Characters / Love Live! – Aqours

Love Live! Character Index
Love Live! (μ's) | Love Live! Sunshine!! (Aqours) (Yohane the Parhelion -SUNSHINE in the MIRROR-) | Love Live! Nijigasaki High School Idol Club (NijiGaku) | Love Live! Superstar!! (Liella!) | Link! Like! Love Live! | Love Live! School idol festival

This is the character sheet for Aqours from Love Live! Sunshine!!.

Beware of spoilers

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Aqours

"We want to shine!" From left to right: Ruby, Dia, Hanamaru, Riko, Chika, Kanan, You, Mari and Yoshiko.

The franchise's successor group, this time hailing from Uranohoshi Girls' High School in the rural seaside neighborhood of Uchiura in Numazu. Founded on a whim by µ's fan Chika Takami, they were initially idols for the sake of being idols, but the shaky status of Uranohoshi as an institute gave the group a new purpose, being to support their school and its reputation.

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In General

Sunshine!!

• Animal Motifs: One piece of merchandise, as well as a set of SIF cards released on Dec. 14, 2017, matches the members of Aqours with a stuffed aquatic animal that (usually) references their character:
  • Chika has a prawn, like the plush she has in her room.
  • Riko has a sea otter.
  • You was associated with a walrus based on the real-life Izu-Mito Sea Paradise's mascot Uchicchi ever since she became the center for Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM. She also wore a walrus costume in her Imagine Spot on episode 11 of first season. Season 2 reveals that she did work at Izu-Mito Sea Paradise and wore that costume.
  • Kanan has a dolphin to represent with how fond she is of being underwater. Also, her image symbol as a member of Aqours depicts a pair of dolphins.
  • Dia has a penguin, the same animal that Mari "mistook" her for in the Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM drama CD.
  • Yoshiko has a shark that matches the hanging sleeping bag she uses in episode 10 of first season.
  • Hanamaru has a toad. Her voice actress, Kanako Takatsuki, revealed on Twitter that she owns the same plush.
  • Mari has a leopard seal, referencing Michael, the seal she fished up in the Guilty Kiss drama.
  • Ruby has a coelacanth, which may be the same one that Hanamaru got for her in the Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM drama.
• Be Yourself: A major theme of Sunshine is the girls learning what being Aqours means to them and how to shine on their own. In the first season the girls often tried to emulate μ's instead of finding their own unique identity as a group. This is eventually called out by Saint Snow after they come in last place in the Tokyo round and the girls are left wondering what it means to be their own group. By the end of season 1 the girls realise that they no longer need to emulate μ's to be successful and from that point on decide to find their own way of shining. This is shown by the fact that afterwards the girls rarely discuss μ's at all in season 2.
• Beware the Nice Ones: They're all genuinely friendly people; however, they give Mari's mother a pretty scathing Death Glare when she attempts to force Mari to give up on her wishes for her future for an Arranged Marriage.
• Cast Herd: Much like µ's, Aqours' nine members can be divided into several groups of three (or less).
  • There are the years, with first years (Ruby, Hanamaru, and Yoshiko), second years (Chika, You and Riko), and third years (Kanan, Dia and Mari).
  • With SIF in the picture, there's one attribute representative for each year, with Smile members Hanamaru, Chika, and Mari; Pure members Ruby, You, and Kanan; and Cool members Yoshiko, Riko and Dia.
  • Then there are the sub-units CYaRon (Chika, You and Ruby), AZALEA (Dia, Kanan and Hanamaru), and Guilty Kiss (Yoshiko, Riko and Mari).
• Cast of Expies: Downplayed. The characters gain some traits of the School Idol Project series, though they're not exactly the same.
  • Chika resembles Honoka for her outgoing Genki Girl personality, being optimistic and somewhat goofy. On a deeper level, she actually has low self-esteem, a trait she shares with Hanayo and Nico.
  • You mixes traits of Kotori (Chika's supportive childhood friend and the group's costume designer; they also have the same grey-brown hair color) and Rin (being rather impulsive, athletic and tomboyish).
  • Ruby resembles Hanayo for being a meek and shy Shrinking Violet, yet very passionate about idols.
  • Dia resembles Eli for being the Student Council President, serious and business-oriented, and starting out as kind of an Obstructive Bureaucrat who becomes kinder and friendlier overtime. Furthermore, both have a little sister who likes idols.
  • Hanamaru shares some traits with Rin, being the more cheerful and easygoing best friend of a terribly shy girl, and also having a Verbal Tic. However, she's bad at sports and is much quieter, and has more in common with Nozomi (a laidback girl who frequently spends her time at a temple and has an interest in spiritual subject matter).
  • Kanan somewhat resembles Umi for her blue hair, though personality-wise, Kanan is more laid-back, and thus resembles Nozomi for her status as the kindhearted Team Mom.
  • Mari resembles Nozomi for her mischievous tendencies, groping the other girls' breasts, but she also serves as the big sister figure who gives out advice. They also have purple as their image color and the largest chest sizes of their respective groups.
  • Riko has some traits of Umi (being generally serious and polite, but also shy and prone to freaking out easily) and Maki (being a piano player and song composer). That being said, she's less stern than Umi and significantly friendlier than Maki.
  • Yoshiko resembles Nico for her Cloudcuckoolander attitude, Butt-Monkey status, and occasional Tsundere tendencies, though deep down they're both rather awkward and insecure. However, Yoshiko lacks Nico's egotistical streak, and while she can be defensive at times she's much less abrasive.
• Characterization Marches On: The members' characterizations in the Dengeki magazine, manga, novels, and anime are once again all somewhat different with only the characters' core traits remaining consistent between media. As with the original Love Live, this is an effect and a liberty taken with a franchise that has more than one Alternate Continuity running at a time.
  • An example in terms of plot is Kanan, who in magazine interviews talked warmly about the idol business as another one of Chika's antics that she was pulled into. In the anime's backstory Kanan herself started an idol group with Dia and Mari in order to save the school, and those memories are a big source of angst for the third years for most of the anime series.
  • It's also notable in Dia's case; in magazine interviews she has no initial interest in being an idol (only joining the group after losing a bet to Chika) and expresses disbelief that she'll have to wear frilly idol costumes, but in the anime she's a huge fan of µ's and willingly formed an idol group with Mari and Kanan in the past. She's also much more of an Aloof Big Sister towards Ruby, even to the point of getting along with Hanamaru better than with Ruby and saying that Hanamaru feels more like her real sister, but in the anime she really spoils Ruby.
• Childhood Friends: Several. Chika and You are childhood friends, they also has this relationship with Kanan (though Kanan is more of an older sister figure); Kanan was also friends with Mari and Dia ever since the three of them were kids. Hanamaru is childhood friends with Ruby in Dengeki G's material, though in the anime this was changed to her being kindergarten classmates with Yoshiko.
• Color-Coded Characters: Each of them have one image color (listed in their character sections below) to represent them and they mostly stick with those colors with the exception of Yoshiko, whose "gray" image color is functionally better described as "grayscale" with how often it shifts from white to black, and sometimes even strays to blue. Kanan, at least in School Idol Festival, also seems to shift from green to blue.
• Contrasting Sequel Main Character: Despite various characters sharing similar traits with one another there are a few key differences between Aqours and μ's. While the members of μ's lived in Tokyo and went to a school that was located between three thriving neighborhoods, the members of Aqours live in the rural seaside neighborhood of Uchiura in Numazu, which is quite far away from Tokyo. While μ's were able to constantly improve themselves and able to easily advance through each stage of Love Live without any trouble, the girls of Aqours have had to struggle a lot more and undergo significantly more failures. Finally, even though they weren't able to pass Love Live in their first go around, μ's participation was enough to save their school in it's first semester. Conversely, even after participating in the preliminaries, Aqours’ school was still in danger of shutting down due to low perspective students and in the end they weren't able to get enough students in time and the school was forced to merge with another. The movie further reinforces this in regards to the aftermath of their respective third years' graduation: μ's has no intention of continuing further since they've already succeeded in their main objectives, while Aqours is still active and has passed down to the next generation.
• Country Mouse: All of the members grew up in the rural seaside town of Uchiura, and the fact that they're idols trying to make it nationwide despite the setbacks of being from the country is a key point of contrast between Aqours' story and µ's. Sole City Mouse Riko has extra narrative significance thanks to being the exception: she gained her valuable music skill from the city, is connected to Otonokizaka, and serves their guide when they visit Tokyo.
• Custom Uniform of Sexy: Some of their idol outfits fit this; there's also the beach episode, with most prominent examples being Mari (who even gets the camera focused on her belly when she's hungry), You (who cooks with an open shirt that reveals her belly) and Kanan (who spends a long time in her swimsuit, and later on in episode 12 she opens her wetsuit, showing her bikini top, belly and cleavage).
• Determinators: Even if they faced numerous setbacks and failures, they find the strength to stand back up and move on forwards. The biggest one on the group is, surprisingly enough, Chika.
• Depending on the Writer: In the Anime, Aqours starts from Chika, You, and Riko. In the manga, the group starts from Chika, Kanan, and Riko before You joined.
• Fangirls: While it's most obvious with Ruby and Dia all of the girls seem to have been inspired by μ's in one way or another with Chika even having a μ's poster on her wall in season 1. One of the major story arcs of the first season is the girls learning to shine on their own rather then just emulating their idols.
• Four-Philosophy Ensemble: When Chika, You, Riko, Hanamaru and Ruby formed the new Aqours group, the attitude of the remaining members who had to enter yet was fitting: Mari was the Optimist (the one with the more positive and cheerful attitude); Kanan was either the Realist or the Conflicted (easily the most balanced in her visions but was somewhat doubtful about reforming the group or not); Dia was The Cynic (of course, since she was the Obstructive Bureaucrat, against the formation of the group), and Yoshiko was the Apathetic (the chuunibyou living in her own world of eccentricity and delusions, who just acted weird).
• Four-Temperament Ensemble / Five Temperament Ensemble:
  • Chika and her three closer friends fit this dynamic (with a slight variation as the Choleric is missing):
    • Chika is the Eclectic (mostly Sanguine as she's an outgoing Genki Girl, but she also suffers more inner conflict than she lets on and has low self-esteem).
    • You is the Sanguine (a friendly but somewhat impulsive Passionate Sports Girl).
    • Kanan is the Phlegmatic (generally the most laidback and composed member of the group, and also the Team Mom).
    • Riko is a slight Melancholic (softspoken, reserved, and shy, usually tries to be levelheaded but is easily prone to panicking when things go wrong).
  • Going with the remaining members, they fit the temperaments almost perfectly:
    • Hanamaru is the Phlegmatic (a gentle, docile Bookworm).
    • Ruby and Yoshiko are both Eclectic (mutually combining traits of Melancholic and Sanguine). Ruby is very shy and kind of a crybaby, but is very bubbly and energetic at her best and is more passionate beneath the surface. Yoshiko comes across as an extroverted Large Ham, given she's a chuunibyou cloudcuckoolander, but is actually rather socially awkward and insecure.
    • Mari is the Sanguine (cheerful, eccentric, and mischievious).
    • Dia is the Choleric (serious and hardworking, but easily angered and prone to being melodramatic).
• Freudian Trio: By year:
  • The first years:
    • Hanamaru is surprisingly the superego; while somewhat eccentric in her own way, she's an intelligent, bookish, diligent and level-headed girl, and the calmest among the first years.
    • Ruby and Yoshiko tend to overlap roles. Yoshiko is eccentric, hammy and delusional, yet not exactly the most open about her feelings, which she tends to hide beneath her chuunibyou persona. Ruby, on the other hand, is more balanced, yet she's very shy and finds it painfully difficult to talk to strangers, freaking out and crying.
  • The second years:
    • Chika is either the id, being very outgoing, the most excitable and somewhat outlandish, or the ego, being more quiet and less impulsive in some way than You.
    • You is either the ego, being a bit more grounded and quiet than Chika yet still very upbeat, or the id, considering she's more impulsive and rash compared to Chika.
    • Riko is the superego, as she's the quietest and (generally) the most composed.
  • The third years:
    • Mari is the id, being the most eccentric, playful and mischievous of them.
    • Played With in Kanan and Dia's case. Dia is generally an assertive, all-business, perfectionist, so she would be the superego; that being said, she can be melodramatic and is very prone to yelling or losing her temper. Kanan, on the other hand, is more laidback and levelheaded; so she's mostly the ego (or the superego when Dia loses her cool).
• Girl Group: One composed of students from Uranohoshi Girls' High School.
• Legacy Character: A variant, as the third years had named their own group "Aqours" back when they were first years. While the second years were brainstorming names on the beach, Dia on a whim wrote her old group's name in the sand, which led to the unwitting second years adopting it as the name for their own group.
• Legacy Launch: A variant, as Dia gave the second years the idea to name their group "Aqours", which was the name of her old group, clearly wanting them to carry on her group's legacy. By Episode 9, however, the third years (all of the members of the original "Aqours") all join this new group, thus reclaiming their group's identity. Unlike most examples of this trope, the first and second years do not relinquish the title, but remain in the group as well.
• Leitmotif: All nine girls have a different tune that plays during special messages (such as Valentine's Day and New Year's messages).
  • Chika has a jazzy, energetic theme with some beach music vibes sprinkled in, which evidences her cheerful Genki Girl status.
  • Riko has a slow, but elegant piano piece, fitting her status as an Elegant Classical Musician.
  • Kanan has a relaxing, yet still upbeat theme with some high piano notes in the beginning, which fits her laid-back, kind and positive nature.
  • Dia's theme is written in the style of traditional Japanese music, fitting her serious and lawful personality.
  • You has a fanfare with drums and horns, fitting her temperamental and cheerful personality.
  • Yoshiko's theme is darkly dramatic, complete with organ music. Not surprising, considering her Yohane persona.
  • Hanamaru's theme is a slow, calming piece played on a Rhodes electric piano, fitting her bookish and calm nature.
  • Mari's theme wouldn't sound out of place in a palace thanks to the usage of fancy string instruments.
  • Ruby has a cutesy music box tune to fit her childlike appearance and personality.
• Meaningful Name: "Aqours" is a Portmanteau of "aqua", for the sea, and "ours", for "a dream we achieve together" (though it's still just pronounced as "Aqua").invoked
• One Degree of Separation: With the exception of Riko, everyone in Aqours was already connected before the group formed thanks to the prevalence of Childhood Friends. Yoshiko was a kindergarten classmate of Hanamaru, who is the best friend of Ruby, the younger sister of Dia, who in turn was friends with Mari and Kanan, the latter of whom was also friends with Chika, who practically grew up with You. This is all justified since they live in a rural seaside city with a small population, unlike the big city of the previous group.
• Only One Female Mold: Downplayed, but in comparison to µ's, the Aqours members have much more similar size measurements and heights on top of being more ordered by age (the tallest members are the third years, followed by the second years, then the first years). Hanamaru and Mari are the exceptions due to their relatively larger bust sizes.
• Passing the Torch: At the end of the movie, as a result of the original trio graduating, Aqours and its legacy are now in the care of the remaining six.
• Saving the Orphanage: Similarly to μ's in the previous series, Aqours focuses its efforts on saving their school from shutting down and merging with another school in Numazu. However, unlike μ's, Aqours was not initially founded with this goal in mind. Episode 8, however, reveals that this was why the third years started their initial endeavor as idols, since there was already a rumor that the school would shut down back when they were in their first year.
• Skewed Priorities: Mari invites the other third-years and the first-years to her house so that they can better come up with songs for the upcoming qualifiers. Instead, they lounge around and help themselves to some afternoon tea snacks.
• Title Drop: "Sunshine!" is part of their pre-performance cheer, similar to µ's "Music Start!".
• Town Girls: The second years: Riko is the elegant, polite Femme, while You is the athletic, tomboyish Butch and charismatic Genki Girl Chika is the Neither.
• With a Friend and a Stranger: The second years in Aqours, who were the first three members, are Chika, her Childhood Friend You, and Riko, the New Transfer Student with musical skills.

