In an era where Japanese entertainment—from chart-topping musicians to binge-worthy anime—has captured a global fascination, there’s no shortage of glossy portrayals of stardom. But what happens when you peel back the curtain and explore the shadows behind the spotlight? Enter the manga Oshi no Ko (推しの子), unraveling the pressures, sacrifices, and lies that fuel the machine of stardom. The manga has received critical acclaim in its four-year run, but it begs the question: Is this groundbreaking social commentary or another sensationalist story about the entertainment world?
To fully understand the series, grasping the concept of idols and idol media is essential. Idol media refers to entertainment centered around pop idols—performers celebrated for their rigorously crafted personas, which often involve singing, dancing, and other engagement with fans. These idols create an image of perfection designed to captivate audiences and foster intense loyalty from fans.
This culture doesn’t just impact the fans—it has a major effect on the idols themselves. More generally, such a culture creates a toxic pressure cooker environment for entertainers and others who wish to achieve the perfect image of themselves for a target audience. Many people, particularly young adults and teenagers, can relate to how the internet has exacerbated unrealistic and unhealthy body standards by amplifying the slightest wrinkle or bit of weight gain.
Oshi no Ko (2020-2024) dives straight into these harsh realities. Created by Aka Akasaka, known for Kaguya-sama: Love is War (2015-2022), and illustrated by Mengo Yokoyari, the manga explores the cutthroat and brutal world of idols and the entertainment industry. The series centers on the reincarnated souls of a doctor named Gorō and a terminally ill patient named Sarina, who become the twins Aquamarine “Aqua” and Ruby Hoshino, respectively. These twins are the secret children of a famous idol, Ai Hoshino. Both Gorō and Sarina idolized Ai in their past lives, and her early, brutal murder becomes the defining tragedy that sets the two twins on their respective paths.
Ruby sets her sights on becoming a star in the bright, glamorous side of the idol industry to follow in her mother’s footsteps. In contrast, Aqua finds himself infiltrating the entertainment industry’s dark underbelly—where manipulation, exploitation, and hidden agendas are the norm—to uncover the truth and seek revenge.
When Oshi no Ko first gained popularity, I was skeptical. The entertainment industry narrative seemed potentially cliché—like Love Live! Sunshine!! (2016–), or The Idolmaster Cinderella Girls U149 (2016–2024). Unlike other stories, Oshi no Ko was a far more nuanced and scathing critique of parasocial relationships, industry pressures, and the cost of being a star.
Even the artwork by Akasaka and Yokoyari seems to play into the centrality of that theme of the parasocial; the broad, vivid strokes of color capture the writer’s characterization of Ai Hoshino as both an untouchable perfect goddess and a tragically imperfect human, demonstrating the crux of the idol movement—artificial personas designed by the system to be ideal for the audience yet a façade of the entertainer.
As opposed to the many idol media that revolve around the romanticization of the world of entertainment, Oshi no Ko is far more interested in deconstructing the system. It’s an analysis of the society that allows it to exist, peeling away the curtain on a Kafkaesque world that often traps its participants in lies and perfection.
One such example is the story’s spotlight on the problem of parasocial relationships in the age of cameras and screens. Sarina’s original life is emblematic of this—she starts out as a terminally ill, young teen patient in a lonely hospital whose mother stopped visiting because she didn’t want to think about the pain anymore. She is trapped in a gray world of blood tests and X-rays without a connection to the outside world. Why wouldn’t she form unhealthy parasocial and social idealizations of people as vivacious as Ai Hoshino?
Speaking more broadly, identifying the broader causes of unhealthy parasocial worship of celebrities can be tricky, but there are some clues scattered about in other societal trends. Even before the internet, people across the world have found themselves lonely. This trend is often accompanied by suburban sprawl, fewer friendships, and a more secular society. Oshi no Ko demonstrates one of the key demographics that idol culture appeals to: people who feel adrift and without purpose. Perhaps they work in something mundane and too humdrum for their innermost desires—someone who thinks that they need a little bit more light and color in their lives.
A parasocial relationship is, by definition, a one-sided one: the sweet promise of the idol, entertainer, or demagogue that will give love and attention to the acolyte in return for loyalty and adoration. Idols like Ai Hoshino are secular replacements for traditional communities and religious structures, fulfilling roles once occupied by those institutions.
As the nature of parasocial relationships might suggest, someone you uphold as an idol can do no wrong. So why do fans sometimes turn on their idols? This bedeviling paradox is resuscitated in this manga series: Why did Ai Hoshino’s fan kill her?
The simple answer is that when the perpetrator learned about her having two children, it completely shattered the carefully crafted image of the perfect and untouchable idol she had built for her fanbase. Ai is a poster child for the ethos of our “fake it until you make it” societies. She has carefully crafted an image of herself as a charismatic country girl and has convinced herself that she genuinely loves her followers.
