6 comments on “Morning Musume 20th Anniversary Official Book Interviews: Makino Maria

  1. Maria is very funny and it’s been great watching her mature and improve. This was fun to read. Thanks Henkka!

    • I really agree with what you said about watching her grow up and mature. At first I was like; who is this kid who’s overly cute and everything. Over time I grew to love her, but reading this made me value her more and more. She is such a key asset to Morning Musume. Really proud of her!

  2. Every interview makes me realize how important Tsunku’s advice and guidance was to the group. He would plant the seeds of what would be their charm or character or skill, the girls themselves would nurture them. Yokoyan, Chii and 15th gen don’t and won’t get that sort of advice, so their paths are going to be more difficult. Hopefully their senpai will help guide them.

    And Maria is incredibly hardworking. Out of all of H!P she gets the most gravure work, and gets a cover special almost every month. I believe it was last year but she beat out ex-SUPER GIRLS Asukawa Nana, a gravure juggernaut within her own right, for most covers in a year. Today’s idol world is all about visuals and a specific visual so Maria’s presence in Musume is very necessary.

  3. You can really tell she’s working hard to become a reliable senpai for future generations. Im excited to see what awaits (also one reason why I love following H!P)

  4. It’s interesting to hear about how Maria was too serious, because even in KSS, she’d steal the scene because she’d just bliss out in front of the camera, setting up others to rib on her, especially Murota. And then, of course, she provided the best reactions to the 12th gen prank, all on her own (Haachin had prepared to provide a punchline reaction if necessary, but Maria made it so that she didn’t have to). Like Sasaki Rikako, her crybaby moments were pretty entertaining. Maria has got that X factor.

    But still, the story about how Tsunku pushed her to come up with Loverin reminds me of a story about AKB’s Oshima Yuko, who was also told by Akimoto that she was too much of an honors student type, which was boring, and so Oshima developed a much more interesting character, which pushed her and the group to the top. So yeah, Maria has the same kind of potential for greatness.

  5. Any girl who would make a chicken wear a cowboy hat and ride a skateboard should be in variety. I wish Morning Musume still had its own variety show because as funny as the bus stop theaters were fifteen years ago, I think current MM would produce funnier results. It would also be a great way for the girls who don’t “shine” because there are “too many members” to increase their presence.

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