CYaRon!

CYaRon!'s first single, "Genki Zenkai DAY! DAY! DAY!"

The "Smile" subunit, denoted by their bright, poppy sounding music and cheery overtones. They occasionally get slower, softer, more melancholy songs to distinguish them from the usual "happy" stereotype as a way to exemplify their range and versatility. CYaRon! consists of Chika Takami, You Watanabe, and Ruby Kurosawa.

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• Ascended Meme: The misspelling "CRaYon!" (crayon), sometimes used jokingly to refer to the group, was referenced by the Uranohoshi High School Entrance Exam April Fools' Day gag.
• Genki Girl: The group's defining trait. Best exemplified with their first single, "Genki Zenkai DAY! DAY! DAY!".
• Lyrical Dissonance: The group's other forte. In particular, "Kaigandoori de Matteru yo" and "Sakura Baibai" are set to bouncy pop rock tracks while having sad lyrics.
• Meaningful Name: The capitalized parts of their subunit's name are taken from the first letter of each of their first names: Chika, You, and Ruby.

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Chika Takami

Image Color: Mikan

Age: 16

Birthday: August 1 (Leo)

Blood Type: B

Height: 157 cm

Three Sizes: B82/W59/H83

Skills: Softball, karaoke

Hobby: Iron bar, table-tennis, penmanship

Trademark Favorite Food: Mikan(!) ^note A citrus fruit similar to a mandarin orange or a tangerine

Least Favorite Food: Coffee and shiokara

Symbol: A mikan

Voiced by: Anju Inami (Japanese), Jad Saxton (English)

Aqours' founder and leader, who was inspired to create her own school idol group after seeing a µ's performance during a school trip. She serves as Aqours' lyricist along with Hanamaru. She lives at the Tochiman Inn, which is run by her family, and she also has a pet dog named Shiitake.

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• Adaptational Jerkass: Played for Laughs. Her puppet self in Sunshine's April Fools' special did not at all hesitate to beat up Kanan for a misunderstanding Kanan actually tried to clear up nor did she think twice about sucker headbutting a defenseless Ruby before asking her to join her school idol group.
• Adaptation Personality Change: Downplayed. In ALL STARS, due to being Out of Focus and thus having little to no opportunities to tap into her passionate or more grounded side as seen in the anime, she is played her up as a bit of a ditz with a hint of a Cloud Cuckoolander side, similar to a cross between her anime and audio drama personalities. That being said, her perseverance as the leader of Aqours and her determination to find their group's own radiance are both carried over from the anime, so her grounded personality isn't completely gone in the game.
• Ascended Fangirl: She is a fan of µ's, and gets to start her own school idol group in the spin-off series.
• Astonishingly Appropriate Appearance: It can't be a coincidence that the member of Aqours that loves mikan the most has a hairstyle that resembles a freshly-picked mikan.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: When Chika first heard that Uranohoshi was threatening to close down soon thanks to a lack of students, she was at first excited because that means she'd get to follow µ's for real this time, thanks to the similar situations. When the threat actually became apparent and imminent just when Chika began to cherish the school more for bringing Aqours together, she became desperate to save it... only to be devastated when it actually closes down in season 2.
• Be Yourself: In episode five, she delivers this to Yoshiko to prevent her from giving up on her "Yohane" persona.
• Beware the Nice Ones: As the third years find out, while it's hard to get the very positive and cheerful Chika really annoyed, you do not want to push her to that point.
• Book Dumb: Implied; the anime never brings up her grades, but a few background details and her inability to spell certain words point to this trope. Not only did she get an unimpressive test result of 32 marks in the first PV, she can't even write "Club" in "School Idol Club" correctly in the anime. She even misspells "Aqours" on a banner in one of the official promotional images!
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Despite being a sweet and energetic girl with a somewhat goofy personality, Chika is incredibly charismatic and determined, and is competent and goal-oriented when interested in a subject.
• Captain Ersatz: Of Kasane Hasekura from SIF, who has a similar build and design. Which make sense as Kasane is voted to be the most popular girl out of original characters in the game.
• Childhood Friends: With Kanan and You^note in the anime.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Moreso in the audio drama and less in the anime and the games. In one of the CD dramas when Chika helps Dia pack for a camping trip, she packs things like bowling balls and globes.
• Contemplate Our Navels: Chika has a tendency to do this when she's alone and/or something big happened. Riko is the one who usually snaps her out of it.
• Contemplation Location: The WINDY STAGE intermissions had Chika sitting on the rooftop of the inn and looking at the setting sun over the sea. Riko notes that whenever Chika is on the roof, Chika is in deep thought about something.
• Deadpan Snarker: In the anime, though this is better shown through her expressions rather than her dialogue; she can be pretty deadpan at times, usually whenever Yoshiko is concerned. This is more pronounced in the English dub, where her dialogue tends to be more sarcastic.
  Riko: (after hiding in the bathroom from a dog) I'm listening! Spit it out!
  Chika: (sigh) What a weirdo...
• Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: You explains that Chika doesn't often get into things because she doesn't like doing anything halfheartedly. Her interest in idols is one of the few, if not the only, things that struck a chord in her heart so strongly that she had to pursue it.
• Determinator: Very much so, to the point it's her key trait. Chika has a very strong sense of perseverance (even more so than fellow leader Honoka), which is pointed out by the other girls. According to You, although Chika doesn't often get into things because she doesn't like doing anything halfheartedly, whenever she sets her eyes on something, she never gives up no matter the circumstances. Asking her if she wants to give up makes her even more determined to succeed. This sense of perseverance is what keeps pushing Aqours to success.
• The Ditz: Downplayed, as despite her airheaded moments, Chika isn't stupid, and is still determined enough in her goals. She is just prone to leaps of logic that wouldn't necessarily be normal.
• Don't Explain the Joke: Has a tendency to do that with her puns, as Riko points out.
• Dub Personality Change: Downplayed, but her dialogue in the English dub of the anime tends to make her a bit more of a Deadpan Snarker than she is the original Japanese version.
• Establishing Character Moment: After she was exposed to the world of idolhood via μ's, she becomes determined to save her school, similar to how μ's saved Otonokizaka, and establishes a school idol club.
• Expressive Hair: Chika's Idiot Hair occasionally moves independently, like an antenna.
• Fangirl: She is obsessed with µ's. Not just with the group, but anything relating to the group as well. She is actually delighted about the prospect of her school potentially closing down, because it's the same thing µ's went through.
• Fiery Redhead: The Genki Girl of the group, a Determinator who goes all-out on everything she does, and if Episode 9 is any indication, will get angry at her friends when they fight over absurd stuff with no one to stop them.
• Fire-Forged Friends: A downplayed example, but she attempts to invoke this among the rest of Aqours in the "Unite! Our Survival" audio drama by deliberately neglecting to pack any gear or food for the group's camping trip, thinking that forcing them to scrounge for food and survive in the wilderness will help their teamwork and unity.
• Genki Girl: Her very energetic nature is of her key traits, as seen multiple times throughout the anime. The first time she meets Hanamaru and Ruby? She outright asks them if they want to be school idols. Asking her if she wants to give up? This only makes her more determined to succeed.
• The Heart: Moreso than previous protagonist Honoka. She's more considerate of others' feelings aside from being extremely charismatic and people-oriented, which makes her effectively the glue that holds the group together.
• Hidden Buxom:
  • Despite having a bust size of 82, the cover of Genki Zenkai DAY! DAY! DAY! reveals that she is a bit busty. Kuzu Kou's submission for the official CYaRon Comic Anthology also lampshades this as well◊.
  • Chika's bust in general tends to not get emphasized as much (in both official and fan works) compared to You or Kanan despite having the exact same bust size as You and being only one centimeter smaller than Kanan's.
• The Heart: She (along with Riko and You) is the glue that holds the group together, and looks after the other members' needs and feelings ahead of her own. So when the second years were temporarily split from the rest of the group to speed their progress up in season 2, besides the Kurosawa sisters, the rest of the Aqours members couldn't find common ground to get along with each other until the end of the episode.
• Hypocritical Humor: She calls Riko "a weirdo" when the former hides in the bathroom from a little dog (she's afraid of them). Somewhere along those lines, Chika must've forgotten she herself isn't the most normal person out there.
• Idiot Hair: One small strand of hair sticks out of her head, and she is a bit of a goofball.
• Idiot Hero: While Chika is fairly well-versed where feelings are involved, and is not exactly stupid, she's prone to making odd, nonsensical leaps of logic. These tendencies tend to vary across continuities, with her audio drama incarnation being the most of a space cadet.
• I Just Want to Be Special: Seeing µ's succeed despite being ordinary high school girls is what directly inspires her to be a school idol.
• Image Song: "One More Sunshine Story" and "Never giving up!", both of which have the unique distinction of being styled like Broadway musical songs.
• In-Series Nickname: "Chikacchi", usually by Mari. She occasionally encourages others to address her as such when she introduces herself.
• Late for School: Arrives late for the start of Uranohoshi's second term in the first episode of Season 2. Readily pointed out by her sister Mito:
  Mito: Hey! Were you still in bed?! You'll be late for school!
  Chika: WHAAAAAT?!
• The Leader: Of Aqours. Several episodes cover Chika's development as the leader (and less often, the founder), and she takes the responsibility seriously despite herself.
• Magnetic Hero: Kindness and charisma are undoubtedly her main traits. She has a natural people orientation and positivity which undoubtedly attract others.
• Nice Girl: She can be a little pushy and loud at times, but she's nonetheless very cheerful and friendly. Her naturally people-oriented personality undoubtedly helps in gaining the support of others.
• Pungeon Master: Appears to love making puns, though this trait is only seen in the Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM audio dramas.
• Ridiculously Average Guy: Initially views herself as such, until she discovers school idols.
• Ryokan Inn: Her family owns and lives in the Tochiman inn.
• Stepford Smiler: At first, she isn't visibly dismayed over the fact that Aqours attained zero votes in the Love Live selections. Justified, since she didn't want to further drag down their morale after their performance in Tokyo.
• Stock Shoujo Heroine: Just like previous protagonist Honoka, she's pretty much a textbook example, being an extremely optimistic, cheerful, persistent Nice Girl and Magnetic Hero, who's also a bit Book Dumb.
• Strong Family Resemblance: She looks a lot like her mother, more so compared to her sisters, especially considering that they both have the same hair color and very similar hairstyles, right down to the ahoge on top of their heads. In fact, Riko initially mistook her mother for a ghost when she saw them both side-by-side.
• Trademark Favorite Food: Mikan. She has stickers of mikan on her laptop, the one time we see her schoolbag open there are two mikans inside it, she almost undoubtedly is the one who wrote "Mikan" in the sand while brainstorming group names, she wears a Fun Shirt with "Mikan" written in English, her hair strand makes her hair look suspiciously mikan-shaped...
• Vocal Evolution: Most prominent with her solo mixes, where Inami's natural voice comes out a bit more and gives Chika the impression of more powerful and mature voice compared to her usual style. The songs themselves are usually a factor as well, since several of the later Aqours songs are more demanding vocally compared to standard idol-type songs.
• Youngest Child Wins: Chika leads the main idol group this time around, and she's the youngest of three sisters.

You Watanabe

Image Color: Light Blue

Age: 16

Birthday: April 17 (Aries)

Blood Type: AB

Height: 157 cm

Three Sizes: B82/W57/H81

Skills: High diving, Weather Forecast

Hobby: Muscle Training

Trademark Favorite Food: Salisbury steak and mikan

Least Favorite Food: Sashimi and anything too dry

Symbol: Sailboat
Voiced by: Shuka Saito (Japanese), Apphia Yu (English)

Chika's childhood friend, and one of Aqours' costume designers alongside Ruby. She's athletic, and Chika's first supporter in forming the group. She really loves all kinds of uniforms. She's also a member of the high diving club at Uranohoshi Girls High School, and is good enough to qualify for the national team.

