Hololive English Debuts With a Bang!

Just this weekend, the Virtual YouTuber (VTuber) community spent the rest of the day watching members of the newly-formed Hololive English unit kick off their debut on the platform.

Catered to the English-speaking audience, Hololive English brings one of Japan’s successful virtual groups to the other side of the world with five virtual idols centered on the theme of mythology. Members of the Hololive English’s first generation are Mori Calliope 💀, Kiara Takanashi 🐔, Ina’nis Ninomae 🐙, Gawr Gura 🔱 and Amelia Watson 🔍.

On this feature, we will be sharing what we know about Hololive English’s 1st Gen:

Mori Calliope 💀

Mori is “I died” in Spanish, while Calliope in Greek mythology is regarded by Hesiod and Ovid as the Chief of all Muses who presides over eloquence and epic poetry.

Mori Calliope describes herself as the Grim Reaper’s first apprentice whose job of being a reaper is put into hiatus, resorting to producing sick beats and slapping sick raps.

Her first extended play album (EP) to be released this week includes “失礼しますが、RIP♡” (Excuse My Rudeness, But Could You Please RIP?), an original song composed by kokorobeats gives us a taste of Mori’s deadly wordplay inspired by Japanese rap music. Popular anime YouTuber Gigguk said in a comment that “These bars dropped harder than the 2020 world economy.”

Her dreams are to be a great track maker and mixer, write songs for anime/games, become a fluent in Japanese, and start a business. She’s aiming to collaborate with other virtual YouTubers and people alike, as well as have a 3D model and do a live show.

On a wholesome note, she also dreams to support her Hololive English colleagues “because they are great!”

Kiara Takanashi 🐔

There are many definitions of the name Kiara, but this Kiara is a fan of fast-food. It shows.

Kiara Takanashi is a “part-time warrior/idol, majestic phoenix” who dreams of owning a fast-food shop. She blatantly says that she is neither a chicken nor a turkey.

Setting aside the cute noises on her debut, she celebrates her birthday on July 6th (National Fried Chicken Day), and is a well-aware phoenix who wants to make her Hololive boss YAGOO proud.

Her favorite senpai Usada Pekora welcomed her debut in the live chat, much to her surprise.

It’s worthy to mention that her character designer is Huke, famous for his character designs on Black Rock Shooter and Steins;Gate.

Aside from opening a fast-food restaurant and having her 3D model, her goals include collaborating with games/anime/conventions, stand on the same stage as her seniors in Japan, release original music and looks forward to fanart and cosplayers of her.

Kiara has shown her idol side by singing the Hololive original “Shiny Smily Story,” being the first to do so among the team.

Ina’nis Ninomae 🐙

Ina’s backstory is interesting: “One day, she picked up a strange book and then started to gain the power of controlling tentacles. To her, tentacles are just a part of her ordinary life; it has never been a big deal for her. However, her girly mind does want to get them dressed up and stay pretty,” hence the Louis Vuitton-like designs on her tentacles.

She, a Priestess of the Ancient Ones, now adds being a virtual YouTuber to her list of roles which already include being a talented artist. As an artist, she is a major contributor in providing material for the team’s debut including Mori’s EP album art.

Ina is backed by two powerful papas: Her character design is done by Kouhaku Kuroboshi, best known for his works on Kino’s Journey, Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online, Fate/Grand Order, Princess Principal among others. Her Live2D model is done by rariemonn who also built models for a number of Hololive senpai including Korone and Okayu. Prior to her debut, she already owned books of her two papas.

Aside from world domination, Ina’s goals are to make a lot of friends from all over the world, do lots of collab streams, get better at Japanese, and draw everyone in Hololive. She already hinted a big scale project which is still being planned.

Gawr Gura 🔱

Perhaps the cutest shark around hololive, Gawr Gura (Read “Gar Gura”) has simple goals: Play twister in a 3D collab with all of her Hololive English colleagues, play the scariest horror game with a heart rate monitor, learn to play the banjo and play it on stream.

Most fans underestimated Gura’s interest in music so much that they were dumbfounded when she sang a Tatsuro Yamashita’s Ride on Time instead of Baby Shark.

Amelia Watson 🔍

If most of us were thrown away with Gura’s city pop singing, we were all thrown away with who Amelia Watson is in general.

Reactions from the viewing public described her as a mix of Holmes, Kiryu Coco and Haachama (Akai Haato). Amelia looked normal the most among all of the cast, but it turns out that she’s quite the opposite.

Amelia got so curious investigating Hololive that she joined the ranks as well. She already reached her goal of having a hundred thousand subscribers, so what remains of her goals is to investigate more Hololive members, improve in Japanese, design merchandise and make a Hololive game. This is aside from her dream of having her own 3D model.

---

To summarize the debut of Hololive English, it’s a mix of strange and not-so-strange people backed by some of the big names in Japan’s creative industry and Hololive itself. After their debut stream, they are already getting used to their audience. We look forward to their developments in the future.