OP: “Happy Go Ducky!” by the pillows

It’s been a good while since we’ve had a season that looks like this one.  Only finding 4-6 series I have any real desire to cover has become the new normal the past few years, but – at least one paper – Fall 2019 could be different.  Hell, just looking at carryover and sequels to shows I’ve previously blogged would take me above that number, and there are a passel of other series that seem likely to make a strong case to be blogged.  This doesn’t have the look of a true epic season like Spring 2007 or 2012, but it certainly could be the best since 2016 in terms of combining quantity and quality.  I hope it is, but if so it’s likely to leave me consistently exhausted.

The rollout begins (for me) with diomedéa’s adaptation of Hinata Takeshi’s basketball manga, Ahiru no Sora.  This is certainly by “B” Sora series this season, but that doesn’t mean I have low expectations.  I’d certainly love to see a decent basketball anime – since Slam Dunk they’ve pretty much ranged from mediocre to awful (and Ahiru’s chief director was at the helm of one of the awful ones, worryingly).  Ahiru no Sora has been running for 16 years now, with decent sales, and while even an unusually long run of 4 cours isn’t enough to adapt that much manga, the fact that the manga is ending soon leads me to believe diomedéa is going to try.

A couple thoughts on the premiere jump out.  First, I rarely cap OPs for any but my top picks for the season but seriously, there was no way I wasn’t doing that here – even if this is my first fall series the race for best OP is already pretty much over.  Also, any series which has Kaji Yuuki in the lead role (which is, like, 30% of them these days) pretty much starts the game staring at a 10-point deficit.  That can be overcome, and with the right writing and certain types of characters, Kaji can become something close to a neutral influence.  But that’s a best-case scenario – I still don’t know if either of those things apply to Ahiru no Sora and Kuramatani Sora.

Once you get past those pre-impressions, I thought the episode itself was… good.  Maybe even very good – certainly a cut above the average sports premiere.  There’s certainly a lot of formula in this story – an undersized but spirited hero (the mangaka’s name is Hinata after all) trying to stave off bullies and a club full of yankees to get basketball off the ground at his new high school.  But there are already signs of some distinction – the role of women and girls as more than pretty managers, first of all.  That end starts out badly with a peephole scene, but it’s clear the girls’ basketball club (which is a real one, unlike the boys’) is going to be an important factor, especially their star player and Sora’s potential love interest, Madoka.  There’s also the fact that Sora gets his inspiration from his mother, who was a star player but now (for reasons undisclosed) either can’t play or has passed away.

The character that jumps out most from the premiere, though, is the affable strongman Hanazono Chiaki.  It’s not even really Kaji’s fault that Sora comes off as a little bland – that’s the burden the formula places on him.  But Chiaki is interesting and amusing, and though Konishi Katsuyuki is obviously way too old to be playing 17 year-olds the fact that Chiaki looks about 35 lessens the disconnect, and Konishi is really good here to boot.  The rest of the toughs are pretty much formula too so far (including Chiaki’s twin brother who looks nothing like him) but it’s early days yet.

The general view of the manga seems to be that’s it’s quite good but not a classic, though there are a few people who hold it in extremely high regard.  Not having read a panel of it my opinion will be formed based solely on the anime, and so far it looks pretty good.  Everything worked fine in the premiere – it was never worse than predictable, and often times showed a real spark.  Production values were more than decent, and there was no indication that we’re going to get another basketball series that totally defies the laws of physics with Shounen Jump moments.  The competition this season could be stiff, but I always make room for a good sports anime.  Hopefully Ahiru no Sora will prove to be just that.