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• The Ace: She's a skilled illustrator and concept artist, has enough charisma to get a selfie with dozens of new fans, is able to make professional level idol costumes with basically no prior experience, able to diagnose problems with dance routine based on her experience as a national-level high diver, is a Supreme Chef, and has at least some basic knowledge of judo.
• Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: The Childhood Friends aspect of her relationship with Chika is heavily downplayed in the manga. Compared to the anime where they are practically joined at the hip, the manga presents their familiarity with each other as little more than being acquaintances who happened to grow up together.
• Ambiguously Gay: Her jealousy towards Chika spending time with Riko may say something. Also later in season 2 she tells Riko she loves her very much, and it's ambiguous if her Love Confession is friendly or romantic.
• Character Catchphrase: "Yousoro", a sailing term^note meaning "steady ahead" but sometimes translated as "aye aye" and the like which happens to start with her name. She sometimes plays with it, like instead saying "Yoshiko" the same way while Yoshiko is around, or saying "ohayousoro" in the morning (the latter being a pormanteau of "ohayo"^note Japanese for "good morning" and her catchphrase).
• Character Tics: She tends to salute a lot. This is because her father is the captain of a ferry, which she aims to be herself one day.
• Childhood Friends: According to the anime, she is this with Chika and Kanan.
• Daddy's Girl: She loves her papa. Supplementary material often talks about how she looks up to him and in the anime, how she looks forward to him finally coming back from his trips overseas during the summer.
• A Day in the Limelight: Gets one on Episode 11. See Green-Eyed Monster below.
• Even the Girls Want Her: You is one of the most popular girls in Aqours in-story; at some point before the group even has their first live show, she gets a group photo with over a dozen school girls.
• Genki Girl: She's very cheerful and outgoing; though she's usually more grounded than Chika.
• Green-Eyed Monster: Episode 11 has her realize that she's jealous of all the time Chika has spent with Riko while bringing Aqours together, especially when it was she and Chika who began the school idol club in the first place. However, she eventually talks it out with Chika and they come to a better understanding.
• Hot-Blooded: You is pretty impulsive and sometimes engages in risky behaviors, for example when almost falling off her school's balcony to catch a uniform falling.
• Image Song: "Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM", in which she's the center.
• Lovable Jock: Female example: she's one of the more athletic and tomboyish members of the group, and she's an unconditionally loyal and supportive person.
• Male Gaze:
  • The Happy Party Train PV treats us with a glorious sight of wet You in a competitive swimsuit when she's coming out from a pool.
  • One scene in episode 11 shows off her large bust covering nearly the entire display and being groped by Mari from behind.
• Miko: She dresses as one when the group visits the Kanda Shrine in episode 7.
• Ms. Fanservice: Not quite to the same degree as Kanan, but some promotional material likes to take advantage of the fact that she's a professional-level swimmer with the body to match.
• Nice Girl: Very kind and friendly, and an unconditionally loyal and supportive friend.
• Not the Fall That Kills You…: Almost suffers this after diving over a railing to grab an idol uniform that Kanan hurled out the window one floor above. Lucky for her, Chika and Riko were there to grab her before she could fully go over.
• Out of Focus: She's fairly prominent early on but soon recedes into the background until she has her single episode in Season 1, and her prominence in Season 2 is disturbingly minimal.
• Passionate Sports Girl: She's very into swimming and high diving (she's actually good enough to qualify for the national team in the latter), and wakes up early every day to do muscle training and jogging. However, stamina-wise, Kanan outdoes her.
• Pervert Revenge Mode: She responds to Mari groping her chest by judo throwing her.
• Power Copying: A more mundane example; the reason why she comes across as The Ace is because she can easily pick up various skills from others. Because she is able to analyze form due to her diving experience, in the event of another Aqours member being unable to perform, she is capable of copying that person's dance steps to fill in for the missing member in formation.
• Satellite Character: In the anime, her character is almost entirely built on her being Chika's best friend. Her Day In The Limelight revolves more around her friendship with Chika and less around her actual character.
• Supreme Chef: Revealed to be this in Episode 10, as her dish was the only one prepared by the girls to sell. Additionally, she was able to turn Yoshiko and Mari's dishes into delectable curry as well (she does however credit it to her father's recipe rather than to her own skills).
• Tareme Eyes: To her mother's Tsurime Eyes.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: The athletic and outgoing tomboy to Riko’s shy and modest girly girl.
• Tomboy with a Girly Streak: She's very athletic and aims to be a ferry captain like her dad, but she's still enthusiastic about being a school idol and is one of the costume designers for the group.
• Tomboyish Baseball Cap: She wears one with her name on it as part of her training outfit, and she's one of the more athletic members of the group. She also wears a backwards baseball cap during the trip to Tokyo in Episodes 7 and 8.
• Undying Loyalty: To Chika. She's been devoted to her since they were kids and has always been by her side since.

Ruby Kurosawa

Image Color: Pink

Age: 15

Birthday: September 21 (Virgo)

Blood Type: A

Height: 154 cm

Three Sizes: B76/W56/H79

Skills: Sewing

Trademark Favorite Food: French fries and sweet potatoes

Least Favorite Food: Wasabi

Symbol: Lollipop

Voiced by: Ai Furihata (Japanese), Sarah Wiedenheft (English)

Dia's shy younger sister, and a huge fan of idols herself. She and You work on the costumes for Aqours. She's very good at sewing.

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• Always Second Best: A part of her School idol diary has her mulling over constantly being in her sister's shadow, as Dia was always considered intelligent and talented while Ruby was always "the other Kurosawa sister" who isn't as good as Dia. Yoshiko cheers her up by telling her that her imperfectness makes her unique and relatable as a school idol.
• The Baby of the Bunch: She tends to be treated this way, being cute, innocent and the most childish (though Hanamaru is the youngest and shortest), as well as already being Dia's younger sister.
• Big Sister Worship: She loves Dia and greatly looks up to her, even to the point of being hesitant to join the group at first since it would make Dia angry. She's even raising her voice when debating about big sisters with Leah.
• Cannot Talk to Men: In the Dengeki Gs stories and the manga adaptation, she is noted to be androphobic. Justified, as her dad is the only man she has extensively talked to.
• Character Catchphrase: "Ganbaruby!", which combines her name with the Japanese word ganbaru (meaning "I'll do my best"). The English dub has her saying the similarly punny "I'll do my Rubesty!" instead.
• Character Development: Gets quite a bit in Season 2, in which she becomes noticeably more assertive due to her desire to make Dia proud of her, as well as wanting to stand on her own without her sister's help. She even goes so far as to seek out and befriend the antisocial Leah, who she was shown to be intimidated by, and arrange a performance with the rest of Aqours and Saint Snow. It's highly doubtful that she would have been able to muster up the courage before she joined Aqours.
• Commonality Connection: With Leah Kazuno, due to them both being socially awkward first years who admire their older sisters greatly. Leah even cowers behind Ruby at one point the same way that Ruby usually does with Hanamaru.
• Cower Power: She is quick to hide behind Hanamaru after being startled by Yoshiko falling out of a tree. Ironically, Hanamaru is 2cm shorter than her.
• Cry into Chest: Does this to Dia after returning from the Tokyo performance.
• Cute, but Cacophonic: Her fits of shyness involve shrieking at the top of her voice. Apparently this is common enough that Hanamaru knows to cover her ears before it starts happening.
• Cute Clumsy Girl: Is said to be one by her sister, Dia. She also tends to trip a lot. In Ruby's School idol diary Yoshiko claims that this is one of Ruby's charm points.
• Depending on the Writer:
  • In the anime, she is a fan of fellow Shrinking Violet, Hanayo, from µ's. In the manga adaptation, she is instead a fan of Rin (which is switched to Hanamaru instead).
  • Both the Dengeki G's stories and the manga, she is shown to be androphobic, while the anime omits her phobia due to the show's Chromosome Casting.
• Family Theme Naming: With Dia, as they're both named after precious stones.
• Fiery Redhead: Inverted; she has reddish-pink hair, but she's more of a Shrinking Violet. While she does gradually become more assertive, she's still not very fiery.
• Fire-Breathing Diner:
  • She becomes one after eating Yoshiko's "Tears of a Fallen Angel", takoyaki stuffed with Tabasco sauce.
  • And also in this quote◊ in School Idol Festival where she consumes kimchi as Korea's poster girl.
• Genki Girl: Played With in that she's normally a meek Shrinking Violet, but at her core she's a very playful and bubbly young girl with a strong inner fire.
• Girlish Pigtails: Of the "two side up" variety, which fits her since she's often the most childish of the group.
• Hidden Depths: Ruby breaks free from her shy self when she's arguing with Leah in favor of her sister Dia.
• Important Haircut: In Dengeki and the SIDs, Ruby used to have longer hair in something like a Hime Cut just like Dia as a part of being a daughter of the Kurosawa family, but at some point she cut it to her current look as a way of self-expression and to somewhat distance herself from her family name, which she's also stated to have insecurities about upholding well.
• It Runs in the Family: Lampshaded by Hanamaru after seeing both Ruby and Dia stutter and attempt to run away after being probed on the third years' past, as well as both reacting in a similar manner after being caught in Yoshiko's grappling hold.
• Little Miss Snarker: Even she can have her moments, though they're mostly directed towards Yoshiko.
  (when discussing how to get to the Love Live! qualifiers)
  Yoshiko: Then allow the fallen angel's wings to transport you!
  Ruby: Oh yeah. I forgot we could do that.
• My Dad Can Beat Up Your Dad: She has a brief argument with Leah in Episode 9 of Season 2 over who has the better big sister.
• No Poker Face: A yonkoma for ALL STARS shows that Ruby's "poker face" is just as bad as Umi's.
• No Social Skills: She's quite socially inept due to her shyness, and is pretty clumsy. She gets better, though.
• Only Friend: She was this to Hanamaru prior to Aqours, because she spent a lot of time in the library reading about idols.
• Rock Theme Naming: Her name is Ruby and her sister's name is Dia, which is short for "diamond". According to Dengeki interviews, it's a tradition in the Kurosawa family to name their daughters after precious stones.
• Rose-Haired Sweetie: A very bubbly, sweet and kindhearted girl with reddish-pink hair.
• Shrinking Violet: Gets nervous easily and stutters a lot, so she often hides behind her best friend Hanamaru. However, there are occasions where instead of shrinking away from social situations, she shrieks at the top of her lungs.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Ruby is timid, playful, clumsy and only raises her voice when her shyness hits, while her older sister Dia is assertive, all-business, prone to yelling and a perfectionist. Both, however, like idols.
• Super Drowning Skills: Downplayed, apparently she can't swim despite living in a seaside town.
• Tareme Eyes: Which highlight her timid and innocent personality.
• Third-Person Person: Some of her speech patterns contain this, presumably due to her "little sister" image.
• Those Two Girls: Often seen together with Hanamaru.
• Token Mini-Moe: She's among the youngest members of Aqours as well as the most childish in terms of looks and personality, despite being a teenager in high school like the others.
• Verbal Tic: Whenever she is surprised, scared or under stressful situations, poor little Ruby intones a unique and cute onomatopoeia of panic which sounds like "Pigi!" or the long stretched-out version of "Pigyaaaaaaaaaa!!" when she is screaming.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: If this magazine scan is any indication, she was originally going to be afraid of dogs, but that trait ended up transferred to Riko instead. In the manga, she also has problems when talking to men other than her father. This doesn't apply to the anime, where Ruby is shown to have no problems with dogs and her fear of men isn't explained.
• Yamato Nadeshiko: Ruby is a shy, modest girl and a bit submissive towards her older sister Dia but develops the Silk Hiding Steel part as she undergoes Character Development. According to Dengeki interviews and the School Idol Diaries, she's had insecurities about living up to this trope, and she used to have a Hime Cut like Dia before cutting her hair to its current length.

AZALEA

AZALEA's first single, "Torikoriko PLEASE!!"

The "Pure" subunit, consisting of Kanan Matsuura, Dia Kurosawa, and Hanamaru Kunikida. Unlike the previous "Pure" subunit, lily white, AZALEA has a notable Electronic Music twist on the usual pure themes, blending synth and soft rock with graceful vocals and lyrics, though in recent years they seem to be shifting away from this gracefulness a little bit in favor of a more straightforward electro-pop style.

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• Electronic Music: Their music style. The synths are used to either highlight the maturity of its members ("Innocent Bird", "Sotsugyou desu ne") or to enhance the dreamlike element of their songs ("Tokimeki Bunruigaku", "Galaxy Hide and Seek").
• Floral Theme Naming: Much like lily white before them, AZALEA is... well, an azalea.
• Lighter and Softer: Their songs tend to be a lot softer in terms of music, their album covers have a gentle dreamlike quality, and their name was chosen to reflect the mature, modest feel the members give off.
• Meaningful Name: The azalea is the prefectural flower of Shizuoka, where Uchiura and Numazu are located. In hanakotoba^note the Japanese system of flower symbolism, the azalea means patient or modest, which reflects the members' image.
• Pink Means Feminine: AZALEA is the most feminine among the Aqours subunits and they have pink as their subunit image color.

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Kanan Matsuura

Image Color: Emerald Green

Age: 17

Birthday: February 10 (Aquarius)

Blood Type: O

Height: 162 cm

Three Sizes: B83/W58/H84

Hobby: Observing the sky, swimming

Skills: Diving, operating a boat

Trademark Favorite Food: Sazae (sea snail) and wakame (seaweed)

Least Favorite Food: Umeboshi (pickled plums)

Symbol: Dolphins

Voiced by: Nanaka Suwa (Japanese), Michelle Rojas (English)

A childhood friend of Chika, and later, You. The group's Passionate Sports Girl, she helps run a scuba diving shop with her family, and is a scuba diver herself. She oversees Aqours' physical training and dance routines.