Perhaps Oshi no Ko isn’t necessarily critiquing the creation of masks but is warning about forgetting the difference between the mask and the person behind it. A warning against creating a mask so convincing that even the artist believes it is true…
The problems endemic to the entertainment industry don’t end with the audience or entertainer but extend to the private interests involved. In a world where feedback from fans is nearly instantaneous, producers are driven to become increasingly aggressive with tension and drama, even if it has adverse outcomes for the participants or is risky in general. Remember how Survivor actually killed someone and injured others? The manga’s Dating Show arc shows us the complete picture on and off-set and exemplifies this problem perfectly. When Akane, the struggling actress, and another character have a spat on set, their eventual reconciliation is not shown in the final cut, as it doesn’t fit the narrative of constant friction. The producers let the audience make their conclusions to draw more clicks and views, even if that makes Akane suddenly the target of fan outrage and intense cyberbullying that puts a drain on her mental health.
Despite how much we know about the presence of abuse in the entertainment industry, it seems that no amount of media attention will change the system. Because of this intense pressure, as we’ve explored earlier, Oshi no Ko reasons that the entertainment industry encourages not just idols but entertainers, in general, to give up and become the victims or choose to be the perpetrators in order to rise to the top and maintain their position.
Spoiler alert! I won’t divulge too much, but one of the primary antagonists is a victim turned perpetrator. Having been abused by an entertainer in the industry and reduced into a broken person, they ended up joining the entertainment industry to become a high-profile name. One that would continue the cycle of abuse and violence in the system.
So what?
I loved the dynamic between Aqua and Ruby, with their opposite approaches and the fact that they were still equally obsessed with their mother’s memory.
Through his obsession, Aqua’s path of cynical revenge negatively affects those who care about him, such as Akane or Ruby. The reader is acutely aware of Aqua’s self-destructiveness while taking a paternalistic approach to what he thinks will help Ruby. He lives a life of Kierkegaard’s Knight of Infinite Resignation, believing in a goal that he knows will only bring him misery. Yet, he is not perturbed by all the problems he brings to people who care about him while on his warpath.
Ruby is far more faithful to herself regarding her methodology than the rest of her family, even if she isn’t entirely sure exactly what she wants. Ruby is Kierkegaard’s Knight of Faith, willing to sacrifice her happiness and ultimately being rewarded by her dream that she can break through despite the odds being stacked against her. In that sense, her actions foreshadow the transcendence of her obsession by superseding her mother.
If anything, Ruby’s success reflects a silver lining in an industry filled with darkness that someone can succeed based on luck, passion, and magnetism. Dolly Parton made a similar blind leap of faith and managed to succeed. It’s not to suggest that everyone can be Dolly Parton (nor am I asking you to be so.) However, Oshi no Ko indicates that not everyone is condemned as victims or victimizers in the system.
That said, while Ruby’s story and the manga’s themes highlight brilliant moments of hope and triumph, the manga is far from flawless. The latter part of the series and the ending suffer from clearly rushed storytelling from a decreasingly interested writer, leaving numerous unresolved plot threads.
I won’t criticize the existence of love triangles; those are the bread and butter of angst, and the main one involving Aqua’s relationships with Akane and Kana isn’t the issue. The problem lies with how the resolution feels unsatisfying, especially the intense emotional dependencies the two have on Aqua. I understand how this quote might seem a little out of context if you haven’t read the manga, but take Akane’s declaration, for example: “I would have even gone to hell as long as I was with you.” What makes the ending more jarring is how quickly these intense dependencies seemingly disappear in the last two chapters. It feels abrupt and unwarranted, as if the characters suddenly moved on without addressing the weight of their emotional investments. It gives the impression that the series is trying to juggle too many threads simultaneously, ultimately losing the emotional impact it built up earlier.
Another issue stems from the asymmetry of the amount of story time given to each of the two twins. The manga is very Aqua-centric and has trouble deciding if Ruby is a supporting or co-main character, which hurts the narrative of the twins’ dual paths.
And speaking of narrative, another issue that popped up in later chapters was trying to create a moral problem about forgiveness and how some of the perpetrators of abuse are victims themselves. However, it creates a cognitive dissonance when these same antagonists are portrayed in a way that shows them to be genuinely unremorseful.
Despite all its narrative problems, Oshi no Ko presents a fictionalized yet reflective question about the entertainment industry while maintaining a unique and engaging story. I’d highly recommend a read, and the anime has shown to be a reasonably faithful adaptation, with a catchy soundtrack to boot. I think it’s a good reflection on how many lies we’ve constructed for ourselves and the people around us…
