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soullistrations · 2 months

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okay so i finished season 1! and while i was watching the interhighs i made like. a bunch of liveblogging notes in a document and i only posted some of them. so here's all of my watch notes from the season, copy and pasted and not edited at all:

daichi also came from a not very good middle school. very much the same as hinata, he pulled his guys together. ‘they’re just middle schoolers, just like us.’ ‘whenever there’s a net between you, it doesn’t matter what anyone’s ranking is anymore.’ ‘we can’t win unless we try’—look up sub/manga versions of this.

'even if you’re not confident that you can win, and even if everyone around you says it’s impossible, no matter what, you can’t allow yourselves to say never.’

love how we see iwaizumi and kindaichi hanging over the railing, and we see oikawa putting on a show and his pre-game reactions. we see him yawning at asahi and standing up at the railing grinning at the first quick with hinata, but then in ep 16 we don’t see him at all until the end of the match. we keep cutting to them and to their reactions, but we don’t see oikawa there at all until the very end of the match, when he stands up to join them and say he respects kurasano for giving their all in their first game (but we see that he’s moved up a row, probably when he saw that quick attack on the way), and then there’s that long silent look at kageyama.

that whole time he’s like. huh. kageyama did it. i wonder how. and it goes back AGAIN to the upperclassmen training their younger counterparts! like. what suga did was REMARKABLE and it throws kageyama’s middle school experience into sharp relief.

sugawara not getting to play in the second round, silent when everyone else says ‘yessir!’ suga not getting to play against dateko, not getting to right his wrong, not getting to blaze a trail for asahi, going to kageyama to ask him to blaze a trail for asahi. to fight for asahi. ohhhhhhhhhhh no.

date tech slam shots—it’s all of date tech vs. suga and then asanoya. separated because suga’s not on the court.

so the girls’ team shows up, michimoya sees suga shouting from the sidelines and realizes suga’s not in the starting lineup kageyama—i have to create a path for the ace! followed by asahi remembering the view of the other side because just like he promised, kageyama did for asahi what he’s done for hinata—oh, and suga’s so happy ah i love that they have a little shot like they do with hinata sometimes, where they linger on his face and there’s this question of ‘is he frustrated? is he upset? no he’s excited/determined/focused’ and we get this same thing here, where the camera lingers for a moment on suga’s blank face and you’re like ‘is this bittersweet? is he resentful? how is he feeling?’ and then the answer is that he’s so happy and relieved for his team (and also contrasted with oikawa’s nothing pisses me off more than a prodigy) add in kageyama telling suga to keep setting to asahi until he gets it—paralleled later in kageyama setting to hinata in the nekoma game reference to the fact that they’re borrowing tactics they’ve seen from nekoma cataloguing little ‘moments they fell in love with volleyball’: aone blocking hinata (for aone), hinata being a successful decoy and clearing the way for asahi to get a point—embracing that decoy life

on to ep 18!

when they go to set 2, asahi is matched up with aone in order to free up hinata. asahi specifically saying that we can’t just lean on hinata, and everyone needs to pull their weight to earn points. hinata saying he’ll do his best and asahi getting that support from a team, then being able to say ‘you can definitely count on me’ asahi, taking tsukki’s ‘little old me just holding down the fort’ and pointing out that that’s the important part—consistent throughout this story that the least flashy parts are the most important keys to victory a specific focus on asahi’s newfound mental strength ohhhhhhhhh the end of the dateko match bringing back kageyama’s words to suga—one more time, one more time! except this time it’s suga to kageyama, and asahi says ‘until i can score!’ and kageyama gives him his favorite set to show that he’s made that connection and trust with the team ace not asahi’s flight being reflected in noya’s eyes AUGH if i’m this team’s ace, you guys are the heroes in his case, he’s got TWO setters who believe in him, so how could he not be confident? suga the mastermind who came up with the signals ‘i would’ve preferred to beat them with my sets’—>daichi: i’m glad you’re still keeping yourself involved in the game