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• Adaptational Backstory Change: In the manga, Kanan is genuinely unaware of what school idols are until Chika brings up the topic to her one day, implying that there was no original Aqours in the manga continuity. As a result, she agrees to join Chika's budding school idol plans from the outset.
• All-Loving Hero: While normally somewhat reserved, Kanan is a very sweet and loving girl who is kind to everyone by nature, and has loved hugging others since childhood, even hugging people she barely knew.
• Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Downplayed; she can come off as such in her earlier interactions with Mari, though when interacting with the other girls she's much more open and friendly, and once the third-year drama gets resolved her aloof nature dissipates; she's still one of the more reserved and composed members of the group, but she's also a Cuddle Bug.
• Animal Motif: The dolphin is her symbol, and reflects her affinity for water as well as her kind and quiet nature.
• Badass Arm-Fold: She does this in season 2: in episode 1 just after Chika arrives late to the gymnasium, then in episode 6 when she asks Chika to demonstrate she could do a special routine devised by her, Mari and Dia two years ago, and again during the Couch Gag credits for episode 7. This is despite rarely showing this across either season.
• Beneath the Mask: Kanan spent most of the first season coldly pushing away Mari after the latter's return while outright refusing to reconcile with her once best friend after an incident in the past that broke her, Mari's, and Dia's friendships apart. Turns out, the aloofness Kanan displayed towards her was a deliberate act out of kindness on her end because she cared that much for Mari, and didn't want her to give up on her future possibilities.
• Big Sister Instinct: She displays this to the younger members, mostly to the second year trio in general, but she's especially protective of Chika, who she outright considers as a younger sister of hers:
  • As written under the Hidden Depths entry below, she's very reluctant to allow Chika to perform the special routine the third years originally devised years ago, as not only is it difficult to pull off, it could risk injuring her or worse. Chika's persistence and determination to succeed with it and the group's desperation to pull off something unique to draw in the crowd convinces Kanan to let her practice it, but gives her a deadline should she continue to fail for her safety.
  • In Futaba's Bond Episode during the special crossover event for the Shoujo Kageki Revue Starlight mobile game, ReLIVE, she outright forbids Chika from even attempting to ride a motorbike by herself because of her clumsiness and her inability to stay focused when riding.
• Book Dumb: Episode 2 of the anime's second season reveals that she does not like to read and quickly dozes off if forced to do so. It's easily justified, as she has a hard time attending classes due to the fact that she must take care of the shop while her father recovers from a fractured bone. Chapter 10 of Love Live! School Idol Festival ALL STARS reveals that her grades are rather bad and might actually be worse than Chika's.
• Bridal Carry: Does this to Mari in the beginning of Season 2, apparently to check her weight.
• Broken Bird: The incident from two years ago turned her much more emotionally distant towards Mari, although it turns out to be an act out of kindness. The first catalyst was failing to perform on purpose due to Mari's ankle injury before the third years' first live performance in Tokyo, which causes them to demoralization for their failure. And the second catalyst was to quit being an idol; disbanding the first Aqours in the process so Mari would finally take one of the overseas study offers.
• Character Catchphrase:
  • "Hagu shiyou~!"^note "Let's hug!" in English., when asking for —you guessed it— hugs.
  • "Uttaeru yo!"^note "I'll sue you!" in English, directed at Mari when she wants to lie — jokingly or not.
• Cheerful Child: As a child, she was very energetic and cheerful. As a teenager, however, she's more reserved and laidback.
• Childhood Friends: With Chika, You^note in the anime only, Mari and Dia.
• Cool Big Sis: To Chika, You and later even Riko, who admire her maturity and see her as kind of a role model. Kanan is typically kind and mature, and in turn looks after them and offers advice much like a real older sister.
• Color-Coded Characters: Some official material (mainly the games) is weirdly inconsistent with what color Kanan should be associated with, since her hair color is dark blue but her image color is teal-aqua green. She has a lot of blue outfits in School idol festival for no reason other than matching with her hair.
• "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: A lot of her issues and problems she faced could have been solved if she had just told Mari from the beginning why she didn't perform on stage or disbanded their idol group. Mari calls her out on this in episode 9.
• Cry into Chest: She allows Mari to hug her after confronting their reasons for the disbandment of the original Aqours two years ago in Season 1, Episode 9. Both of them weep in reconciliation.
• Cuddle Bug: Has been this ever since she was a child. The first time she meets Mari? She asks for a hug. When she's afraid? She hugs someone close (or a pillar). When Mari slaps some consciousness on Kanan, and asks her to slap back? Kanan hugs her instead. ^note And they reconcile.
• Curtains Match the Window: Blue/purple hair and eyes, though her hair is in a darker shade.
• A Day in the Limelight: Shares one with Mari in episode 9 of Season 1.
• Dumb Jock: Downplayed, she’s not an idiot per se (she’s actually one of the more rational and levelheaded girls), but she has poor grades in school and doesn't like reading, in contrast with her athletic prowess. Again, this is easily justified to her skipping school while helping her family with work.
• Even the Girls Want Her: Just like You, Kanan is popular among girls due to her athletic and kind nature, as seen in episode 11 of Season 1.
• Girly Girl with a Tomboy Streak: Kanan is a very graceful and feminine girl both appearance and personality wise — she's beautiful, has a deep love for nature, is a Cuddle Bug, and has no problem wearing frilly dresses, especially as a member of AZALEA. That said, she's also a Passionate Sports Girl who jogs and works out every morning, and frequently goes scuba diving.
• Hidden Depths:
  • When Mari comes back to Japan from studying abroad, she wants to scout Kanan into Aqours, but Kanan refuses, and doesn't want to reconcile with her old friend as seen on subsequent episodes. However, this is all a facade, as Kanan delibarately refused because she didn't want to emotionally cause Mari to suffer from the same pain they and Dia went through two years ago. When she finds out she was actually causing her former best friend to suffer by refusing to reconcile with Mari, as the latter just wanted to be with her friend, Kanan finally breaks out and reconciles with Mari.
  • In Season 2 episode 6, when Chika is trying to practice the special routine the third years devised two years ago (which Kanan didn't approve of), after several failed attempts (and injuries sustained) throughout the evening, she tries to convince Chika into giving up if she can't pull it off by the next day. However, by the next day, when Kanan comes to check in on Chika, the third years can be seen with their faces slightly dirty. Turns out, Kanan actually didn't want Chika to keep hurting herself, and that the third years had seemingly practiced the routine if Chika couldn't pull it off in the end.^note Chika succesfully pulls it off in the end, and later in front of a crowd.
• I Hate Past Me: A downplayed example, but on the train home from Tokyo, she remarks that Saint Snow's victory-oriented attitude reminded her of herself two years ago, which is why she couldn't bring herself to think that way in her goal of saving her school.
• Image Song: "HAPPY PARTY TRAIN", in which she's the center.
• Informed Attractiveness: She's often stated to have the best body and gets quite a few fans in-series because of this. Based on looks however, you wouldn't really be able to tell given the relative similarity in body types among the group and the fact that almost all the girls are drawn attractively.
• Jerkass to One: At least before Episode 9. While jerk would be a stretch, she’s laidback and friendly around Chika and co., but around Mari, she's significantly more aloof and tries to push her away at every opportunity. Subverted as it actually turns out to be just an act, and all out of kindness and support of Mari's possibility to study abroad.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: As seen when she pets a kitten in the temple.
• Lovable Jock: Like You, she's a female example — she enjoys scuba diving and has the most stamina of the Aqours girls, and personality-wise she's a very sweet girl.
• Male Gaze: When Dia explains her plan to lure customers, the camera shows the entirety of her physique in a swimsuit. She's definitely fit, no doubt about it.
• Ms. Fanservice: She's often stated to have the most attractive body in Aqours; to be fair, she is attractive, with an athletic and shapely figure, and the anime isn't shy about showing it off.
  • Dia tried to turn Kanan into an example of this trope in episode 10 of season 1 in order to lure customers. We get a long-lasting Male Gaze as Dia explains her plan to her.
  • In episode 12, she's seen opening that tight wetsuit of hers, revealing her bikini top (and cleavage) underneath.
• Nice Girl: She initially starts off being rather cold towards Mari, though she behaved as such out of kindness and at the end of the day, she's a very selfless and kindhearted girl, without a mean bone in her body, who loves giving her friends hugs, supporting them, giving good advice, and prioritizes others' feelings before her own.
• Not So Above It All:
  • Season 2 reveals that the ever calm and cool Kanan can still be afraid of creaking noises and being high up.
  • Throughout Chapter 10 of ALL STARS, she repeatedly tries to make up excuses to get out of studying and frequently complains about it, showcasing an immature streak that only shows up when it comes to her poor grades.
  • Along with You, she's one of the two girls goofing around the school as Uchicchi on the Festival day.
• Not So Stoic: She's normally the most levelheaded and composed member of the group, but she's much more apprehensive when it comes to heights and strange noises.
• Only Sane Woman: Even compared to the likes of Riko, Hanamaru and You, she's the least likely to get worked up over anything.
• Out of Focus: At least in the first half of Season 1, as she does not appear at all in episodes 5 and 7, and only has a brief non-speaking cameo in episode 3. This is justified due to being unable to attend school, since she has to help run the family business as her father is injured. She's officially back at school in episode 9, and given some focus from that episode onward.
• Outdoorsy Gal: She spends enough time outdoors that she would rather go out to the beach instead of just reading about it in books, as Season 2 episode 2 indicates.
• Passionate Sports Girl: Among the members of Aqours, she possesses the best stamina. She jogs every morning, including scaling several flights of stairs. As part of her job at her family's diving shop, she also scuba dives regularly. Notably, she is the only member of Aqours who doesn't get the slightest bit exhausted from Umi's training regimen or the one Saint Snow gives them, which wipes out the rest of the characters.
• The Quiet One: Easily the quietest and most composed member in the group.
• Raised by Grandparents: In the Dengeki continuity, she lives with her grandfather. This doesn't seem to be the case in the anime, since she mentions her dad in the first episode.
• The Stoic: She isn't exactly impassive, but easily the calmest member of Aqours, and one of the least likely to lose control of her emotions.
• Super-Strength: She's implied to regularly bridal carry Mari to check her weight. She's also strong enough to accidentally break the lever of the mikan plantation trolley the group uses in Season 2 episode 3.
• Tareme Eyes: Which highlight her kind and soft personality.
• Team Mom: Seems to fill this role, looking after everyone's well-being even to the point she ignores her own feelings to do so.
• Tearful Smile: While she's about to hug Mari while they reconcile, she smiles at her while crying lots and lots of tears.
• Tender Tears: Acts aloof around Mari for a big part of Season 1... And when they reconcile, she cries a river of tears.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: If one can call her passion for working out and scuba diving "tomboyish", then she's the tomboy to Mari's girly girl.
• Tragic Keepsake: An old notebook of Aqours dance formations, as pointed out by Mari. Kanan tries to dispose of it by throwing it into the ocean, only for Mari to jump out after the book and get it back.
• Turn the Other Cheek: When Mari slaps her in S1 Episode 9, Kanan hugs her instead.
• Tsundere: Played With towards Mari, and yet heavily downplayed. She's easily one of the kindest and most selfless characters in the series, and puts on a Harsh front towards Mari due to feeling the latter should pursue her dreams. After they reconcile, she turns out to be a Sweet example mostly Played for Laughs, making a few grumpy remarks towards her friend, especially when the latter is being mischievous.
• Used to Be More Social: Seems to be the case with her, based on flashbacks. Though it's ultimately an act, and after she reconciles with Mari, she becomes more sociable again.
• Verbal Tic: Season 2 gives her "umu!" in place of "yes" or "hmm".
• Walking Swimsuit Scene: Season 1 Episode 10 has this. Since she looks very attractive and is wearing a swimsuit, Dia orders her to lure customers in this way.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Kanan is pretty tough, level-headed and gifted, yet she's Book Dumb and easily afraid of heights and noises.
• We Used to Be Friends: Before the start of the series she was close friends with both Mari and Dia having formed a school idol group with both of them when they were first years. After two years apart she's shown to be quite distant to Mari (outright refusing to reconcile in one episode) and isn't shown interacting with Dia much (if at all). After sorting out her issues with Mari, the three reconcile at the end of episode 9.
• Wingding Eyes: In the MV of her character song "Motto ne" her eyes are eights.

Dia Kurosawa

Image Color: Red

Age: 17

Birthday: January 1 (Capricorn)

Blood Type: A

Height: 162 cm

Three Sizes: B80/W57/H80

Hobby: Watching movie, reading

Skills: Koto (Japanese musical instrument), chanting, dressing in kimono

Trademark Favorite Food: Flan and matcha-flavored sweets

Least Favorite Food: Salisbury steak and gratin

Symbol: Hibiscus

Voiced by: Arisa Komiya (Japanese), Morgan Garrett (English)

Uranohoshi's (usually) cool and collected Student Council President, and Ruby's older sister. She was raised in a very traditional Japanese household and comes from a well-known and respected fishing family.

