Daichi Taira and Sosogu Hoshifuri were as close as anyone could get as children. Together, they made a promise that when they got older, they would live together and get married. But Sosogu moved far away one day, and he never saw her again.
A couple of years later, Daichi is a regular teen living a humdrum life. Not even his parents leaving for an overseas trip can change that. Just before the pair can get out the door, his mother gives him a bit of advice among the usual warnings: "Take care of Sosogu". Unfortunately, he cannot exactly remember who or what Sosogu is—pretty bad, since she just moved into the house, right within earshot of him saying that. A lot of things have changed since their childhood, especially with Sosogu becoming the lead singer of girl group sensation Drop Stars and gaining a whole new group of friends. Despite this, she is determined to make him remember that promise they made all those years ago, even if he has to get roped into her new career as her manager to do it. Along with the aloof and possessive Shinobu Tsukino and the older sister-like beauty Korona Yuuhi, Daichi's life is about to take a whirlwind turn for both the romantic and the musical…
…If only Popuko didn’t tear through the series first.
Originally written as a oneshot after Pop Team Epic's first season of strips, Hoshiiro Girldrop (星色ガールドロップ) is Bkub Okawa's send-up to idols, romcoms, and especially idol-based romcoms, packed with as many tropes as he could possibly fit in. The series was made a regular gag in Pop Team Epic announcements after its publishing. It even got the honor of being the gag for the series' anime announcement on April Fools 2017, complete with animated trailer and theme song done by none other than Kamikaze Douga. Despite its joke status in the latter series, it would go on to be sort of expanded on as a regular segment, with an animated version of the original oneshot serving as the first Cold Opening and later functioning as the show's On the Next segments. In February 2018, it was fully turned into an Anthology Comic by Bkub and other artists, letting the audience for the first time see what the manga (probably) would have been like.
In September 2023, the manga returned to Manga Life Win under the name Hoshiiro Girldrop Redrop!, apparently with the cast having gone through multiple unseen adventures since its last chapter.
Tropes:
- Affectionate Parody: Of Idol Singer manga, considering Bkub's known love of one series in particular.
- Anti-Humor: When paired up with Pop Team Epic, the humor of the series comes from being played absolutely straight compared to its trope-loving cousin. The anthology zig-zags this, thanks to the humor style ranging from being chapters from a straightlaced romcom idol series to chapters from the hypothetical gag spinoffs of said straightlaced romcom idol series.
- Art Evolution: Redrop!'s art style is drawn with softer colors and gives its characters more detail, carrying over from the designs seen in the anime. Daichi's hair is also made more distinctive than his original hair in the anime and oneshot.
- Canon Discontinuity: The anime and anthology treat Sosogu revealing she's Popuko like it never happened.
- Canon Immigrant: According to the anime and anthology, the God of Eurobeat (now Kouji Shakano) is Drop Stars' producer.
- Childhood Marriage Promise: Daichi and Sosogu's promise is what kickstarts the plot, even though he barely remembers it.
- Cliché Storm: The oneshot intentionally runs through quite a few "first chapter" tropes before the twist at the end.
- Creative Differences: One clip in the anime shows the group about to break up due to a difference in the direction they want to take when Sosogu wants to do a show with their rivals Devil Volcano. Sosogu's vote of ballad is up against two votes for metalcore from her bandmates.
- Did They or Didn't They?: Episode 10 previews an Almost Kiss between Sosogu and Daichi, but because the whole anime is limited to previews, that's all we get.
- Foreshadowing: The anime's ending phrase of "fall in love again!" subtly foreshadows the end of the series where it's revealed that Daichi was in love with Sosogu, lost his memories of her, and proceeded to fall in love with her again after her revival.
- Idol Singer: The Drop Stars, as well as their rivals Devil Volcano.
- Latex Perfection: Popuko's cartoony face is able to fit perfectly under a (comparatively) realistic mask.
- Lighter and Softer: Compared to what ran before it, it's more in line with Bkub's less overtly wacky works like 3LDKM.
- Mood Whiplash: After 10 episode previews of lighthearted, if occasionally sad content, episode 11's preview shows Sosogu died in an accident and was revived 5 years ago, is about to die again to save everyone, and Daichi is willing to make sure she doesn't go through with it. If that wasn't enough, the Season 2 preview snaps right back to light and fluffy as if that drama bomb never occurred.
- Mythology Gag: The anime's opening includes a brief shot of Sosogu frantically pointing to herself like the second-to-last strip in the oneshot, even though the relevant gag the pose came from was cut.
- No Ending: You ever wondered why Popuko was pretending to be a random schoolboy's childhood friend in the oneshot? Good luck figuring out, because it ended right there. Fortunately, the anime previews and anthology managed to conclude it.
- Official Couple: If the second season preview is anything to go by, Daichi and Sosogu are together given he proposed to her.
- Overly Prepared Gag: The oneshot itself. What else would you call a series with extensively prepared profiles, four months of promotion, and getting your previous work faux-cancelled so you could announce a second season?
- Wham Shot:
- In the original: Sosogu abruptly tearing her face off in the last page, revealing the real purpose of the oneshot.
- In the anime: Daichi amongst ruins, immediately accompanied by a flashback to him sobbing while cradling Sosogu's corpse.
Tropes about the Anthology:
- Art Shift: Comes with the territory of an anthology. From Kamiya Fujisawa's rounded designs, to Romancing Abe's large, angular faces, to Akio Watanabe's professional cover, each entry looks different from the last.
- Author Powers: "Abeiiro Girldrop" features Abe-san (the Author Avatar for that chapter) simply hitting Daichi's electrocardiogram to keep him from flatlining when he gets in a coma. He also presumably was responsible for Sosogu telling Daichi she wants to become Abe-san's wife.
- Bookends: The last anthology chapter ends with Sosogu coming to Daichi's house and chastising him for not remembering her, just as she does in the oneshot.
- Broad Strokes: The basic plot, Daichi and Sosogu's relationship, and the dynamic of the Drop Stars are the only consistent things between each chapter.
- Denser and Wackier: In general, the comics get much sillier than the original oneshot.
- Depending on the Writer: Other than the traits Bkub mentioned in their profiles, the characters act however the author wants. And even then, those profiles can be changed to fit the plot.
- Footnote Fever: "Logic & Hime-chan's Punch" is loaded with footnotes telling the reader to refer to previous (fictional) chapters.
- Noodle Incident:
- According to their character profiles, Daichi got an injury that will permanently prevent him from playing basketball again, Sosogu's aiming for a Nobel Prize in cuteness, and Shakano used to be a Child Soldier for a drug ring.
- "Logic & Hime-chan's Punch" mentions a ton of these, along with a helpful footnote for each incident.
- Ordinary High-School Student: Parodied with Daichi in "Abeiiro Girldrop". He describes himself as a normal high school student before throwing it out the window to save a dog from an oncoming truck. After being told to describe Daichi to the emergency hotline, the dog describes him as "a normal high school student that looks like he would say 'sometimes, you gotta do what you gotta do'".
- Ret-Gone: After Sosogu sacrifices herself to stop a world destroying meteor, she disappears and is erased from everyone's memories. She gets better at the end of this strip.
- Selective Obliviousness: "Giant Shizuku!!" portrays Daichi as not being able to hear the girls talking about work during school, as well as apparently not realizing they're Clark Kenting at school.
- Shout-Out: One of Daichi's friends is a pixellated Tsubasa Oozora.
- Fall in love with us again next time!