episode 19

kageyama and sugawara sitting next to each other to watch the match daichi ‘is it just me or does kageyama seem more tense than usual?’ and then immediately hinata goes running past ‘welp there he goes’ iwaizumi sees him taking that game dvd home and he’s like ‘hey don’t work too hard’ and oikawa has that devil may care shiny smile. and then he has that hungry focused look watching the game alone in the dark later. MASKS, again! daichi, the steady tonesetter--he’s experienced defeat and he still is the one to be like ‘calm down and focus we can win this’ the mental strength of being captain! kageyama does a setter dump back yES

episode 20

it wasn’t middle school that was impressive—it was him. if i can surpass him, i can be the best setter in the prefecture—kageyama about oikawa the way they keep referencing what they learned from nekoma—the eye misdirection, the coordinated attack—and it’s interesting because they played TWO practice games before interhighs but they didn’t really take much from aoba johsei

later, coach says, don’t forget who you’re fighting here. it’s aoba johsai, not just oikawa. and you’re not the only one fighting him.

oikawa targeting people in efforts to break the team’s spirit, first noya, then later tanaka when he shows positivity (targeted tsukki during the practice game)

ooh, we see oikawa sitting off to himself all focused to not break the focus of his serves, and then we see something similar at nationals with kageyama

hinata catching tanaka’s receive—they’re not facing aoba johsai alone! and the moments when they do their least noticed moves are also some of those most crucial moments for keeping the ball in the air

kageyama trying to figure out how to get around the blockers by using speed, vs other setters who have aces with power they lean back on. he could lean back on asahi but he's already started--yeah okay oikawa about tobio—he’s got power, and talent, and he craves victory more intensely than anyone i know. all those qualities make up kageyama tobio’s strengths—but they’re also his weaknesses. no man is an island, little tobio. you may have been at this for 2 months now, but it takes longer than that to break a bad habit.

sugawara coaching hinata again—hey, do you remember the signals? ‘we’re gonna use the signals we talked about?!’ he’s so excited!

the return of tempo—kageyama speeding up, ‘valuing speed above all else, but losing their accuracy. as their speed increases, the number of mistakes does as well’

hinata can handle the fast sets, but it’s not the best thing for everyone else. oikawa says the one who can take every spiker’s quirks into account and use them to their full potential is a true setter.

yamaguchi notes that in the face of oikawa, kageyama doesn’t seem like himself anymore. followed immediately by kageyama using ‘i’ language about winning. i have to win, i refuse to lose, i have to win and stay on the court’ —his first missed throw with tsukki, whose trust he hasn’t gained yet. it’s save by asahi whose trust he just has gained, but it’s shaky

and then immediately after that, sugawara is subbed in.

episode 21

ooh they’ve never played against sugawara before!! they were the ones that requested kageyama the first time, and then he’s been playing the whole time they’ve been watching

kageyama has just desperately wished to stay on the court and now he’s being subbed out. sugawara tells him, don’t feel bad, we just have to change up the rhythm. hand on his shoulder, facing opposite directions. the first bit of the setter twin switch thing (see screenshot)

sugawara is worried that kageyama being taken out will shake hinata (we can’t have both of this guys losing their grip at once) immediately hinata gets in kageyama’s face and says, ‘i’m gonna be the one to beat you so don’t you dare lose to those guys first!’ kageyama, petulant: ‘well i haven’t lost yet have i. the game is still on.’ (reminiscent of all the ‘we haven’t lost yet’ things they say earlier) sugawara watching this sees there’s no need to panic

ukai: take a few minutes to cool off. maybe you’ll learn something from your upperclassman

not sugawara whacking everyone and then high-fiving noya . he grins and says ‘we’re getting this point’—setting the tone. hinata watches sugawara and turns to kageyama and is like ‘you’re not talking to the team, you’ve been quieter in this game than any others’

suga lecturing daichi about being so quiet (where is his positive tone setting?) (tanaka and asahi are nonplussed. nobody lectures daichi except for him)

waves tsukki over to whisper in his ear about switching spots with suga. ‘that was great tsukkishima. i’m lucky to have someone so tall next to me’ and tsukki’s all flustered— ‘i’m a low blocker so i’m always getting targeted—taking advantage of being underestimated and using that against the opposing team

suga tells hinata how to block slowly to match the tempo—literally coaching on the fly

i was able to watch with new eyes. the time i spent not playing was useful too.

