Anki

I think Yuzu would be more popular in Korea if not for Yuna appearing first. Based on how those Korean flower girls hawked him only at the Olympics gala, you can tell he is sooo their type. But many Koreans don't like the fact he got two golds when Yuna didn't, and that he has garnered a fan following greater than she had (and its still growing). Even Orser in his interview say he has become a far bigger phenom and he has been through it all with both skaters. If Boyang had won more golds or (*in whisper* is more attractive), I am not sure China would necessarily be as warm to Yuzu as they are now. He would still be very popular, but he probably would have a bigger amount of detractors too. In some way, whether he has competitors (even in other disciplines) in a country somewhat affects his position there too. But if we going to talk about difference in Western and Asian aesthetics it's got to be the costumes... how many times has 'western' viewers complained about his costumes, yet on most Asian platforms he is considered to have by far the best costumes (a lot can't understand why someone would want to go to the Olympics wearing a sweater that looked randomly bought at Uniqulo...). And even the music too, Semei seem to be the most highly regarded programs of his amongst western viewers, but they tend to find H&L music boring, yet I find a lot of Asians fans actually prefer H&L more, particularly because of the music.

I think Yuzu became popular for all the reasons listed above, but all of them come together for, what I think is the (or one of ) main reason, and that is he naturally induces in people a strong feeling of..wanting to protect him? almost like a "motherly" feeling, and there is no stronger feeling than that in the world. Remember that commentator who said to "wrap him up in cotton wool" when he was young? that is basically how to describe it. And of course after you get to know more about him as a person, including his strong will, injuries etc. that feeling becomes even stronger. There are many athletes in the world that makes you admire or be in awe of them, and Yuzu is the king of doing that, but he has this juxtaposition of being the strongest of the strongest in his field yet there is an air of fragility that makes him more endearing than your typical top athlete.

I think aesthetic sense are actually pretty similar between China, Korea and Japan, because their entertainment industry in some way cross-pollinate each other? White skin, big eyes with double eyelids, small heart-shaped face, high nose, skinny long limbs and androgynous and youthful looking features are prized in all three countries. Yuzu ticks all the boxes other than the double eyelid. His eyes are only small when he smiles, they are not small when he is serious and not smiling. I actually think Yuzu's looks are more closer to China and Korea taste than Japan though? I can actually name some Chinese and Korean celebrities that I think Yuzu resembles, but not so much Japanese ones (despite I watch more Japanese dramas). But then his golden proportion body is rare. Most people have a 5:5 torso to legs proportion, some you might even have 6:4. Having a 4:6 proportion is already considered extremely good proportions. If you look at that that picture in the tweet, Yuzu is '8-heads' tall even without the skates, which means he is almost "9-heads tall' counting in the skates. His torso is only '3-head' long, which means he has a 3:7 body proportion when he is on the ice. That sort of proportion really only exists in mangas and few high fashion models. You know the famous manga drawers "Clamp" that love to draw really long limbs and crazy proportions? I used to think such proportions can't exist in real life until I saw Yuzu, he reminds me of a "Clamp' character

Yes, this was the season of Yuzu doing "I chose this music and layout because I like it to reward myself" instead of being fully strategic, and one is enough. He needs to be pragmatic about everything next season. Otonal fits him well and the judges scores it decently when clean, so it is a safer bet than a new SP. I won't mind a new costume though, like Chopin, to change things up. Origin, as much as I love it, unfortunately has too much baggage associated with Nijinsky - judges expects to see Nijinsky, and when they don't get it they mark it down. I think Seimei resonated so well in general because judges have stereotypical views - they see a Japanese skating some Japanese icon they get it better than something in the abstract...so something like a Samurai or Ninja program might be the clever choice. there are of course many great Japanese music to fit these themes.

Sorry I know we've moved on from the topic of challengers and GP spots selection, but I hope Yuzu will choose the latest challenger possible, being Finlandia. It is a whole month later than others so not only more time to train, but also more time to heal, which I think is the most important thing right now. Plus ACI always mark super harsh and I don't want Yuzu starting a season being beaten down by judges on his first pancake. Finland is probably his only happy memory of this season so it will be a good place for him to start - his lucky place. If he chooses IDF or COC as first GP, there will still be time after Finlandia. I will probably say IDF given there is more time between NHK to allow him some rest ( I think part of the reason for the injury this season is lack of rest between Helsinki and RoC). I know IDF is notorious for bad organisation, but after the bad ice condition at the SP in Saitama this year when you think Japan should do better, goes to show bad ice condition can occur anywhere, so might as well pick the best GP timewise.

In light of what JSF said pre-competition, the results of the competition is such karma. They so want to prove there is more than one megastar, yet in the end there is only one megastar. Perhaps the time JSF spent in trying to replace Hanyu, should be spent on not letting other federations make a fool out of them on their own home arena.

