Reproduction of the second season of the anime on stage! Love Live! Sunshine! Aqours 3rd LoveLive! Tour ～WONDERFUL STORIES～" Saitama concert report!

Love Live! Sunshine! Aqours 3rd LoveLive! Tour ~WONDERFUL STORIES~" has finally started. This time, we covered the Saitama performance (MetLife Dome) on June 9, 2018, the first day of the tour, followed by the Osaka and Fukuoka performances, Akatsu Saito (played by Yoh Watanabe), Aika Kobayashi (played by Yoshiko Tsushima), Kanako Takatsuki (played by Hanamaru Kunikida), Aina Suzuki (played by Balli Obara), and Ai Furuhata (played by Ruby Kurosawa), the nine members of Aqours, gave a sparkling performance.

From the title of their live, the anime "Love Live! Sunshine! Sunshine!", but the performance was even better than I had imagined. Fans of "Love Live! fans have a tremendous amount of love for the content. I think they not only love the voice actors singing the songs, but also the characters, and they are rooting for both of them. Perhaps this is the answer from the fans to the series' long-held goal of a sense of synchronization with the images.

The audience filled the MetLife Dome, and when the members of Aqours appeared on stage, they started the live with the opening theme song for the second season of the TV anime, "Mirai no Bokuraku wa I know it," which was a spectacular start to the show. The second song, "Kimi no Hitomi wo Meguru Kodo Adventure," was another highlight of the show, as the audience was quickly united by the smiles and dance moves of the members, each of whom had a wonderful expression and expression on their faces.

After the familiar self-introductions, the members responded to the overwhelming view by waving their hands. This was my second time at this venue, and it seems that no matter how many times I see it, the power of the performance remains the same. Akatsu Saito's extraordinarily cute vocals started the song "'MY LIST' to you! The song was followed by the Japanese rock song "MY Mai☆TONIGHT" with a video clip, and the synchronization of the two songs was also very impressive. Then they performed their debut single "Is your heart shining? with an anime PV. As expected, the audience shook the venue with their tremendous shouts (although the dome did not shake as expected...).

During the interval, a digest from the first episode of the anime was shown. In this way, the audience was able to see "Love Live! Sunshine! is a treasure trove of emo quotes. Especially Chika. As I was moved by those words, the song "MIRACLE WAVE" was sung in the 6th episode of the 2nd season of the TV anime. Here, Ms. Iha performed the backflip that Chika performed in the song, and the audience cheered loudly!　The audience cheered loudly. When the song was over, the members gathered around her at once, and I could hear through the head microphone that they were all gasping for air. It was evident that the song was a very hard one that exhausted all the members.

After that came the solo part. Iha-san danced gracefully as if she were watching a musical. Ms. Takatsuki smiled as she rode on the trolley. Ms. Kobayashi sang a four beat EDM song in full throttle. Ms. Aida sang a ballad with all her heart, and the audience was treated to a BD bonus song.

After that, the live was again following the storyline of the show, with a series of songs that were sung in the episode 7, "Sora mo Kokoro mo Harueru Kara", "SKY JOURNEY" sung in a blue and fantastic atmosphere, and the 2nd single "Koi ni Naritai AQUARIUM" that is very popular in the live.

Then came the digest video again. Here, Asami Tano playing Seira Kazuno and Hinata Sato playing Ria Kazuno, the school idol Saint Snow of Hakodate Seisen Girls High School, appeared on stage! The live performance of Saint Aqours Snow, a unit that transcends the group boundaries with Aqours as depicted in the 9th episode of the second season, was recreated. 11 members performed "Awaken the power," and the audience's voltage was unbelievably high. It was truly a live performance that went back and forth between the world of the anime and the real world. The story continued on to the scene of "WATER BLUE NEW WORLD" sung in the Love Live final of episode 12. This scene was also perfectly recreated, including the costumes, and was a very moving scene including the content of the story.

The winner of the Love Live final, Aqours, sang one more song! The song was "Aozora Jumping Heart," the OP theme song from the first season of the TV anime!　The audience shouted and waved their hands in excitement, and the main part of the live came to an end.

For encore, the audience rode a big trolley around the venue. The audience moved halfway around the venue with "Landing action Yeah! and "Where's your courage? In your heart! and returned to the main stage again.

Aqours announced many exciting things: their Tokyo Dome concert in November, the release of their theme song CD, and the theatrical version of "Love Live: Sunshine! Sunshine! Sunshine!" will be released on January 4, 2019, and the release of Aqours' 4th single with an animation PV. All of these made the audience happy.

There are a lot of people who come from faraway places to see us. That's great, and Aqours is amazing! I think Aqours is amazing! That's why we have to keep shining, and I really think that we should never neglect our efforts," said Iha at the end of the show. The audience applauded loudly as their efforts proved to be successful. The real last song was "WONDERFUL STORIES," the theme song for the 13th episode of the second season of the TV anime and the title of this tour. They sang through the first day of the tour with their best smiles until the very end.

(Reporting and writing by Junichi Tsukagoshi)