People in Japan sometimes look over the water at South Korea, where plastic surgery among women is relatively common, and tut in disapproval. But the truth is, plastic surgery also happens in Japan -- and is something of an open secret in the entertainment world, where models and actors have work done early in the career but keep it under wraps.
Only a few go public about it, though internet rumors persist over several other celebrities.
Former AKB48 idol Kana Kobayashi has admitted to having had plastic surgery.
The model Tenchim (Tenka Hashimoto) has confessed to a boob job (the results ...
Former NMB48 idol Miyuki Watanabe has released a new photo book, Dappi, marking what seems to be a somewhat maturer look and more sensual development in her career as she enters a new stage in life.
Also a one-time member of SKE48 and AKB48, Watanabe (known as Miruki to her fans) left NMB48 in 2016. She turned 30 earlier this week. Since leaving the music group, she has worked as a model and launched a music career as a solo artist and member of girl group Ange et Folletta.
Dappi is her fifth book and marks the latest stage in this more adult part of her career.
Last year, she ...
Hinatazaka46 idol Hinano Kamimura has released her first photo book.
The 19-year-old's book, Sono mama de (As It Is), came out on September 12 with four different covers (one for each of the seasons).
It features a series of pics of the music idol in underwear or swimwear, plus a somewhat more explicit of her in a bath. Some shots have a summery vibe; others look ahead to the imminent autumn season.
If you want a slim and youthful Japanese girl, you've come to the right place.
There's one decidedly sexy, more mature shot where she's lying in her underwear on a ...
Talking about going out with a bang.
So many idols from AKB48, Nogizaka46, and their sister groups quickly disappear into the ether after graduating, so their final individual release (photo book, photo shoot, etc.) may be one of the last ways they can make a mark.
Seira Hayakawa is doing just that, and then some.
Whatever happens to the 23-year-old Osakan after leaving Nogizaka46 at the end of August (and she has indicated her intention to fully retire from the entertainment world), she has rewarded fans with her most explicit photo shoot yet.
Her photo book, Some You Again, Someday, ...
The travails of former music idol Ai Kago continue.
Once a member of long-running female idol group Morning Musume -- she was part of the same generation as Rika Ishikawa and Nozomi Tsuji -- she departed the group in 2004, joining other groups like Hello! Project.
Such young female idols are forced to maintain a wholesome image but this was hard for Kago, who clearly has a rebellious streak. She was suspended from her agency for underage smoking (oh, the horror!) in 2006 and dismissed the next year.
In 2009, she had an affair with an actor and his wife sued them both. In the early 2010s, ...
It's one of the industry's open secret that most Japanese music and gravure idols are poorly paid. While it's natural to assume that a struggling musician or an underground (chika) idol has a day job, the agencies and management for other kinds of idols are very controlling, and prefer their idols to be available 24/7 despite not paying them a living wage.
It leads to scandals sometimes, when the compensated dating that many idols do gets exposed. Such a scandal led to the end of Shoko Takasaki's gravure career in 2015 -- and the birth instead of her porn career, where she enjoyed immese ...
Takako Uehara is back in the news again over another alleged adultery scandal.
The beautiful former member of pop group SPEED has experienced some real highs and lows since the group disbanded in 2000.
Uehara published a successful semi-nude photo book, Vingt Takako, in 2003, but this divided fans, some of who saw it as a betrayal of her image. We are eternally grateful, though, for the fapping material she provided during this period.
She worked as an actor and model, fronting advertising campaigns for the likes of Shiseido.
But the Okinawan's complicated love life has proved a thorn ...
We recently wrote about ex-AKB48 idol Satomi Kaneko's retirement, noting how she had carved out quite a striking career as a sexploitation actress and nude model after her brief stint with the group.
In general, after leaving one of the AKB or Sakamichi groups, or any idol group for that matter, the surest way to cement your status is to do more provocative shoots in gravure magazines, release photo books, and branch out into fashion modeling and TV gigs, either acting or presenting.
Only a lucky few land "serious" acting roles (perhaps only Atsuko Maeda and Yuko Oshima spring to mind), but ...
We recently wrote about AKB48 idol Mion Mukaichi's somewhat surprising decision to do a semi-nude photo book while still a member of the supergroup.
As we mentioned in our post, most music idols wait until graduating before posing semi-nude or nude. And in fact, they are often forced to do something like that to build any sort of career in a crowded marketplace.
A case in point is the ravishing Satomi Kaneko, who carved out a name for herself as a provocative, sensual model after a brief stint in AKB48 in 2007.
She started doing gravure in 2014 after an acting role in a sexploitation movie ...
With music sales down, fewer meet-and-greet events like before, and far less general public interest in its current members (which means fewer TV appearances and fewer lucrative advertising campaign contracts), AKB48 is in, well, perhaps not quite a state of decline but certainly a period of less prominence in popular culture compared to the glory days of the early 2010s.
Is this why its members are doing semi-nude photo shoots even before graduating the group? The AKB overlords used to be very exact about how much flesh the members could show, determined to keep things tantalizing and ...
