YoRHa Musical & YoRHa Boys Stage Play Livestream on Friday, May 11

There will be a special livestream regarding the blu-ray release of the YoRHa Musical and YoRHa Boys Stage Play on Friday, May 11 at 9:00pm (JST) on NicoNico Douga Live.

[ Direct Link Here ]

Like I previously reported this past Saturday, this broadcast will feature some of the cast from the shows. Thus far, the following actors have been confirmed from the YoRHa Musical side:

  • No2 – Ishikawa Yui
  • No21 – Hanana Mio
  • Rose – Hinagata Ui
  • Anemone – Tachibana An
  • Commander – Maikawa Miyako
  • Vocal – Kawano Marina

And the YoRHa Boys side:

  • No9 – Saito Naoki
  • No2 – Eda Shinichiro
  • No21 – Murata Hisashi
  • No22 – Terasaka Hiroki
  • No6 – Doi Yuuto
  • No3 – Shouji Masato
  • No4 – Oguri Ryo
  • Cactus – Inko-san
  • Lotus – Masuda Tomoya
  • Phlox – Tanabe Toshiki
  • Instructor – Kikuta Daisuke

Of course, Yoko Taro will also make an appearance on the program! This ought to be fun! xD

Source:

YoRHa Musical Ver.1.2 Recap and Exclusive Interviews from the Cast and Crew

It’s been almost exactly two months since the performances of the YoRHa Musical by now, but I am finally able to share my officially endorsed article and recap of the dress rehearsal, which includes several exclusive interviews from the cast and crew!

Read the Article Here!

As a quick overview, you can find personal comments and interviews from the following members:

  • The Cast
    Ishikawa Yui (No2)
    Takana Reina (No4)
    Mochida Chihira (No16)
    Hanana Mio (No21)
  • The Music Team
    Emi Evans (vocal)
    Goto Takanori (guitar)
    Kawaji Emi (piano)
  • Extended Interview with Tanaka Reina

I may write an afterward eventually detailing my first experience as official press.

YoRHa Musical Ver.1.2 – Scene 15 Monologue with No2 and No4

This is just a quick message. Comparing the script from the new YoRHa Musical Ver.1.2 with the script for the YoRHa Ver.1.1 Stage Play, this scene has *not* been changed in the slightest. Merely, my English translation has changed a little bit since then.

This is my translation directly from the musical script that was sold at the show:

No2: Our memories… are pseudo memories.

No4: They’re false memories programmed in order to promote diversity and evolution on the battlefield.

No2: In my memories, I lived in the country with my grandma.

No4: In my memories, I hung out a lot with my friends at school.

No2: Everyday, grandma and I would tend to the farm and knit… …The cold of the rain, the ferocity of  storms. The silence of the snow. The gentle warmth of spring…

No4: After school, we’d go eat the most delicious things, have fun dressing up, playing games…

No2: Since we lived in the country, I couldn’t have everything I wanted. But because the other villagers looked out for me, including my grandma… stranely, it wasn’t so hard.

No4: As long as I had my friends, I could endure my studies. We’d laugh day after day; no matter what hardships came our way, we were able to overcome them.

No2: ……My grandma taught me “kindness,” a gentle heart to cares for others.

No4: ……My friends taught me “hope”, a strong heart to laugh even in the face of difficulty.

No4: Holding tightly onto these false memories, we fight.

No2: But they are also our precious memories.

No2 & No4: The time… draws near…

No2 & No4: Our final moments… are about to begin…

YoRHa Musical – Notes and Spoilers

This post is a Work In Progress.
Updated: 18.02.15 20:50


I had the rare opportunity to participate as PRESS for the YoRHa Musical dress rehearsal yesterday. Although I was busy concentrating on taking photos, I was still able to follow along with the musical and have a couple bits of news regarding how the musical is different from the previous plays.

Below will be a bunch of spoilers on this topic and also the details on the story. If you haven’t followed my previous articles on the YoRHa stage play, I suggest you check out this page and the links at the bottom first.

First off, here’s a non-spoiler that was revealed by stage director Matsuda Ichidai on twitter:

▲ He says that Yoko Taro wrote the Japanese lyrics to the songs that were originally only in Emi’s “chaos language”. This includes No2’s solo to the song “Voice of No Return” and No21’s solo to “Grandma”.