This past weekend I felt like I just watched some major turn of events in an Anime or something.... You know where there was a happy end to a major Arc (the Olympics) and you thought the story is coming towards an end, then a new bad guy (it's the evil judges here rather than specific skaters) suddenly appears that beat up the protagonist, who now have to find a quiet place and practice some new powers. I mean Yuzu had joked before his life story is very anime like, but to watch a real person with flesh and blood go through it rather than paper characters is so much more heart wrenching. At the start of the season I did get the feeling Yuzu just really wanted to jump the 4A and then retire, hence all the tribute programs. And even after his injury in RoC, it felt like he just pushed this plan to one year later. But somehow Worlds became the catalyst for his wish to jump 4Lz, 4F & 4A, and given his current health, he will at most add one new quad to his program per year, which means we're pretty much headed towards the Olympics again I hope the powers out there don't end up regretting they may be the one that end up sending him there The one good thing that came out of this Worlds was that Yuzu maybe finally understood how important his health is.. not saying he didn't before, but I still think he was very rash about it after the Olympics by choosing to skate at RoC FS. Maybe because he won Olympics with injured ankles and then recovered nicely from it, he wasn't thinking right at that time. I believe that skate may have cost him the gold at Worlds (if he didn't injure his ankle further, he might have recovered earlier to arrive at Saitama in better shape). And I think that realisation hit him hard this time to really put his health first, hence his withdrawal from WTT (before his announcement, I was convinced he would want to go to avenge himself there based on the old Yuzu I know, so I was surprised at the welcomed response to withdraw). Somehow my gut feeling tells me this turn of attitude may mean he end up being the one staying relatively injury-free in the next few years ( I know this may be just wishful thinking, but one could hope).

Or maybe they promised him the CM and interview will all be about his figure skating and not really the product XD Nothing better to bait Yuzu than figure skating....but they must be paying a good sum or gave him something he really wanted (maybe charity) for him to come out of his cave to even make blog posts. I recalled after the Olympics, there were news that the amount of fee for his commercials are in the top ranks in Japan.

Being the fact he is actually an ageless alien from another planet? Hence , why no suit fits him either...He doesn't have the body of a normal human being XD

No he talked about figure skating only (what else could you have expected? He ain't giving his secret away)

If I remember right his data for Sochi Olympics is 171cm and 52 kg, yet here when he is 15 and 169 cm and 52 kg, which means he did not gain weight at all during those four years of what should have been puberty ? Yuzu you are too scary...

Had he went the route of ballet or contemporary dancer, he would have equally excelled. However, ice skating has Olympics, which spreads his fame around the world more, so I'm glad he ended up in skating. My sister who don't usually follow skating and accompanied me to the competition, basically said she thinks he outdid all the ladies in terms of grace and elegance at the competition gala, including even the ice dancers ( and I agree with her)

He had already beaten Patrick in GPF 2012 where he was silver and Patrick was bronze (Takahashi was gold), and if not for the knee injury he suffered before Worlds 2013, Yuzu could have had been a gold contender. I recall after Worlds 2013, Yuzu seemed to have lesser ice show placements, which received some complaints from other skaters' fans, and JSF's response was given he is a potential gold medal contender, he needs to be given time to heal properly. So at that time, JSF already placed their hope on him for the Olympic gold. Of course, had he missed 2013 GPF, that might have dampen some of JSF's faith, but if he had won Nationals, he would have gone to the Olympics even if he did not make GPF 2013 due to the selection rules.

I think Yuzu will be more excited at Disney than Shoma XD has he ever mentioned he went to Disney before ?

I know which TV snippet of Hanyu as a kid you are talking about (but I am finding it hard to find again), but in my memory I thought Yuzu was asked what is your dream/goal, and he said to win the Olympics, and the interviewer asked him 'when?', and Yuzu answered "in the Olympics after Vancouver (at that time Sochi had not been decided as the host yet), and I will be 19!" something like that. Also David Wilson said in his interviews that Yuzu wrote an email to him at the start of the 14 Olympic season along the lines of "I do not want to wait till 2018, I want to win the Olympic now, so please please help me). So I think he had his mind set on gold only at Sochi from the very start. In fact I would say whilst he always planned two golds, his thirst for the 2nd one probably only intensified due to the not so great free skate at the first Olympics.

