Let's speculate ... Where the "Sexy" comes from.

I really thought I only would do one blog about the whole Sexy Boy thing but a thought struck me and has been gnawing at me since. And I honestly still have thoughts on both this group and the A.B.C-xyZ thing as well as they actually tie together.

To best explain how these two groups could be connected it's good to look at how some Junior names are created. A good deal are acronyms that either stand for words to describe the group in some way such as with A.B.C. for "Acrobat Boys Club" or J.J. Express being short for "Johnny's Junior Express". Then there's the popular each letter of the name standing for the first letter of the member's names like how KAT-TUN and Kis-My-Ft2 were created. One of the other ways names seem to get created is to tie the group into an already existing group, like A.B.C. Jr or Hip Hop Jump. And if my theory is right Sexy Boy actually is perfectly in line with these Junior unit naming conventions.

I believe Sexy Boy is a unit that will be tied to A.B.C-xyZ. If you remember the explanation of the new unit name that "xy" stood for "sexy" so much like throwing a "Jump" onto Hip Hop Jump's name connects them to Hey! Say! JUMP the "Sexy" in Sexy Boy connects this group to A.B.C-xyZ. This makes good sense as with mentioning that Kikuchi Fuma is a candidate for the group it indicates that Juniors of his age are probably the most likely Juniors being looked at to be added to the group. So having a young tag-a-long group of their own falls in line with how things tend to be done, as despite the talk of the new members being sexy I'm sure Johnny is just trying to not outright say that he thinks the group needs younger members for him to think they will have a successful debut. Because honestly it's really harsh, though with Kis-My-Ft2 debuting with all the members being 20 or older having another group with a high age range for an idol group debut isn't going to help distinguish A.B.C-Z from the many debuted Johnny's groups that have plenty of members in their age group. While having sixteen year old members will give them the youngest members of a debuted group now that HSJ has lost their youngest member.

Now why would Johnny's have a group so young be connected to a group like A.B.C-xyZ? Simply put, the old man was actually dead series about this debut. If you're familiar with Johnny's concerts you'll find in mostly the younger groups, like from Tackey & Tsubasa and newer, have a Junior Corner. This corner is a bit of break in the concert where the main group gets a break as the Juniors back dancing get a chance to perform on their own in front of the crowd. Certain Junior groups tend to get placed with certain debuted groups, like Kis-My-Ft2 and A.B.C-Z with T&T and KAT-TUN or for Hey! Say! JUMP they have Hip Hop Jump and B.I. Shadow (whose name also connects to HSJ with their name most likely coming from Mayonaka no Shadow Boy). A-Z are bound to have such corners and if Sexy Boy are their usual Junior group they're coupled with it means this group will be featured then. So A-Z will begin to take over being the group that the really young Juniors get coupled with as HSJ can then better move on with changing their unit image to something a bit mature as they wouldn't have the youngest members of a Johnny's group anymore.

I will expect to see if this theory is correct or not in the near future. The concerts with Kisumai and the Juniors at the Imperial Theatre this week is one chance of shedding more light on the matter. The next of course will be the A.B.C-Z concert in November that I'd be more surprised to find doesn't give us anymore information about A-Z.

The name of this new Junior unit is still full of unfortunate implications though, and I can see that might influence in the kind of following it gets in the English fandom. Even though it would look more ridiculous I think if they went with "XY Boy" instead it would actually avoid some of the issues actually using "Sexy" brings for this group as well as still be well in line with the eye rolling kind of names Johnny's come up with, and honestly can't be considered worse than Mis Snow Man. Though until the group is around for a while no one can really tell how many are willing to overlook the name, just as most fans are willing to overlook about the rest of the ridiculous names Johnny's come up with. You can expect to see me reference them as simply SB from now on mostly. That, and wonder how long it will be until the other common Junior group naming technique is used and we get "Sexy Boy West" for the Kansai Juniors.