>>109287891The Selen Post (2nd Anniversary) Part 2
I have referred to The Selen Incident as the reversal of The Coco-Taiwan Incident - with the after where EN fandom was being protected by the corporate and before where EN fandom was being threatened by the corporate. I was thinking about commenting on the recent turnaround of Cover regarding China, with Cover finally nabbing the MiHoYo and Yostar permission in the middle of last year, but that’s for another time, really.
Using the analogy above, I could have seen a similar turnaround for ANYCOLOR in four or five years in time - as in ‘28 or ‘29, I would see return of a stable EN fandom that would justify the long cost of the wilderness years. But the specific of how that turnaround would be was a mystery to me - for a long time, I thought it would be where a new generation of EN fans would completely replace the old dying EN fandom. But recently, I wondered if things would head into kind of a quiet ‘mea culpa’ and partial retcon of termination as a separation.
Yes, the fans would demand a lot more - a naked dogeza from Tazumi Riku himself or something - but would Doki want that? I think Doki would be happy to return without compensation to the ‘old’ way of doing things, perhaps the ‘golden’ way of doing things - something that some people here really want apparently.
This reminds me of Sasaki Saku’s graduation. Ultimately, it wouldn’t have been called a graduation if there were such intermediate procedures, but everything was graduation at the time - and what graduation there was did not have much precedent either
Saku’s return shifted a lot about what should have been done and so on and ultimately Nijisanji learned from that lesson. And that has been true ever since. That history is why JP people usually trust Nijisanji - even if they did make a mistake, they will become better afterwards.
This idea continues to this day with the recent return of Suzuhara Lulu, which continues this idea of Nijisanji has improved to the point someone could return after four and a half years.
I talk about the Game-bu incident quite a bit, because it really is a template - it might be the oldest VTuber drama that people generally remember, and likely would be for a long time.
But I’m bringing this up, because if you Brave Group now about this incident, they would 100% disavow whatever happened in that incident. They would repeat that they fired everyone who was responsible for the decisions and that they heavily apologize for the talents and fans.
This has been their stance since at least 2022, but it might have been earlier. This disavowal might be surprising to some, but they have disavowed because the incident follows them - reporters will mention the incident if they have the chance. They did in 2022, and that’s why we know how Brave Group feels about the incident - one of the reasons for the name change.
If Nijisanji were to make more definite steps towards the West again, then reporters will start asking questions about Selen, and the problem is that… ANYCOLOR will never fully disavow what happened then. Hence, they will never fully enter the western sphere. Ever.
That’s the difference. Nijisanji will never have a remarkable presence in the Western scene ever again and I do mean ever. As long as there are people who remember the Selen incident - I mean as long as Doki does streaming, there will be people who remember, and reporters will be piqued to ask and ANYCOLOR will not give a satisfactory answer.
ANYCOLOR will always be Black. No matter the cost.
One could say Selen ‘won’, but what did Selen win? Sure Nijisanji lost the PR war, but that was an uphill battle that was only made because they had no other recourse at the time. Once more, it was a mistake that gave Nijisanji a valuable lesson - as with all the controversies beforehand.
Of course, the problem is that Selen’s ‘Win’ comes with a lot of baggage that doesn’t necessarily follow - Selen winning doesn’t mean GFE is the best and only way for Girl VTubers (I mean why would that be true from the outset) it doesn’t mean Hololive is the best place for VTubers or perhaps even that Hololive is better than Nijisanji, which borne out in the year of graduation.
The best interpretation that I would say in regards to the sentiment that Selen ‘won’, it’s that Gamers and Edginess being the only viable outlet… Selen Shock was emblematic of the collapse of the burgeoning EN Corpo industry, best exemplified by the Five English Sisters and the Following Five Sisters afterwards. The fact is that the only major EN agency that remain standing and in fact thriving, currently in shoulders with people like Nanashi and Appland is Phase Connect, which might be the agency that best fits the Selen-like attitude, even though people who like Selen/Doki tends to not like Phase in ‘narcissism of small difference’ way.
