English Dub Review: Oshi No Ko “Game of Telephone”

Overview:

The creator of Tokyo Blade isn’t happy with the unfaithful adaptation of her manga and demands a revision of the entire script. However, only twenty days remain until opening.

Our Take:

The thing I love about this show is how it provides insight into show business. It’s not the first show to do that, but we are more used to it about Hollywood as a Western audience. Seeing how it works in Japan is very interesting but that doesn’t mean it isn’t relevant to Western media. I’m sure we have all gone to see a movie or TV show based on our favorite book or comic and thought “Why can’t they just follow the source material?” Hopefully, this episode provides insight into why that doesn’t always work out for the people on the project.

No one purposefully tries to put out a bad project, they do their best. At first, I thought the scriptwriter sucked too, and understood why the manga creator would want all the revisions. But then we learn about all the things the scriptwriter put himself through to make the best play possible. He loved Tokyo Blade and wanted to make a play that showed that love but he also knows what makes a good play. The problem was the game of telephone that happened because the author’s revisions would go through five other people before they reached the scriptwriter. There are only twenty days till the play starts and it’s off to a rocky start.