Talk:Episode 178 - The Best Present/@comment-26432463-20160303233622/@comment-24848025-20160306072814

I think the rumors that Season 4 was going to end the series was going around since even September but no one had really anything solid as most assumed that we would be getting just another generation added to the Starlight arc.

This was all planned since October when DearStage had a open casting call to add to Aikatsu Stars. I think the bad ratings in the current season forced a acceleration (and possibly because someone leaked a good amount of the Aikatsu Stars info before it was fully ready.)

I really feel that they were going to give Aikatsu at least one more cour and let it run into the Summer before ending it, but someone in the Bandai Corporate chain decided to pull the plug on that now (which might have caused someone to leak the Aikatsu Stars info) and we got quite a few jumbled weird episodes trying to wrap up side-plots before getting into the SQC while seemingly pulling production resources away from Aikatsu and towards Aikatsu Stars.