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• A-Cup Angst: Invoked by Mari on Season 1 Episode 3. When Mari hugs Dia after not seeing her for almost two years, she then gently gropes Dia while jokingly stating her breasts didn't grow during that time. A very flustered Dia then snaps at her for that.
• Accidental Public Confession: She inadvertently broadcasts her knowledge of µ's for the whole school to hear after Chika accidentally turns on the PA system.
• A Day in the Limelight: Season 2 episode 4 focuses on Dia and her attempts to become closer to the rest of the Aqours members other than Mari and Kanan (who are already close to her since childhood).
• Adaptation Deviation: Dia in ALL STARS is a lot less fanatic about µ's compared to her anime counterpart, since it would be kind of weird to be a head-over-heels fangirl over an idol group that you already meet and perform with. She still shows a preference for Eli as her favorite µ's member, although much more subdued.
• Aloof Big Sister: In earlier material, including the School Idol Festival mobile game, Dia was colder towards Ruby, expressed tinges of disappointment and annoyance with her, and even once said that she preferred Hanamaru as a younger sister over her. In the anime, she initially acts aloof towards Ruby, until flashbacks and later events show that she's actually a warm and even doting older sister to Ruby before Kanan and Mari's fallout happened years before the anime's first season. Once the conflict in Episode 9 is fully resolved, she's no longer this trope, going right back to being the doting older sister she always was towards Ruby and spoiling her whenever she can.
• Aloof Dark-Haired Girl: Subverted; she has dark brown hair and is the no-nonsense Student Council President, which can definitely give the impression of this trope, but she's very temperamental, raises her voice often, and is prone to being melodramatic.
• Anywhere but Their Lips: In her childhood flashback, Dia kisses Ruby's forehead to make her pain go away. Also the closest thing to get a canonical kiss scene in the Love Live anime.
• Big Sister Instinct: She definitely has this towards Ruby.
  • When she sees Ruby's outfit in Yoshiko's video (mainly due to someone commenting on her short skirt), she gets pissed.
  • It happens again after Ruby eats Yoshiko's very spicy cooking, immediately demanding what she put in there.
  • Dia also takes action to protect Ruby (and Riko) from a sea lion at the aquarium.
  • During a pillow fight, she also intercepts and catches a pillow that Mari tries to throw at Ruby. Dia then demands to know what the others were doing to her.
• Bridal Carry: Carries an embarrassed Ruby this way through an imaginary blizzard in their duo-trio set drama track. In the last track of the set, while the rest of Aqours waits for Riko, Hanamaru and Mari to meet them at the summit of Mt. Fuji, Dia also threatens to personally track them down and carry them there herself the same way.
• Character Catchphrase: "Buu buu desu wa!"^note "Boop boop, you're wrong!" in English, which she says whenever someone says something she disagrees with.
• Character Tics: Scratching the area around her mole in nervousness when trying to keep a secret from others.
• Chewing the Scenery: If the tropes below give any indication, if something upsets Dia (which isn't hard to begin with), there's a high chance she'll overreact. Her Establishing Character Moment, after all, is how she begins harping on about µ's after Chika pronounces it incorrectly.
• Childhood Friends: With Kanan and Mari.
• Closet Geek: She's a walking µ's encyclopedia, but she'd never admit it of her own free will. She used to be much more open about her love of µ's before entering high school. This is because of the disbanding of the first Aqours group, which she was a part of, due to their failure to perform in Tokyo. Though she was passionate about being in a school idol group like µ's when she was a first year, her falling out with Kanan and Mari led her to become outwardly bitter about it, even telling Ruby to keep anything to do with idols out of her sight. After Kanan and Mari mend their friendship and the third year students join the new Aqours group, she's more openly passionate about µ's.
• The Comically Serious: Despite her position as Student Council President of Uranohoshi, it's hard to take her seriously overall.
  • She slams her palm on a table as she objects to Chika's club application and hurts it in the process, to Chika's amusement.
  • She blasts at Chika for pronouncing µ's incorrectly before harping on about her love for the group.
• Continuity Nod: In the "Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM" Drama CD, she, Kanan and Mari have to go look for an escaped penguin, and Mari manages to drive her up the wall with an Insane Troll Logic argument that the penguin might be a stray from Antarctica and thus, she should keep it. Later, in the AZALEA Drama where she and Kanan have to look for Hanamaru in Mari's hotel, they find a locked door, and Dia, on the verge of losing it, guesses that a penguin is behind it.
• Cool Big Sis: To Ruby.
  • Despite their contrasting personalities and that Ruby seems to sometimes feel intimidated by Dia's more assertive attitude (enough, for example, for Ruby to hesitate before going through with becoming an idol because it might upset Dia), it's shown that they have a good relationship, that was even closer when both were μ's fans at the same time.
  • She comforts a visibly upset Ruby after the latter, alongside the rest of Aqours, returns from her Tokyo performance, and praises her for doing her best.
  • In Dengeki G stories, this is how Hanamaru sees her, feeling jealous of Ruby for having such a kind elder sister.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: While initially opposed to the formation of a school idol club and remaining aloof towards Aqours for a while after Mari approves the club, she slowly starts to lend them her support and expresses concern that they may meet the same crushing demoralization that hit her, Kanan, and Mari two years ago when Kanan purposely failed to perform due to Mari's injury in Tokyo. This culminates in episode 4 of season 2, where she feels that she's not close enough with other Aqours members.
• Distinguishing Mark: Her beauty mark is unique in the franchise as its on the side of her mouth unlike others like Erena or Lanzhu, whose beauty marks are near the eyes. She also has a habit of scratching it every time she lies about her true feelings, so it gets a bit of focus as well.
• Don't Call Me "Sir": Because her demeanor tends to be more formal and serious compared to her fellow third years, the first and second year members of Aqours constantly use the "-san" honorific to refer to her, as opposed to "-chan" for the other third years. Episode 4 of the second season revolves around her struggles with this, as she too wants to be addressed using "-chan", believing that "-san" creates a barrier between herself and the other members of the group. The title of the episode even lampshades this trope. Ironically, Dia herself refers to almost all the other girls with the "-san" honorific (with the only exception being Ruby, since they're sisters).
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Has this reaction following Aqours' performance in the first Love Live preliminaries, when a group of schoolgirls fangirl over the other members, but have no clue who she is.
• Family Theme Naming: With Ruby, since they're both named after precious stones.
• Fangirl: It turns out she's an over the top µ's fanatic. Her favorite member is, predictably, Eli Ayase, because she's also a student council president and idol.
• Formal Characters Use Keigo: She speaks in very formal linguistics at all times (even using the very formal pronoun "watakushi" for herself), highlighting her upbringing from a very traditional (and wealthy) Japanese background.
• Freudian Slip: Near the end of her tirade about µ's in the second episode:
  You: W-wow, are you actually a µ's fan?
  Dia: Of course! Who do you think I— I mean, this is common knowledge!
• Generation Xerox: The "Miracle! A Treasure for the Future" audio drama reveals that an ancestor of the Kurosawa family took a photo with eight of her friends and hid it in a cave as a family treasure. Decades later, Dia goes looking for the treasure, not being aware of its nature. Eventually finding the photo, Dia decides to keep it, but not before taking a photo with the rest of Aqours and leaving it in the cave to replace the one she took.
• Giving Someone the Pointer Finger:
  • Nearly stabs Chika between the eyes with her fingernail after Chika laughs at Dia hurting her own hand.
  • Happens again with Ruby in season 1 episode 10.
  • She does this to the second-years when they come up with an idea to take random part-time jobs, and later to a customer in a flea market in season 2 episode 4.
• Graceful Loser: An easy to miss example; when Mari dares Chika, You and Riko to succesfully fill their school's auditorium for their first live in order to have their school idol group approved, she no longer tries to stop them and goes on with Mari's approval, averting her Obstructive Bureaucrat side.
• Hair Color Dissonance: Most of the time, Dia's hair appears to be a very dark brown, though in some pictures it appears black.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Just about anything sets her off. In both of the audio dramas that prominently feature her, she completely loses it when having to deal with Mari & Hanamaru's shenanigans.
• Hidden Depths:
  • Apart from believing that no other group could match µ's, her attempts to prevent Chika from starting a school idol club were also borne from her own crushing failures when she tried to be a school idol in her first year, and wanting to spare Aqours from experiencing the same trauma should they fail in Tokyo like she did.
  • She also brings up how idols need to make their own songs. For someone who despises idols, she knows quite a bit about them. Then you realize she's a Closet Geek.
• Hime Cut: Worn to fit her image of traditional Japanese regality, even if her personality falls short of the associated demureness and serenity.
• I Never Said It Was Poison: She accidentally outs herself as the one who knocked over Chika's bowling set-up in "Aberration! A Midnight Mystery", by claiming that she didn't trip over it, when no one brought up how the set-up was knocked down to begin with.
• Japanese Politeness: Speaks very formally at all times, to the point of referring to all her friends with the honorific "-san" (even her Childhood Friends Mari and Kanan), and ending nearly all of her sentences with the very feminine and polite "desu wa". Justified, given her ojou status.
• Jerkass Has a Point: While harsh about it in the early episodes, she wasn't wrong about her criticisms of Aqours, such as claiming they only managed to fill the school auditorium out of the townspeople's good will (which showed when they got zero votes from the audience in Tokyo), or that they couldn't sustain their popularity rank with gimmicks such as fallen angel outfits alone (with their rating plummeting soon after to prove her point). That she would go out of her way to make such points also hinted that she was secretly concerned for them, and indeed, she was very comforting and understanding when they bombed in Tokyo since she and her friends went though the same thing.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: The "jerk" part is largely downplayed; she initially came off as an Obstructive Bureaucrat who disapproved of a school idol club and has a short temper, but she's not a bad person by any means, being a doting older sister to Ruby and secretly supporting Aqours behind the scenes and helping with the group's reformation despite her initial opposition towards them.
• Large Ham: She's prone to being VERY melodramatic whenever she loses her temper (and when talking about µ's).
• Milking the Giant Cow: A usual occurence whenever she's set off is to make gestures, such as when Chika mispronounces µ's name.
• Mirror Character:
  • Lampshaded by Hanamaru after seeing both Ruby and Dia stutter and attempt to run away after being probed on the third years' past, as well as both reacting in a similar manner after being caught in Yoshiko's grappling hold.
  • In flashbacks to when they were children, we see her mannerisms and expressions were very similar to Ruby's, including hiding behind Kanan the way Ruby hides behind Hanamaru.
• Not So Above It All: Despite her attempts to maintain a serious demeanor, more often than not, she finds herself swept up in the rest of the group's zaniness.
• Obstructive Bureaucrat: She, like Eli, opposes the formation of an idol club at her school, at least initially. However, it's not because she doesn't like school idols; she's actually a huge fan of µ's, and believes that no other group could possibly match their greatness. It's later revealed that this is also because she used to be part of a school idol group with Mari and Kanan, and she doesn't want Chika and the others to go through the same disappointment they faced when they failed to perform in Tokyo. She softens as the series goes on.
• Older Is Better: She owns a flip-phone.
• Ojou: She's the eldest daughter of an old and very prominent fishing family, and she speaks and acts formally.
• Only Sane Woman: Subverted. Despite being the Student Council President and seemingly being the picture of order and reason, Dia is incredibly obsessive and prone to losing her head over trivial things.
• The Perfectionist: She's very concerned with things being perfect, and can get easily worked up over trivial details.
• Pinocchio Nose: She has a tendency to scratch her mole when she is hiding something.
• Proud Beauty: In the mobile game, she will frequently brag about how good she looks, and one of her reactions to touching her partnered portrait is saying she didn't know she was such a babe, being amused by the player character staring at her so intently.
• Rock Theme Naming: Her name is short for "diamond" and her sister's name is Ruby. According to Dengeki interviews, it's a tradition in the Kurosawa family to name their daughters after precious stones (though Dia mentions that her father made the unusual decision to pick English-sounding names for her and Ruby rather than Japanese names).
• Runaway Fiancé: In School idol diary, Dia reveals that she plans to run away if an arrange marriage between her and a random man happens in the future.
• Saying Sound Effects Out Loud: Her catchphrase, "Buu buu desu wa!", since "buu buu" is the Japanese sound effect for a buzzer in a trivia show. She makes this sound when she is denying something completely, such as when the girls couldn't come up with the answer whenever she's in her Fangirl mode.
  • Subverted in the dub. She makes an angry buzzer sound for the same effect, but later changes to "boop boop" in the second season.
• Serious Business: She does not like it when school idols are treated lightly. Lampshaded by characters for "seriousness" in the scene where she rants about Chika mispronouncing µ's name.
• Shared Family Quirks: In flashbacks, Dia shares a lot of Ruby's nervous mannerisms◊, and even now they get drawn out in the right situations.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Dia is assertive, all-business, prone to yelling and a perfectionist, while her little sister Ruby is timid, playful, clumsy and only raises her voice when her shyness hits. Both, however, like idols.
• Stealth Mentor: While apparently taking the Obstructive Bureaucrat stance, she's the one who turned on the backup generator for the school auditorium in Episode 2, and wrote "Aqours" in the sand when Chika, Riko and You were thinking of names for their group.
• Student Council President: Of Uranohoshi Girls' High School. Though she is very responsible and can be good at getting situations under control, she does have a tendency to put off her paperwork and cause it to pile up over time, necessitating a bail out from the other members of Aqours.
• Team Mom: Despite initially being against the formation of an idol group, Dia has been supporting Aqours both from the background and emotionally ever since their formation, like turning the emergency generators on in episode 3's blackout and explaining that Aqours' performance in Tokyo, despite garnering 0 points, wasn't a failure. This role even extends toward the other 3rd years:
  Chika: You really like [Kanan and Mari], don't you?
  Dia: Well, you're going to have to take care of them now. They're actually quite sensitive.
  • In Love Live! School Idol Festival ALL STARS, she extends her role to both μ's and the Nijigasaki High School Idol Club.
• Training from Hell: She finds the training regimen Umi drafted and attempts to have Aqours follow it, which naturally leads to this. After the training wipes out everyone except Kanan, she questions how µ's could possibly train like that, not realizing that µ's themselves never actually used said training regimen in the first place!
• Tsundere:
  • A classic Harsh example. She is very assertive, fiery, and temperamental, but also has a softer side that seems to show up when people and things she cares about are involved — she is supportive of her little sister, is mentioned to care a lot about her old friend Kanan, and is very passionate about μ's (though she quickly acts haughty if this is pointed out). Over time, her kind side starts to come out more often, culminating in season 2 episode 4.
  • Also worth mentioning is that, despite losing her patience with Mari several times, she's still seen with both her and Kanan at the town meeting at the beach at Season 1 episode 6, much like a normal group of friends.
• Tsurime Eyes: The most noticeable of the girls; they highlight her icy and serious personality.
• Verbal Tic:
  • In similar fashion to Ruby, Dia also shouts "Pigi!" or "Pigya!" when stressed or surprised (or in pain), but unlike her sister, she's a lot more conservative about it. The 2nd Years even comment on the resemblance after Yoshiko puts Dia in a grappling hold.
  • In general, she tends to end her sentences with "desu wa" or simply "wa"; using "wa" this way is a very feminine speech pattern.
• Yamato Nadeshiko: Subverted; she has the looks and upbringing of one, looks really beautiful in any Japanese-themed dress, is very polite, and tries hard to be mature and dignified. However, she's too temperamental and melodramatic to fit the trope in terms of personality.

Hanamaru Kunikida

Image Color: Yellow

Age: 15

Birthday: March 4 (Pisces)

Blood Type: O

Height: 152 cm

Three Sizes: B83/W57/H83

Trademark Favorite Food: Mikan and red bean paste

Least Favorite Food: Milk and noodles

Symbol: Hanamaru ^note a variant of the O mark used in Japan frequently used in praising or complimenting children

Voiced by: Kanako Takatsuki (Japanese), Megan Shipman (English)

Ruby's best friend, and Aqours' lyricist alongside Chika. Chika personally picks her out of a crowd to become an idol because she looks the part. She loves books and is fascinated by technology due to being raised in a Buddhist temple without very many modern conveniences. She's Uranohoshi Girls' High School librarian.

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• Accent Slip-Up: Every time she catches herself speaking in her native Shizuoka accent in a situation which it'd be inappropriate, she lampshades this trope, saying something along the lines of "There I go again, talkin' all 'un-lady-like', zura...". ^note To be exact, she catches herself using the gender-neutral first-person pronoun "ora", which is normally not used in standard Japanese.
• Bespectacled Cutie: She wears glasses when not practicing or performing during Over the Rainbow and the music video for "Mitaiken Horizon". They fit with her Cute Bookworm personality.
• Big Eater: In the anime, she's usually seen gorging on food in the background, the most common sweet being a roll of noppo bread. She also usually asks for seconds when she finishes a meal, as seen in episode 10 of season 1, and episodes 8 and 11 of season 2.
  • We also see/hear her take a bite out of a tall hamburger in episode 8 of season 2. Twice.
  • She is prominently seen chowing down on all manners of Italian cuisine in Over the Rainbow, including (but not limited to) pizza and Italian gelato. To the point Yoshiko implies Hanamaru's metabolism to be pretty high.
• Boke and Tsukkomi Routine: Starts to have one with Yohane after episode 5, with their roles switching depending on the situation. Usually, though, Hanamaru plays the role of the Tsukkomi.
• Bookworm: She has always loved reading books ever since she was a child. As she stayed in the background reading books didn't have any friends except Ruby.
• Character Catchphrase: "Mirai, zura!" ^note  "It's the future, zura" in English, which she says whenever she comes across modern technology that impresses her.
• Childhood Friends:
  • She was kindergarten classmates with Yoshiko in the anime.
  • In Dengeki and the manga, she was kindergarten classmates with Ruby.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Downplayed since she's usually pretty level-headed, but she sometimes acts weird, such as when pointing that what Aqours need to win Love Live is to pursue "nothingness" (specifically the Buddhist concept of "nothingness"). Yoshiko agrees wholeheartedly.
• Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: Hanamaru is usually put in charge of keeping "Yohane" in check by Yoshiko herself. Strangely, Hanamaru sometimes activates "Yohane" by way of a Trigger Phrase.
• Curtains Match the Window: Almond brown hair and eyes.
• Cute Bookworm: She loves reading and is easily distracted by books. Justified since she was raised without TV or internet, so books are her main source of entertainment.
• Deadpan Snarker: Towards Yoshiko. She often teases her because of her quirks and chuunibyou personality.

