REVIEW: ‘Oshi No Ko,’ Episode 11 – “Idol”

After loads of practice and preparation, B Komanchi is ready to take the stage. But while Kana stands at the center of the stage, she feels like she’s anywhere but at the center of it all in Oshi No Ko Episode 11, the finale episode. The episode takes some more time to explore her struggles with the past, though it may also give her glimpses of a brighter future.

The vast majority of this episode takes place as B Komanchi plays out its debut performance on a little side stage of the idol festival. The performance the girls give is a fantastic one. The music pops off, and the visual presentation is filled with kinetic energy as the camera bobs and weaves between the girls. It has so much energy, it feels like a solid payoff to the band’s journey to this point.

Sprinkled throughout the performance, however, are far more somber moments. As the girls dance and sing their way through Oshi No Ko Finale Episode, the episode repeatedly cuts back to Kana, as she looks around her and feels like she is once again being overlooked. As the girls dance, glow sticks are waved, each color chosen for one of the band membes. As Kana looks out over the crowd, she sees far more sticks for her bandmates than for her, forcing her to relive all the times in the past she felt left behind.

While this might feel a bit overboard a response for something like glow sticks, when a person struggles with that sort of weight, we often go looking for reasons to see its presence, whether it’s really there or not. And whether her response is reasonable, the moments that this episode shows that have built up this inferiority complex for her certainly seem like the sort of string of events that would leave a person with those sorts of feelings.

But while the runtime of Oshi No Ko Finale Episode is given mostly to Kana, it is Aqua that steals the show. Coming to cheer his friends and sister on, Aqua has a moment that feels like a shout-out to the Aqua of episode one, rather than the colder more calculating individual later episodes have crafted him as being. Seeing him in such fun and upbeat light, makes me hope that perhaps the young man’s soul isn’t completely lost, though we’ll have to wait for later seasons to know for sure.

The final minutes of the episode set up the next phase of Aqua’s plan for revenge as it lays out his next acting project, as well as which of his friends will just happen to be participating alongside him. While this setup works, it feels like an odd note to end a season on. Maybe I’ve just gotten too used to cliffhanger hooks or tantalizing hints at things to come, but Oshi No Ko Finale Episode comes off feeling like just another episode, as opposed to something that has been laid out to wet the viewer’s appetite enough to keep them hungry till season two.

So while the Oshi No Ko Episode 11 feels like a weak wrap-up to a season, it does some great work as an episode. Fun music and strong characters make it an enjoyable entry into the series.

Oshi No Ko Episode 11 is streaming now on HIDIVE.