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fzzr · 1 year

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Why Do I Only Like Sports Anime When They're Weird?

In general I am not a fan of sports anime. If the show is about getting the team together to show skill matters more than expensive gear, or we're unbeatable if we just work together, etc. I usually don't even bother to sample it anymore. However, my list of anime watched and rated highly is not bereft of things that happen on courses, tracks, and unconventional fields of play. So let's talk about lesbian golfers, horse girls, and beating the shit out of people for discount lunches.

Reviews

Birdie Wing: Golf Girls' Story is a 2022 anime about the most unethical sport that doesn't involve non-human animals. Now, I wouldn't watch golf even if it wasn't boring as shit, just in protest of the amount of land and water it wastes. I will admit that if real golf was like the sport of the same name in Birdie Wing, I would be more sorely tempted. You see, the protagonist of Birdie Wing isn't just a golfer, she's a golfer who plays underground matches for money, and the mob. Yes, in this setting gangsters work out their differences using golf duels (also sometimes regular violence, but golf first). Mobsters not being overburdened with an abundance of principles, they obviously cheat a whole lot, and our protagonist, Eve, just wants a good clean game.

Her world changes when she falls in rivalry with aspiring professional golfer Aoi. From here Eve works to escape from her crime-adjacent life and follow Aoi into the world of "real" golf. Along the way she faces off with such characters as "definitely not a vampire" and "don't worry at all about how mechanically perfect my play is". Birdie Wing has everything you would expect from a sports anime. There are our two leads with their different philosophical approaches to the game as they clash and cooperate. There's the example of how two good players don't just make a good team. There are the characters who will do anything to win, and those who just want to play.

This show has some absolutely wild moments, both of comedy and of emotional impact. Homoeroticism between rivals in a sports anime is by no means innovative, but the way Birdie Wing goes about it is distinct. I don't want to spoil how it happens, but I was so invested in their relationship by episode 4 that a particular moment hit me like a sack of bricks.

Birdie Wing: Golf Girls' Story is 8/10. It's just a little violent and just a little lewd, but there are sports anime that go further. I bet they're not this funny. Give it a try, especially if you want something wacky to watch while a little drunk.

Uma Musume: Pretty Derby is a 2018 anime about an unethical sport that does involve non-human animals. Specifically, each season of Uma Musume follows the actual career of a real life Japanese race horse... except instead of a horse it's about a horse girl with the same name. Also they're idols sometimes. Don't worry about it, it only comes up a few times. Given that it's built on a substrate of real life events, it really is crazy how much they manage to squeeze out of the plotlines. Most of the charm comes from the titular horse girls, of course. They're all fun characters, and even though the themes of hard work and believing in yourself are conventional the execution is solid all around.

Uma Musume: Pretty Derby (both seasons) is 8/10. It's wholesome as hell, pretty much a show for everyone.

Ben-To is a 2011 anime about the highly ethical sport of beating people up in supermarkets. The titular bento are pre-made lunches made and sold daily by markets and convenience stores. Come dinner time, the stores need to clear out stock, so everything goes on sale. As soon as the discount stickers are applied and the staff are safely out of the way, the game starts. The rules are simple: If you get your hands on a bento, it's yours. Take only one. Speed, subterfuge, or brute force - use whatever you want to get that half-price lunch.

Given the... unconventional... premise, it takes a bit of extra work to make it clear that this IS a sports anime. The freeform nature of the brawls means no single collection of sports tropes applies. It's not martial arts, but there is an emphasis on the value of personal excellence and motivation. The protagonists are solo players, "wolves", who fight for honor and always go for the most premium bento on the shelf. There are "dogs" who work as a team, and "boars" who break the social contract, so shifting alliances form even among those who normally square off. There are cross-town rivalries and places where bad blood from past events impacts the tenor of the sport. Retired players give the newcomers advice and instruct them on the philosophy of the game.

Ben-To is 8/10. (It would have been 9/10 if it didn't get distracted by anime tiddy for a few episodes). The concept is wild, the action is great, and it's just a fun time all around. It has some parts that require an elevated power level (if you know what a "fujoshi" is you have the prerequisites) so you can't show it to just anyone, but I think almost anyone can have fun with it.

OK but why though

So, why is it that I find the WE GOTTA DO IT FOR THE SENPAIS and IF WE BELIEVE IN EACH OTHER WE CAN BEAT ANYONE of conventional sports anime boring, but these all do it for me? One thing they have in common is that they're not depicting a real game being played in a real way - the unfamiliarity clearly adds something to the experience. I do think each of them shows how to make sports anime good in a different way, though.

Birdie Wing takes golf as a stepping off point, but chooses not to limit itself by the rules of reality. The tools and terms are what you have overheard people talk about when clubball is in the news for some reason, but also Eve calls out special move names and a mob boss spent millions of dollars on a reconfigurable subterranean golf course. In essence, this is a sports anime that chooses to indulge in what you might call "anime bullshit" and does it well.

Uma Musume is about running. It's truly impressive where the strategic complexity is found - different turf, different training patterns - but the sport itself isn't the source of the hyperreality. Instead, it's everything else. The characters use the actual names of the horses they're based on, so you have Special Week looking up to senpai Silence Suzuka. The designs and personalities are strong and distinct. There's nothing revolutionary about wanting to get a sports scholarship to a school in the big city because you want to play, with the school being secondary. It's just that there's this whole unstated bit of worldbuilding where oh yeah, these are horse girls who dream of growing up to be like their role model horse girls and be famous horse girl idols and horse girl champions.

Ben-To is the Chaotic Good of sports anime. It doesn't go off the rails, because it's too busy assuming you understand that of course grocery stores keep first aid stations in the back in case of concussions during the nightly refrigerator section brawls to be on rails in the first place. The freedom granted by the premise lets it pick and choose the best parts of sports anime without being beholden to the mundane things that hold the genre back. It doesn't have to deal with the heartbeat of a school year or tournament season schedule. All it takes to introduce a new twist is to brawl at a different market or have someone new show up to yours.

No seriously, why?

After stepping through all that, I think the answer is simple and a bit unsatisfying. I like weird sports anime because of the weird, not because of the sports. Weird anime are just fun, and taking something I find less fun and weirding it up means I get a bit of extra unfamiliarity from the weirdness.

#uma musume #ben-to #anime #birdie wing #sports anime #maybe if real golf had vampires I would give a shit #honestly the racing in uma musume is kinda unethical too #I can at least sympathize with the willingness to slug someone for that one eel bento #original post

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