Welcome to part one of 2020 Vision: Upo~n the Graceful New Decade! special blog edition and I'm going to jolt down some of the highlighted moments of 2020, especially at the time of the ongoing pandemic!
Who in Quarantine!
Organized by the Doctor Who Magazine editor Emily Cook, Lockdown Who was first created and intended to cope the Doctor Who fans from all over the world by doing rewatching tweetalongs of some of the classic and the new series' episodes in the time of the coronavirus pandemic. There were also never-before released contents after each tweetalong proper or in some occasions that didn't have one, including the fan choir renditions of "The Long Song" and "Abigail's Song" for The Rings of Akhaten and A Christmas Carol watchalongs together with German arranger and guitarist-slash-Whovian Borna Matosic, the audio-visual Doctors Assemble, "Descendants of Pompeii" for the Fires of Pompeii watchalong and many more.
Baby Blue's Gonna Back You Up!
On September 1, HalloHallo Entertainment announced its partnership with Tower Records Japan and formed Baby Blue, the first official subunit of the Filipina AKB48 sister group, MNL48. The said subunit consists of Jan Elaurza of Team MII as its leader, while Coleen Trinidad of Team NIV and Amy Isidto of Team L served as the members. Their debut single "Sweet Talking Sugar" made its release in the EGGS Music app in Japan, which had been taking over the top spot on its recording releases rankings, before subsequently took place on iTunes and Spotify a few days after its maiden release. Meanwhile, its music video was released on September 17 and was directed by Carlos Francisco Manatad. It also debuted in Pinoy Myx Countdown on the top spot, making the subunit's first to reach that milestone.
Two months later, Baby Blue then released their second single entitled "Negastar" which was subsequently trending in Japan due to its 1 minute preview and the subunit's continued popularity there. The song's music video was released on Cure Scarlet's birthday, December 15.
PS. Stream Baby Blue's "Sweet Talking Sugar" and "Negastar" MVs on the official MNL48 YouTube channel! Also, don't forget to stream the "RIVER" MV and the prior ones as well!
The Woman Who Chimed Into Earth
During the last stretch of the two-month hiatus of the current Pretty Cure season, Healin' Good PreCure, Toei Animation officially announced that Suzuko Mimori of Love Live! fame would be voicing Asumi Fuurin/Cure Earth, the current team's fourth member that has wind powers and the second Reiwa mid-season heroine after Star Twinkle's Yuni/Cure Cosmo, on June 22. Almost two months later following the show's resumed airing in July, Earth made her initial debut in the season's 19th episode aired last August 9 and her proper maiden one took place on her and Yume Hinata's birthday, August 16.
Asumin is the first spirit Cure in the franchise as well as the first purple Cure heroine with blonde hair in normie form, and also the only Healin' Good Cure whose mascot partner (Latte, in this case) doesn't fuse with her weapon that doubles as a henshin item. So yep, another historical moment happened and I definitely can't wait to see her and the gang even more in the remaining episodes of Healin' Good, but also am not ready to say goodbye to them as well.
Sayonara to Shokugeki...
After five years of airing, the Shokugeki no Soma anime series (and franchise) made its curtains properly close last September 25 with its final season, The Fifth Plate. Prior to the said proper conclusion, its manga series was recently concluded on June 17, 2019 after almost seven years of serialization in Weekly Shounen Jump, while on August 29, 2019, the series released its three-chapter sequel entitled Shokugeki no Soma -Le dessert- on Jump Giga.
The final season of the anime series' airing had been delayed due to the effects of COVID-19 pandemic, but on May 25, it was announced that the show would have new episodes following the reruns of the first two starting in July.
In all honesty, we're all missing Soma Yukihira and the gang so much and we'll send our thanks to the people behind this another masterpiece that shaped the cooking world even more!
Mewkle~! Sparkle~!
Sanrio announced about the Mewkledreamy anime series project in 2019 whilst its franchise was officially launched two years prior. The show was first premiered on April 5, 2020 and produced by JC Staff. On April 26, the character franchise company announced that episode 5 and the later episodes would be delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On May 23, it was announced the anime would be resumed with new episodes on the week after.
The story revolves about Mew and Yume Hinata on their heart-pounding adventures to keep and protect people's dreams by collecting Dreamy Stones from the Black Schemas that engulfed with their nightmares. Together with the other Dreamy Mates Peko, Su, Nene and Rei, and their Dream Partners Maira Tsukishima, Kotoko Imai, Tokiwa Anzai and Asahi Minamikawa, the tandem has had a bumpy but enjoyable balanced quest between normal life and keeping one's dream with the power of the Dream Synchro.
Who's excited already for season two that's Mewkledreamy Mix! next year? I really, really do! But also, I can still feel the high tension (again, no pun intended) for the remaining episodes of the first oooooh~! Anyway, I posted an in-depth about Mewkledreamy on the blog last June, so you can go check it out if you haven't.
Gather! PPop Group All Stars!!!!
Do you think that Toei's "Contemporary Big Three" aka Super Sentai, Kamen Rider and Pretty Cure, Tsubaraya's Ultra Series, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the DC Universe and Doctor Who have been creating their own, respective awesome (and sometimes, ambitious) crossovers among the characters within them? Well, think again, folks! Because we're already discovered another ambitious crossover to watch out for... The gathering of the Philippines' notable pop groups of this generation in one stage and we've already seen them for two straight times now, the other was from the 2020 ABS-CBN Xmas special which I had to segway into!
First was the twincool opening performance of MNL48, BINI and the Star Hunt Academy Boys in Pinoy Big Brother Connect on December 6. The Emenel girls, double centered by Abby Trinidad and Gabb Skribikin, were smashingly lit the PBB House already with their latest single "RIVER" and towards the end, they were taking the transitional breakdance to the tune of BINI's rendition of "Da Coconut Nut." Speaking of which, the gals of the latter were really good too and the song was honestly catchy as heck not gonna lie! Finally, the transition to the SHA Boys was pretty cool and I really enjoyed watching these three groups especially they were dancing to the reality show's iconic theme "Pinoy Ako" at the end of the performance.
The hashtag #MNL48xBINIxSHABoysonPBB was trended at number 4 on Twitter PH whereas all the hashtags trended were KPop-related due to the 2020 MAMA Awards, but this thing made to the top spots and it showed that we should support our homegrown groups, and that's the properly served tea.
Two weeks later on December 20, the three groups were joining forces once again, but with the addition of another one - PHP - for the KTnX Ang Babait Ninyo charity concert, in which the sales collected will be proceeded to those who're affected by the recent typhoons in the Philippines. Other than that, they had various games and we know that they enjoyed them so much plus there was a virtual meet-and-greet with the fans. Anyway, here's to more collabs in 2021!
#JackIsBack
"Haha! You missed me right?"
After a decade of absence, John Barrowman made a much-awaited return to Doctor Who as Capt Jack Harkness and encountered the 13th Doctor's three companions during episode 5 of season 12 of its new series that was "Fugitive of the Judoon," although only briefly appeared for few minutes. His last full TV appearances prior to it were "The End of Time Pt. 2" and the final season of the spinoff Torchwood.
Capt Jack is set his full TV return in the festive special, "Revolution of the Daleks," on New Year's Day (January 2 in PH and in different parts of Asia and Australia) and we're all excited to see him and the Doc for a reunion finally.
That concludes part 1 of the #YK2020Vision special blog! Tomorrow is the second part and I have some more highlighted moments as well, so don't miss it!
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