VTuber Mori Calliope Shares Her Favorite Suicide Squad Isekai Characters
by Jean-Karlo Lemus,
All right, so as I understand it, you're also working with TeddyLoid and Giga on the song "Go-Getters." How did it feel to work with the two of them?
Mori Calliope: We've had a couple of opportunities to work together in the past, most notably our song that was on my major debut LP, Let's End the World. TeddyLoid is a friend of mine, and he did DJ work for me at my solo concert a couple of years back, so I'm familiar with them. I'm super honored to get into their schedule to make this song because every song they make is fantastic. They hit the nail on the head for the vibe that we're going for. It was a long process choosing the vibe and sound good for the anime and also for my vocals to be on as well. It went through a lot of revisions. They are awesome professionals—the best in Japan, in my opinion.
The same way that Suicide Squad ISEKAI is a strange mix of an anime take on a Western property, you as a VTuber also find yourself in a weird nexus between American and Japanese fandoms. How does it feel to have fans across both America and Japan?
Mori Calliope: There are quite a few fans of Hololive English in Japan. Whenever I speak a little Japanese on stream, all the Japanese fans seem to file in and say hello, which I appreciate because they're watching despite not knowing English. It's difficult to have two very distinct subsects of fandom from a business perspective. I can only speak so much Japanese in a stream before English speakers start to be like, "Hey, where's the English?" And then I can only speak so much English before JP bros go, "Well, I don't understand this. This isn't Japanese, so I gotta go." It's quite a delicate balance to figure out. I'm appreciative of all of my fans around the world. I wish I could always have subtitles for all of my streams, but I think we're not quite there with the technology. I think Suicide Squad ISEKAI will be a fantastic way to unite those parts of my fanbase.
You mentioned earlier that the Japanese fans are shyer than the American fans. Expanding on that a little bit, what do you feel are some of the other bigger cultural differences between Japanese VTuber fans and American VTuber fans?
Mori Calliope:There's a few. When it comes to JP VTuber fans, I think they're a lot more intense with viewing their favorites and almost exclusively their favorites. Usually, they make time to catch every single stream. I do think that JP Bros are much shyer when it comes to English or when it comes to speaking a language that they don't know. I think they're a little more worried about making mistakes. But everyone's friendly, so I'm happy to hear from them, even if they speak Japanese in my chat. All of us are united in our love for VTubers and anime and this culture that we're all a part of. Those things keep us together.
I feel like we might have touched upon this on another question, but Suicide Squad ISEKAI is an anime based on an American property. What's your takeaway on this?
Mori Calliope: I think it's a brilliant idea because Suicide Squad has always seemed like a property that would reach its full potential in animated form because there's a lot of ridiculousness going on with those guys. I love them all to death. They're crazy, and their antics are insane—especially Harley Quinn. The recent Harley that has cropped up since the major motion pictures, even starting from 2016, is much more suited to reaching her full potential in anime if that makes any sense. I almost feel like the inspiration came somewhere from anime. One interesting thing about this is that I didn't know it would be an isekai. When I started seeing the commercials pop up, I felt, "I don't know if this is going to work." [But] the concept itself is so ridiculous that it might work. It's better than just doing an anime version of Suicide Squad. This is way more entertaining, I think.
Kind of like how they made the Superman manga in Japan [Superman vs. Meshi]. It's not just a Japanese Superman manga, it's a Superman manga where he's going around Japan eating different local delicacies.
Mori Calliope: Exactly. It's amazing when they put that kind of twist, especially since it is a Japanese production. I think it fits perfectly.
Especially with how much people in Japan love American superheroes. I think I know what you'll say, but who's your favorite member of the Suicide Squad? Be it from the upcoming anime from the comics or any other previous media.
Mori Calliope: I've talked about this a lot on stream. Killer Croc isn't in the main squad, but I love Killer Croc. I've always loved Killer Croc.
I'm surprised by that answer.
