Checking Out Gingham Check

I say I probably won't do another single review after Perfume's Spending all my time and look where I am now! Typing a single review! I've decided to give Gingham Check one final hurrah before moving on to bigger and better things. Mainly for the same reasons I decided to review SAMT: in order to fully judge the single, I felt like I had to analyze every aspect of the single as a whole. I hated the A-side so would the B-sides fare any better? Using my trusty Apple Rating System, I will go through each song on this track and see if there's anything that makes up for the blandness of Gingham Check: Nante Bohemian, Do Re Mi Fa Onchi, Show fight!, and Yume no Kawa. I'm excluding the theatre song because I'm lazy. Five apples means I love the song; it's a bright, shining red apple glistening in sparkling sunlight! One apple means it's a rotten, worthless song I'd rather kick under the gutter than bite into. Everything else in between... I'll let you figure that out! Now let's check out Gingham Check!

Covers/Outfits

I am not a huge fan of pastel. I think that draws back to an incident from when I was eleven in which I was invited to an all-pastel birthday party and I didn't get the memo so I showed up wearing black. Childhood trauma aside, pastel just washes everything out. It's nice in small amounts but too much of it and I can't stand it. So considering the backgrounds to these covers are light pink, mint green, and pale yellow... I don't like them at all. The covers do have a nice retro-feel to them but other than that they're incredibly dull. The problem is there's nothing that catches my eye in them; Flying Get had a kickass movie-poster theme to it and even Ue Kara Mariko had interesting, albeit poorly Photoshopped, covers. This one is just them stand around doing cutesy idol poses I've seen a million times already. They don't even bother to shoot different covers for the different editions, just changing up the font colors! The outfits are better but the lavender white gingham patterns make me think of Dorothy or the checkered tablecloths little old ladies play bridge on. If these were for a group like, Nogifail46 then I'd be a little more happy with the outfits since they'd be the only good ones they've gotten all year, but this feels more like a downgrade for AKB48. No golden uniforms, kickass, military jackets, or iconic schoolgirl get-ups for this song. Just... so much gingham... I think I'm going to drown in it. If I never post anything else on this blog again, you'll know it was the gingham that did it! Or Mayuyu's Creeper Smile But you know what they say: never judge a single by it's cover! Just look at Hello! Project! Let's see if there are any good songs that can save the awfulness that is Gingham Check!

Gingham Check

Gingham Check is a song that's familiar AKB-style music when Aki-P's in a lazy mood. Think Ue Kara Mariko, which won the titled of most loathed song of 2011 for me. So yeah... I'm not a fan of these types of songs. My biggest problem with songs like Gingham Check is that they're fantastically bland. There's simply nothing new presented in them. At least with songs that are bad for attempting a style and failing miserably, I can at least say "Well... you tried." Aki-P didn't try at all in making this song a memorable A-side and I think he knows that! Maybe. I have no idea. I will admit, after awhile, the chorus gets a little catchy but all songs like this are meant to be catchy. Bland yet irresistibly catchy is the allure that draws hungry wallets to buy singles like this. It's not experimental and won't polarize the fandom; Gingham Check is safe, albeit painfully safe. And in hindsight, I think I know why. With Acchan leaving, what else to do than present something already familiar to keep the fandom's attention after her graduation? Aki-P probably didn't want to take a chance with this song out of fear that the fans would leave seeing Acchan's graduation as the end of an era and style of music. Maybe. I'm just BS-ing this whole theory. I really have no idea. What I do know is that I can firmly say the only reason this song has grown on me at all is the PV and there's no way I'd listen to it alone without watching the PV. I'd already have forgotten this song if the PV hadn't been so entertaining.

