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lilac-melody · 2 months ago

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Why Shiranami Nagisa is actually a great character

Okay, so, to start off with, this post is not to dissuade anyone from disliking Nagisa. Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, so please, no attacking anyone for liking Nagisa or Nagihiyo or whatever. Let's all be normal, okay~?

This is all just my personal perspective and opinion. People commenting hate for him or general discourse will be blocked. We share a fandom space, so let's all get along!

Without further ado, let's begin~

Who is Shiranami Nagisa?

Shiranami Nagisa is a character from the Confession Executive Committee franchise, better known as Honeyworks. He debuted in the CHiCO with Honeyworks song, Gamushara, back in October of 2021, and made his first official debut with his own solo song, Suki na Ko ni Uso Tsuita, in April of 2023, though he made an appearance in the shitty anime adaptation of Heroine Tarumono. He recently just got his second solo song, Kimi wo Kawaiku Saseta no wa Doko no Doitsu.

He is the guy in Honeyworks who is crushing on Suzumi Hiyori.

What is Nagisa's story arc, currently?

We don't have a whole lot of information on Nagisa, to be perfectly honest. From what we do know, however, is that when he was a little kid, he and Hiyori met, and Hiyori defended him from bullies at one point...and one day, Hiyori wore a dress to a wedding and Nagisa thought she looked too cute. And being, what, 4? 5 years old??? He told her that she looked weird in dresses. He continues to grow up alongside Hiyori, doing track with her and eventually supporting her in her decision to go to Tokyo to continue track.

He receives 2 tickets to an Ft4 concert, and as he's a big fan, he invites Hiyori to go along with them. He was not expecting her to show up with two boys in tow, and even worse? The boys were idols. Handsome idols. To make matters even more worse, it's LIPxLIP, and he finds out that she's their manager in training.

Nevertheless, he takes her to the concert, and afterwards, he makes dinner for her and ends up confessing when she talks about how LIPxLIP were there for her when she was at a low point in her life.

Hiyori takes over a day to think it over before deciding she wasn't ready for romance, and apologized to him, before adding she was really happy that he confessed to her, because she truly felt like a heroine.

(Hiyori's song, Heroine wa Heikin Ika, is the entire plot of this.)

The two separate, and for a while, we know they kinda keep in touch but not a whole lot..given that, during a tour, when LIPxLIP were going to perform in Izumo City, the three of them, plus Manager Uchida, runs into Nagisa while they were exploring, and we find out Nagisa is going to their concert (to support Hiyori's hard work). Still, they all part on good terms once they were done hanging out.

You can read the Izumo City Collab Vomic here. I also have the OG video in the post so that you can follow along or check for any possible mistakes~

A year later, when KimiKawaii takes place (it's their second year in high school now), Hiyori comes back home, finally, to visit. She enjoys her time with Nagisa, her family, and her other friends, and leaves, with her and Nagisa seeming...more sweeter to each other than before, as seen when she stops, turns around, and gives him a little wave.

Which is something she didn't do when they parted ways the previous year.

After that, their story is a blank slate, but we do know that the two end up going to the same university in Tokyo together, based on the endings of SukiUso and HeroHei.

That is where their story, at the present time of typing this, ends.

What is Nagisa's relationship with Hiyori?

As I mentioned above, the two go way back to childhood. Hiyori's father supplied(s) Nagisa's father with fish for his restaurant, so the two pretty much grew up together.

Hiyori values Nagisa's opinion of her, as she wanted to dress up all cutely just for him so that she could prove what he said as a small child was wrong, that she was cute in dresses. She supported him when they were in track together and the two often went on jogs.

Nagisa loves Hiyori. He's head over heels, and finds her beautiful whether she's all dolled up or if she's covered in sweat from running.

As such, the two relied on each other a lot growing up and, given they were halfway across the country apart once Hiyori moved to Tokyo, they grew...less reliant on each other, despite their close connection still.

Hiyori thinks Nagisa is a hero who everyone likes, given how popular he is.

While Nagisa doesn't particularly care about other people's attention and just wants Hiyori's attention. He tells her after she rejected him and said that he made her feel like a heroine that she would always be a heroine.

Not to mention, Yamako, Gom, and Shito have stated in an interview for the Nee, Sukitte Itaiyo album that Nagisa's love for her is at 100%, while Hiyori's friendship with him is at 100% and her love is currently rising from 0%. Which we can see the clear difference in how they interact from HeroHei/SukiUso to KimiKawaii. Here's that part from the interview.