I think Otonal is one of, if not best SP of Yuzu's , so no he shouldn't change it just because, I wouldn't even mind if he used it again next season (or alternatively, Origin) so he can focus his time on landing the 4A, his real target. It's not the first time Johnny has dragged Yuzu into unfavorable comparisons, some even with other disciplines. I recalled in 16 GPF he commented that Evgenia has better chance to win the Olympics than Yuzu and we saw what happened in the end. Or in another interview in the past he stated Yuna was the bigger deal because she gets mobbed everywhere while Yuzu wasn't necessarily, and we know who can't go anywhere without security guards today. I think Johnny meant what he said yesterday, not just to please NBC, but as per the examples above, his predictions can go pretty wrong. However, I am used to the two-faced nature of people around Yuzu so I am pretty chill over his comments. Call me cynical, it's for the same reason I don't take any of the TCC family love or Plushenko's gushing seriously, cause at the end of the day in sports, its each athlete for himself, regardless of currently active ones or retired ones.

I have actually seen amongst fan-wars of Korean and Japanese idol group cases of extreme Antis who later admitted to be mentally ill from hating someone so much that they had to get treatment, and then after treatment regret they ever became like that. So yes, a lot of extreme antis are probably mentally unstable to start with or on the way to become mentally unstable, hence why they are irrational. Here, I am not talking about the usual fan of another skater who happen to not like Yuzu's style or feel threatened and criticise him, but the antis that actually spend more time than even Yuzu fans in watching his routine or reading his latest interview just for the opportunity to find anything they can twist negatively. In my opinion, that is already a level of obsession on the verge of mental problem, and you will find in some cases, they have forgotten to even care for the original rival skater they were supporting. When you win as many competitions as Yuzu, you are bound to hit a couple of nutcases like that, people who took the defeat of their preferred skater way too personally. If I don't like a skater, the normal reaction is I don't want to watch said skater's routines more than once let alone follow his every move or interview.

Wow I know he must be disappointed that he missed GPF again, but I didn't know he would be so kuyashi he is already declaring goals for one year later when he hasn't even finished this season yet lol I don't think we will ever see the emergence of `i dont care about wins and records, I'm skating for myself ' Yuzu ever again

Judging from the Christmas decorations on the wall, this should be recent right, not some old video only released now

The size of the Japanese market for figure skating vs the rest of the world is probably another reason there is little need for Yuzu to extend his fame beyond Asia. Japan is probably by far the biggest market for figure skating now - you see other countries skaters flooding into Japan to earn money from Japanese ice shows but not the other way round. Wasn't the rating for Yuzu's segment of the Olympics like 46%, and it was midday not even during prime time? that is like half of Japan watching his wining moment. The average rating of Japan's World cup game is around the same figure . If I recall correctly, the worlds and GP series where Yuzu competed can have average ratings of 20-30% (even during midnight hours), whereas the ones where he didn't compete (such as GPF 17 and Worlds 18) had on average single digit rating to 10+%. So whilst Japan loves figure skating in general, a lot of the popularity also is in Yuzu himself as a person that cannot be passed on to another skater even from his own country. I remember Yuzu's childhood coach telling him to not be the coach of a particular skater in the future, but rather be in a role of a producer in spreading the popularity of the sport. For my own selfish reasons, I hope whatever he comes up with after he retires (be it the opening of a skating school or developing skating shows) cost a lot of money so he is forced to be more active active commercially and appear on a lot of Japanese TV shows . Cause Japan has a lot of wacky and funny game and TV shows that i am dying for Yuzu to appear on one day when he has time. He is pretty quick-witted and has such exaggerated reactions and expressions that he will be comedy gold on those shows.

The answer to that would be Yuzu hasn't signed with any big agency. A lot of skater's fame are also due to their agency's heavy promotion in the media, creating buzz, sporting rivalries, and extending their commercial activities. If he had signed with a big international sport agency like IMG, given his achievements, they would have made the whole world know him as the GOAT by now. Those earnings ranking publications also get their data from agencies, hence you would not see Yuzu in one - how much he earns only he and the tax office knows. Yuzu achieved his fame and popularity of today without any agencies' help, so imagine what it would have been like if he had an agency that promoted him further. But I can understand why Yuzu doesn't want an agent given he likes to be in control of his life. As someone whose job previously had some association with agents, sponsors and celebrities, I can tell once you sign with one, you have no freedom - they dictate what you say and do in the public, and how to run your career. Judging from internet activities and attendance at competitions and ice shows, if we are talking about the amount of dedicated fans that will follow him around the world, I think Yuzu beats Yuna in that respect, even if comparing across the two eras. Not to say he has reached a certain level of popularity in China like no other skater has, which is new potentially big market, with next Olympic at Beijing. It is a pity he doesn't try to commercialise on his fame as much as he can, but also remember a lot of sponsors add extra pressure on the skater and distract them from their skating with commercial activities. I think Yuna is a rare case of where extreme commercialisation of her fame hasn't affected her performance much, but there are many times where too much pre-Olympic puff and pressure end up costing the gold medal - Michelle Kwan and Mao Asada are examples that come to mind. In that way I think Yuzu's has been clever in taking the minimum amount of sponsorship to earn enough for himself but not so much it affects his focus on skating After his PC win, he, as far as we know, hasn't take up a single new advertisement, despite based on Japanes news, the amount of money Japanese companies are willing to pay him is top tier, not just amongst athletes, but all Japanese public figures. That is a crazy demonstration of having no interest in money if you ask me - most Olympic winners go crazy on trying to cash out their title as much as they can. But I wouldn't be surprised any sponsor that signs him now would require a commitment to not retire by a certain time, which is probably why he didn't take up any - I am sure Yuzu wants to run the rest of his career on his own terms.