So let's talk a little about that PV! I will say the PV is a completely different story. I've already done a lengthy PV review and screencap praising it for its fantastical quirkiness and ode to old Japanese B-movies. I didn't think I would like it that much though considering the amount of effort it would take to get me to willingly listen to this song again. So my adoration for the PV only clashes with how much I loathe this song and it's really annoying! Do you know how hard it is to try and struggle with two complete different ends on a love/hate spectrum? My blogger friend Chiima calls it my own "personal West Side Story" between my hate for the song and love for the PV. And yeah, that sums it up pretty well, just less snapping and random musical numbers and suicide. What Gingham Check's PV has is randomness, and not in a bad, immature "lol we're so random!!!" kind of way. There are lots of flashy images and high-budget effects thrown at you that it can be overwhelming for some but for me it's really fun to watch. Every time I watch this PV again I always feel like I find something new I hadn't noticed before! It's an eye-catching PV that thrives off the high budget and the concept its director decided to go with and is the only redeeming factor of this song. If you like movies (particularly old B-movies) then I think you'll enjoy this PV. I know I did; hell, I went in thinking I'd find the song to be a hot mess but was happily mistaken!



For being nearly worthless to me, Gingham Check gets two apples. The PV would bump it up to three apples but I'm not factoring the PVs into my ratings. As a stand-alone song, Gingham Check is a bland Gingham Mess whose catchiness can't save the song from fading into obscurity for me.

Nante Bohemian

I admit, I'm a little biased since Akimoto Sayaka's in this song and she's my favorite member of AKB48. But it wasn't like she was singing a solo or anything so I decided to approach this in the most unbiased way possible. Besides, I don't know half the Undergirls in this song. I was hoping the Undergirls song would fantastically outshine Gingham Check and... I guess it did. But it's not my favorite song on the track. Nante Bohemian is like wine; the more you have of it, the better it gets. Not that I would know or anything. The first time I heard this song, it was really, really weird, especially from AKB48. I'd never heard this sound from them before and it was a little shocking at first to hear such a song with such a distinct sound. It made me think of Morning Musume's Koi no Dance Site, except a little more hardcore or maybe even Happy Summer Wedding minus the annoying. At first, I was a little "meh" toward the song, trying to figure out if it was fun or extremely annoying. At first I leaned toward the latter but every time I listen to it, the song just grows on me! It's feels like Aki-P stepped out of his comfort zone putting this on a single! You'll either love the sound of this song or find it to be the most annoying thing you've ever happened upon besides Yurushite Nyan. I like the quirky, exotic sound to it and the fact that Sayaka is in this song.

There isn't much to the PV; it's just a bunch of glamour shots. I guess they really did blow the budget out on Gingham Check! It isn't necessarily a bad PV but it's pretty boring if you're not into girls standing around looking pretty. And since I'm not, the PV's pretty boring. Don't get me wrong, everyone looks lovely (especially Sayaka!!) and I'm happy Akicha's the center but I can't really say much about the PV. Hell, I don't even know half the girls in it since the Under Girls were dominated by SKE48 this year. My only complain is where the hell is Akimoto Sayaka? She's number four in the Under Girls and in every close-up she's always shoved to the back where I can barely see her! For shame, for shame! I wished they had incorporated like an Indian theme into the PV so it would match the song but oh well. The song's good enough, everyone looks lovely so I'm a pretty happy camper with or without the PV!

I'll give Nante Bohemian four apples out of five. Although the sound might shock you at first, after a few listens, the Indian-type sound can grow on you. Also, Akimoto Sayaka. What else does this song even need to be awesome?