Hiyori didn't become conscious of her own love for Nagisa until she was confessed to. Which is normal- it happens.

What is Nagisa's relationship with LIPxLIP?

Nagisa's relationship with the two idols is...rather strained, honestly. While they do become on relatively okay speaking terms by the end of the Izumo Collab, he still despises how they talk to Hiyori. He hates how they call her a "potato girl", and hates how they tease her.

However, while all of that is perfectly valid, he also gets anxious since Hiyori is friends with them. After all, to him, Hiyori is the cutest girl in the world, so who wouldn't fall for her???

As such, he's constantly thinking he has to one-up LIPxLIP for Hiyori's heart, despite Hiyori already stating that she has no romantic interest in them, and they have none for her.

I feel like even if Nagisa and Hiyori got together, he'd still be bitter towards them due to their own treatment of Hiyori, unfortunately, but he'd also be a bit more open to them since she would be "safe" from them lol.

Why people don't like Nagisa?

To get the bitter part out first, there's a couple different reasons why someone would dislike him.

For one, he debuted in 2021, after Hiyori's two novels already dropped, while Hiyori's song, Heroine Development Plan, debuted back in January of 2020. That's well over a year- (one year and 8 months to be exact) from each other's debut.

Not to mention, despite Yamako repeatedly mentioning that Koi Iro ni Sake, the end of the MV was just introducing the Gen 3 characters and was not setting them up, many people believed them appearing side by side meant that they would get together.

Which...even if Yamako never did state this, this argument doesn't make any sense, since it isn't just the canon couples shown.

The idiot trio aren't a poly group or anything. Ken is dating Arisa from the second image, Kotaro married Hina from the second image, and Koyuki gets with a girl who doesn't even show up in this MV!

But I digress.

Because of this MV, many people thought Yujiro and Hiyori would get together...though, in truth, Yamako says that she just wasn't done with Aizou's design yet.

Unfortunately, she's stated this on her private pixiv, which I do not have access to, so you'll either have to take my word for it, or DM me and I can have a friend screenshot her saying this.

As such, many people thought he was too..."last second", and "forced". Especially since Hiyori's already crushed on the (now discontinued) character, Kaido Asuka.

And while that is a pretty fair point, it's safe to say that Nagisa's design just took Yamako a long time to finish, as she had planned for them to be together from the beginning. Did they handle his appearance and his and Hiyori's overall story poorly because of the novels and such? Yes. But it shouldn't be taken out on Nagisa.

Another reason for people to dislike Nagisa would be that they dislike his personality. Lots of people dislike the "childhood jealousy" trope. I would assume that they hated Kotaro too, since his jealousy with Hina was through the roof, and Yuu, at least in the movie "I've always liked you", was jealous to the point of acting terribly to Natsuki and Koyuki. But I'm just assuming.

That, or they hate how he was the reason why Hiyori's self confidence went down about being more feminine. He, however, betters himself and restores her self confidence tenfold after the events of HeroHei/SukiUso. Plus, he was literally like 5 years old, it's not fair to hold that over him.

Especially if the biggest reason why someone dislikes him is because...they ship Hiyori with LIPxLIP, or just one of the two.

Ship what you want- it's all okay!! However, if you hate Nagisa for what he said to her, you should also be holding LIPxLIP accountable for the terrible things they've said to and about Hiyori.

From the novel them telling her to throw away her hoodies because they're ugly, putting a panda bear costume head on top of her and telling her it's an improvement, to telling her she'll be rejected if she doesn't look like a real heroine...they, at age 15, act way worse than Nagisa, who was 5 years old.

If you refuse to look back at the novel, then look at the MV.

Even the anime, they taunt her that she won't be a heroine without her makeover. I'm loathe to get screenshots, but...

Teasing or not, they were aiming to bring down her peppy mood. It's just going way too far. It goes beyond the single thing Nagisa said.

Again, ship what you want, but it's hypocritical to hate Nagisa for that one line when they pull all of this ^ in the span of a single arc. And do more in other arcs.

I really didn't want to talk about this very much, but. It's inevitable, given how many people who ship Yujiro with Hiyori freaked out on JPTwt over Nagisa's latest MV. I'm talking harassing Gom, harassing the vutuber who sang Nagisa's song, screaming, cussing, harassing Nagihiyo shippers...this level of anger and hatred is intense for a honey fandom.

