morphing into a good thing although she needs Miichan by her side.