Do Re Mi Fa Onchi

I first heard a preview of the chorus of this song in a CM featuring them dressed as nurses (yeah, just don't ask) and I was already stoked for it. From that little snippet, it seemed like we would be getting a powerful, and maybe even inspirational song for our Next Girls. With a Wasamin center, I was getting pretty hyped on this teeny tiny little preview. Now I've heard the whole song and realized I really need to stop doing that. I mean... Jesus Tapdancing Christ, this song is a mess. And I'm not exaggerating, this song has got to be one of the messiest, cluttered songs I've ever listened to. And I listen to Kyarypamyupamyu. Parts of it, sound like choir scales (and I think they are singing the typical Do Re Mi scale a regular chorus practices with), other parts they're chanting like cheerleaders on Walter White's crystal meth and then somewhere in the mix is that chorus I loved so much. The closest song I can compare Do Re Mi Fa Onchi to is Go Girl ~Koi no Victory~ by Morning Musume but this song makes that one look like Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. There's just too much going on in this song for it to sound good to my ears. It makes me think Aki-P hired some slaves to write this song and none of them could come up with ideas beyond little ones so they thought "HEY! We can combine them! If it worked for Chou Happy Song, it'll work for us! We're AKB fucking 48!" Well it doesn't. Maybe I'll just end up looping the chorus and creating my dream song to match it in my head. Even then, the chorus alone can't save this god-awful mess.

The PV doesn't help either. At least for Gingham Check, there was so much going on in that PV that I was able to forget about the song and watch Mayuyu get chased around by ghost!Rena. This PV's brings nothing new or entertaining to the table for me. Just a bunch of idols dancing around in idol outfits doing idol stuff... I can only take so much of one cliche at a time! Jamming them all together into one PV is simply too much! There was a decent transformation sequence but I'm just grateful it didn't turn them into the sex kittens in NMB48's Mousou Girlfriend PV (that PV still gives me nightmares O__O). And I think there might be a little shout-out to Wasamin's attempted pursuit of an enka career that may-or-may-not still be something her agency's letting her explore further. There might be other shout-outs to the other girls' personalities but hell if I know; I only know the names and faces of AKB48 and a few other girls outside of that and even less of those personalities stick out to me! If you like PVs that consist of nothing but every cliche in the Great Book of Idol Cliches then I'm certain you won't have a problem with this video. Personally for me, I find it absolutely boring and it does nothing to improve and/or distract from the god-awful song. And to think I was so excited for a music video with a Wasamin center...

This gets one apple for a promising chorus leading to some of the shittiest composition I've seen in a long time. It's a hot mess that doesn't know if it wants to be cute, serious, or something in between. Next please.

Show fight!

This was also another CM song I was stoked for. This chorus sounded badass, energetic, badass, awesome, and badass. Did I mention it sounded badass? But after listening to the steaming mess of Do Re Mi Fa Onchi, I wasn't going to fall under the CM Spell a second time! I was going to learn from my mistakes and view this song as rationally and neutrally as it would allow me. And when I did, I came to the conclusion that... it beat the other songs to a musical pulp just as I suspected it would. Maybe CMs don't always lie! Show fight! is definitely the most energetic of the songs on Gingham Check, and if you read this blog, you know I'm a huge fan of energetic songs! Already, the beginning sounds badass with the whispered repetition of the song's title and the feeling of something huge about to go down. The verses continue that anticipation, building up the tension until you hit the chorus. The chorus is definitely the best part of the song as it's where the energy and the vocals reach a climax. Show fight! also is playful, but not in the childish way, more like when you're repeatedly hitting a punching bag! It's a great song to just do stuff to, like working out, taking notes, writing a single review you should have written weeks ago... anything! I'm still confused as to why the hell this wasn't the Senbatsu single; it sounds like one and it's ten times better than the title track! Oh Aki-P, your mind works in mysterious ways. But you're probably sitting in a pool of money drinking money juice so who am I to complain?

There isn't much to the PV but it's still incredibly entertaining! I thought I wouldn't really be interested in the PV considering I only knew like four of the Future Girls for this single but I was happily mistaken! The best way I can put this PV is that... it's AKB48 Fight Club. I can't talk about it though. Just kidding, that joke has been around too long to be interesting anymore! The PV is girls beating the crap out of each other, complete with blood and bruises and cheesy but still badass combat scenes! I guess there's some kind of wrestling match to determine who gets to be center of the Future Girls and the plot doesn't get any more elaborate than that. We don't know what they're doing in some random boxing ring, how they got there, who they are, and it doesn't really matter. The song rocks and the PV matches the badass tones of the song perfectly. Hey... this PV is also a competition for a center position? Doesn't that sound awful familiar to you guys? I'm on to you, Aki-P. When I finally canoe to Japan, I'm going to figure out just why this song wasn't used as the Senbatsu song!

