When Eightman Production announced the major debut of a new porn star in January 2019 and teased fans that it was a former idol, it didn’t take studious netizens long to identify the lady in question.
Though the PR boasted that the lady in question was an idol who has appeared on TV variety shows, released a photo book, and done a stint as a regular gravure idol, the truth did not quite live up to the hype.
Some speculated, without much actual hope, that it might be 19-year-old Manaka Shida, who has just announced her graduation from Keyakizaka46. Now THAT would be a development worthy of a blog post here. No, the truth is a little more mundane.
The debutant has been outed as Tina Nanami, a former chika (underground) idol in Nagoya who was apparently fired (what did she do to justify that?!).
To be fair, Nanami is not a big star (yet), so this is not such a major event as when certain former idols from AKB48 or SKE48 have made their AV debuts.
It’s also another sign of the partial dishonesty of Japanese porn producers when it comes to promoting their releases as actress “debuts.” After all, Tina Nanami already released her first nude “image video” in June this year — titled, without much originality, “First Nude” — and posed for a hair nude full-frontal shoot to accompany it.
So while January may well bring Nanami’s very welcome debut in porn, it’s not quite as a groundbreaking a change in her circumstances as the marketing suggests. That being said, we look forward to watching the fine work Eightman Production will certainly do.