• Friendless Background: Prior to meeting Ruby, she had no close friends since she was the type to stay in the background.
• The Glasses Gotta Go: In her character introduction, Hanamaru mentions she normally wears glasses. She's never seen with glasses in the anime, but she does wear them in Over the Rainbow and in the PV for "Mitaiken HORIZON".
• Good Old Ways: Since she was raised in a temple, she has very old-fashioned habits; she doesn't even watch TV or go on the internet. This has caused her to be teased in the past. However, unlike most examples of this trope, she doesn't treat old-fashioned things as superior, and is easily impressed with technology.
• Heavy Voice: Wearing so many layers when it's cold out makes her voice comically deeper.
• Hidden Buxom: Despite being the shortest member of the group and likely being an ectomorph, she actually has the second biggest bust in Aqours alongside Kanan, at 83cm.
• In-Series Nickname: She's called "Maru" by most, while Yoshiko calls her "Zuramaru".
• Male Gaze: The anime gives a few gratuitous shots where you can clearly see her bust.
• Mundane Object Amazement: She finds a computer that can access the internet amazing, and thinks automatic faucets and hand dryers are futuristic technologies. Justified since she grew up in an old-fashioned temple.
• Nerds Are Sexy: A geeky, yet very pretty and attractive girl. Also the second-bustiest girl in the series, on par with Kanan.
• Non-Uniform Uniform: Wears a yellow cardigan over her uniform.
• Out of Focus: She largely is regulated to a background character after her spotlight episode early in the anime. Ironic, given her backstory.
• Playing a Tree: She did this in a school play when she was younger, not being the type to have a main role. Apart from supporting Ruby, part of the reason she joins Aqours is because she would get a starring role on stage.
• Primal Fear: Growing up in a Buddhist temple, Hanamaru was easily frightened by the decor and atmosphere of the temple at night; combined with her relatively lonely upbringing she became easily scared of sudden noises and dark places.
• Proper Tights with a Skirt: Like Hanayo, she wears this with her school uniform.
• Swapped Roles: In Season 2 Episode 5, due to Yoshiko suffering from O.O.C. Is Serious Business, Hanamaru briefly adopts Yoshiko's speech patterns and posing to comment on it. When Ruby comments on the similarity, she responds with "zura" in a similar tone to Yoshiko's "gira".
• Tareme Eyes: The most noticeable of the girls; they highlight her soft personality.
• Third-Person Person: Tends to refer to herself as "Maru", a shortened version of her own name.
• Those Two Girls: Often seen together with Ruby.
• Tranquil Fury: Hanamaru very rarely gets angry, that is, until Yoshiko decides to hold Ruby in a lock in episode 9. Hanamaru's response? She lightly karate chops Yoshiko on the head, with a visible smile on her face.
  Hanamaru: Stop that, zura.
  Yoshiko: Oh...? Okay.
• Verbal Tic: She speaks in a Shizuoka dialect, referring to herself as "ora" (when she isn't being a Third-Person Person) and ending her sentences with "-zura". Both parts are pointed out by Leah.
• Visual Pun: Hanamaru's signature pose is her holding her hands up in a "O" shape. "maru" means "circle" in Japanese.

Guilty Kiss

Guilty Kiss' first single, "Strawberry Trapper"

The "Cool" subunit, Guilty Kiss is notable for their distinct influences stemming from Western-oriented music styles. Their type of music tends to vary wildly as a result, including themes like Western pop, Electronic Dance Music, and hard rock. Its members are Riko Sakurauchi, Yoshiko Tsushima, and Mari Ohara, who, despite the theme of their subunit, have some... pretty interesting personalities.

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• Calling Your Attacks: All three of them in particular get in on this, with Riko only doing so after a case of Got Me Doing It with Yoshiko. Yoshiko's and Riko's attacks are both for wrestling holds, while Mari's is for a pillow fight throw and a dodgeball game; Riko's and Mari's attack name are also in English, while Yoshiko's is in the type of Japanese that wouldn't be out of place in a shonen battle manga character's repertoire.
  Yoshiko: Fallen Angel Secret Technique: Fallen Dragon Phoenix Hold! ^note Datenshi Ougi: Datenryu Hou-ouraku
  Riko: Silent Cherry Blossom Nightmare...!
  Mari: Shining Tornaaado!
• Cosmic Motifs: Guilty Kiss' SIF collaboration single, "New Romantic Sailors", has a strong space/sci-fi theme in both titles and lyrics, featuring songs like "Love Pulsar" and "Phantom Rocket Adventure".
• Electronic Dance Music: "Guilty Night, Guilty Kiss!", "Guilty Eyes Fever", "Shadow Gate to Love", and most especially "Guilty?! Farewell Party" are EDM pieces in Guilty Kiss' discography.
• Elegant Gothic Lolita: Their costumes trend towards this fashion style.
• Hard Rock: "Strawberry Trapper" and "Kowareyasuki" are outstanding examples of Guilty Kiss' exploration of the Hard Rock genre. Their album "Shooting Star Warrior" marks a pivot to go further into hard rock with the titular song and "Deep Sea Cocoon" as standout tracks.
• Hotter and Sexier: Their name was meant to symbolize the slightly grown-up and little demon-like image the unit has. This is also reflected in the lyrics of Guilty Kiss' songs.
• Spotlight-Stealing Squad: As far as subunits of Aqours goes, Guilty Kiss stands out as this. Their subunits' gothic lyrics and exploration in the Hard Rock and EDM genres have led to their popularity dwarfing those of AZALEA and CYaRon!. Guilty Kiss proved to be so popular that they have performed standalone shows at the Tokyo Dome and in New York City. Moreover, in the Unit Live Adventure festival (a tour which was to feature standalone performances from Aqours' subunits), Guilty Kiss performed at the Musashino Forest Sports Plaza... a venue that has twice the capacity of the venues AZALEA and CYaRon! were slated to perform in.

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Riko Sakurauchi

Image Color: Sakura Pink

Age: 16

Birthday: September 19 (Virgo)

Blood Type: A

Height: 160 cm

Three Sizes: B80/W58/H82

Hobby: "Drawing", handicraft, cooking

Skills: Music instrument (piano, viola)

Trademark Favorite Food: Hard-boiled eggs and sandwiches

Least Favorite Food: Green peppers

Symbol: Piano

Voiced by: Rikako Aida (Japanese), Jeannie Tirado (English)

A second year transfer student from Otonokizaka. Chika personally seeks her out as a key member of Aqours after learning that she has musical skills. As such, she's the composer of Aqours. She lives beside Chika's inn.

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• Adaptational Backstory Change: In the manga, her transfer is stated to be due to her father's work and not tied to a Performance Anxiety incident. She is also stated to have been in the art club back at Otonokizaka, although she has played the piano since she was a child.
• A Day in the Limelight: She has two: Season 1 Episode 2 is devoted to her joining Aqours and her slowly overcoming the trauma of her failure from her last piano concert and Season 2 Episode 5 focuses on Riko attempting to overcome her cynophobia.
• Ambiguously Gay: Not only is Riko shown to be a Yuri Fan but in episode 10 she gives a Love Confession to Chika which is just ambiguous enough that it could be friendly or romantic love she's feeling. She also says that she's sometimes attracted to Nijigasaki High's Karin Asaka due to her glamorous and mature image.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Riko is one of the nicest girls in the group, but this doesn't mean she's totally above getting angry. She stares at Chika with a rather pissed off look in her eyes when, instead of writing the lyrics for a song, she draws Riko in goofy poses.
• Big Sister Instinct: After their episode in Season 2 together, she starts looking after Yoshiko like a fussy older sister.
• Butt-Monkey: She doesn't get it as bad as Nico Yazawa, and has a strong contender in Yoshiko as the whole group's Butt-Monkey, but Riko is definitely this among the second years. She gets the most amount of physical comedy among the girls, due to her fear of dogs (she goes to the point of jumping out of a window to avoid Chika's dog). Also, after several episodes, she still gets teased about her early suggestion for the group's name, Three Mermaids.
• Calling Your Attacks: In "New Romantic Sailors".
  Riko: Riko-chan Laser Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeam!
• The Chew Toy: Is also a mild version of this. Even her friends can't help but find amusement in her distress.
• City Mouse: Being a native of Tokyo, she is the only member of Aqours to be this, in contrast to the others who grew up in Numazu.
  • Invoked in the "Unit! Our Survival" drama, where Chika manages to get everyone, except Riko, to go with her idea of surviving in the wilderness during a camping trip through scrounging food. Her hesitation to the exercise is chalked up to her not having grown up in Numazu.
• Cute Clumsy Girl: Despite her polite, mature and reserved nature, Riko is quite the klutz and has several goofy Butt-Monkey moments.
• Deadpan Snarker: Inevitable, given how she's usually the group's Only Sane Man. While Riko does get to snark a lot in the anime, it gets played up more in the Drama CDs where everyone's antics are a lot weirder.
• Death Glare: Gives one to Chika on season 2 episode 2 after the latter, instead of writing lyrics for Aqours' next song in her notepad, draws Riko in a series of goofy poses displaying anger. Chika's expression when Riko stares her down says a lot.
  Riko: Chika-chan...
• Demoted to Extra: She has a smaller role in Season 2, mostly due to the season largely ignoring her relationship with Chika. She does get one focus episode in the season, though, and she's returned to being among the more prominent characters in The Movie.
• Depending on the Writer: In the manga, Riko transferred to Numazu during her second years due to her father working there. In the anime's film, it was implied that Riko visited Numazu during her childhood before she was eventually transferred here many years later.
• Deuteragonist: The closest thing to a secondary main character after Chika in Sunshine, especially in season 1. While she arguably loses a bit of focus in season 2 compared to the previous season, her importance to the group and to Chika's character (even if relatively glossed over) remains, and she receives an elevation back to her previous status in The Movie.
• Did They or Didn't They?: At the end of Episode 10, after Chika tells her that she should enter a piano competition, Riko tenderly hugs Chika and tells her she loves her. Due to her saying this at the end of the episode, it's unknown what happened afterwards or even if Riko was talking platonic or romantic love.
• Elegant Classical Musician: She's been a pianist for years and is noted to be reasonably attractive and graceful. Her official profile also reveals she can also play the viola.
• Fetish: She seems to be fixated on the concept of "Wall Pin of Love" and "chin-in hand" kisses. This is referenced in the ED with Chika.◊^note The original term of Riko's fetish in Japanese is kabekui, a portmanteau of kabedon (the Japanese term for Wall Pin of Love) and agokui (chin-in-hand). Official subs for the first season didn't include the kabe (wall) part, and it is commonly interpreted that Riko likes the combination of kabedon and agokui even if kabekui itself would be more along the (bizarre) lines of 'wall-in-hand' as illustrated in the covers on the doujins she buys in the anime.
• The Generic Girl: In the mobile game, a lot of her lines are about Riko thinking of herself as extremely dull in comparison to the other girls and despite having come from a trendy place like Tokyo. The anime downplays it by adding some extra comedic traits to her character such as being a Butt-Monkey.
• Got Me Doing It: She ends up copying Yoshiko's outward middle- and little-finger gesture in Season 2 episode 6 and only realizes it seconds later.
• Heroes Love Dogs: After getting over her fear of dogs in Season 2 Episode 5 Riko eventually realises that she really loves dogs and finds them cute eventually getting one of her own in the Season 2 finale.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: She does this to herself a lot, as she is unable to see what is so special about herself.
• In-Series Nickname: Yoshiko sometimes calls her "Lily" (Ririi) in Dengeki, SIF and throughout the second half of the anime's 2nd season. Usually it has to do with Riko as a member of Guilty Kiss.
• Japanese Politeness: She's more elegant and polite than her friends Chika and You, especially when referring to adults or people she just met. An example of this is how she refers to Chika as "Takami-san" until they become friends on episode 2.
• New Transfer Student: She used to live in Akihabara before transferring to Uchiura. Specifically, she used to go to Otonokizaka, since she's wearing their freshman uniform in Aqours' first PV (where she keeps it on the entire time for some reason), and in the first episode of Sunshine.
• Nice Girl: She's a little shy and neurotic, but is nonetheless a gentle, kindhearted, polite, and softspoken girl who supports her friends and treats everyone well.
• Not So Above It All: A large source of comedy from her comes from these kinds of moments. Despite her composed personality, Riko can be rather dorky at times.
• Ocean Awe: Unlike the other members, Riko's a city girl, and in her introductory scene she tries to jump into the ocean to find musical inspiration, specifically mentioning a change of scenery.
• Only Sane Woman: Within Guilty Kiss, between Yoshiko and Mari, she certainly counts as this. She also usually plays this role to Aqours as a whole, being far more likely to question everyone else's antics. That said, she does have her fair share of quirks and easily freaks out.
• Ordinary High-School Student: She claims to be "a plain girl" in her introduction.
• Performance Anxiety: Back when she was still in Otonokizaka, the pressure of competing against other great musicians got to her, resulting in Riko freezing up during a competition and withdrawing from playing her piece right on stage.
• Porn Stash: A downplayed example since none of it is explicit, but her collection of yuri literature is practically this to her, and she reacts in predictable fashion when Chika stumbles upon it.
• The Quiet One: Although to a lesser degree than Kanan; she's generally mature and composed but has a rather quirky side to her personality.
• Refusal of the Call: Seeing herself as a classical pianist, Riko initially wants nothing to do with being a school idol, but after Chika helps her out of a musical slump she goes from non-participant to composer to full-fledged idol.
  • This is reversed in Episode 10, when she gets an invitation to participate in a piano competition but declines it in favor of entering the Love Live preliminaries with the rest of Aqours. It is Chika that winds up convincing her to go to that competition, noting that it is a way Riko for to make up from her previous disastrous showing at the piano.
• Satiating Sandwich: Riko's Trademark Favorite Food. She also likes making them and usually brings sandwiches to share with the rest of Aqours during events.
• Ship Tease: As is usual for a Love Live character, Riko has this for her partner Chika. Although she goes on step further by actually giving her a (vague) Love Confession, even though afterward the teasing goes right back to being just that.
• Shrinking Violet: She's pretty shy and soft spoken, though unlike most examples like Ruby above, she's a more realistic take on the trope as she won't exactly run away when meeting someone new.
• Spotlight-Stealing Squad: She's this In-Universe. After Riko joined Aqours, she got all of Chika's attention, thus leaving You alone. To the point that Mari was actually surprised to learn that You was the first member of Aqours to join after Chika having assumed that it was Riko.
• Terrible Artist: Dengeki G Magazine revealed that Riko has an interest in drawing because she was in the school's art club. Then her drawing skills are finally shown in episode 5 of season 2... and she draws this◊. This is most likely a reference to her seiyuu's infamous drawings.
• Transfer Student Uniforms: In Aqours' first PV, she always wears her Otonokizaka uniform while the other girls wear the Uranohoshi uniform.
• Tsurime Eyes: They aren't as noticeable as Dia's and Yoshiko's at first glance, likely because of her calmer personality. They become more noticeable in one rare moment when she's angry at Chika.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?:
  • The "Charge! The Open-Air Marine Park" audio drama reveals that she's afraid of frogs.
  • In the anime, she's deathly afraid of dogs, especially Shiitake, Chika's pet. She says it's their fangs that she's most afraid of. She's also shown to be afraid of sea lions, because their faces resemble those of dogs. A major subplot of Season 2 Episode 5 is her slowly overcoming her fear of dogs after taking care of a lost dog for most of the episode. By the episode's end she is shown petting Shiitake.
• Wrestler in All of Us: In Season 2 episode 12, she locks Yohane in a Crossface Chickenwing hold which she calls the "Silent Cherry Blossom Nightmare".
• Yamato Nadeshiko: She's easily the most refined and feminine girl in her group. Personality-wise, she's elegant, kind, polite and, while usually reserved, she does have a tougher side, especially when dealing with Chika's antics. Though she is a redhead, personality-wise she fits the archetype better than Dia.
• Yuri Fan: Subtly implied to be one, as she sneaks off to buy yuri literature during Aqours' trip to Tokyo. Later on, she is shown to have vastly increased her collection while in Tokyo for her piano competition. One of her hairpins also resembles a lily.