Show fight! is the only song I can eagerly give five apples to. It's got a catchy hook in its chorus, the verses are strong, and the whole song is filled with energy and power. Why the hell wasn't this the Senbatsu single anyways?

Yume no Kawa

I had the feeling that Aki-P would find some way to squeeze Maeda Atsuko on AKB48's last single before her departure from the group. Not that I'm pissed about that or anything, I just saw it coming. Anything to squeeze a few bucks more from her wotas, right? Unsurprisingly Yume no Kawa is a melancholic, almost nostalgic ballad... isn't it always? I actually would like to see another graduation song with a more energetic, happier sound;an upbeat song worked for Takahashi Ai's graduation song and she has about as much personality as Acchan does! The song is okay but it's plagued with a lot of problems your typical ballad will have. For one thing, it really drags. It also doesn't really stick out for a ballad, although it's a rather nice sounding song. The one interesting thing about this song is how much emotions I hear in the girls singing. Everyone, especially Acchan, sounds like they're about to cry in this song. And not in the way where everyone is breathy and blubbering and the vocals sound like a teary mess; like in the movies, where people sing emotionally but don't actually let their emotions affect their vocals! Does that even make sense? No? Well, at least Acchan has some emotion in her this time! Nice job for putting emotion into your voice Acchan! Is it because you know your career is screwed after you're out of AKB48? I kid, I really do like Acchan and it's nice that she had such a sweet, heartwarming sendoff song, even if it's a little slow and cliched for me.

And then there's the PV. It pretty much consists of Acchan riding off in a boat away from the only girls people recognize in the group the front girls to heaven. Or something like that. There really isn't that much to the PV; it's nothing interesting or compelling. I mean, it was obviously meant as a gimmick to tug on wotas' heartstrings and... and... okay, I cried. Yes, somewhere in my bitter, cynical mind some shard of it still managed to choke a few tears out after watching this PV. I wasn't a sobbing wreak or anything like that but the cinematography made the atmosphere so sad and then all the other members looked like they were being doomed to the hell of bad sales without her. And then Yuko just had to start crying and... I'm an emotional person who gets easily moved by movies, okay!? I cried when Jurina died in Sakura no Ki ni Narou, of course I was going to cry when Acchan "left" on a white boat to whatever the hell her post-AKB48 career has in store for her! She was a good front girl and one of the few I was generally okay with. Picturing AKB48 without her is going to be a surreal experience for me. If you're not a fan of Acchan, then you'll most likely point and laugh at the melodramatic nature of this video but if a sucker for ballads with PVs that are essentially symbols of the death of someone, then you may like this PV. It's simple but kind of sad, especially when you factor in the future of AKB48 without their ace.

I give it three apples out of five. It's an okay ballad but nothing's special or unique about it. I expected it for a farewell song and that's the only thing it is. On the up side, it isn't a bad song and everyone sounds genuinely sad in it, including Acchan the Drama-less Queen herself.

The Verdict

Gingham Check was a highly polarizing single as a whole for me. Half the songs I liked, and the latter I pretty much loathed. Same goes for the PVs. So what lay in store for this single? Gingham Check or Gingham Mess?

I've decided to give it three out of five apples. So Gingham... Median? Show fight! was stellar and Nante Bohemian was interesting to listen to. Yume no Kawa was a pretty but bland ballad that was overall okay for me but nothing special. Gingham Check and Do Re Mi Fa Onchi can both drown a bucket for all I care. I won't miss them at all. So if you're an AKB48 fan looking to buy a single, I'd recommend the Limited B since it has Show fight! and Nante Bohemian to balance out the half-assed blandness of the A-side. If you're looking for a last hurrah for Acchan, Limited A edition has Yume no Kawa. And naturally I think you'll like either edition if you're just buying it for Yuko finally being center. Lastly, if you don't give two shits about any of these songs... what the hell are you doing reading this? Go wait for their next single to be released or something!

