The paranoid main protagonist.

In the midst of heavy work-load that is customary near the end of the year, I can still slip in a new short review of yet another sport anime, titled Ookiku Furikabutte. A 2007 anime, it will challenge Bokurano that was crowned as ‘Anime of the Year 2007’ holder just recently. Not helping its cause is the sport genre handicap that was applied by virtue of being a baseball-related anime title taken place in a typical high school setting. Thus, read on to see the failure of this anime in its quest to defeat Bokurano and becomes the new successor.

The busty head coach doesn't waste any time to force the players to endure a customary training camp in their quest for Koushien.

Story:-
Our wimpy main protagonist Ren-Ren that cries a lot (even more so than the protagonist in Over Drive) but is actually very talented in baseball pitching (far more talents than Over Drive’s protagonist) reluctantly joined the newly formed understaffed baseball club at his new high school. Unlike his middle-schooler teammates, his new teammates quickly recognized his talents in baseball. Still, our main protagonist is haunted by his bad experiences during middle school days and that constantly makes him become emo and paranoid plenty of times, sometimes in the middle of an important match. Therefore his boyfriend need to ‘comfort’ (let your imagination runs wild here) the protagonist so that he can focus doing what he does best on the mound. If Saki features plenty of main female characters while relegating male characters as insignificant side characters, this anime is the other way around.

With some rare exceptions, stories in sport genre titles tends to be just average and filled with all the usual clichés associated with the genre, and this anime is not excluded. But just like almost all titles in this genre, the anime becomes far more interesting once the action started. This anime doesn’t waste its time to go straight into its (genre-requiring) training camp and the staple friendly match at the end of it. With the Koushien (hahahahahaha – very original indeed) being the club’s aim, the scenes where hard work, steely determination and unbreakable team spirits are abound in this anime, especially during the matches. The story has excellent flow and nice pacing, plus the director followed the example set by Over Drive and dedicates a full episode for the well-executed good ending, which has a lead-up to a second season.

There will be a second season right? This anime really deserved one! Still plenty of unfinished business in this anime!

Character development potential in this anime is huge, and the best positive that this anime has. Even after 26 episodes, I think the director only has tapped a tiny bit of potential that this anime has in this regard. There are plenty of notable characters in this anime that still need to be developed further. I do not think that will be doable even if this anime has 50 episodes, such is the detail put into that extremely long (and good) first round match of the summer prefectural tournament. I may have to visit lurk@irc.irchighway.net, the manga where this anime is based on is already in the 12th volume. It goes without saying that while the main protagonist is the character that has developed the most in this anime (definitely the best character in this anime), I can still feel that he can still evolve much further physically, mentally and of course with his talent too. The same can also be said for his teammates, especially the protagonist’s boyfriend (the protagonist’s cousin doesn’t stand any chance at all romantically).

And I will say it again. This anime really needs a second season. Really! And so are Bamboo Blade, Saki, Umisho etc.

An apt desription of the main protagonist by his boyfriend.

Character Design:-
The character designs in this anime is common for a generic shounen title, although the faces that main protagonist made is mildly interesting. Black hairs are rare, replaced by the more common brown hairs with different shades for each character. The design are decent but not spectacular.

Voice Acting:-
In general, voice acting in this anime is decent, although I can’t pinpoint any characters that is outstanding in this aspect. Uhmm… I have nothing else really to say here.

The prelude of the 'bonding process' between the main protagonist and his boyfriend, tha will lead to scenes that are NFSW that happened off-screen.

Music:-
The two OP themes and the 2^nd ED theme are quite good really. Meanwhile, the OST is basically unnoticeable and the 1^st ED theme is not really good unlike the others.

Despite their 'intimate' relationships, it takes the main protagonist quite some time to know the first name of his boyfriend.

Animation/Direction:-
The animation quality in this anime is very good, even in fast-paced scenes. Choreography in action scenes in this sport anime are realistic and not overexaggerated unlike a certain sport anime that should remain unnamed. The director has done a decent job with this anime especially with character developments and story handling. Definitely a positive point for this anime.

A dedicated flashback episode in a sport anime? Surely not!

Conclusion:-
8 out of 10. Still a decent sport anime despite the failure of challenging Bokurano for the ‘Anime of the Year 2007’ title. This anime is good enough for me to go read the manga version before I start watching either the long awaited Clannad After Story or the long-stored Paradise Kiss. See you later, probably next week if I can help it.

Some nice advice from the boyfriend that will really help keeping their 'intimate' moments smoother.