What are Mari Okada's other productions? I feel that one of her series or the other would eventually feel the pain brought by AKB0048's pressure.

Right now she has this, Aquarion Evol and Lupin III, and she's undoubtedly doing prep work for the Hanasaku Iroha project that's coming later in the year plus whatever projects she has for the summer.

OKAY, 2nd PV!

FLAWLESS SKAYKBITCHES!!
the queens of Japan is coming to dominate in 2D <3

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1g5uqtspv1qcbdug.gif

LOL JK :P

But anyway the concert scene is so gorgeous <3 and I love the remix A!K!B!DOUBLE O!48 overture lol

http://i42.tinypic.com/fleo7k.gif

I'm happy all the unpopular girls (beside Kuumin and Mayuyu) are getting promotion. My Amina baby is finally getting the recognition she deserve ;___; Tho listening to them I know why....lol the loli voices members....

From her blog, Rena Matsui wasn't happy about...
Better stream it up, Aki-P. :heh: Somewhere like at Nico or DMM.

LOL.
any news if they'll pre-air the first ep on Nico like the other animes?

Dunno, and wondering if it'll be simulcast with a US-based streamcast service, but it would be mindblowing if licensed for global airing.

Despite some small bits of news and info, in general 90% of the project is still completely shrouded in secrecy, and heck, I couldn't find any mention of the show in, say, Kana Ueda's (anime!Tomochin) blog, so she and the other VAs must've signed an NDA apart from the contract.

OBTW,
account: @AKB0048_anime
hashtag: #akb0048

Wow..this is like some top secret anime or something considering the lack of infos :O
We hadn't heard anything about the theme song AKB members will sing too...

Since AKB is the representative of Japan's tourism and all, they got some pull to get int. license.
Hoping Crunchyroll simulcast this anime. They're already simulcasting all or at least most of the anime this season.

By following their Twitter account, found out that they were working on the OP portion, and then afureko work:

OP storyboards:
http://twitter.com/#!/AKB0048_anime/...598595/photo/1
http://twitter.com/#!/AKB0048_anime/...336576/photo/1

Afureko sessions:
http://twitter.com/#!/AKB0048_anime/...598144/photo/1

BTW, hope that gastroenteritis thing goes away so that Mayuyu can get back in and wear Chieri's shoes again.

https://p.twimg.com/AqFdnK2CAAEK1fJ.jpg:large

I see a creature (mascot?) thing in one of the sketch on the lower right :O

Sigh...AKB girls are dropping like flies...Acchan, Takamina, Sayaka, Yukirin, Sashi, Tomochin, Chiyuu, Kojiharu, now Mayuyu...:(

OffTopic: Anytime soon, Aki-P would be forced to retweak the girls' working schedules so that it doesn't affect their health and well-being.

Ontopic: As with most shows under Kawamori (i.e. Macross 7, Frontier, Aquarion EVOL), yep, there's going to be a trusty pet.

It's their fault. Election is coming up, I think they're forcing themselves to work so they don't lose rank. Jurina was told to slow down by Mariko and Sayaka meaning it's not just the management overworking her.
IDK..I guess they have amazing work ethic so I admire that but no point being 1st if you're half dead hook up to IV..=___='

Those are just storyboards, not genga. It does tell us that Kawamori is storyboarding the OP though. :)

Fixed, my bad. :heh:

Given the tight secrecy around it, still little incoming news, unfortunately.

Well, it'll be airing next week, so not much longer until we can see what horrors await us. Lol.

So, are you predicting a flop? We still can't be sure if this is going to fly or not, given that we know it's an original work.

BTW~ do you have any idea what character is like the "spirit inheritance" of the real AKB girls?
I'm thinking of doing some fanart and pair the fictional girls with the real ones and do 5 pics according to 5 AKB songs but so far I can only tell Acchan/Nagisa, Mayuyu/Yuka, and Takamina/Kanata

http://aramatheydidnt.livejournal.co....html#comments

I have a feeling Mimori is Kojiharu tho consider the description is tall and have a nice body and Suzuko is Yukirin because she's an idol wota like Yuki is but Chieri give off the princess vibe Yuki have too...:\

Anyway i don't know how it will turn out but it might be so bad it's entertaining XD
Who know~ the animation for the concert scene look pretty nice tho.

One has to wonder if the poor PV impression is because the show is actually some sort of huge disaster (Satelight and early production disasters almost seem to go hand in hand a lot of the time...Kissdum: Engage Planet anyone?) or because the AKB48 fans of which this shows target audience is almost certainly a large part of has unrealistic expectations.

There's actually tons of theories I'd love to run over, but I want to hold off until there's more of a basis to go on.

Looks more and more like for fans only show without a larger audience appeal.

^
By wider audience you mean anime fans who are non AKB fans? I think there's alot of high expectation and skepticism from anime fans, especially the hardcore ones, concerning this anime. Being Japan's national idol is one thing but able to make a good anime is another. But since AKB name is attach to this, people who aren't anime fans might watch this too.
anyway if it's just for fans only, they wouldn't spend so much money casting popular seiyuus. Fans would just be happy hearing the girls' voices.

It's hard to tell right now before the show start out anyway...especially with this lack of information <__<
Even if it's just targeting their fanbase, they can still pull in 3-4% viewership (same with their AKBINGO nightly show) which is pretty well for a non jump/original anime and air at late night.

My only concern about this is...despite the people they hired I wonder how serious they are about this anime because there hasn't really been a promotional attempt for this show at all. AKB is practically omnipresent in Tokyo promoting everything from coffees to shoes with posters practically all over Shibuya, even taking over the 109 just for their music video collection DVD release, poster all over train station, actually taking over train stations just to promote candy http://www.tokyohive.com/2012/03/akb...nirs-of-tokyo/, Harajuku etc but I hasn't heard or seen any billboard for this show....They seem pretty lazy promoting this project compare to their other releases but they obviously spend alot on this...