As for myself, I'm going to go listen to Flying Get. Peace out.

I'd Be Lying if I Said This PV Was Crap

Gingham Check, the song, is like that beautiful scoop of ice cream atop a cone. But instead of remaining delectable and scrumptious, said ice cream fell off the cone and onto the sidewalk, becoming a gooey, melted mess.

Gingham Check, the PV, is like the friendly ice cream man who witnessed your despair at losing your beloved ice cream so he picked up that messy scoop of ice cream, added sprinkles and chocolate syrup, placed a cherry on top, and gave that new and improved ice cream cone back to you.

I don't think this has ever happened so drastically before. In the past, whenever I find a song to be bad, usually the PV isn't all that good or only marginally better and either way it almost always doesn't improve the song itself. But Gingham Check... this single has been driving me mad. I was ready to pull the switch and call it quits on this even being a halfway decent Senbatsu song until I watched the PV. And for the first time, there's such a contrast between my love for the PV and my hatred for the song that I don't know where to start... I guess the easiest thing to do is sum up my original feelings. So when Gingham Check was first released via live performance I was... underwhelmed to say the least. Frankly, I loathed the song and now I still loathe it just not as much as I used to. Anyways, the problem I had with the song was that it was incredibly dull. I heard the same sound I'd heard from over half of AKB48's discography (think Chance no Juban or Ue Kara Mariko to catch my drift) and the song was more generic than the generic soft drinks at my local Wal-Mart. Call it... Catchy Generica because despite how much I hate these kinds of songs they always, always implant themselves in my head in some way. Usually I find myself humming only the chorus on an endless loop and hating every minute of it. And so this was what happened for Gingham Check. Even now the only reason the chorus isn't stuck on chronic repeat in my head is because I'm blasting Chocolate Disco as I write this.

Gingham Check is currently a contender for worst A-side of 2012 for yours truly along with the future Janken single which I expect to be bad because they're always half-assed. But the thing with Senbatsu songs is I never expect them to be half-assed and I think that's one of the driving reasons why I can't stand this song so much. In the past, every Senbatsu song has had a very distinctive and powerful hook to it. Iiwake Maybe had the rock-ish influences, Heavy Rotation was idol music presented in the best and most energetic way possible, and Flying Get was a badass song with an even more badass PV. But Gingham Check is more vanilla than French Kiss' discography and lacks anything memorable or iconic. If 2011 me heard this song by some weird means of time-travel I would never think "Wow! What a great Senbatsu song this is!" because I wouldn't even think it was one, not even a B-side for the Senbatsu. And that's what makes Gingham Check such a huge slap in the face... It's like Pixar releasing WALL-E, Up, and Toy Story 3 and then releasing Cars 2. That's how I feel about this Senbatsu song. It's not a Senbatsu song, at least not to my ears. So after I'd concluded Gingham Check was a Gingham Mess, I was more than ready to dig my claws into the PV and pretend this single never happened. I'd seen bits and pieces of the PV and had pretty much concluded it would be just as much of a mess as the song was. And then I saw it.

This PV... good lord, this PV... is fucking amazing.

Damn you, Aki-P! Why do you have to hire a good director that gives this crap song a PV that so mind-blowingly amazing I'm left with conflicting feelings!? It would have been so much easier to bash the song, bash the PV, and move on to something else but noooo, you had to get me to love this, didn't you? I loved it so much I screencapped the shit out of it!

Ah, the Tokyo Police HQ, where justice (and donuts!) are served!

Somewhere, in some far off place, an Acchan hater is screaming in joy...

I don't know why but John Steele reminds me of a duck :D

Careful, Acchan! Emote too much and the world will implode on itself and cause a rip in the fabric of space and time!

Off she goes to collaborate with RiDOS so that there combined blandness will cause a rip in the fabric of space and time!

Hellooooooo new supreme ruler of AKB48 Yuko!