[spoiler title=”GeneralSpoilers”]

  • At the after talk segment after the evening show today, Yoko mentioned that Accord is somewhere in the Kingdom of Night, aka North or South America…!
  • Saito said they’re also planning something for the 1st Anniversary of Automata, but couldn’t say anything about it.
  • The big difference between this new version of the play compared to the others is that there’s a huge chunk taken out of the narrative in lieu of new characters and scenes.
  • All scenes involving Seed, Shion (I previously changed her name to Daisy), Kalmia, and Clematis have been removed.
  • The new character Daisy is mostly there for comedic affect because of her size… I didn’t find this amusing. I didn’t feel much of an emotional connection to her, but that may change. There is a scene in which she discovers the lifeless bodies of No16, Lily, and a couple others and she cries over their bodies pretty well. That was good. Later we find out that she gets infected by the Logic Virus and is used by Term Alpha and Term Beta to fight No2 and No4 later in the server room.
  • Without Seed, not only do we *not* get to see her past training and how unsuited she seemed to be as a fighter, I don’t feel like we get the chance to see her “innocent” side nearly as much. She is a sweet girl who is not confident in her own abilities. It’s out of the dire situation that forces her to become strong and protect her friends.
  • Ver.1.1 added new scenes between Kalmia and Clematis that were absolutely beautiful. I loved it so much; I’m very upset that even the characters as a whole were removed. It’s really a shame.
  • It also seemed like some of the already existing characters were sort of “melded” into the characters that were deleted. I forget who it was now, but there was definitely a character that acted a lot like Kalmia… very confusing. lol
  • Granted, I was multitasking to the n-th degree, so maybe my feelings will change, but I really thought Ishikawa Yui’s performance was somewhat flat, like she picked one emotion and stayed that way throughout. That’s not how the character is supposed to be. There are clear ups and downs, a wide range of emotions. I didn’t really feel that.
  • The musical performances were *amazing* as to be expected. Emi & Marina’s vocals were gorgeous and I had difficulty keeping my composure at certain moments. Hearing Goto Takanori rock out those classic DOD3 boss battle themes live was so much fun!! No2 and No4 also sang a couple songs solo, too. I don’t recall which song it was now, but Ishikawa Yui sang Japanese lyrics to a song that was only originally in Emi’s chaos language…so that will be interesting to get those lyrics written down.
  • A lot of stage effects helped to illustrate previously hard to imagine scenes, for example, the first scene when the YoRHa squad are descending in their aerial units. There’s a really nice backdrop screen that projected the ocean quickly moving past as though the characters were actually flying. Certainly, the technology available in the musical outmatches the others by far. That’s what having a decent budget will get you. xD
  • No4’s sacrifice at the end was illustrated much clearer this time. Before we just see her on the same level as No2 when she self-destructs, but this time she overloads her black box *and* jumps from the platform where they stood to explode the server further down, I guess. I imagine this server room is similar to the Soul Box, Meat Box, etc., only it’s underground. That would make me imagine that this particular server is inverted as opposed to the tower type of the “Boxes” we see in NieR:Automata.
  • There is a new scene at the end showing how emotional the Commander is regarding the “failure” of this mission. I always knew that she took upon herself a lot of guilt for what No2 went through and yet she had to keep on chugging along because that is her duty. She has no power to go against it. In this scene she’s actually talking with “The Council of Humanity”, the same male voice that we hear in the game (or at least, it sounded a lot like him; I’ll have to check if his name is in the credits). She argues with them but is essentially told to suck it up and just do her job. When the call finishes, she is nearly beside herself with anger, regret, and a whole lot of other negative emotions, I’m sure. She angrily throws her staff / stick thing to the ground. This was really great, but I still miss the delivery of her final line better from Aida Runa.

[/spoiler]

[spoiler title=”201802101800″]

201802101800 – EVENING SHOW – AFTER TALK

  • Guests: Saito Yosuke, Ishikawa Rinka (Futaba) & Kaneda Ibuki (Yotsuba)
  • Saito said that he got Yoko’s okay to reveal that Futaba and Yotsuba were dismissed from the Bunker and are somewhere on the surface of the planet.
    • Sometime after the Pearl Harbor Descent Mission, the Commander felt extreme guilt over the two of them having to undergo screening checks (which basically erase their memory in order for them to do their job without question), so she dismisses them to the planet.
    • Although we don’t know where they were sent, maybe this move will be putting them in danger, but… we’re led to believe that this choice is the most humane compared to their existence on the Bunker.
    • There was no specific mention of the “Kingdom of Night” here, so that’s speculation… but it *might* turn out to be accurate at some point, especially after Yoko dropped the info about Accord being in the Kingdom of Night…

