Real-life town where anime’s second arc takes place experiences hateful vandalism.
Regardless of whether or not you’re personally a fan, you’ve got to admire the success of the marketing team behind anime franchise Love Live! By promoting its animated school girl songstresses like real-life idol singers, Love! Live!! has become one of the most popular, and profitable anime of the 21st century.
But just as Love Live!’s idols have achieved popularity rivaling human pop stars, so too are there detractors who are extremely vocal in their dislike of certain characters and sub-groups within the franchise. Not long ago, an anti-fan was spotted dragging a Love Live! plushie on the ground behind his car as he drove, and now come problems with a Love Live! Sunshine!! promotion in the Shizuoka Prefecture town of Numazu, where the anime takes place.
As a bit of cross-promotion, Numazu has installed manhole covers featuring the Love Live! Sunshine!! girls (because in Japan, even manhole covers are part of the local aesthetic). However, someone has been spray-painting over the artwork, as seen in the above video posted by Numazu city councilman Ryu Ozawa (@llllnumazullll on Twitter).
This wasn’t an isolated incident, either. Ozawa also posted photos of another Love Live! cover that had been similarly defaced.
It’s one thing to be salty enough about the success of Love Live! to drag a plushie (that you ostensibly bought and paid for) behind your car, but spray-painting manhole covers is straight-up vandalism, and supporters of the series, as well as basic human decency, voiced their hopes that the culprit is apprehended as quickly as possible.
Oazawa himself went on to say:
“Seriously…rethink the way you’re living your life. Do you want to spend it spray-painting over manhole covers? If you don’t snap out of it and start thinking more about having a proper purpose, you’re going to end up living an empty life until the day you die.”
Considering all the effort Numazu has gone to in promoting itself as “the Love Live! Sunshine!! town” (a local car rental agency even has official Love! Live! itasha for rent) and the tourism money that comes in as a result, odds are Ozawa isn’t the only local legislator who’s upset over the vandalism, and hopefully the news out of Numazu will be back to more benign things, like gigantic inflatable anime panties, soon.
Source: Twitter/@llllnumazullll via Jin