ukai you’re worried because you benched kageyama and he’s so prideful right?—but now kageyama is able to see suga in action.

starting with ‘i’m not as skilled as kageyama, but here are hand signals to communicate our next move during a game’

daichi on suga: when an outsider looks at suga, they only see one thing: a poor third year who got replaced by a first year. but what they don’t know is that suga has spent enough time on the sidelines to know exactly what to do, so he’s just as much of an asset as kageyama.

similar language to the coach about oikawa—‘in terms of ability i pale in comparison to kageyama’ that coach said the same thing. ‘but i’ve been watching this team a lot longer than he has. i know i don’t have what it takes to beat seijoh, but my friends are amazing at what they do’—echoed later when hinata tells the other team—i’ll never beat you one on one, but i’m not alone.

all of them are starting to look before they leap now, including the short one, and he tends to blindly rely on his instincts—but suga showed him how to use those instincts in different situations

kageyama approaching suga: hey listen. number 12’s quick attack is a little on the slow side, don’t you think? and suga agrees and takes his observation into account. because kageyama has seen how observing from the sidelines helped suga so he’s trying to help suga with his sideline observations in turn.

suga’s speech to kageyama: kageyama. okay, so i kind of understand that since we’re both setters we’re supposed to be competing for the same position or whatever. but i just wanna play volleyball! (k: uh. same here!) now that i’m actually standing on the court, i realize how tall the aoba johsai guys, are, and how that makes me a walking target for their spikes. it’s kinda scary. but you know what? i know i’m okay, because now i have you right there behind me. that’s reassuring! the points we make while i’m on the court, and the points we make with you on the court—they’re all points from karasuno. so i will give it my absolute best, and you give it your best too. that is how we’ll beat seijoh.

kageyama: right! hinata: are you crying, kageyama??

daichi pulling suga out of his head: you don’t have to get all introspective and overthink this.

ennoshita explaining why suga does what he does: ‘compliments and talking are his way of checking in with how his spikers are doing. it helps him decide how to set, because every spiker is different. ennoshita reading minds—you’re thinking ‘why should i care what a jerk like tsukkishima feels?’ and then explaining that we have some advanced spikers who can hit sets even if they aren’t what’s best for them. so don’t you think that if they got sets that helped them compete at 100 percent, they could compete with any block they’re up against?’

daichi on receives! our 1-2-3- of our first core members from karasuno breaking oikawa’s serve on the first try. showcasing suga’s thinking pattern—sending it to tanaka because he broke the pattern of serves in the first set.

suga’s attacks are textbook and predictable and he never rushes a set either. —ooh, they started being able to predict what suga will do next. suga tends to rely on the left side because those attackers are strong and predictable.

ooh these back to back suga and kageyama character arc monologues; first suga with ‘i feel the noose tightening, i feel the pressure, but i’m able to think clearly because i have a goal in front of me’ and then kageyama’s ‘i used to think that getting benched was the end of the world because i wasn’t useful anymore (that probably was the reason back then) but now he sees suga and he’s like we work together. different strengths but our goal is the same’

oh and then asahi stepping in with ‘send me the next ball, i’ll make it count.’ you can count on him, he wasn’t wrong to count on asahi or lean on him.

suga coming off the court like ‘welp that was my time in the sun it was nice while it lasted’ and then coach is like hey let’s do this more often! like suddenly it isn’t the end

and suga talking to kageyama who has the whole team at his back! no more i language--'i know i'm okay because i've got you at my back!' ahhhh!