[/spoiler]

[spoiler title=”201802111300″]

201802111300 – AFTERNOON SHOW

  • 2B’s line “So, this is the ocean? It’s pretty.” line is flat, no sense of wonder but rather sorrowful.
  • The number of deployed units (Y.U.) is displayed on the backdrop on stage. The number continually drops from 16 to 4 as the units get hit.
  • Goto-san’s guitar “screams” at that part of the song in Normandy.
  • No21 has an SS unit on her left arm.
  • No16 takes off her goggles and stuffs it in the front part of her dress.
  • The four units fight big ball spider machines
  • The Resistance comes in from the audience
  • No16 & No2 argue and fight briefly
  • Rose says that they’ve all been abandoned by the Moon à Emi’s vocal
  • Dance of the extra Resistance members depicting their past struggles
  • The Commander says under her breath “Don’t curse me, No2.” It’s unclear whether she’s thinking of the original No2 from the incident in 11937 or the current No2 unit, but probably more likely the current unit.
  • No16 talks with Gerbera who seems extremely interested in her high-tech gun and asks to look at it. No16 says it’s okay, “Just look.”
  • No16 & Dahlia argue and fight… and the improve part No16 suddenly kisses Dahlia, who is then defeated by the shock.
  • Daisy has 2 core reactors.
  • Great view of Kawaji Emi on the piano
  • There’s a moment of Anemone taking out her handgun, clearly contemplating or remembering something.
  • Rose explains that there used to be 160 members in their Resistance.
  • Lily calls Daisy “Daisy-baachan” and Daisy laughs hysterically… until she gags. (audience laughs). Daisy says that this is the 765th time that she’s told her to call her “Daisy-oneechan”… Lily runs over and hugs No21 and says, “I don’t wanna!”
  • Prior to intermission is the “Guadalcanal” song/dance segment. No4, Marina, and Emi take turns singing.
  • The Red Girls summon machines who then lift them up. The scene ends with them all laughing really, really creepily.
  • INTERMISSION
  • Red Girls’ eyes are really creepy!!
  • Gerbera seems like a combination of Kalmia & Clematis.
  • Opening dance with Emi singing
  • False memories
  • What is life? –reason for life
  • Daisy’s false memories were of a “Food Fighter”
  • No16 casually puts her arm around Gerbera and later shoves her away when she realizes how close they are
  • Rose says that she can give the YoRHa girls names like the other Resistance members but No2 says that they can’t until after the mission is complete. No4 is really excited.
  • Monologue w/ No16 and No21, reminiscing about their training
  • In the usual spot where No2 has a flashback of Seed, she sings new Japanese lyrics to “Voice of No Return”.
  • No16: Let’s kick her ass when we get back to the Bunker.
  • Rose doesn’t try to go back for No16 et al. Very short comment from No2.
  • No21 shakingàvirus
  • New Japanese lyrics to the song “Grandma” sung by No21. The Red Girls come in asking why? why? why?
  • Emi scowls powerfully as she sings
  • Machine centipede
  • Goliath attack
  • Emil’s song – quietly plays during the overload, from the new tribute album?
  • Shion = Margarete
  • Daisy’s heart shatters when she survives the attack by the Goliath but the others don’t. The Red Girls come in and give her a “new reason to live”
  • Monologue by No2 & No4 – sound of a ticking clock, “The time has come.” This scene remains the same from Ver.1.1
  • Dance w/ machines & Emi singing
  • Back on the bunker Futaba relays that both No16 and No21 are gone
  • The Red Girls tell No2 and No4 that their mission was to gather data to create the next generation of androids, not necessarily to destroy the machine server.
  • No4 says Kaine’s classic curse
  • The Commander contacts the Council of Humanity – Voiced by Yasumoto (Pod042)

201802111300 – AFTER TALK

MC: Daisy, Rose
Guests: No21, Yoko, Term Alpha, Term Beta

  • Yoko: It’s a horrible story.
  • Yoko: I tend to dislike my own work, but when I see the actors take it and bring it to life, I often find myself crying at their great performances.
  • No21 talks about Operator 21O
  • Term Alpha & Term Beta mention that their tone of voice is slightly different – Term Alpha is more “innocent” and young sounding; Term Beta is more robotic and creepy.
  • Daisy ate a lot of sushi.
  • Term Alpha is just 17 years old and is tends to laugh very easily at things
  • Term Beta is more serious and calm
  • Yoko talks about how the YoRHa group solute “Glory to Mankind” with their left hand rather than the right hand, which is what humanity used to do. This is to show respect to humanity since the androids…are not human.
  • No21 used a lily scented perfume and smells good… contrasting that is Daisy, whose pink jacket was intentionally stained with coffee… so she ends up smelling like coffee.
  • Rose: ふわっと、男らしい
  • They mention how noisy the Resistance girls are.

