HOLY WALL OF TEXT, I didn't think it would be this long. I'm sorry for being so wordy I also didn't revise this after typing, that would take too long, so if thoughts are incomplete or jump around, so sorry about that too~ Well, it's still Rin's birthday (well, in my time zone at least). I'll start off with yet another HAPPY BIRTHDAY RIN. Here's my Rin post I've talked about making. This isn't a "Why you should love Rin" post, this is a "how I came to loving Rin". So, where to start. I think I've passed the point of saying "I love Rin because of x reason", because it's now simply, I love Rin because she's Rin. There's nothing about her that I don't like. Things weren't always like this though, Rin has only been the uncontested best for me for a mere 9 months, despite being aware of the franchise for nearly 2 years now. Everything started back in winter of 2013. I was new to anime and otaku stuff in general, and when I'm new to something, I like to completely immerse myself in it to learn stuff as fast as possible. I started watching anime in fall of 2012, and winter 2013 was the first season I watched stuff as it aired. I bought my subscription to Crunchyroll and was watching what CR was streaming, one of the anime was Love Live! School Idol Project. Now, before you think this is where the obsession began, you're wrong. It was just another anime I was trying out, and it aired 1 hour after the anime Amnesia. Unfortunately, Amnesia is still on the lower end of things I've watched, and since it came out right before Love Live, I was always in a bad mood going into Love Live, so my opinion was a little harmed by the time I finished. Opinion wise, I liked it a lot, the first Start:Dash performance definitely moved me back then as it still does now (though, more so cuz of the end of S1). By the end, it placed around the top of my favorite things that aired, but was overshadowed by Little Busters and Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo (Ezeefreak knows ) I had one other friend that watched the anime as well, and we talked about it a couple months after it finished airing (though, I didn't know him while it was airing, he's also here on this forum, username Niko), we told each other our favorite characters. I said Honoka, then Maki, then Nico. He said Nico, Maki, and the orange haired girl (he couldn't remember her name at the time). My response was, there was an orange haired girl? That's right. I didn't even remember her. When he reminded me who she was, I remembered Rin not for herself, but for being Hanayo's friend who helped her join the group, and nothing about Rin herself. (**I shed a tear in shame typing this, I'm not exaggerating/lying). In the first season of the anime, Rin played absolutely no importance, often was on the side of scenes, and didn't get any where near as many lines as other characters. She played her part in episode 3 getting Hanayo to join, had a couple moments where she shined, but not enough. And so, interested, I went back and rewatched the series (I've always been a fan of rewatching stuff). Here, I paid more attention to the characters themselves to remember them better, and especially paid attention to Rin. No, this wasn't a "I finally found her", still more time to come. By the end of this rewatch though, my top order changed, and Nico was knocked out of my top 3 in favor of Rin, who was tied with Honoka as my favorite (genki ftw!). I loved a few things about Rin at the time, like how she was always energetic and joking around, I liked that. What really topped her off to being tied with my favorite of the time, Honoka, was episode 3 where she helped Hanayo. Helping others is such a great trait to me, it was a major driving reason for Rin to be right at the top when I focused on her. Along with her genkiness (which I'm fond of in people, I'll add more about this waay at the end), she was a star in my eyes (Get it? Hoshizora?) Now it was early fall 2013, Rin and Honoka were tied for my favorites, but my time with Love Live didn't disappear. I loved the music, and I had started to play osu! at that time, and had a few Love Live maps downloaded that I played a ton, and I also watched each of the 5 PVs of the time (Music Start wasn't out yet). I didn't really know the non-PV songs at the time, only Bokura no Live (obviously), Snow Halation, Natsuiro, Mogyutto, and Wonderful Rush, along with the anime songs, and the Kokuhaku because it had a map as well as Spicaterrible (Kotori solo). Anyway, because I was still involved with the music, I was still watching clips from the anime at times, and eventually I declared Rin my favorite over Honoka, so it was only really a marginal difference. Then Season 2 was announced, and everything changed. I was hyped, Season 2 was coming. My friend and I had both agreed in the past that Love Live NEEDED a second season. **Spoilers for S1 here** I was starting to get obsessed with Love Live at this point, I listened to the PVs a lot of times each, and was looking forward to another season for months before it was announced. This was also where I started listening to some solo songs occasionally at night before going to bed too, since they came up in the related section of the PVs (back when Youtube didn't murder every single Love Live video uploaded!), and I realized Rin had an AMAZING Singing voice. i don't remember what song it was, but when I first heard her solo (I never paid attention to voices in the anime performances or PVs), I was like... wait... this is RIN!? Season 2 started airing, and the first thing I noticed, this season literally quadrupled Rin's screen time. She had more lines than ever, always on screen, making jokes, just participating in general. And then episode 5 came, the episode "The New Me". Previously, Rin wasn't an obsession, she was just my favorite character in my most anticipated anime of Spring 2014, ranking midway in my favorite characters of all time list. Episode 5 changed that favorite characters list. Suddenly, the red haired Shana wasn't #1, it was an orange haired girl. **S2 E5 spoilers, not bothering with spoiler tag. This is the most crucial part, so deal with being spoiled. Me explaining it won't do it justice anyway.** Rin displayed the ultimate trait that made me fall in love with her. The insecurities and the shyness. I'll relate this below, but the insecurities and watching her eventually overcome them makes me so happy, and puts so much depth to her. She was troubled the entire episode, and right up to the end, denied her cuteness (omg, this opinion is definitely wrong for most people, but Rin's Cuteness levels overall is a 100 on a scale of 1-10 already!) Love Wing Bell makes me cry every time I listen to it, it makes me so happy. Watching someone I care about overcome something troubling them is pure joy for me. Also, her shyness when they were practicing was adorable. I can't really describe how I feel about this episode well enough, it is one of my favorite episode of anime. And the anime kept airing, Rin kept getting screen time thankfully, not just dropping off like some anime tend to do with characters they gave an episode to. She continued being cute, continued to wear her new outfit, embracing the fact she really is cute. She continued just being herself. And lastly, she continued to keep me locked in. Time to wrap this monster post up with relating reasons I love Rin with personal stuff. As Maki~chan has already imagined, I am, to put it simply, similar to a male version of Rin. I'm energetic, all jumpy over my friends (I seriously jump on them in the hallways :3 despite being short), I'm small (Like Rin being skinny and stuff), and slightly like the opposite gender (Rin is more tomboyish, I'm a bit feminine in many ways). I'm also energetic while around friends and shy when attention is specifically on me in certain situations (like when Rin was leading in episode 5). I care deeply about my friends and drop everything to help them. My mind is going blank typing this, so I'll leave similarities alone now~ Another thing, Rin is also similar in some ways to my childhood friend, and first girlfriend (it didn't work out sadly). They both have orange hair (probably where my love of orange hair comes from), both act like cats at times, both have insecurities, both joking and teasing but very nice and dedicated. I'm bad at conclusions, so uhh, thanks for reading all this, this was a FUCK TON of text. Originally, I knew it would be a bit and delayed starting it, which is why this is coming so late, but I didn't realize it would be THIS long, taking over an hour to type, sorry D: I wish there was a way I could make it up to anyone who reads this~ And also, I wish I were Hanayo, so that I could have Rin all to myself <3 And so, once again, HAPPY BIRTHDAY RIN. No matter what you think, you're the cutest in µ's, as Hanayo says, and one of the girliest, like Maki said. You're a great friend to the members of µ's and a wonderful idol.
