ARP Backstage Pass

tl;dr: It's an "idol documentary" series through and through. As in, it straight up gives stories to each of the groups 1st album songs for promotion, rather than creating a superficial story to promote the group



ARP known as Artists Republic Performers....or Augmented Reality Performers(?) are a group of AR idols, mainly known for their 'battle system' which essentially makes all performances like a competition. AR idols aren't necessarily a new innovation, you have some like vocaloids or VTuber idols who also use AR technology to generate a fictional 3D character and perform on stage.

The main thing to note at the end of the day, is ... that this is nothing more than a promotional show for this group


Story:

The main gist of the story is pretty much backstories towards the creation of some of the group's songs that were in their debut album, A'LIVE. In the beginning we get introduced to each of the characters and their persona's, and then we get insight into the "development" of how some of their songs came to life. At the end of each episode is a short little segment featuring the actual idols themselves, where they usually just talk about what happened in the ep (i.e., their 'opinions') and the preview for the next one

Now most of these episodes have similar formats to them, with some proposition, some endless drama and then it all resolves on the grand battle stage where they pour their hearts out or whatever. Some of the drama I will admit seemed rather silly and maybe even overstretched, but it still had a lot of the "overcoming challenges together" themes that are prevalent in idol shows

Art:

Art is a weird one in this show. Generally speaking the art and animation are absolute dogshit, but when it comes to their performances where they switch to 3D, it suddenly becomes amazing. I've seen a lot of CGI idol performances but these ones take the cake

Sound:

Mixed bag really. General voice acting was better in some characters (Shinji) than others (Rage). OST was pretty much nonexistent. The songs themselves though, they were amazing. It's actually the only idol group I've seen where I genuinely enjoyed listening to their songs, and even went ahead and got some of them. They have a wide range of genres too, ranging from more rock based to more funk/hip hop. The OP and ED's were absolutely great as well.

Characters:

Being idol persona's, you can expect each character to have their own attached personality to them. Well this show really sticks with those personalities

Shinji - The charming prince/white knight who will princess carry you wherever you want to go. He's usually the most mature out of the group and is generally regarded as the leader of it

Rage - A-grade tsundere. Honestly he's probably going to be the least liked character in the series only because he has quite a few moments where he's just an absolute dickhead. Still though, those tsun moments where he shows his nice side are pretty good

Daiya - The hip hop dude. Pretty much the controller of Rage,

Leon - The one foreign exchange dude who's there for muh diversity. In seriousness though, Leon is the "don't care just wanna dance" type of character, and his overall positivity can grow on you

Overall the characters I found to have some good and bad moments. There are times where they seem pretty awkward together, and times where they actually are pretty funny together


Enjoyment:

I won't say I really enjoyed this show if it wasn't for the songs. At the end of the day, this show was made to promote said songs and the group as a whole, so I'd say it worked pretty well towards me. Overall though, if you're looking for something with a serious story, or one of the many idol shows that copy-paste things like nakama power and whatnot, then you might not find this enjoyable

tldr; The insert-song videos are beautiful and the music is well made and catchy. It's a good introduction to the people behind ARP.

I should probably state right off of the bat that I went into this show completely blind. Most of the anime I watch is based on recommendation or what's currently popular, but this one was completely a "Let's see where this goes!" pick.
Now what the hell is an ARP?
ARP, also known as Artists Republic Performers, is an augmented reality idol project that debut back in 2016 under Avex Japan. The universe is built from an anime, a web-radio show [https://live.line.me/channels/4531144], and- of course- ... music. As of typing this review, they have 10 singles/eps and a full-length studio album released; and have no intention to stop releasing music in the future.

The anime was my introduction to ARP, and to be honest, I came for the cute boys and stayed for the music. It's similar to shows like Love Live! and Pripara, where the insert-songs are shown using 3D models and everything else uses normal animation... it's just that the animated parts aren't as good as they could be. In the special, Paradise, they use the 3D models completely and it looks really good! If there's ever a season 2, and there likely will be due to it's popularity in Japan, I really hope that they use the 3D models instead of the drawn animation.
That's coming from someone who almost dropped AASide because of the 3D model usage, haha </3
The music is the best part of this show, hands down. It ranges from Shinji's ballads and classic-idol music to Rebel Cross's heavier rock, and it honestly feels like there isn't a type of song they haven't produced yet. Serenade Under a Starless Sky could put someone to sleep, where as Dive Into Love makes me want to get up and dance my heart out. If you're on the fence about starting the series, just do it for the music and 3D modelling. Seriously. The anime might not be super strong, but the music really is.

ARP Backstage Pass is the first idol anime I've watched, so if you're a hardcore idol anime fan don't bother reading my review. It was an interesting experience overall and that's the reason I will point out some of the reasons why this anime should be more popular.

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The first thing to take into account is its unique music, since it's one of the most important things the show has to offer. I'm always stumbling upon idol songs on AnimeMusicQuiz, and almost all of them sound pop. But when I heard the rock song "Black Sapphire" from ARP, I was curious to watch the anime. Indeed, ... there are both pop and rock songs in this anime and the variety of genres is a big plus and something special for an idol anime.

But ARP Backstage Pass isn't all about its music. In 10 episodes, it creates an idol group consisting of 4 people, by showing their personalities, their bonds, their training sessions and their singing/dancing performances. It is like a documentary and this is something really interesting that is often found in sports anime as well; with the only difference that here, the main purpose of the anime is to show how this group behaves and communicates, without having a higher goal (e.g. a match, a tournament, a concert).

A big warning to people who can't stand computer-generated imagery, since most of the live performances are full of it. And another one to those who hate watching scenes that might be characterized as "fujoshi bait" by some - they are unavoidable here since the main target audience are people that just want to enjoy cute guys dancing and singing. But like I said before, this is not the only thing ARP Backstage Pass has to offer.


For more details about what ARP really is, which does not change the anime experience, it is a group of male virtual reality idols who have their own youtube channel. So in fact, this anime is just a promotional work to win new audience. What I haven't fully comprehended yet is who the idols' voice actors are; if they're hidden on purpose, or if their voices are somehow computer generated. I could not find information about that online.

To sum up, what ARP Backstage Pass has to offer is music, enjoyment and a taste of some idols' lifestyles and struggles to achieve their goals. For a 10 episode experience, to me, it was amusing. If the content suits your tastes for a relaxing watch, give it a shot.