[/spoiler]

[spoiler title=”201802111800″]

201802111800 – EVENING SHOW

  • No16 and Dahlia adlib scene: janken. Dahlia wins while No16 looks like she’s baffled at what just happened.
  • Monologue w/ No16 and No21 – No16 mentions how much she hated No21 during training; they both mention how they can’t see the future, the way forward
  • No2’s solo song to “Voice of No Return” takes place where the flashback scene with Seed used to be.
  • Gerbera is affected by reverse hacking from the tablet
  • Lights representing Lily’s Gravity Wave move from the stage to the audience to depict Lily directing the wave
  • No21 puts on her hood during hacking scenes
  • No21 sings a solo song to “Grandma” with Japanese lyrics
  • Lily calls Daisy “onee-chan” in the end and they hug. The four link to No16 and gather their energy to defeat the Goliath
  • No4: We live to die. This is our fate.
  • No4: Hope
  • No2: Kindness
  • Council of Humanity: Our hands have already been soiled.
  • White’s dance to the song “Faltering Prayer (Dawn Breeze); several machines in black dance around her, Futaba, and Yotsuba. Eventually White joins in with their dance, possibly signifying her slowly regaining her composure and accepting her duty.
  • No2’s solo battle – she mentions that she learned “strength” from No16, “kindness” from Daisy.

201802111800 – EVENING SHOW AFTER TALK

MC: Commander, Daisy
Guests:
Rose, Anemone, Dahlia, Matsuda

  • They are the “noisy team”
  • Dahlia told a short story about always getting wedgies
  • Matsuda: That’s no different from a pervert!
  • Matsuda: They’re always noisy, no matter what.
  • Matsuda: What do you guys usually talk about?
    Dahlia: We talk about everything, even sticking out our butts.
  • Anemone uses a perfume called “tea tree”
  • Rose was mentioning something about Daisy but paused before saying her name and said “What’s her name?” as though she forgot her name.
  • They talk about Daisy’s jacket being intentionally stained with coffee and how it smells like coffee.
  • Anemone moves her cape to the side so we can see her costume more clearly. Underneath she’s wearing a sort of vest…that resembles a fishing vest with pockets.
  • Dahlia tells of a story when the bullets she wears all fell off and she had to go running after them all.
  • Anemone tells of her gag that she did in the audition – a soccer cheer.
  • Dahlia: Wow! It’s a wonder you were chosen at all!
    Anemone: Yeah, and as Anemone, no less.

[/spoiler]

 

YoRHa Boys Stage Play – Notes and Spoilers

This post is a Work In Progress.
Updated: February 6, 2018 12:55am (JST)


I just got back from the YoRHa Boys Stage Play, so here are some initial notes and spoilers! Click on the button to below to view the spoilers! (You’ve been warned!!)

[spoiler title=View Spoilers]

  • No2 – Defender, but he’s actually an Executioner in disguise. oh no
  • No9 – Healer
  • No3 – Attacker
  • No4 – Gunner, but he used to be an Attacker
  • No6 – Attacker
  • No21 – Scanner, (No21 and No22 are twin models)
  • No22 – Gunner

No3 and No4 were part of the M001 project and are considered the “senpai” of the M002 members who are deployed later.

The instructor’s name is Black, direct opposite to White, aka the Commander.