The English fandom isn't much better. Sure, there's way less hate going on, but there's still some people actively going to other people's accounts and attacking them for just liking Nagisa.

Some people have said "but...people only ship nagihiyo because Hiyori's in the way of their uwu yaoi ship aiyuu!". I've seen it from multiple different people.

But isn't that argument also hypocritical?

You only hate Nagisa because he's in the way of your uwu poly ship.

The turns have tabled. Now please stop attacking people who like Nagisa and Nagihiyo. So far, no one has said this ^. So please stop disrespecting other shippers when they're trying to vibe in joy.

I also want to say I will 100% call out aiyuu shippers as well when I see them being toxic to other fans, I think ship wars are fucking stupid. Just live and let live!! It isn't hard!!!

So...why do people like Nagisa, then?

OKAY. We have finally gotten to the POINT of this longass post. Sorry about that~ I just wanted to cover all my bases before diving into this and potentially confusing anyone!

Many people became drawn to Nagisa in his debut MV, due to his refusal to give up when he was doing poorly in track. He had a whole montage of training and fighting to do better, with his friends cheering him on as he was so close to winning first place. He went from dead last to second. That's extremely admirable.

However, he truly began to pop off after the anime began.

People liked him for his kindness towards Hiyori. Sure, anime onlys got a big misconception about him when he first appeared, but they quickly changed their tune after his episode. I think what most people liked is the fact that, even if it was in a moment of desperation, he was honest and upfront with Hiyori about why he told her when they were children that dresses looked weird on her. When he confessed to her and saw her shocked, he quickly excused himself and didn't once push.

In fact, he was about to leave without pushing for any sort of answer at all, but Hiyori caught up with him and gently rejected him, since she had track, high school, friends, and a job to juggle. It would be too much to add a long distance relationship.

And Nagisa respected that. He smiled at her and was unbothered.

He completely respected her decision, and simply told her that she's always been a heroine.

In KimiKawaii, a year later, we can see him wanting to hold hands with her-

But he refrains.

Because he respects her boundaries. She told him "I'm not ready for a relationship", so he refuses to do anything romantic until/unless she's ready.

Some people may have complained that Nagihiyo didn't have much progress in this MV...I disagree. Their interactions are sweeter, and you can tell Hiyori's growing fonder of him. Given this is their second year of high school, it makes perfect sense that he's holding back.

When looking for a partner, of course you want someone who respects your choices and boundaries. The fact that Nagisa refuses to push her, bring up the confession, ask her if she feels any different, is proof that he truly loves and values her.

Hell- he told her not to contact him until she gets the results for her tournament. Why?

Because he wants her to succeed in her goals more than anything.

Likewise, Hiyori is the one who completely supports Nagisa in being a chef. Both of them, not just Nagisa, put each other's dreams ahead of their romance, because they both want the other to be happy.

Nagisa also is the one who actively calls LIPxLIP out on their treatment of Hiyori. Uchida doesn't do much of anything, and their classmates are unaware of what's going on. Of their manager and idol relationship.

Nagisa is, outside of their work, the only one who knows how Hiyori gets treated by them. Even in SukiUso, he has a line demanding they stop calling her a potato girl while hugging her protectively.

Which, to many who adore Hiyori, is honestly a breath of fresh air. Hiyori really does deserve more than to be the laughingstock of LIPxLIP all the time, you know?

Even when she and they are getting along, they still tease her.

It's nice to have someone wholly and fully defending a character who keeps getting kicked down again and again and again. People love Nagisa for that.

He's not afraid to speak out against them in general.

He's a genuine guy. Outspoken. Protective. A good cook. Someone who, despite failing over and over again and just flat out not winning doesn't give up. His spirit is something we should all admire.

And of course, while LIPxLIP tease Hiyori for her appearance, he doesn't. He loves her no matter what she looks like.

And...while we're on the topic of their love...

Why Nagihiyo?

Yes, I had to include this as well. Just for a short little rant.

The reason people love Nagihiyo isn't because they want to shove Hiyori away from the BL ship, aiyuu. (Okay, I'm sure a few shippers do think so, I know I've seen one, there's probably a couple more), it's because their themes are wonderful.

Yeah, we all love childhood friends to lovers. Sure.