Mori Calliope: Oh, really? My friends in college were even bigger fans of [DC Comics] than I am. They introduced me to DC. My friend's favorite was Killer Croc. She brainwashed me into being a Killer Croc fan. I joked on stream, saying my favorite iteration of Killer Croc is the one where he eats people, and everyone's like, yeah, that's all of them. My next obvious one is King Shark because he's similar to Killer Croc but much less intelligent. He's just a silly, hungry guy who's also super violent. But, you know, you can't help it that he's hungry. After those two, though, I say Clayface because he's, you know, ikemen. Super ikemen guy. And also a total failure of a human being in the best way. And I feel like I relate to him because I often feel like a huge failure. I feel like I see that part of me in Clayface. Those are my three answers because I try not to pick Harley or Joker, but I love them too.
Pretty much everyone would immediately say Harley Quinn or Joker.
Mori Calliope: Everybody loves those guys. So I try to be different, but they're great too.
Now that you've sung the ending sequence song to anime, is there another dream anime you'd love to collaborate on?
Mori Calliope: There definitely are. I feel like some of them—one in particular—if I say it, it won't come true. So I'm trying to keep one to myself, but we'll see if that ever manifests beyond that. [JoJo's Bizarre Adventure], for sure. I love Jojo so much. Jojo got me through a really difficult time in my VTuber career. I was in quite a dark spot when my friend introduced Jojo to me. And now reading the manga, it's a property very close to my heart. Someday, I'd love to do something related to Jojo in any way, even if it wasn't anime-related. I'm a huge fan of Jojo, so I'll hold on to that dream because it's nice to have dreams even if they don't come true.
Currently, what is your favorite anime?
Mori Calliope: That's a tough one because it cycles through the ones that I'm into recently, I have one favorite anime of all time that will never change. That is Gurren Laggan. It changed my life forever. I own all of the special Blu-ray editions of the show. I have all the action figures, et cetera, posters hanging around everywhere. It's a perfectly self-contained story, perfect for what it was, and didn't need to be continued. And it's thanks to that anime I never give up on whatever I do. Aside from that, recent anime that I've been watching are Kaiju No. 8 and Golden Kamuy. I got into Golden Kamuy recently and marathoned all of that, and I didn't realize how much I could like a show that dips into Japanese history. But I dig it a lot.
Considering your musical background, what music have you been listening to lately?
Mori Calliope: I went through a rough time. After the release of my (LP) Jigoku Six, I felt like I really couldn't listen to music anymore. Whenever I listened to music, I wanted to turn it off. I think I had burned myself out on music so I stopped listening to it for a long time. I wanted to find a way to get back into enjoying music. Slowly but surely, I just started listening to subtle background music, like lo-fi without any lyrics, arrangements of soundtrack music from different video games, and stuff like that. A lot of it is still the same J-rap or alternative Japanese music that I enjoy when it comes to overseas, as in "outside-of-Japan" music. Maybe someday I'll be able to enjoy English music again. Someday. Fingers crossed.
ANN: You mentioned listening to some video game soundtracks. Do you mind if I press you? Which soundtracks jump out at you?
Mori Calliope: A lot of them are for my background music. I would listen to relaxing game music arranged by fans. Like Pokémon, Harvest Moon, Stardew Valley, Animal Crossing, even Yoshi's Island, in the background. I love Metal Gear, Rising: Revengeance. I'm always listening to every song from that game in the background. At some point, I will make some time for Revengeance because those songs never get old to me. A lot of people have been recommending DMC [Devil May Cry] to me, so I think I might check out DMC next.
When they say "DMC," do they mean, like, the greater "Devil May Cry" series at large, or do they mean just the one DmC?
Mori Calliope: I think the series at large, [HoloEN] fans are really into when the streamers play the series, and they want us to play from start to finish. So I might check it out.
I can actually testify, the music in DMC is just phenomenal. Amazing butt-rock.
Mori Calliope : Oh, that's fun. I love butt-rock.
ANN: Do you have any final words for the Deadbeats?
Mori Calliope: Hey, Deadbeats! Thanks so much for reading this interview. I hope you are doing well and taking care of yourselves. I feel great about this album and this year. And I feel extra good about the ending theme for Suicide Squad ISEKAI. I'm super honored to make it, but a lot of that can be attributed to your incredible passion and love for what I do and all of your support for what I do. So, thank you always for following me and supporting me. And so let's make this year even better.
Special thanks to Warner Bros. and Cover Corps for arranging the interview with Mori Calliope, and to Mori Calliope for taking the time to speak to us.