ep 22

wait until last year—so his first and last real time as the starting setter was the spring tournament when dateko shut them down and then asahi and noya had that fight WOOF

note: kageyama’s focus being on the opponents/blockers vs his team

suga: kageyama told hinata that he’s only the greatest when he’s around. but it goes both ways. together they’re both the greatest

kageyama smiling, complimenting hinata, checking in with asahi—communication, implementing everything he’s learned from watching suga

sugawara looking at kageyama staring at tsukishima and he knows exactly what he’s thinking and gives him a push to talk to him

tsukki, referencing how everyone (including hinata—he singles him out here) is always thinking on the court, and then proceeding to be his own decoy, with those three dinks and then a real spike

look i love oikawa’s pre-serve vertical spin vs. kageyama’s pre-serve horizontal spin—it’s a fun little visual parallel

middle school iwaoi: starts with iwaizumi remarking that oizawa’s smile seems genuine this time, rather than put on. oikawa: i’m always genuine! ima: if you have to say that then you know it’s not true we wanted to reach new heights, but we were always shut down. we were annihilated by shiritorizawa—didn’t even win a set. (check the i language in oikawa’s language about losing—i lost, i just want to win—vs iwaizumi’s ‘we’ in his narration) and then a genius swooped in to take our place (interesting use of ‘our’ here). he looked so happy just to be playing volleyball. ‘he can play any position, but eventually he’ll be a setter. after that, oikawa started working harder than ever. iwa has to beat him into taking a break. ‘he was completely losing his cool.’ and making a lot of combo mistakes, and then he got replaced by kageyama. interesting that both oikawa and kageyama had these moments where they were relegated to the bench in middle school—and that they so messed up the both of them is a clear sign that kitagawa didn’t do a good job with teaching its athletes how to be on the bench. so then that same night, after that practice game, after oikawa had run himself ragged with practicing serves, is when kageyama approached oikawa and oikawa almost attacked him. oikawa: i’m not good enough ima: all you ever say is me me me! (so it’s the return of ‘you can’t win alone/you can’t lose alone’—oikawa shouldering this burden as all his fault for not being good enough is seen as a selfish dismissal of the strength of his team) the best team of six wins—oh iwaizumi! bringing the wisdom—it’s like i’m invincible—ahhhh the return of that language! ah!! so like, the big difference between the two of them besides all the other differences—is that oikawa had an iwaizumi, and kageyama didn’t

oikawa’s back’s against the wall, so his next move is sending it to iwaizumi

oikawa: he noticed out unbreakable bond of trust iwaizumi: we don’t have that and you know it sure iwaizumi. sure

hahahahahaha loveeeeee after the flashback when oikawa refused to teach kageyama anything, he recognizes that suga mentoring kageyama is a big part of the reason that kageyama is evolving as a setter

toodaloo kangaroos

ep 23

it’s interesting how in the the dub version mid-volley calls are spoken with a lot more emphasis—nice receive! vs a quick nice receive, ‘IT’S A CHANCE BALL!’ vs the practically one word ‘chanceball!’, hinata’s weirdly slow ‘bring it! to me!’—idk there are some things i like about the dub but the mid game dialogue just doesn’t have the same ring of breakneck breathless realism. like calm down and keep the ball in the air, y’all.

the first time we see a libero set!! and important that it only comes AFTER aoba johsai/oikawa gets ‘irritated’ and starts giving their all as earnest rivals to karasuno. karasuno crows picking up shiny stuff (aka plays) from the people they play against—and they’ve played aoba johsai before, but they didn’t really pick up anything from them that time, in glaring juxtaposition with nekoma. and i think it comes down to—nekoma gave their best from the beginning. they respected karasuno as opponents so karasuno did the same in return, and they walked away from that match with new ideas for how to get better. aoba johsai/oikawa didn’t give their best to karasuno, so karasuno didn’t really walk away with that match with anything other than a new declaration of war. but NOW, now that oikawa has seen kageyama’s growth, recognized suga as a serious threat, gotten all fired up and started taking them seriously—NOW they’re deploying tactics that karasuno will learn from and borrow in the future.