But the whole point of nagihiyo is that Nagisa doesn't have to be "Prince Charming" to get Hiyori to like him. He just has to be himself. And likewise, Hiyori doesn't need to dress cutesy and girly to make Nagisa like her. She doesn't need to be a Cinderella. She's a heroine in her own right, and Nagisa was the one who helped her realize it.

The two of them support each other through and through. They don't have to change a single thing about themselves. It's simply a given.

So while yes, his debut and appearance were handled a bit sloppily, he's still coming forward, full force. I hope we get to know him better through more MVs, and I hope that he and Hiyori get the happiness that they both deserve.

Their dreams, their hopes, their love.

Everything.

*Again, please note this is all my opinion and what I've gathered from other Nagisa likers. If anyone else who loves Nagisa has anything else to add, please feel free.

#shiranami nagisa #suzumi hiyori #lipxlip #nagihiyo #confession executive committee #honeyworks #heroine tarumono/heroines run the show #long post

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nagisaspolyeden · 8 months ago

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okay i need to get really obnoxious about the new nagisa and hiyori solos for a second

(before i go further i adore them, obviously. they are absolutely perfect for them and their character growth, all four of edens solos are, i am blown away by what theyve done with these and i could go on and on about how much i love them individually but in this post i want to go on about something very specific)

seeing hiyoris solo name, Accept My Love, i had some expectations for this song- namely that i expected this to be an overwhelmingly hiyojun song (in the way that other solos have obvious nods to important characters in their lives without being Explicitly About Them (Wandering Clown and Crystal Pleasure being obvious examples of this)) which i was excited for! and i think you can absolutely see it that way!

however!

there are also some nods in Accept My Love that feel more explicitly nagihiyo that have me absolutely struck- both in the references that seem to be links between both of their solos, and the links in Accept My Love that feel like theyre referencing back to some of the kiseki stories from ! era

i just want to pluck the examples i can think of, starting with just the solos (and also with the caveat that this is from one particular person's translations so there may be different interpretations, this is just me drawing conclusions from the ones ive found)

first, from nagisas:

and hiyoris:

poking at this, i can draw a parallel at the very least visually- nagisa finally stepping out into the world where the wind blows, and hiyori standing behind him calling to him to remind him hey, im right here, pay attention to me too...!

but then, going a little further

nagisa:

and then, hiyori:

now this i dont feel i even have to say anything about. the obvious parallels between nagisa struggling with the concept that trying to connect with others being a sin while hiyori just lightly dismisses it as not even something worth considering. loving sigh

and then!

nagisa:

hiyori:

again, a very easy to make comparison. hiyori has always been light-coded, and light in the darkness is a very easy metaphor to make for human connection and love, but i like drawing the parallel regardless as its used in both of their solos

and now... i also want to bring attention to something else.

in kiseki revenge match, thats when hiyori talks about nagisas backstory, and in the midst of it all, he says this

thats how he describes nagisa. and i truly believe that it came from anxiety, and a sense of inadequacy. hiyori poured all of his love into nagisa, and it helped- it undeniably helped, and nagisa has stated as much time and again, that hiyori brought him to life, that hiyoris light saved him, that hiyori is his sun. but hiyori alone couldnt be his whole world (no one person can, even if theyre soulmates (which they are (to me))) and so hiyori, whos sense of self worth is tied to his ability to love and to be loved and to heal, felt insecure over it and started to see nagisa as hopeless. as a bottomless hole.

however

this now brings me back to Accept My Love

do you think there is a limit on how sunlight radiates?

this is so, so stunning to me- because hiyori has come so far, because he believes that his love is endless and healing, because- reading it the way that i am- he can see his love as enough, that his love and giving it isnt hopeless anymore. and he wants to give it! he wants it to be received! accept my love!

and, the final piece that really tops all of this off for me

again, from hiyoris solo

in this journey with no destination.

I REST MY CASE.

NAGIHIYO INVENTED LOVE

#nagihiyo #nagisa ran #hiyori tomoe #hiyonagi #eden enstars #i will also note you can very obviously also draw the parallel between hiyori and juns solo #with the linked lines 'how dare you taking your gaze off me/you should know looking down wont do you any good either/where else should you #direct your gaze?'#and 'if you wish for yourself to be found/nothing will change if you only keep looking down'#from hiyoris and juns solos respectively #like i said you could very easily read accept my love as being directed at nagisa or jun or both #but i was so stunned by my own observations i had to put them all together into something coherent

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