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The story
A thread that started with the post “I don’t get what’s so great about Kohaku” sparked a wider debate about the value of NHK’s Kohaku Uta Gassen (the famous New Year’s Eve Red and White Song Festival). One trigger was Juice=Juice’s failure to land a spot on this year’s show, which set off claims that “Kohaku is a washed-up relic surviving on prestige alone,” countered by arguments that “a program still watched by nearly a third of all households is rare” and “getting picked for Kohaku has become a crucial status symbol in today’s idol world.” Some posters pointed to veteran artists like Tatsuro Yamashita and Kazumasa Oda, who have never once appeared on Kohaku, to argue that “the real greats don’t bother with Kohaku” — turning the show’s very criteria for value into the central point of debate.
What people said
And Juice=Juice couldn't even get on that
Yeah, it's not even worth appearing on, is it?
[Prediction] Let's guess the excuse patterns Juice fans will trot out over the Kohaku snub
https://kizuna.5ch.io/test/read.cgi/morningcoffee/1794468830/
Number 4 on that list
That thread nailed it lol
That's just authority-worship, isn't it
I can't even be bothered to watch TV at all, let alone Kohaku
Though it's not like I'm watching videos, streams, or social media instead
Says the guy browsing a trash board like Ookami (a Hello! Project fan forum) and still saying that
Million-sellers on singles and albums one after another
They're Japan's top idol group
So even skipping Kohaku wouldn't make a dent
Just like Nogizaka46, they don't have a hit everyone actually knows
A group that's big with hardcore fans, not the general public
In terms of "wouldn't make a dent," that applies to Juice too though
So groups like ILLIT would get the "oh, my grandkid's favorite" treatment lol
Forget the grandkid angle, they wouldn't even know what ILLIT is singing lol
More like "huh, that's a weird dance" reaction
Classic Hello! otaku move
Those old Hello! fanboys love their sour grapes
The fans just want the Juice members to see their grandparents smile, that's all it is
I'll give it that much value, sure
There's no deeper meaning than that
It's that the status of having been picked for Kohaku carries huge weight in today's cutthroat idol scene
So that makes Kohaku amazing then lol lol
The truly great ones never bother with Kohaku
Grandpa, that's way too old-school
Yeah, and YMO and Kiyoshiro Imawano never appeared either
The real ones don't show up
and putting anyone who messes up on blast
it's just dumb
Sounds like you're enjoying it just fine lol
Apparently they don't even do that anymore
https://kizuna.5ch.io/test/read.cgi/morningcoffee/1794468830/
Isn't this thread playing out exactly like that prediction
Doesn't it feel pathetic to get called out this precisely?
Just because the pattern was predicted in advance doesn't mean the point doesn't land
I've watched every single pattern play out in just these past few hours
Impressive how dead-on that analysis was
Guess all that's left is "favors" behind the scenes (makura, slang for trading sexual favors for opportunities) and throwing someone under the bus
This pattern comes up a lot
Reon Inoue, Maika Sasaki, Aya Ogawa, and Yui Sakurai
it looks like Reon Inoue is the only one not getting on Kohaku
Even though she's more talented than any of them
What created the decisive gap between her and the other performers in that collab
was that the Hello! Project members sang like they were at a live show even though it was TV
There's no way an amateur who can't adjust for the camera gets to appear on Kohaku
She already got completely owned over that — "it's TV, look at the camera" — lol
Exactly
Inoue (from Juice) can't sing while staying aware of the camera
"Lesser" would've suited it better
Did you even watch the video?
She was looking right into the camera
You really just make stuff up and act like whoever says it first wins, huh
Background and Key Points of This Debate
NHK’s Kohaku Uta Gassen has aired live every New Year’s Eve since 1951, and the annual announcement of its lineup has long been treated as an end-of-year ritual — over time, whether or not an artist gets picked has come to serve as a kind of benchmark for idols and musicians alike. The thread split between those who point to the show’s high viewership (one post claimed “a third of all Japanese people watch it”) as proof of its authority, and those who argue it “only survives on tradition and has no real value,” drawing comparisons to other long-running institutions like sumo to make the same point. One thing readers might easily get wrong is that the fact certain big-name musicians have never appeared on Kohaku (the thread cited names like Tatsuro Yamashita and Kazumasa Oda) doesn’t by itself disprove the show’s overall value — each artist’s reasons for declining or staying away differ case by case. Likewise, high viewership speaks to the scale of the broadcast, but that’s a separate question from how talented any individual performer is, and the thread kept conflating these two points throughout.
*This article is compiled from excerpts and a summary of the 5ch (Hello! Project) thread “Sorry, but I don’t get what’s so great about Kohaku.”
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