Yoshiko "Yohane" Tsushima

Image Color: White (Black in CYaZALEA☆Kiss☆DADANDAAAN)

Age: 15

Birthday: July 13 (Cancer)

Blood Type: O

Height: 156 cm

Three Sizes: B79/W58/H80

Trademark Favorite Food: Chocolate and strawberries

Least Favorite Food: Mikan

Symbol: Demon

Voiced by: Aika Kobayashi (Japanese), Morgan Berry (English)

A 1st-year afflicted with chuunibyou that makes her believe she's a fallen angel named "Yohane" who has been cast out of heaven and cursed by God. In reality, she just has abysmal luck. She's also a fairly popular streamer on the internet, and thus serves as Aqours' video editor.

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• Adaptation Personality Change:
  • Yoshiko's manga counterpart is depicted as being far more grounded than in the anime or games and is capable of acting normally towards others without publicizing her Chuunibyou tendencies too much. This is effectively the opposite of her anime/game depiction where she constantly goes into chuuni mode out of habit and gets picked on because of it.
  • She also lacks her "It's Yohane!" catchphrase in the manga, as she isn't nearly so wacky as to insist that others refer to her as "Yohane", and it's shown in the School idol diary stories that Hanamaru and Ruby unironically refer to her as such despite their preference for her real name in the anime.
• Adaptational Backstory Change: In the anime, Yoshiko created the "fallen angel Yohane" persona as a child because she thought she was too normal and thus created her own unique way of standing out. In the manga, the "Yohane" persona was created because she is so horribly unlucky that she figured that she might be a fallen angel cursed by God.
• Aroused by Their Voice: Invoked. Her identity as "Yohane" is a fallen angel who likes to seduce mortals into becoming her followers. To emphasize this, she sometimes switches from her normal, high-pitched voice to a deeper, lower one when feeling especially dramatic. ^note At least in the original version; in the English dub her voice when "normal" is nearly as deep as her voice as Yohane but more raspier, only noticeably higher when she is panicked. Yohane on the other is more smoother. She also does this in songs, singing some lines with her high/"Yoshiko" voice and others with her low/"Yohane" voice (most notable in Guilty Kiss songs). Whether any of it works, however, is anyone's guess.
• Bizarre Taste in Food: Aside from her signature super spicy takoyaki recipe, in one SIF story, she eats a dish Riko prepared that accidentally had mayonnaise in the place of cream, and says it's pretty good before the other members even get a chance to warn her.
• Boke and Tsukkomi Routine: Starts to have one with Hanamaru after episode 5, with their roles switching depending on the situation; usually though, she is the Boke to Hanamaru's Tsukkomi. She also develops one with Riko in season 2 after the two begin spending more time together.
• Born Unlucky: Has incredibly abysmal luck. According to her, this is a curse, a side effect to being a fallen angel: it's bound to rain when she goes on a trip, she's prone to falling when it snows, becomes sick during exam periods, and so on. As seen in the anime, she even never wins anything from lucky draws in groceries. And to top it off, ironically enough, her given name means "lucky child"!
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Despite the majority of her screentime being dedicated to her being weird, certain material describes her as at least well-read and intelligent. She's also shown to be fairly good at cooking, bizarre taste in food aside.
• Butt-Monkey: Easily the biggest one in Sunshine! Not only does she possess truly abysmal luck, she constantly gets picked on by the other members of Aqours (mostly Hanamaru) or ignored altogether if they get sick of her antics and often suffers from various Amusing Injuries.
• Breakout Character: She becomes the main character of the fantasy spin-off series Yohane the Parhelion -SUNSHINE in the MIRROR-, which was adapted into an anime in 2023.
• Character Catchphrase: "YOHANE!"^note "It's Yohane!" in English., whenever someone calls her Yoshiko.
• Character Tics:
  • She creates scissors with her ring and index finger whenever she plays Rock–Paper–Scissors, a habit that Hanamaru uses to confirm that it's her in episode 1.
  • She tends to make a v sign over one eye (usually her right one) whenever she's acting like a Chuunibyou.
• Childhood Friends: Was kindergarten classmates with Hanamaru in the anime and games, but has no such relationship with the other members in the manga.
• Chuunibyou: She has a made-up persona as a fallen angel named "Yohane" who seduces mortals into being her followers through her voice. She even insists on being called "Yohane" instead of her real name. Her episode in the anime's first season shows she's well aware that demons and fallen angels don't exist and that her chuunibyou behavior is silly and embarrassing, but by now her Yohane persona is so deeply ingrained into her personality that she often slips into it without realizing. She also feels conflicted about keeping her Yohane personality in high school, but with the help of Chika, Hanamaru and the other girls, she decides to accept her chuunibyou side as part of herself.
• City Mouse: Not quite to the same degree as Riko, but in the manga she is noted to live in the nearby and considerably more modernized city of Numazu. She somewhat resents having to go to school in rural Uchiura where she has to take the bus both ways every day, and part of her motivation for joining Aqours lies in wanting to spice up her otherwise mundane life.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Zigzagged; being a Chuunibyou, she tends to slip into her Yohane persona out of habit, which results in her trying to act like a cool and mysterious "fallen angel" even when she's in public. That said, when not in her Yohane persona she's pretty good at being rational and levelheaded.
• A Day in the Limelight: Is the focus of Episode 5 of Season 1 and Episode 5 of Season 2.
• Depending on the Artist: Her hair length varies a bit.
• Do Not Call Me "Paul": She prefers to go by "Yohane" instead of her given name, going as far as to cross out her real name in her introduction and replace it as such.
• Does Not Like Spam: Her general distaste for mikans is brought up a few times. Hanamaru reveals in ALL STARS that she had way too many and eventually grew to hate mikans.
• Duck Season, Rabbit Season: A short version. Normally, when someone calls her Yoshiko, she insists that "It's Yohane". But in season 2 episode 5, Riko calls her Yohane, and she replies with "It's Yoshiko" only to realize what she just blurted out.
• Establishing Character Moment: In her first scene in the anime, she is introduced jumping from a tree and then acting out her fallen angel persona to cover up her embarrassment about it, only to run off in shame when Hanamaru recognizes her.
• Expy: Seems to be one of Sachiko Tanaka, one of the N girls from SIF, as both have chuunibyou personas and dislike being referred to with their real names.
• Fallen Angel: Her chuunibyou persona is based around her being this. She claims she's an angel who was cursed and banished from Heaven, which is a way for her to justify her constant bad luck.
• Face Palm: She does this during the group's collective Lame Pun Reaction to Mari in season 2 episode 5.
• Flanderization:
  • Infamously subject to this in Season 2, where Yoshiko is almost exclusively reduced to a comedic relief character outside of one Filler episode. Contrast with Season 1, where she was a comedic relief character but at least had character development and non-Chuunibyou qualities.
  • Ditto for ALL STARS, where she has by far the least influence on the plot, with the majority of her appearances having her make some sort of quirky side comment before the other girls re-rail the conversation.
• Fully-Embraced Fiend: While not an actual fallen angel, she settles fully into adopting the persona of one at the end of Episode 5.
• Gag Nose: Downplayed. While it isn't exactly played up as such, her noise is drawn more prominently compared to the other girls in the franchise.
• Gamer Chick: One of her listed hobbies is playing video games.
  • In a Dengeki interview, she says she prefers fighting games and racing games.
  • One of her Bond Story events in ALL STARS has her livestreaming a horror game in-character as Yohane... only to break character when said game scares the crap out of her.
  • Her "Kyou no Aqours" episode is about her playing retro games.
• Gratuitous English: Whenever she mentions "little demons" as part of her "Yohane" persona, she always says it in English (though she pronounces "demon" as "dehmon"/"dæmon").
• Hand Gagging: Hanamaru starts doing this to her in Episode 9 whenever she slips into fallen angel mode. Or a Dope Slap; she just needs a small physical reminder to cut the act sometimes.
• Hereditary Hairstyle: Episode 13 reveals that Yoshiko's mother has the same hairstyle as her, with a bun on the side of her head.
• Hidden Depths: While at first glance she comes across as over-the-top and eccentric, deep down she's very socially awkward and somewhat shy, using her fallen angel persona as a way to hide her insecurities.
• Iconic Item: Her black feather.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: By the time she got to high school, she decided that she needed to drop the "Yohane" persona and live life as a regular person. Unfortunately for her, by then "Yohane" was so ingrained into her personality that she reverts to that persona purely out of habit.
• I Just Want to Be Special: According to Hanamaru, this is one of the main reasons Yoshiko created her "fallen angel" persona: she had always been a normal girl who didn't stand out much and wondered if that was her really real self, and so decided while in kindergarten that she was actually an angel. Chika manages to coax her into joining Aqours because the group would allow her a non-judgmental atmosphere to assume her "Yohane" persona as much as she likes.
• In-Series Nickname: Riko and You refer to her as Yocchan in Dengeki and SIF.
• Insistent Terminology: Expect her to tell you to address her as "Yohane" if she catches you addressing her by her real name.
• Ironic Name: Her given name translates as "lucky child", and yet she's Born Unlucky and is often the biggest Butt-Monkey of the group.
• Irony: She always states she wants to be called "YOHANE", but then when Riko refers to her as such in Episode 5 of Season 2, she yells "YOSHIKO!".
• Large Ham: Naturally, given her chuunibyou tendencies.
• Lethal Chef: She's actually fairly good at cooking but her preference for spicy food means that everything she cooks end up being really spicy, well over the tolerance of everyone in Aqours.
  • Her dish, Tears of a Lovely Angel, looks pretty weird: apparently it's takoyaki, but black with red insides, and did not sell. Unlike Mari's dish, which is approved when the girls taste it, Yoshiko's makes poor Ruby's face get bright red from Hot Sauce Drinking, since she flavored them with Tabasco sauce instead of octopus. However, Yoshiko and Mari seem to find it pretty good anyway, and later when Tears of a Lovely Angel is integrated into You's Sailor Curry, the girls seem to approve it.
  • In ALL STARS, Yoshiko cooks up a successor called "Tears of a Fallen Angel - Revolution" using habanero sauce. For reference, habanero sauce is over twice as hot as Tabasco. Ruby is not excited at the prospect of eating Yoshiko's cooking again.
• Loner-Turned-Friend: Thought she made efforts to change herself and drop the chuuni persona to socialize with people, Yoshiko had difficulty making real close friends prior to joining Aqours, and even then had to be convinced twice before becoming a full-fledged member.
• Mad Libs Catchphrase: She frequently brings up "little demons".
• Nice Girl: In spite of her dark Anti-Hero fallen angel Yohane persona, at heart Yoshiko is a kind, honest girl who is supportive of her friends and helps Riko overcoming her fear of dogs, taking care of a lost dog along with her.
• Only Sane Woman: Ironically, whenever she isn't in Fallen Angel mode, she'll be one of the first ones to question and even snark at the group's zanier antics. In a reversal to their usual dynamic, she also serves as this for Hanamaru at times.
• Poor, Predictable Rock: Yoshiko has a unique "scissors" where she tucks in her middle and pinky fingers. She always picks scissors due to having a unique hand gesture, which leads to her losing most of her Rock, Paper, Scissors games.
• Real Men Take It Black: Going hand in hand with her more "mature" image, Yoshiko's drink of preference is black coffee. Ruby notes that she still can't stand the stuff.
• Satan: She namedrops him at the start of her first-season focus episode.
• Significant Birthdate: It can't be a coincidence that the ironically-named, unlucky Yoshiko was born on the unlucky 13th day of the lucky 7th month.
• Shy Blue-Haired Girl: She doesn't seem like this at first, but that's because she uses her "Yohane" persona to disguise her social anxiety around others. When she tries to drop the persona, this becomes a lot more obvious.
• Sore Loser: In the audio drama, she does not take losing to Ruby well at all.
• Strong Family Resemblance: She looks even more like her mother than Chika looks like hers. They even have a very similar hairstyle.
• That Man Is Dead: An attempted inversion. After Dia's scathing comments about the group drawing attention to themselves by emphasizing their unique characters, she tries to do this to her "Yohane" persona, but Chika has none of it, encouraging her to be herself.
• Trigger Phrase: A variant of this, as sticking her feather into her hair bun can activate her "Yohane" persona.
• Tsundere: A "played with" Harsh type, skirting the line between both classic Harsh and Sweet. She's not exactly the most open about her feelings in the group, and can be somewhat brash when she insists she's "YOHANE!"; however, she's much easier to get along with once you know her as long as she's not chuuni mode.
• Tsurime Eyes: Which highlight her "little devil" personality and strong emotions.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: With Hanamaru, who frequently makes snarky comments at her expense. Nevertheless, the two are among the closest members of Aqours due to being Childhood Friends.
• Vocal Evolution: Particularly around the time she finished recording for the anime's first season, Aikyan's voice for Yoshiko became a lot smoother and natural, as did the balance and transitions between her Yoshiko voice and her Yohane voice. Compare her current voice work with Yoshiko's introduction track, where her voice was tighter.
• Wrestler in All of Us: She uses a grapple hold (an abdominal stretch + crossface combination) on the Kurosawa sisters when they attempt to evade the probing of the other characters regarding the third years' past.
  • Said grapple hold above resembles a standing version of the Twister, a submission lock which is also used in MMA.