Cactus had been fighting the machines for years…and used to be confident in commanding his team… but during an ambush, he was the sole survivor…which shattered his resolve…and he became a coward after that (traumatized)

  • Pod also makes an appearance in the form of a new “SS” technology that all of the M Squad are given. (SS = Support System Model Delta Code 153)
  • Akiyama Kaoru, who voiced Pod153, provided the voice for the SS system
  • She appears in the audience for the final scene with No9 and also on stage during the curtain call
  • No2 and No9 bond in the course of the play…and No2 feels severe guilt that he was instructed to exterminate them ALL
  • No21 gets infected when he tries hacking into the cockpit of the aircraft they were all going to escape the area, but No9 worked his Healer magic on him and No21 appeared to be okay.
  • Once they all fight off a horde of machines, the Instructor flies the aircraft into the sky.
  • Two hours later as they continue to fly back to the main resistance camp.
  • There’s a brief scene with No2 and No9 discussing things. No9 gets all excited when he sees the ocean from out the window and mentions how beautiful it is.
  • No2 asks him what he would do if/when the war is over. No9 is confused at first and laughs as though it was a silly question–there’s no way the war will ever be over… but he mentions how nice it would be to someday read a book in a peaceful place like the view out the window.
    ▲ While No9 is distracted, No2 grabs his sword and is about to kill No9, they hear the Instructor screaming from the cockpit.


    ▲ No21 along with No3 and No6 begin their coup d’etat.

  • No21 calls out to No22 to join, No3 does the same to No4, but No4 responds, “And where would we go if I did?” No6 explains that they plan to go to the other side of the planet to the “Kingdom of Night” where Command cannot find them.
  • When No9 and No2 enter the cockpit, No6 grabs No2 as No21 explains that they need No2 to come with them… since he is important for backing up everyone’s data.
    No6: You smell so good…No9. heehee

     

  • Then No21 outs No2’s secret… that he is a E-model who was about to kill them all.
  • The entire cockpit erupts in battle as Lotus and Phlox try to keep the aircraft in the air.
  • Some damage is done to the aircraft and it quickly starts falling out of the sky. There is nothing they can do to avoid a crash.
  • They crash in a forest somewhere, all of them scattered into 3-4 separate groups.

◼️The End

  • More characters than expected survived through the end… Only No2, No3, No6, and No21 die. xD
  • No6 takes great pleasure out of slashing the Instructor close to death, but the Instructor manages to reprogram the SS system and attaches it to his sword…which he then stabs No6 with. No6 says that he can’t be hurt…and then the Instructor tells the SS to begin the scan, but this time, it somehow rewrites the code on No6’s black box and starts the self-destruct sequence. No6 cries out in denial and says that the Instructor will die, too… to which the Instructor says that he always planned on seeing his students off until the very end.
  • No3 and No4 fight. Eventually No4 reluctantly takes up his sword again to fight him (he reverts back to Attacker mode).


▲ In the end, No3 pleads with No4 to finish it.

  • There’s a part where No21 thoroughly gets killed and reanimated by the virus…and he screams SO insanely, it was amazing. I totally got the chills, it was great!
  • During the fight with the infected No21, No2 asks No9, should he become infected with the virus, that he kill him…
  • But No9 refuses, so No2 ends up killing himself
  • Before that, No2 left a message for No9 and asked him to delete No2’s back up personality data… because he didn’t want to remember having to kill them all should they meet again in the future…
  • But Cactus was shown alive at the end…along with the other two resistance members. No4 is confused when he sees them…and sees Cactus’ arm twitching weird like he’s infected with the virus (like he should have been before!”, but… he says that “cowards have their own way of fighting”. His arm and the other two were merely injured by gunfire, not the virus. Attackers and Gunners were fazed our after this experiment with all male-model YoRHaThe male-models were a bit of a failure, so the Council of Humanity decided on producing only female YoRHa models in the future.
  • The surviving male-models were to be formatted and reprogrammed as Scanner types, which explains why Scanners are all male-models.

At the very end, the whole cast comes on the stage during the YoRHa song “Guadalcanal”. During this part of the song, they merely sing “Ahh” rather than the original lyrics which were as follows:

outo o, yamai o, itami o, umi dasu
ishiki o, kiroku o, kikai o, horobosu

Give birth to vomit, sickness, and pain
Destroy the consciousness, the chronicle, and the machines

◼️ My Thoughts

  • I really liked Phlox. As one of the three Resistance members, he was a pretty minor character, but his personality was really quite noble and he was very loyal to a less-than-adequate leader like Cactus.
  • No6 is a sadist like Dito. Plus, he seems to be enamored with the Instructor. There’s a scene in which the Instructor demonstrates how to use the SS system to scan for viruses and he uses it on No6 who reacts very…uniquely. He squirms with strange pleasure and is disappointed when the scan stops. He even goes up to the Instructor and asks him to scan him again… preferably somewhere alone, just the two of them. The Instructor unfortunately declines. The next moment, No3 says, “So, you’re even hot for men, huh?”. 

[/spoiler]