I’m traveling in Tokyo for the next several days, so the usual disclaimers about post length and timeliness not reflecting any opinion about the episode apply. I’ll try and keep up as best I can, but generally speaking I’ll need to give priority to series (or season) finales in all likelihood. We’ll see how it goes.
It’s entirely possible that Hinomaru Zumou may in fact be the most consistent series of the season, and I’m factoring its best series into that equation. Never flashy, this show, but it’s yet to really put a foot wrong. Some of that may reflect a low-risk approach – they don’t get much more traditional in the realm of sports anime than this series. But I don’t mean that as a pejorative, even if it comes off that way – when you tread familiar ground, in some ways you have to be even more flawless in order for the material to be interesting.
We’re back in training mode again, with a trip to Nagoya for some quality time with the Shibakiyama stable. But before that happens there’s time to kill – which sees Ushio, Kei and Kirihito head off to Nagoya Castle while the others (not history buffs) head off to put the ruin to another tabihoudai restaurant. A historical re-enactor is soliciting sumo challengers at the castle – which is certainly a coincidence – and that sees Ushio squaring off with another high school national treasure, Odente-kun.
This is an interesting one, as Odente (I’m still not quite sure if Ushio knew who he was all along, but the converse is certainly the case) proves quite invulnerable to Ushio’s new “Demon Drop” triple move. This gets into head, and he takes his anxiety with him to the training camp where his mentor Saenoyama-san immediately senses something is amiss. He invites Ushio to train with the Sekitori, the high-ranking “white belts”, in a separate tent (as the girls film everything).
I quite appreciate the degree of realism here. A high school, much less an undersized one like Ushio, really shouldn’t be much of a match for ranked Sekitori. And while Ushio gets the drop on the first one with his strange move, once the pros have seen it, they make short work of him. Again, good realism here – if Ushio truly wants to transcend his physical limitations and become the high school Yokozuna, I don’t think a trick move should be at the heart of it.
The big twist here comes with the arrival of the mysterious old gentleman who shows up to watch Ushio train, then promptly whisks him away from the other Sekitori. This is Ogawa Tokio, and he’s a former Yokozuna himself – and I think it’s pretty safe to assume Shibakiyama-san himself has asked the old man to help the boy who’s caught his attention. Ogawa-sama will be a stern taskmaster, surely – but Ushio can take it. And he’s a lucky lad indeed to have a pro like Shibakiyama take an interest in him. Pluck has its own rewards, indeed…
Nadavu
December 24, 2018 at 8:04 amI do enjoy Onimaru Zumou quite a bit (as is evident by sticking around for the entire first cour), but I always felt it was a bit thin when it came to characters and tone. We never got a good sense of what every day life is like in Odachi high outside the dojo, or any depth of home life for any of the sumoubu members. So I was definitely on board with the whole gang going sight-seeing in Nagoya. It does sometimes feel like the series is as obsessed with sumou as Onimaru and just as one-track-minded. I mean, yeah, that’s the heart of the series, of course–but I wouldn’t mind getting a fuller sense of what it’s like to these characters every now and and again.
Guardian Enzo
December 24, 2018 at 11:25 pmYeah, I agree for the most part. The history buff thing was a nice example of that.
Asupara
January 8, 2019 at 12:55 pmThere’s a lot more character depth in the manga.