Star Beat - The Knock-On Effect Of A Single Sticker

While rewatching the first season of Bandori, it really sunk in that the most meaningful and impactful event in the entire Bandori canon was the act of placing a single star sticker on a single utility pole. Without that single small sticker, none of the events of any seasons of the anime, as well as a large number of events in the gacha game, would ever have happened.

Let's start with the obvious. If Kasumi never finds that star sticker, she never finds the Ryuseido or Arisa. She never sees the Random Star and never makes it to SPACE to see Glitter*Green live. She probably continues floating from club to club around the school, never actually finding the star beat she's searching for. As for Arisa, she likely ends up remaining a loner and a shut-in, continuing to skip classes and not making any meaningful connections with her peers.

Let's look a bit deeper. Without Kasumi's influence, Saya would probably continue helping out at the bakery and taking care of her siblings, never picking up the drums again, and never reconciling with Natsuki or the rest of CHiSPA. O-Tae would probably continue working at various live houses and music stores once SPACE closed down, maybe even finding work as a support musician. Assuming she and Rei still had a chance to meet each other again, it's possible she would have become the permanent guitarist of RAS at Rei's insistence.

Rimi would probably be happy to continue playing the bass with her sister, although I'm not sure she would have handled Yuri moving overseas for university without the rest of PoPiPa to help her grow a larger friend group. Yuri herself, as well as the rest of Glitter*Green, would have gone through a pretty major change. Without Kasumi to perform the infamous "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" scene, they wouldn't have made it to SPACE in time in the events of S1E3, resulting in the Owner banning them from the venue. How this would have affected the group, I'm not sure.

This is all still very surface-level, though. Let's go even deeper. Remember that the catalyst for Rokka moving to Tokyo was watching PoPiPa perform at the final concert at SPACE. Without that performance, maybe Rokka still would have found motivation to start a band, but more likely she would have just returned to Gifu and continued her school life there. Even if she did make the move to Tokyo, with RAS's guitarist position taken by Tae, there really isn't a band for her to join. Likewise, one of the reasons for Mashiro starting a band was meeting Kasumi after a concert. Without PoPiPa, there's also no Morfonica, which has its own consequences down the line.

Sakiko's inspiration for starting CRYCHIC was watching Morfonica perform at Tsukinomori. Without them, CRYCHIC is never formed or disbanded. Tomori never finds the outlet of songwriting for her feelings. Soyo continues blindly conforming to everyone around her, and Taki continues to deal with being compared to her older sister. Maybe Anon eventually recruits Tomori into a band, but given Anon's personality, it's unlikely that band would ever amount to anything without the rest of MyGO to help out. Without Tomori to catch her attention, Rana likely continues coming and going as RiNG's stray cat.

As for Ave Mujica, they have no reason to exist if Saki doesn't gain an interest in bands. Uika either continues her work in Sumimi or ends up being sent back to the island by Sadaharu. Umiri continues working as a support musician, and Nyamu gets to focus on being a social media influencer. It's not really clear what might happen to Mutsumi, and it's hard to tell if Saki would have continued living with her father or eventually moved back in with her grandfather.

There are a lot of other minor things that could potentially change among the other bands if PoPiPa is never formed, but that would take a lot more time studying event stories than I have to dedicate. Regardless, it's still interesting to see just how much the landscape of Bandori changes from an object as small and simple as a golden star sticker.