Ciao Nekotomi and Test Me

Watch it here!

Saori “Ciao Nekotomi” Tachibana is Oshi no Ko’s assistant director but more broadly Doga Kobo’s greatest current creative, a powerhouse visual storyteller whose been known to me since 2022 with Shikimori’s Not Just a Cutie’s gobsmacking OP, coincidentally my introduction to the studio itself. In that time she’s pulled off even greater work directing not just openings and endings but Oshi no Ko’s finest 2.5D hour, culminating for now in Test Me, an opening that puts everything in this franchise(and current season) to utter shame.

Her work is defined by its fashionable modernity, diegetic photography capturing moments big and small to tell life stories, glamorous clothing draped around outrageously polished drawings and flights of fantasy escaping worlds otherwise grounded in current reality.

Her only uninteresting work is RaG’s 4th OP which fully committed to a fairy tale aesthetic but without the same level of animation talent as her other efforts beyond her ever present colleague and master artist in her own right Kanna “Kappe” Hirayama. By fully utilizing Kappe’s own genius talent as an AD/KA in almost every single one of her works Nekotomi elevates her OP’s and ED’s beyond their respective series bar of quality, pushing for full wardrobes of unique costumes to be designed, drawn and then thrown away after her 90 seconds are up.

Characters simply look better when she’s their executive creative voice, sporting anything from casually stylish high school apparel(Shikimori, Alya, and Chitose[ED]) to imaginative high end fashion(RAG and ONK’s latest), she’s definitely got an eye for fits and can go all out designing when working within these wraparounds of series where complex designs don’t unnecessarily bottleneck productions. Kappe is basically the best at what she does and she’s never better than when Nekotomi is directing her hand, she was the SB/ED for THAT sequence of ONK Episode 1 if you need the most memorable example.

To make matters worse for anyone else at Doga Kobo trying to stand at the top Kappe isn’t the only godlike artist at Nekotomi’s beck and call, she isn’t Kobo’s most powerful KA as that title belongs to Shun “Amoji” Takeda.

Amoji is the animation powerhouse completing this esteemed trifecta, handling basically every memorable ONK cut(yes, he’s the guy behind those revenge eye’s) and when she needed the pinnacle of ONK to hit with her adaptation of the 2.5D stage play in Season 2(episodes 6 and 8 are her baby’s) he stepped up as action animation director. With her storyboards, Kappe’s corrections and Amoji’s exceptional animation they took on Mengo Yokoyari at her best and pulled off the manga’s most challenging imagery without even breaking a sweat. Those episodes are probably the best artistry I’ve ever seen from Doga Kobo and now knowing the team in charge it all makes sense.

But once you hit the peak the only direction is down, so they pivoted. ONK hasn’t missed a beat when it comes to it’s wraparounds, every OP and ED is a gorgeous affair even if we’ve forever been stuck in the shadow of Idol, simply one of the greatest of all time. There’s just one thing, she never handled any of those. Until now.

Test Me is a remarkable piece of visual storytelling and one that attests to the power of the artists involved. Nekotomi filters all her stylistic interests into its construction times like 100, Kappe has so many designs to work with here and Takeda gets a disgustingly gorgeous sequence to pull off, this is Kobo’s A Team at their S tier.

I can’t really talk about the messaging because my brain ain’t wired to decipher this all and it’d be plagiaristic to put someone’s smarter interpretation in my mouth so that’ll be linked here. What I can saw is that this OP is chefs kiss and we all need to appreciate the trifecta that made it possible, especially SB/ED/GOD Saori “Nekotomi” Tachibana more!

Editor’s Note: Forgot to mention but the song itself also slaps, thanks CHANMINA!