#like the sports anime cliches really don't deter me at all

[hxhhasmysoul]

i binged sk8 the infinity at the weekend and i enjoyed it a lot. for a show with an ai robot skateboard and tricks that would be 100% deadly irl it’s a surprisingly grounded show.

like yes, the costumes and personas of the background characters are over the top, the villain is extra as hell and creepy af in a truly anime fashion. the skateboarding power moves are there to emphasize that this is a sports anime true to its genre. it’s all super entertaining in this classical sports anime way with really stunning animation moments. and yes, one of the protags is super gifted and becomes a top tier skater in ridiculous time.

but the skating actually feels grounded despite that. the non power move things they do are real things skateboarders do. their boards have these visual styles that feel right, there’s this street aesthetic to everything, including street art stickers. and it’s all filmed like a rl skateboarding video, like the creators watched a shit ton of those and really understood the visual language of that. (yes, i do love to the street art aesthetic in all its forms)

the other thing that feels grounded are the characters. the background ones are more comic relief and they also have these personas when they skate - i have no clue if rl skateboarders do that actually or was this done due to the anime conventions and for entertainment value - so they are extra at times and don’t get that much development but they are also endearing. the two that feel more grounded are the honorary straight, shadow, he’s such a fun character, and the brat miya, he’s got such perfect middleschooler energy. 

the grounding kind of falls flat for me with the villain, my attitude to him very much mimics langa’s attitude. the dude is a great skater but he’s also weird and cringe so he’s not really interesting. i loved how langa was all the time: i really don’t give an f about your creepy personal issues, i’m not going to react to that, i just find you upsetting because you hurt my friends and also an interesting skating challenge. when they rolled out the villains back story my thoughts were: i know that’s meant to be sad and it kinda is but i also don’t care about you, now go to jail. no the subtext kink dynamic with the other guy you have going isn’t really doing it for me either, go to jail.

where the character writing shines is with the main two. they don’t have personas, they are just themselves in their daily life and during the underground skateboarding events.

reki is enthusiastic and passionate but also vulnerable in a way that’s relatable. his crisis feels very real in a teenage depression kind of way, or even an adhd rejection kind of way - though i’m not saying i think he has adhd in canon, i try not to diagnose characters, it just felt very relatable to me, a person with adhd, in how it all played out. and how the crisis is in reki’s mind very much about langa but the little detail of how it affects others was just so good. like how depression is so self-absorbing.

langa is quiet and not great in social situations but he’s very much present. he’s not standoffish and above it all, he’s really there taking everything in even if he’s sometimes slow to react to social situations. but he’s really focused on reki and attached to him and it’s just such a strong relationship. and it’s really cool how langa asks for advice and talks when the situation demands it.

because omg they talk it out like people, and that’s just rare in media period, not just manga/anime which can be extremely emotionally constipated due to its cultural background - i don’t mean that all japanese people never talk openly about their emotions or that they never had until recently or whatever but there is a certain culture of understatements in japanese language and it influences such things as pop culture cliches which deal in exaggeration and super exposing of cultural ideals. tangent aside the conversation was super real, awkward and it hit just right.

this is much longer that i planned. so just honorable mentions.

the anime really is there to cater to the shipping crowd. the two mains are very much implied to be a thing by the text of the show, and i think some creators also implied that though i’m not 100% on that. but i don’t think the show’s going to say it in open text in the following season(s) because it’s still a shonen anime. it can go fanservice all it wants but an openly queer protag in shonen is imho decades away. the rest of the cast is eyecandy very much made to cater to the female/queer gaze. while the og japanese version is subtext, though very loud subtext at times, about it, the dub apparently took it and ran with it and made it very queer.

it’s set in okinawa and that means the world to me. and it also gives a certain unique aesthetic to the show.