This past weekend I attended a small convention called AOD, in which there was a panel called "Crash Course into Hello! Project" that, as its name implies, attempted to give a quick rundown on what H!P is all about to potential noobs and curious onlookers. Unfortunately it was a bit of a messy presentation, as it quickly rattled off names of various past and present acts with almost no visual aids besides CD jackets of current groups' latest singles, and thus seemed like it would've been intimidating and confusing given the brand's long history; overall the panel just seemed to be nothing more than a setup for the panel hosts' cover song performances (which, to be fair, were actually decent). Still, the concept of a H!P crash course did remind me of the existence of this old thread, which, fittingly enough, was created by someone who attended that convention and panel with me.
So the question now is: if you were to set up your own "crash course into H!P", something you could fit into an hour (or less) of convention time, how would you go about it? Would you try to cover all of its long, elaborate history or would you focus more on current lineups and material? How would you balance between visual and musical presentations? How do you explain (if at all) what a Japanese idol is to a know-nothing westerner? I know some issues have been addressed in this thread already, but keep in mind the time constraints of a convention setting, the idol genre's place in otaku culture, and the fact that a lot has changed over the past few years in regards to how accessible material is (compare how H!P was when this thread first started to how it is now).
Personally I think such a panel needs to have a general focus on current stuff, only briefly touching on certain parts of history. One of the things the AOD panel got right was bringing up Momusu's origins in the Sharam Q audition, the "Ai no Tane" sales challenge, and the group's audition/graduation tradition, but beyond that I can only think of a few things that absolutely have to be mentioned, such as "Romantic Ukare Mode" as a fandom staple song, and perhaps the origin of the H!P Kids and certain former Egg/Trainee members...and as an American I think no H!P history discussion would be complete without the mention of [noembed]
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Speaking of which, appearances in western media would be helpful. Besides the Dramatic Chipmunk, one could also bring up [noembed]
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this particular GIF of Airi that has become quite popular on Reddit, or even [noembed]
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And of course, attaching visuals to the names and groups is very important. When I first became a fan I had a pretty tough time telling some girls apart and remembering who's who, especially in a 13-member Momusu lineup, so putting names to faces is something that needs to be done and is where the AOD panel went wrong. This is where the focus on current groups comes in, since obviously there are way too many former members to cover in one hour. Some groups will probably be easier to teach than others (Berryz has Momochi and the tall members, Juice=Juice has had
a couple celebrity look-a-likes, S/mileage has a vampire).
And then there's music, something else the AOD panel sort of got right with the cover song performance at the end. As I said before, I'd personally keep the focus on current/recent material, but there are a few songs that deserve mention, such as the aforementioned "Romantic Ukare Mode", and of course "Love Machine", as much as some of us longtime fans might be tired of it. Also, how much should one talk about the evolution of the H!P sound and Tsunku's songwriting, if at all?
Any other thoughts or ideas? Hell, if the panel hosts ever read this consider it panel feedback and an invitation to join this forum and discussion.