Love Live! Hasunosora Jogakuin School Idol Club Movie: Bloom Garden Party

An incredible and heart-wrenching movie, it's honestly impressive what this movie achieved with a relatively short runtime of a little bit over an hour. The story starts when Maika and her best friend Aoi go to Hasunosora Highschool during the graduation day of the senior of the school idols group. An experience that will change Maika's life forever. In my humble opinion, this movie perfectly captures the spirit of school idols, how they affect people and the connections they formed with each other lives forever. If you're a fan or just slightly interested in this concept, this movie is a must-watch.

Hasunosora fan or not, you should watch this movie if you like Love Live. Give it the time of day. You may not have 50 hours to spare, but I'm sure you've got 1. Serving as a lens for new fans, we are introduced to two new girls through this movie; Maika and Aoi. Aoi is a huge fan of the Hasunosora idol club, giving quick rundowns of the characters, their archetypes, and some key moments in the story. Aoi serves as the 7 Hasu fans who are begging their friends to get into it, but said, "I don't have the time." Those friends are represented by Maika, Aoi's classmate who isn't all that enthusiastic about Hasunosora or its school idols, but through her interactions with each of its members, develops a strong love for them as well and begins to understand the appeal of these idols. Maika and Aoi are to be part of the main cast of the upcoming Hasunosora TV anime, and play a significant role in making this movie in particular an experience thats beginner-friendly for the aforementioned people that don't have time to watch tens of hours of gacha game stories. From the perspective of someone who has watched the in-game stories.... The Bloom Garden Party movie for Hasunosora is a beautiful conclusion to over 3 years of content, the culmination of growth for 11 unique girls that, although I have only shortly been apart of the real-time journey, believe it is a journey worth going on. I would have preferred some more on-screen performances, and although considerably short compared to the length of episodes from it's source material, every moment spent with each of the characters is so carefully crafted. We get a lot of wonderful callbacks and as some stories are told to newcomers for the first time, we get to relive moments of years past as the characters recall times together and memories made, before the inevitable, beautiful sendoff. This movie immediately became my favorite piece of Love Live! media, and I hope it serves as an entry point for new fans to finally get into Hasu.

If you are reading this and have not watched the movie and are even a little interested, you should watch it RIGHT NOW without reading any further. I feel any spoilers, no matter how small would degrade the enjoyment of this movie. With that said, the only people that are still reading should be people who have watched, but I will still keep this spoiler free. This is actually a masterpiece - the best LoveLive has ever made. Besides not really being in the loop of Hasunosora due to the game not being available in my country (or any country besides Japan) I was kind of put off by this being a CG movie. But this is not Bang Dream CG, it's actually very pretty. The movement and the way the characters look are all very good, it's some of the best CG anime I've seen. Not being a Hasu follower for the past few years should not put anyone off from watching this movie either as it acts as a basic introduction to the characters and their sub units, along with introducing the main characters of the movie who you are introduced to the cast through: Maika and Aoi. There is a very interesting twist midway through the movie on who the supposed "main character" replacement for Kaho will be in the next generation, and I left with extremely high hopes for Hasunosora's future, despite the emotional rollercoaster and implications of the current generation graduating. ...aaand they already added another new character (not in the movie). They just had to ruin it somehow. I feel like Hasunosora has always been a bit of a train wreck, but at least this movie is good in a vacuum. 10/10 despite the CG

This movie actually made me tear up. This is coming from the perspective of a person who have been actively following love live series, Muse, Aqours, Nijigasaki, Liella!, Ikizulive! For those series I have listen to music, attended live viewing/delayed viewing, buying merches, watched animes, following seiyus. Except for Hasunosora school idol club, this series I’ve not been following actively, only listen to their songs once in a while and only watched their delayed viewing once. I do not know anything about the characters and story. At first I want to follow them but due to the constrains that is it’s completely different from other series. The story is uniquely following respectively to real world time in link like love live mobile game. This means you have to be really invested into it. Relying on fans recap/translations is another option but I feel like I would miss out something and I don't have time to follow it much. Now, let’s talk about the movie. The plot revolves around the bloom festival party. It’s pretty much like the school fair. The story start with Maika and Aoi, who’s the spectator of the festival. Those two encounter the main cast of the Hasunosora school idol club members, Kaho and friends. The two volunteers to help them carry belongings to the festival. I’d say it’s an interesting watch and get to know the cast. I love the interactions and chemistry between the characters. Although I did not know their backstory, I’ve seen that the girls have been through a lot during their time in Hasunosora. It's like an emotional rollercoaster. It's like the beginning and the end for me. I think I'd appreciate it more if I'm truly invested in the story of the Hasunosora. The characters movement are so smooth and well animated. As for the song and performances are very good too. I wish I could see more animated performances in the movie. I'm very fond of Dream Believers song as it's my most listened song from this series so when I first heard Kaho sang in the beginning, it make me thrilled with joy. Finally, Would I recommend it? Absolutely! Whether it be newcomers to the series like me, or veteran who already following this series. This movie is worth your time. Although, I would like to appreciate it more if I followed them from the beginning. This movie makes me want to know more about the character and story of the Hasunosora cast. Also, I'm really looking forward to the anime series of Hasunosora too!