If you're a creepy wota that's convinced Yuko shall harvest your children, just think of this picture and let cruel reality come crashing back down.

At first, I was distracted by the giant "Ultra Party Motorcycle Girls" until I saw the XMXVVX. What the hell does that mean? Are they really complicated Roman numerals?

A ghost show hm? Well, it'd better live up to its name and be a turbo scary ghost show!

A-HA! I KNEW IT! MAYUYU'S A GHOST! That explains why she spend her days in AKB48 creeping around with that Creeper Smile of hers!

It's really fun to read these captions in a cheesy announcer voice! Try it!

Will love find a way? Only if Aki-P lifts the "no dating" rule!

The Motorgirls definitely have the better costumes of the two gangs...

But come on. The Car Devils have Takamina, Miichan, Rena, Umechan, and Mayuyu. Car Devils win the title of Nia's Favorite Gang (I never thought I'd have a favorite gang...)

From now, Yuko shall be called Jill Powers in these shots! By the way, the fact that there's probably a faction of the Yuko fandom ready to stone her for having a fake-relationship in a PV with a guy brings me great amusement :D

A curse? The curse of the Creeper Smile, perhaps?

Oh, don't worry! I'm very terrified of Mayuyu's Creeper Smile already!

I'm a sucker for cheesy love quotes! I'm adding this to my Cheesy Love Quotes Mental Notebook!

I don't really pay attention to dance shot sets, but this one's amazing.

Mayuyu, you adorable little Creeper. I look forward to your inevitable future center position.

Is love in the air for our Fantastic Creeper?

The cartoon hearts do not lie! There is!

Is that Slenderman? What's Slendy doing in AKB48?

Oh god, not the Momochi pose! Run away! Run away!

The cartoon hearts indicate Jill Powers has broken the hearts of her wotas EVERYWHERE!

...

I have nothing to add to the sheer epicness of this shot.

But holy SHIT, this is amazing! You have no idea how much I love this homage giant monster B-movies! Show more of the Giant Monster Kitty!!! Please!

It's... so... perfect...

Hang on... are they doing the chicken walk?

By Jove, they are! Does the idol industry just have a fetish for chickens or something? I feel like I see chicken moves everywhere in idol dances!

Uh-oh! Jill Powers' jealous wotas have turned on her and are trying to shoot her down for her unfaithfulness D:

Which unspeakable evil? The ghost girl or the Yurushite Nyan PV?

I guess it's the former! Hi there, Kitarie!

Why couldn't Ue Kara Mariko have been like this?

Can I take the giant monster kitty home? I'm gonna name him Chompy!

Oh no! Their love's separated by a wall? Whatever shall they do!?

What, is RiDOS behind that door ready to pump neurotoxin as revenge for all the jabs I've made at her?

I do love the whole "cop-partner romance" plot, not only because it'll piss off hordes of Jill Powers wotas. It's just a lot of fun to watch Jill Powers in action saving the day and kicking ass!

I'd know those locks of hair when I see them! It's my second favorite AKB member Miichan! Glorious, energetic, charismatic Miichan! I'm so glad you weren't shafted like Akimoto Sayaka!

HA! Don't you know the Creeper Smile is a death blocker?

I love how Yukirin and her hubby don't even acknowledge Miichan! They're obviously just not worthy of her presence!

I'll answer that for you: nope. Not with the fandom Yukirin's breasts Yukirin has.

Of course they can! With the power of LOVE! And Creeper Smiles :D

I love how the drawing!Mayuyu looks angrier than the real life Mayuyu... Oh, you can't be angry to save your life can you, Mayuyu?

I love the cartoon drawings because do you know what it reminds me of?

Kyarypamyupamyu! WOO HOO FOR TRIPPINESS!

I'm not sure if this shot makes me feel like smiling and going along with it or running out of the room in terror.

I'm not expert in Giant Monster Invasion Survival 101 but wouldn't the smart thing be to run away? Hello? Are you two even paying attention!?

Oh, so NOW you two take my advice? I see how it is.

