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The story
A thread appeared on 5ch’s Hello! Project board pleading for three trainees — Kotomi Suzuki, Yuna Aoki, and Nana Tamura — to be added to ANGERME as soon as possible. Replies were split over whether the three actually want ANGERME or have their eyes on a different group; some insisted Nana Tamura is “100% set on ANGERME,” while others speculated that Kotomi Suzuki and Yuna Aoki are actually aiming for Juice=Juice. The conversation then spiraled into predictions about when current members will graduate and what the group’s lineup might look like years from now.
What people said
Kotomi's motto is "ōbaitōri" (a proverb meaning each flower blooms in its own way, in its own time)
No way
Just not happening
That's only Kotomi
Tamura and Aoki are aiming for ANGERME
Dumping anyone else into it would just feel unfair to them.
Being the oldest as a 9th-grader while constantly getting scolded and cut from songs has got to be rough.
She and Saeki were already the only two stuck with zero unit songs and nothing but group numbers — and yesterday even those group numbers got trimmed by one compared to last time.
She's clearly better suited to something outside Hello! Project.
As for the red slot after Hashisako, that really should go to Suzuki or Tamura.
Isn't the closest comparison Kosuga from Sma 2nd Gen?
And Mitsubachi (Tsubaki Factory) had lately been taking the long view with rookies and avoiding cutting them too much, too.
She's in the "lizard" slot (fan slang for a particular member type), 19th generation, right?
Panda should really go back to green.
That whole switch reeks of favoritism and backroom dealing.
If that kind of selfishness gets allowed, things will spiral out of control.
Other way around —
pink should be taken from Tameshita and handed to Momoha.
Whose voice did you hear that line in?
That played in Tamenaga's voice in my head and now I want to commit murder
Sure, it overlaps with the other Hana, but who cares.
Then how about "Byo"
With looks and a figure like that, plus being good enough at competitive tennis to make a name for herself, she could've dialed tennis back to a hobby, gone the normal school route, and had an easy life.
Why take the thorny path instead?
No, going for idol is fine — with that face, sure.
But why Hello! Project?
She doesn't seem the least bit interested in singing or dancing.
If anything, she probably hates it.
Meanwhile Kotomi's only solo moment was in the rotating "Seinen no Shuchou" segment of Nippon no DNA, and she got totally upstaged by Sakata (who's got insane vocal power) — a literal elementary schooler.
Yamamoto making the final round of auditions wasn't for nothing, and once Sakata's technique catches up to that vocal power, she's going to be something else.
Kunio: "Aiki Sugata is transferring in"
Tamenaga – Leader
Matsumoto – Sub-leader
Hirayama
Shimoderiya
Goto
Nagano
Plus maybe three new high-school-age members
Matsumoto will probably move on to something else once she's out of university too.
And how long do Hirayama and Goto even plan to stick around?
If Matsumoto, Hirayama, and Goto all bail too, the group collapses — so I'm assuming they stay put.
Once Goto and Hirayama start burning out, there's no holding them back.
Tamenaga alone seems like she'll stick around forever, though.
Matsumoto's young but senior in tenure, so that's one thing — but if Goto and Hirayama graduate first, that's bad news.
It was the same with Musume (Morning Musume) — a popular mid-tier member graduating early does serious damage to the group.
Wouldn't it have been better to hold onto Hashisako, who didn't seem to be burning out?
Though I guess they did get her to stay an extra six months.
Background and talking points
New member additions in Hello! Project only ever become official once management formally announces them, so it’s worth flagging that the thread’s talk of “who’s aiming for which group” is hearsay and speculation, not statements from the trainees themselves. Posts predicting when current members will graduate fall into the same category — unconfirmed guesswork with no official announcement behind it, not fact. One exchange was also left out of this piece: a back-and-forth where posters singled out specific members as unwanted (e.g. “Tamura only, nobody else needed”) and traded insults like “You’re the one who’s not needed, idiot” with anyone who pushed back. It just repeated the same claims and abuse while stoking fan-vs-fan conflict, so it added nothing worth including.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Hello! Project board) thread “Hurry up and let Kotomi Suzuki, Yuna Aoki, and Nana Tamura join ANGERME!“.
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