#Miihi kurosawa

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Cover for the Medalist Fan Book

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Miihi Kurosawa Medalist · 2025 · S01 E08 · Western Powerhouses Part One

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Medalist Episode 8 Review - Fierce Competition

While the plot line of Inori forgetting her suitcase that contains her skates can be a bit nerve-racking, it’s a good opportunity to use it to give her a “break” and see what’s the deal with her competitors. It’s basically build up to see what the other skaters are like before our girl decimates them all. So yeah, it may look contrived, but from a writing standpoint, it’s creative. It’s also a good way to showcase how dedicated Tsukasa is to helping Inori succeed.

It’s so nice to see how much these characters have grown from the kids to the adults. Inori’s mother Nozomi isn’t scolding or being pessimistic about her bag and she just tells her to believe in Tsukasa and for them to wait while worrying about the tournament as Inori could be performing earlier than expected. Not only that, she doesn’t view Mr. Sekoma negatively at all and was happy that he came to see Inori skate.

Inori has grown a lot in that she places full faith in Tsukasa and waits for him by doing warmups and trying to believe in herself. Her monologue about how she’s no longer the person she was before was really emotional. She’s trying her best to not get a nervous breakdown and to be stronger like she wanted and promised.

Tsukasa’s dedication to make Inori a medalist is just so profound. The man will legit run a marathon to the station just so he can pick up the suitcase. He RAN! That’s pure dedication because a normal person would’ve used a taxi, but Tsukasa is known to be super athletic, hence why running to get it fits his character so well. And he makes it back in time as well! I know it’s super anime, but remember that this is fiction—don’t think too much about it.

The other competitors are interesting in that they all skate differently. Seira is an interesting case where she’s also a newcomer to figure skating as she used to be a speed skater and is the daughter of a renowned speed skating athlete. She has a dynamic and rather cocky personality, hence why she skates like she does. However, she focuses more on jumps to earn points. The reason why she changed into figure skating was because her friend Miihi Kurosawa did the same. The little girl, Kanna Kitora, is really good at jumping as she jumps really high and uses a lot of power that she makes holes in the rink. Unfortunately, Ritsuki Koguma gets caught in the hole, so she does mess up her combos; she’s shown to be a more calculating skater because of that as she tries to focus on combinations in her mind.

If you weren’t aware, a lot of these skaters and the coaches are named after animals. The ‘Jaku’ in Jakuzure can also be read as ‘snake’. The ‘ma’ in Ema Yamato’s name stands for ‘horse’. For the other skaters, the Shishi in Shishido stands for ‘lion’, the ‘Tora’ in Kitora stands for Tiger and Koguma means bear cub. I find it cute how there’s a theme going around for these skaters. The only ones not named after animals are the main Lux Higashiyama members—but correct me if I’m wrong.

The voice actresses for the rival skaters aren’t as prolific, but they still got some roles. I think the most notable one is Seira’s voice actress as she’s voiced by Miho Okasaki of The Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime fame; I mostly know her as the Japanese voice actress of Celia of Tales of Luminaria. Miihi is voiced by Kaede Yuasa of Ultraman fame. Ritsuki is voiced by Azusa Sato who’s still a bit of a new face alongside Kanna’s voice actress Momoko Miyashiro. They’re all good, so hopefully, Medalist will be a good stepping stone for them to get more roles later on.

I noticed the lack of CG in these rival girls. I guess they’re saving budget or just don’t want to use CG as these characters time in the rink are brief. Despite that, the way they ended the episode was foul! It really makes one anticipate what sort of performance Inori will give. Will she use a new song? What are your thoughts on this episode?

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merry christmas! read medalist!!

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