Cue the West Side Story music!

And now you two hold the record for world's most incompetent cops!

But Mariko holds the record for sexiest robber!

Fairies? I can roll with that since they're Takamina and Umechan!

Is Yukirin a Disney Princess now and are Takamina and Umechan her fairy friends?

If this is what post-Acchan AKB48 will look like... I think I can live with that!

Can love survive for our Fantastic Creeper?

Nope. Because every time she tries there will be Sadako monsters to chase her away. Poor Mayuyu :(

The way Yukirin's so ditzy and oblivious to Chompy the giant monster is really funny in these scenes!

I can tell Mariko and her posse of Jurina, Tomochin, and Sae had a boatload of fun shooting this scene!

Can love stop the Insane Mariko Posse? Of course it can! It's a movie!

So ghosts can hide in my plumbing? How comforting!

I love how fake the green screen looks like the way it does in real-life B-movies!

I feel like these words are all talk and no show for our AKB Gangs...

Besides, the girls in Show Fight actually beat the crap out of each other!

So... are those four girls supposed to be aliens? Race car drivers? Honmayan's sidekicks?

Love... AND COPS! Say it in a dramatic voice and it sounds even better!

EEE! These horror movie homages are like crack to me! Except not deadly and stuff!

Oh look! Sasshi's getting dragged to HKT48!

Bye bye Sasshi!

Yay! Another awesome dance shot! I guess Jill Powers is leader of the Insane Mariko Posse now?

I approve of all these amazing dance shots!

And Sasshi just won for Nia's Favorite Shot in the Whole Freaking PV. Trust me, that title's harder to get than it sounds.

THRILLER! WOO HOO! If only Akimoto Sayaka were in this PV... she loves Michael Jackson

I know Yukirin's center, but I'm more focused on Miichan and Honmayan Yui!

The Sadakos get a dance shot too!? Does this PV get any better!?

CHOMPHY GETS ONE!? My joy is... so uncontainable... that I'm flying atop a rainbow of joy...

Why yes, bullet are flying. And I'm loving every minute of it!

Neither. It's probably Yukirin's ditziness!

Oh, how I love these quirky, hilarious captions!

Wow, this director's quite brave to show Yukirin with another man! He'd better lock his doors and sleep with a gun to escape the wrath of her angry stalker-wotas now!

And so they all lived happily ever after via High School Musical jump!

So... are you guys still here? Because that was a very, very, very, long screencap. I'm serious, the record for longest screencap I've ever done now belongs to Gingham Check with 80 freaking screencaps. But you know why there are so many? Because this has got to be one of the best PVs of 2012. I shit you not, Gingham Check, a song I actively hate, has now earned a place in my cold, unforgiving heart thanks to just how amazing this PV is. Thank you, Joseph Kahn. Thank you for blessing us with such entertainment I can forget about my hatred for this song for 6 minutes and enjoy one of my favorite music videos of 2012.

Something you should know about my preferences when it comes to PVs is I hate cute PVs. With a few exceptions, I just can't stand cute PVs. They're are so sweet I can feel myself getting diabetes. You can show me the most adorable, moe-moe idols prancing around being adorable and cutesy and moe and I won't bat an eye. I think that's boring. What I do love, and I mean really love, are quirky PVs. These are the PVs that take an angle and twist it into something weird and sometimes awkward at times but it works. Think Kare to Issho ni Omise ga Shitai, all of Kyarypamyupamyu's PVs, and even a few Perfume PVs. On Nia's Scale of Quirkiness, the Gingham Check broke the scale, pieced it back together, then sold it on Ebay. For AKB48, the main theme of this PV is what the director described as an homage to Japanese cinema. Throughout the PV you get little shout-outs to Japan like the Sadako-type ghost girls haunting Mayuyu and the Godzilla-esque monster rampaging through a city chasing after Yukirin. Is it a little stereotypical? Maybe, but who fucking cares? Kahn went with a concept and he went all the way with it. You can tell that all the election money from Manatsu no Sounds good! was put into this PV. There are so many different scenes, special effects, stunning costumes, and so. Much. Quirkiness. I loved every bit of it. There were so many different elements thrown together into this PV but it wasn't messy; it worked. It worked so well! The overall tone of the PV was a combination of cheesiness and campiness and all the girls looked like they were having so much fun in the PV! One thing I really loved were all the captions done in perfectly clear English! Not Engrish, pure, grammatically correct English! The captions helped fuel the campy fun of the PV and added to the quirkiness. There are so many scenes from the PV that I loved, it's near impossible to name my favorites (other than Sasshi and her axe) but other things I did enjoy that stuck out to me more than the whole thing were Takamina and Umechan as angels, the Sadako girls, the Thriller dance, Mayuyu's Creeper Smile, and Chompy. I'll miss Chompy :(

