Kobushi Factory's Fujii Rio has left H!P (7/6/17)

[Zunu]

Wow. I am surprised. It's very rare for UF to make this kind of announcement where they are unequivocally rebuking the idol for her behavior. It's a pretty messed up way to leave the business. Having said that, we don't necessarily have to presume she's jumped to Juvenile Delinquency. I've seen regular world employees who knew they were going to resign, retire or get terminated in the near future who just lose all remaining enthusiasm for their job. Especially if the job involves having to put on a false face a large amount of the time. Even if the person consciously wants to stick it out, they start passively-aggressively sabotaging their own behavior, showing up late, screwing up their performance, badmouthing corporate policy, because on some level they want to hurry up and be done with it as soon as possible, even if that means getting fired. Am I saying that happened with Rio? Of course not. There's not really anything I can say that would not be pure speculation except for what we know: That whatever her misbehavior was, Up-Front THOUGHT it was within her control to deal with it, and because she didn't exercise that control, she was let go in rather brutal fashion. Up-Front, at least historically, has shown willingness to bend over backwards to help the girls, but when they think they're getting jerked around, they lose patience pretty quickly, as is their right. Just as it's her right to want to move on with her life. I was never a fan of hers to begin with, but good luck to her. I just hope that whatever she did doesn't adversely affect Hello!Project.

[Amped]

from Sasaki Rikako's blog

Kobushi Factory Fujii Rio.

May you spend time everyday with a smile.

Everyone, Let all spend some time to just smile today.

http://ameblo.jp/angerme-ss-shin/entry-12290388588.html

[Nayoko-Kihara]

Didn't expect to see this first thing after logging on. I have mixed opinions on both sides of this issue; I won't paint either the company or the girl in a negative light. I'll second Zunu's sentiment in hoping whatever happened doesn't backfire on Hello! Project as a whole.

[Starra]

People are blowing this way out of proportion. It's not uncommon for young people to have points in their lives where they just do not care. I've experienced that many times. Most likely she just stopped being motivated after announcing her graduation and thought "eh I don't have to try anymore". I doubt it's something incriminating and those saying it's a scandal need to get over themselves. It's not a tabloid reporting on illegal behaviour (such as was the case with Kago, who was the last case of "fired for breaking the rules" H!P has seen). We'll never know what rule/s she broke, and it could be as simple as looking bored during events (which many wota have mentioned) or something like skipping practice.

I don't even care about Fujii at all, but Christ. This isn't nearly as horrific as people seem to think it is...

Hell, it took almost 20 years for us to find out the truth on why Fukuda Asuka left.

Eh, kinda. She'd said from the start that it wasn't for her/she didn't fit in (or at least we'd known that for ages), she just cleared up some things.

[Amped]

Taguchi Natsumi is the first to react
http://ameblo.jp/kobushi-factory/entry-12290483451.html

[Menno]

It sound very much like UF terminated the contract early because she showed up late to often or didn't show up at all at scheduled appointments after she announced her graduation. Most likely at rehearsals, but also for media appearances, there was 1 television show, I think it was Live B where she wasn't part of the talk, just doing the performance.

The 1st couple of times she might have got reprimanded, hence the talk about improvement. But if she continued being late or completely absent without reason it's no surprise that UF simply fired her, any company would have done the same in this kind of situation.

[321BreakinOut]

Honestly Rio wasn't a popular member so I wouldn't be surprised as well if they did it just to save on money for her graduation

[Shoujo Q]

But they are losing money during the h!p summer concert. I imagine she's in the DVD, visual book and a number of other things. I'm sure a lot of that stuff has already been printed. Do they dump all those goods and make new ones? They cancelled a whole DVD concert release after Kago and she wasn't even fired yet. Do they let it slide (though I imagine they would need to pay her a little), make new goods or what? I'm curious to hear what everyone else thinks. I was thinking about it all day yesterday.

[Amped]

Fujii Rio's profile has been removed


http://www.helloproject.com/kobushifactory/profile/

[Menno]

But they are losing money during the h!p summer concert. I imagine she's in the DVD, visual book and a number of other things. I'm sure a lot of that stuff has already been printed. Do they dump all those goods and make new ones? They cancelled a whole DVD concert release after Kago and she wasn't even fired yet. Do they let it slide (though I imagine they would need to pay her a little), make new goods or what? I'm curious to hear what everyone else thinks. I was thinking about it all day yesterday.

That's going to be an indication on how bad this 'break-up' is. I think that with Kago's situation it was much more over the media then it is now. So I expect that the goods might not be affected, only the dedicated stuff for Rio will be pulled, but that's never that much at Summer Concerts. We will see next week when the goods are announced before the 1st concert.