Wan Wei Han's Current Life: Past Anime/Manga Review: Skip Beat!

Posted by IAmBored
April 25, 2012

Hi everybody! I'm going to do an old anime/manga for today... Since there are no new animes released that I like, yet.

So now I have about 6 animes that are ongoing and that is seriously my record. So there is a high chance that I may not watch new ones for a while. (unless the plot and art is like superb, then that anime may be included in my ongoing list) I am totally dreading when my animes end, especially if they end all around the same time. (Imagine how many final impressions I have to do!)

Now this anime is an extremely lighthearted anime and is quite funny! :D
I know I promised this a long time ago. So yup, let's go!!!

Skip Beat!

What kyouko looked like before transforming

So the main female protagonist is a sixteen year old girl named Kyoko Mogami. She followed her childhood friend, Shotaro Fuwa, to Tokyo because she thought he wanted her to. She is totally in love with him and even juggled with multiple jobs because of Shotaro's expenditures and lavish lifestyle. She is so supportive to the extent that she does everything for him, and does nothing for herself. She had left her hometown and stopped her education just to go to Tokyo with him. Upon arriving in Tokyo, Shotaro, or Sho (as his fans call him), worked hard and was ranked number 7 for the top 20 most popular male celebrities in Japan. He is also described as an extremely talented musician . However, he only treats Kyoko as a maid and never as a lover or childhood friend.

The first encounter after kyouko
swore revenge

Kyoko overheard him saying this one day,when she went to visit him, and heard him describe her as a boring and plain girl. Sho then proceeds to flirt with his manager and Kyoko saw the entire thing. She then realizes how much time and effort she has 'wasted' on Sho. She saw the difference in attitude when Sho interacts with his manager as compared to with her. She also learns that the reason Sho wanted her to be in Tokyo with him is to do his house-keeping, and he said that he ever forced her to go to Tokyo with him.

Ren (left), Koko and Sho

Kyoko didn't shed any tears at her discovery, instead, she vowed revenge. She wants to be a bigger and more popular star than Sho. With this determination, she changes her appearance and enters into showbiz.

Ren's Manager

At first, she was unable to get into LME (the company which is in competition with Sho's company) but she 'forced' the head of LME's talent section, Takenori Sawara into letting her audition. She had failed the audition initially, but with the LME president, Lory Takarada's help, she joined a department called 'Love Me'. This department was founded by Lory for those people who he deemed as having potential, but they are lacking a key component/emotion: Love. Although she joined LME successfully, she had to collect points as she helped other people, at the same time, also getting random jobs.

The story then continues with Kyoko's journey in the showbiz world. Despite facing many challenges and troublemakers, she ended up overcoming the obstacles and became friends with the people she met.

EVIL Spirits

Another main male protagonist is Ren Tsuruga, No. 1 male celebrity. He is hated by Sho as he is more popular. In the beginning of the anime, they hate each other, but after joining LME, Kyoko hates him even more because of his attitude against her. Ren does not like Kyoko's motive of joining the showbiz world, and he thinks that all actors and actresses should be focused in their jobs, not having revenge as their top priority. So he purposely pisses her off.

Of course lots of things happened along the way and resulted in both Sho and Ren falling in love with Kyoko. (though both males denies it.) And this results in an over used plot-line of a triangle love.

Impressions:

Obsessed with being a princess

Yeah, so this anime is really good. I really like how the characters can act so well. It's really amazing to see them in action. The suspense of the anime is well handled and the story is closely following the manga. The randomness of some things in the anime is really quite humorous.

I wouldn't say that the art is the best, but it is definitely watch-able. And the guys are freaking tall... What I really like about the manga/anime is that Kyoko is actually not very pretty. I mean, out in the anime/manga world, there are tons of beautiful or well-endowed females. I like how Kyoko is portrayed as an average looking girl that has an impressive ability, and I think that's really important. What you have on the inside rather than on the outside. It shows that any normal person with courage and ability can achieve near-impossible goals. :D

I totally love this anime. It is about the only anime that I know that has its story-line revolving about showbiz world. The characters are easy to fall in love and empathize with, with the exception of Sho (in my opinion).

Genre: Romance, Comedy

This anime premired on Oct 5 2008 and ended on March 29 2009. It has a total of 25 episodes.
There is a Taiwanese drama based on this anime that ended recently. A total of 15 episodes. The name of the drama is Extravagant Challenge.

There is no news about a 2nd season of anime for skip beat. Although there are rumors, but no official news has been released. The anime never resolved the love triangle between the main protagonists. So there might be another season in the future, but it would not be anytime soon, since the manga hasn't touched on resolving the romance too.