A complaint within the fandom is that too much emphasis is put on Yuko and Mayuyu and everyone else got shafted so they could get more screen time. Do I think this is true? Well... yeah. But the thing is, I'm surprisingly okay with it. It might be because I'm a fan of both Yuko and Mayuyu and they have such distinct personalities that they can carry a PV together. Does that mean the other girls don't have personalities? Of course not! And I thought it was cool how everyone sort of got to do their own thing in the PV. Mariko, Jurina, Sae, and Tomochin got to be robbers; Takamina and Umechan were lovely angels/fairies; Sasshi, Tomomi, and Harunyan were horror movie schoolgirls; Yui and Miichan were alien scouts(maybe?), and the top three Senbatsu members each got their own main storyline. Of those three storylines, I think my favorite was the horror movie storyline and not just because Mayuyu's the star. As a fan of horror movies and someone who's seen Ringu, Ju-on, and a few other famous J-horror films, I loved seeing AKB48 do their own little ode to that genre. It was funny and even slightly creepy at times and the captions were amusing and rode along with the campy feel of the entire PV. Another storyline I enjoyed much more than I thought I would was Yukirin's Godzilla storyline. I figured since I'm not much of a Yukirin fan I wouldn't really pay attention but then Chompy came in. I loved the animated giant monster and the ditzy approach Yukirin and her boyfriend took to the whole situation. I even laughed when she was innocently singing into a giant megaphone with the giant monster right behind her! And last but not least (hell, she's number 1) I really enjoyed Yuko's cops-in-love storyline; it was the perfect blend of action and cuteness. I always like the way Yuko acts in PVs; she's really quite a decent actress and can go from silly and playful to serious and dramatic. There's also the surprisingly well-done "gang/fight dance battle extravaganza" between two sides of the Senbatsu. I loved the West Side Story vibes I got from this and I found it blended really smoothly with the rest of the PV, something I wasn't expecting. I seriously didn't want this PV to end; it was just so well-done that I would almost say it was perfect. I literally don't think there was one thing I disliked about it other than the song.

But yep, underneath all that campiness and fun is still that generic song I so willingly struck down several paragraphs ago. One criticism you can make is that the only reason the PV has so much going on is to distract the viewers from the fact that the song itself stinks. But I don't see it that way. I think Gingham Check's PV has added on to the song and given it a new angle, much like Flying Get's PV did. And isn't that what a PV should do? Shouldn't it give you more than just what you listened to, turning the raw audio into a visual spectacle that stays in your mind long after you've heard the song and seen the video. The way I see it is you have songs like Beginner and Spring of Life which are already extremely good and their PVs only add on to the top-notch quality they are. And then you have songs like Gingham Check and Spending all my time which are mediocre songs that are improved when combined with memorable music videos that give substance to something that was once bland and generic. Through this musical metamorphosis, Gingham Check has become more than what I was originally presented with, and I'm astounded by the end result. So in layman's terms... you got me to care about Gingham Check, Aki-P. I hope you're happy in that pool of money you're most likely lounging in right now.

Go watch this. Even if you hate AKB48, go watch it. You might be surprised at what these Akibahara chicks can pull.