Mari Ohara

Image Color: Violet

Age: 17

Birthday: June 13 (Gemini)

Blood Type: AB

Height: 163 cm

Three Sizes: B87/W60/H84

Hobby: Sports, horse riding

Skills: Stretching, singing

Trademark Favorite Food: Coffee and lemons

Least Favorite Food: Natto and kimchi

Symbol: Sparkle

Voiced by: Aina Suzuki (Japanese), Jamie Marchi (English)

A third year, part Japanese, part American, part Italian, all trouble. Her family owns Awashima Hotel near Uranohoshi. Two years before the story starts, she left Uranohoshi to study overseas and suddenly returns as the school's director.

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• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!:
  • Invoked in episode 3 of first season. Dia accuses her of this, especially when people are talking to her.
  • Later on, she falls asleep while watching Aqours' PV, though this may or may not have been intentional to make a point about how their video wasn't very interesting and needed to be improved.
• Bad Liar: A very recurrent trait of hers, jokingly and for drama.
  (to Kanan) "Sorry! I can't speak Japanese!"
• Big Eater: Mari surpasses Hanamaru's capacity for food only if she eats burgers, and in that case, she just gorges on them. This incident is depicted in an audio drama, so the sheer quantity of burgers she eats is left to the imagination, supplemented only by the sounds of chomping, crinkling wrappers, and Hanamaru and Yoshiko's horrified commentary.
• Big "OMG!": Drops this three times in a row after Aqours passes the qualifiers in Season 1 episode 11.
  Mari: ...oh my god... oh my god!! OH MY GOOOOOOOOOD!
• Big "SHUT UP!": In Season 2 episode 1, Mari yells this in Gratuitous English. Justified because she's in the middle of a speech to an audience of students.
• Bitch Slap: Delivers one to Kanan in Season 1 Episode 9 after learning the truth about why the original Aqours disbanded from Dia.
• Bizarre Taste in Food: She finds Yoshiko's super spicy "Tears of Fallen Angel" to be good.
• Blatant Lies:
• Bridal Carry: Carried this way by Kanan in Season 2 episode 1, apparently to check her weight.
• But Not Too Foreign: Her mother is Japanese and her father is Italian-American.
• Character Catch Phrase:
  • SHINY!
  • Also, "It's joke!"
• Characterization Marches On: In the anime, she is introduced by having a penchant for Skinship Grope in a similar fashion to Nozomi from the previous series, which occurs multiple times in the first season. By Season 2 this quirk is dropped entirely, and most adaptations based on her anime counterpart ignore that she ever had this quirk.
• Childhood Friends: With Dia and Kanan.
• Cloudcuckoolander: She's described as a "my pace" kind of person, preferring to do her own thing and not really caring what others think of her.
• Cordon Bleugh Chef: Despite Mari being made out to seem like a Lethal Chef in Episode 10, with scenes emulating a witch preparing a potion in a cauldron (with her cooking emitting a purple glow), the appearance of her "Stewshine" with its quirky mix of ingredients, leans more towards this trope, as the other members of Aqours found it quite palatable. Her dish did, however, fail to sell due to being prohibitively expensive.
• Cry into Chest: She has one with Kanan in Season 1, Episode 9 when the latter decides to forgive the former for uncoordinated actions that led to the original Aqours breaking up two years ago.
• Cuddle Bug: She seems to like doing this to her fellow third years, and very likely has gained this trait from Kanan as indicated by episode 8's flashback.
• Curtains Match the Window: Has yellow eyes to complement her blonde hair.
• A Day in the Limelight: Shares one with Kanan in episode 9 of Season 1.
• Defrosting Ice Queen: Mari's School idol diary (based on her currently-unrevealed manga counterpart) involves her initially scoffing at then warming up to the idea of performing in frilly school idol outfits.
• Deuteragonist: A surprisingly large amount of focus is drawn to Mari over the course of the series despite the show being centralized around the 2nd years. Much of the series' drama revolves around Mari in some way, including her dynamic with Kanan and being the most closely connected to the school closing situation.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Played for Laughs with just how ridiculous the comparison is. The drama incident where she consumes an inhuman quantity of burgers has her eating them louder and more vigorously with time, saying things like "Oh, shiny burger!" in faux-seductive Engrish. At some point, she even pauses and tells Hanamaru, in a slow and sultry voice, that she's going to "teach her what it means to be American," before going back to stuffing her face.
• Drives Like Crazy: Downplayed, if bringing her van to a sudden stop near the other eight girls is any indication, though she does drive just fine after they head out.
• Dumb Blonde: Subverted; she acts like an easily-distracted Cloudcuckoolander and the Gratuitous English she sprinkles into her speech sometimes has spelling or grammar errors that others point out, but she's a good deal smarter and more observant than she seems.
• Eccentric Millionaire: Besides "buying" the director's position and using it just to give Chika a shot at being an idol, she's willing to use the Ohara family's affluence to give the seals she fishes up a proper diet of expensive seafood and crustaceans, as shown in the audio dramas.
• Failed a Spot Check: She somehow manages to mistake an escaped penguin for Dia in the "Mystery! Sea Paradise Discovery!" audio drama. She also tries to sell her statue at a flea market.
• Flat "What": Says this in Season 2 episode 2 after Hanamaru explains her idea of "nothingness".
• Funny Foreigner: Mari exploits this trope to look sillier than she actually is and have fun in the process. She also talks with an obvious accent during her silly moments, though she drops it when she's being serious.
• The Gadfly: She loves teasing the other members of Aqours. In fact, her Establishing Character Moment has her tease Dia by gently groping her breasts while saying they didn't grow up while she was away.
• Game-Breaking Injury: While not career ending, Mari suffered an ankle injury two years ago that was responsible for Kanan's decision to throw the third years' Tokyo concert by not singing. The injury also served as the catalyst behind Kanan's decision to disband the first incarnation of Aqours to make Mari go overseas to study.
• Gratuitous English: Has a tendency to scatter English words into her speech, likely due to her foreign ancestry. If Over the Rainbow is anything to go by, she gets it from her mother.
• Gratuitous Italian: Since she's already speaking English, the dub decides to tap into her Italian side, having her occasionally replace words with their Italian equivalent. In the Japanese version, the only Italian she's spoken thus far is when she says "ciao!" after landing her helicopter near the second years.
• Hand Behind Head: She sheepishly does this after being judo thrown by You for groping the latter's breasts.
• Hidden Depths:
  • Mari is an oddball, and the insane challenge she issues to Chika, You, and Riko might seem like a cruel one, but it forced them to work harder and it resulted in a fantastic show.
  • She also really misses her relationship with Dia and Kanan making her seem like she is pretty lonely.
• Hourglass Plot: When they were first years, Mari was originally opposed to being a school idol and has to be coerced by the more enthusiastic Dia and Kanan to join their group. After their failure to perform in Tokyo, she was the only one who wanted to continue as a school idol while Dia and Kanan had decided to call it quits.
• Improbable Age: She is the director of Uranohoshi Girls' High School, despite also being a student there. It is revealed that she was installed into the position because her family poured a lot of money into the school.
• Industrial Metal: This is her favorite genre of music. She gives Yoshiko, Hanamaru, Ruby, Kanan, and Dia a taste of it in Season 2, but the first years have a less than enthusiastic response to it.
• Insane Troll Logic: In the audio drama, her insistence that she should own the runaway penguin is equal parts hilarious and equal parts terrifying.
• It's All My Fault: She takes the closing of Uranohoshi the hardest out of all the girls. In season 2 episode 11, she attempts to apologize to the student body, and even goes so far as to berate herself for not "trying a little harder." Fortunately, no one else feels the same way.
• Keep It Foreign: The English dub replaces her usage of Gratuitous English from the original Japanese version with Gratuitous Italian instead, keeping in line with her having Italian ancestry.
• Large Ham: Leans into this from time to time. She outright claims that Numazu will be invaded by penguins.
• Language Fluency Denial: Mari tries this in season 2 episode 1 while trying to avoid a conversation, by saying in English that she doesn't speak Japanese. Kanan doesn't fall for it.
• Loony Friends Improve Your Personality: Implied to be the case with Mari, Kanan and Dia in the past. Mari was shown to be a lot more reserved than she is now before becoming an idol with the more energetic Kanan and Dia, and even seems to have picked up some of their quirks over time. Since then, Mari seems to have taken up the role of the loony friend.
• Male Gaze: On Episode 10 of season 1, when her stomach growls from hunger, the camera clearly closes in on her bare belly and waist.
• Ms. Fanservice: She's the bustiest in her group, and between her Male Gaze scene and harassment of the other girls, she provides a good chunk of fanservice.
• Nepotism: There's little doubt that the only reason she was appointed as Uranohoshi's director is due to her family's wealth and influence.
• New Transfer Student: She was this while in elementary school, and it was because of it that Kanan singled her out to befriend, not wanting her to be lonely in her new environment.
• Nice Girl: In spite of her mischievous personality, Mari is a kindhearted girl who does her best to save the school from being closed and supports her friends with good advice.
• Non-Idle Rich: Daughter of an extremely wealthy family and the chairwoman/director of Uranohoshi's, as well as a school idol.
• Non-Uniform Uniform: A minor example, as she wears white socks, as opposed to the black ones worn by the other characters. She also wears a green vest with her summer uniform.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: While she generally appears to be a bit of a ditz, it turns out that she's known about the school being closed and merged with one in the city and came back to prevent it from happening. She also briefly drops the act to point out to the group that they've missed what actually makes their town special.
• Ojou: In a different way from Dia; her family is rich and influential enough that she's able to buy the position of school director just so she can let Chika form a school idol club.
• Phenotype Stereotype: Downplayed. Much like Eli, she has blonde hair and is part European (in her case, Italian-American), but has yellow eyes instead of blue ones.
• Phrase Catcher: Sometimes, when she japes or lies, Kanan will quickly direct an "Uttaeru yo! (I'll sue you!)" at her.
• Playful Cat Smile: Sports one fairly often in her artwork to show her carefree nature. It tends to veer into a Cheshire Cat Grin whenever she's up to no good.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: She agrees to let Chika's group form a school idol club over Dia's objections, provided they can garner an audience large enough to fill the school's gym for their first concert. Riko points out the logic in that challenge, stating that the group won't survive in the long run if they can't garner enough momentum early on.
• Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense: Kanan remarks this after discovering that Mari's "stewshine" costs 100,000 yen a bowl, saying that rich people like her are crazy.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: She uses her family's wealth and influence to get herself installed as Uranohoshi's director, simply so she can help Chika's group bypass Dia's Obstructive Bureaucrat behavior.
• Smarter Than You Look: Mari is intelligent and competent despite her eccentricity and airheadedness.
• Stealth Pun: In the audio dramas, when she mistakes Dia for a penguin and Kanan notes that "Dia" has turned completely black, Mari says, "Black Dia... coal!?"^note Contrary to myth, coal doesn't turn into diamonds at high pressure or temperature, but they are both forms of carbon. Later, while talking about Dia's attitude, she remarks that Dia has a "hardness of ten".
• Stepford Smiler: Though Mari is genuinely fun-loving and likes joking around with Chika and friends, it often hides her more insecure, pain-ridden side.
  • Whenever she's with Dia or Kanan, she's moreso this because she was by far the most hurt by Kanan's choices two years ago, and is still hurting throughout most of season 1.
  • She does this again at the start of season 2 when she learns that the school is doomed to close and merge. She's understandably very upset and sad since this means all of her and Aqours efforts to save the school were for nothing, but she keeps acting like she's fine. It takes a lot of pushing from Kanan to get Mari to admit something was bothering her.
• Tareme Eyes: Which highlight her cheerful personality.
• Thanks for the Mammary: Like Nozomi (who she shares 'largest chest of the group' honours with), she seems to have a tendency to grope the other characters' breasts. When she first meet Dia after 2 years overseas, she gropes her and said that she doesn't change much. Afterwards, Kanan is frequently the target of such behavior.
  Mari: (resting her head on Kanan's chest) You're become big, Kanan.
  Kanan: I'll sue you.
  • In an interesting contrast, Mari mainly does this to the ones she's closest to (Dia and Kanan), whereas Nozomi notably does not do it to Eli ^note If you don't count the Anthology Manga chapter submitted by Arumi Tokita.
  • As another contrast, when she gropes You, the latter retaliates by judo throwing her, unlike other instances of this trope in the Love Live! franchise.
• Token Minority: She is part Italian-American from her father.
• Token Rich Student: While she's not the only member to come from a wealthy family^note The Kurosawa family is well off, she's the only one whose status as a rich person gets focused on. In addition, the Ohara family is wealthy enough that Mari can go to any school she wanted in the world yet chooses to go to Uranohoshi, an unremarkable high school in an unremarkable Japanese rural seaside town.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: She's girlier than Kanan, making her the girly girl to Kanan's tomboy (if her love for working out and diving can be considered tomboyish).
• Trickster Mentor: When Mari proposes the second years' to open a school idol club in Uranohoshi's, she tells them to fill the entire school's gym with people for their first concert, otherwise it wouldn't do. This is in an attempt to awaken the girls' Determinator side. She does hold her promise to the end and opens the school idol club after the second years' fulfill the task, though.
• Upper-Class Equestrian: One of Mari's hobbies is horse riding. In Dengeki stories, Mari is sometimes depicted with her horse, Starbright.
  Mari: The horse I get along best with since I was a child is Starbright! A thoroughbred horse with a large build, it has a pattern on its forehead that resembles a cool white star. It's tall so riding it is a bit hard, and its temper is also a bit rough, but it's clever and kind only to me, a real tsundere horse♡ And oh, it's female, by the way. It's my best friend!
• Valley Girl: She has this manner of speaking in the English dub.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Combined with the Bitch Slap mentioned above, Mari calls Kanan out in episode 9 for disbanding the group since she never wanted to study abroad in the first place; she just wanted to be with her friends.

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