suga musing: how can their offense be so airtight? they turn every scenario into an advantage, as if they planned it that way

the continuation of suga coaching from the sidelines—hey, hinata, you should use this attack when you get back in

ohhhhhh tadashi. his first serve is like. so well paced for maximum nerves.

suga and yamaguchi and the promise of next time

daichi shifting the tone with one well-placed ‘next time you’ll get it’—that’s why he’s the captain

i loved the visual of kageyama getting that ball one handed right from under oikawa, passing it back, hinata rising out of the light slomo to smack it down because he saw kageyama going for it so he did too ahhhhhh literally i’ve got this because i’ve got you right behind me (and then the visual of them right behind aoba johsai)

daichi called nishinoya ‘nishi’—cute!

godddddddd, oikawa’s little backstory flashes in his jump serve—incredible. i love it

oooooh the way that just like oikawa and the others at aoba johsai are like ‘what is kageyama learning he’s changed so much’—kunimi is the same to kageyama. he knew him for 3 whole years but he never was able to pull the best from him

check episode 24 for the kageyama kun kageyama san thing

kageyama’s not the same lonely king of the court he used to be—i feel like the whole ed was created around this moment

ooh the way kageyama was able to shut down aoba johsai in set 2 bc he knew that when the chips were down, oikawa would throw to iwaizumi—and then in set 3 karasuno is shut down because oikawa knew that when it’s all on the line, kageyama would rely on hinata

so in the sub when they show up to the restaurant, ukai apologizes for showing up before they’ve opened, but in the dub, he apologizes for coming after they close

episode 25

the silent shots of everyone at the beginning of this ep are so good. hinata and tanaka vibrating with frustration (tanaka hiding his face), noya’s buttoned-up stiff backed posture like he’s focusing so hard but also everyone around him is working except for him, tsukishima daydreaming, asahi’s listlessness, suga compartmentalizing and daichi trying and failing to, kageyama straight up head down eyes closed he just has the bracket out not his books—it’s fun to see how everyone’s reacting to their loss

THAT’s ushijima’s voice? ….maybe it will grow on me

this other sport guy who is Normal about his sport trying to commiserate with hinata is so funny, i’m sorry. like. i feel their pain but also this is soooo funny to me.

love the second and third years both grouping up to talk. ohhhhh and kiyoko hiding around the corner nooooo girl you can be part of it too!!

i just really love shimada and yamaguchi :’)

ooh i love the way that aoba johsai showed that good coaching leads to more independence of the players. like, karasuno on one end had to be independent because they had no coach to speak of, so now that one is here, they’re learning all they can. and then aoba johsai, which has a consistent coach and an established volleyball legacy, has so much more vertical alignment—coach to players, older players to younger players—so many available and established angles of training and communication that when it comes to games, the players are able to problem solve on their own because the coaches have helped them develop the tools to do so. (we see the same thing with nekoma)

oughhhhhh oikawa as ‘the loser’ immediately cutting to hinata crying too don’t mind me i’m just chewing glass over here

ennoshita, ever the practical, is like ‘maybe the third years aren’t coming back,’ and tanaka is like NO YOU KNOW THEY WOULD NEVER DO THAT TO US he loves his senpais so much

the team running practice independently—because 1. they’re used to it and 2. they’ve picked up more skills to be better independent

oof shiritorizawa beat aoba johsai in straight sets that’s ROUGH

daichi is SO good at pumping up the team. he’s so optimistic and focused on the goal.

once again, love this pullback to other teams—karasuno isn’t the only one that lost. they’re not the only ones who are practicing hard in hopes to go further next time.

you and me….and our team! followed by ‘break time’s over, lovebirds!’ followed by slow mo pastel shots of each of them looking at each other before dashing back into the gym like. they didn’t have to do all that.

#rebamble #rebs watches haikyuu #it is a VERY long post #and mostly here for me to group my liveblogging together lol #rebs watches things

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