I am sure his main motivation for jumping the 4A is childhood dream. But it is also, at least for this season, the most realistic replacement for his temporary missing 4Lz, to keep him a step ahead of his competitors. Being first men to jump 4A is itself a record, and the marks record may follow it too. So the dream and his desire to win/break records are not mutually exclusive. They actually all tie in nicely together for him this season hence why he is insistent on jumping it now and not later. BTW whilst the ISU made the 4A totally not points worthy (gotta wonder why right after Yuzu announce he is doing it ), it also gives little to no motivation for other top skaters to learn it, as they're better off learning/stabilising the 4Lz. Which can allow Yuzu to make the 4A his signature jump for awhile (I am sure he would love that), and not something a dozen other men ( and girl) can do like the 4Lz, thus reducing its wow factor (remember how when 4Lz was like Boyang's signature jump... now that is hardly the case with all the men and even girl prioritising that jump) .

The way Yuzu seems to be thinking now reminds me of when I finished my university entrance exam getting out of high school. To get into the course at my desired university, and also because I'm just a really competitive person, I tried to be at the top of all my courses at high school. When I got the offer, I felt a huge sense achievement, and immediately thought I have no pressure to be top now, as a university degree is the same regardless of whether you are top of the class or tenth in the class, so I can chill and enjoy things I didn't have time before. But that zen mode lasted only like 1 month of starting the semester the moment exams began the " I must be top" instinct immediately took over despite the logical me keeps saying "just chill, it doesn't matter any more" . So I highly doubt Yuzu can keep his urge to always win or break records down for long after season starts, despite what he says now. Not to say I don't think in reality he will feel any less pressure than before. The biggest pressure will probably still be from himself to maintain his pride as 2X Olympic champion. The fact he is learning the 4A ( and hinting the Quint too) suggests to me he does not predict nor wishes for the younger generation to surpass him, not even in BV, or at least TES. Sure in the far future a great skater that may surpass him could emerge. But for the current young generation he is competing against, he isn't going to be easily acceptive of that happening. I think in the post-Olympic conference a journalist asked him whether the younger skaters ( I think he was referring to Shoma) tried jumping harder quads at the Olympic to try surpass him or something like that. and Yuzu's response was along the lines of "I don't think he was trying to surpass me, but just trying to get closer" (I take this to be his nice way of saying "Surpass me? no way, don't even think about it" .

I'm sure Johnny Weir had some influence on his fashion sense, but I wonder if he also gets it from what he sees on TV? I watch some Japanese shows and TV, and Johnny's Entertainment boybands and actors are everywhere. Compared to large amounts of feathers, furs, SUPER-bling, glitter, ruffles, draperies, in your face and just "WHAT the??" costumes I have endured from Johnny's talents over the years, Yuzu's costume are almost normal to me. The very first program of Yuzu I saw was R&J 2 , and I didn't find the costumes to be out of the ordinary. It was only later when I read people's complaints about boob skirts and that I went back and realised "oh there is actually lace on it" (I didn't even register the first time lol). I have always wondered at the Japanese boyband costumes, but then maybe girls actually like it? Many years ago I went on exchange to Japan high school for a month, and the excessive amount of bling and rhinestones encrusted on the girls' mobile phones and accessories shocked me - like just soooo much. Also the English teacher there was shocking too. I only knew very basic Japanese and I understood the Japanese teacher better than the English teacher (her grammar and accent made no sense to me, and English is my first language ) Hence, I completely understand Hanyu's English struggle if that was what he had to grow up with...

Like I can understand Olympic being more important because it only occurs every 4 years (anything that is rarer is more valuable) and is watched by the whole world and not just skating fans. The stake of the nation's pride is much more higher than any other events. There are country's officials whose job depends on medal count ! Whereas the regularity of Worlds and GPF is the same (if you miss one year, can always try next year), the audience is the same, skaters are representing their country in both, so the only reason I can see one being regarded as much more important than the other is just because of historical prestige reasons. Just saying because when people compare skaters achievement, GPF is never really considered despite the grueling process required to actually win this, so its kinda disheartening for the skater..