I rewatched IM@S 01 with subtitles to see if I missed anything, and sure thing: not that I missed all that much, but being relieved of the effort to decypher, was able to put 2 and 2 together. In particular, I was reminded that Azusa had a backstory. Not a large or dramatic one, but nonetheless, she graduated from a junior college and found herself unneeded by the society. The only difference with millions of young women with liberal arts degrees that are our contemporaries on both sides of Pacific, she ended in employ of Namco Pro instead of Starbucks. Also, instead of developing a depression, becoming religious, or hooking up on drugs, she is dreaming about the destined person -- but is not doing much about finding him.

There is no special message in any of it, I'm afraid, and actually Azusa was developed for original games, before the higher education bubble became this apparent in America. But if creators play their cards right, she may become more popular than ever. Many people might relate, even in Japan.

UPDATE: Omo counters:

I don’t think IM@S’s narrative cares about self-identification as much as drawing affection (and in the real idol industry, in the mind space) from the audience. Granted in these kind of things, usually there’s some kind of back story in which identification helps to disarm the audience and buy into whatever story that is being sold. But the core of an idol identity is one that is still just a step different than just you or me.

I'm idly wondering if we can ever know what actually works, for example by studying idol rankings and have them broken down by sex of voters. If numbers of her female admirers start pushing those of Mikoto's...

UPDATE in 2013: About MomozakiP (桃邪気P).