Cruel Angel Theses

A competitive gaming (sports, board game, etc) series will inevitably choose to major in one of two areas, both of which are crucial in determining how wide or specialised an audience it will snag: the first, drama; the second, jargon. While the second is important in tapping to a pre-existing fanbase and ensuring a dedicated following, the first is by no means unimportant — too much emphasis on jargon leaves the non-fan alienated, something no self-respecting author or animation studio would want to do.

it’s tough love, making fun of your target audience is

This Catch 22 that any would-be author faces isn’t an admirable task. In my youth, and by youth I mean when I was in what Japan calls middle school, I was somewhat crazy about basketball. Nevermind how in my laughable physical condition then I couldn’t shoot hoops to save my life, what more dunk a hoop, I admired it. It goes without saying then that I would read manga to the tune of Slam Dunk and Dear Boys, the former for the madcap humour and the latter for what I’d best call “mad skillz”.

Consider then the game of shogi. I don’t see myself picking up the game any time soon due to scheduling constraints and how there’s really too much for me to do at the moment without burdening myself with more, but the opportunity to be further acquainted with it was recently made available in the form of the anime adaptation Shion no Ou, and Chika Umino’s latest work, March Comes in Like a Lion.

Shion no Ou is weak and indecisive, for starters. The two episodes I’ve seen so far make no attempt to convert or endear the non-shogi player to it; what’s more surprising is how the shogi aspect of it all is further diluted by what seems to be an attempt to mask what might be “boring” fodder through a prominent murder mystery aspect.

As the title, “Shion’s King”, would suggest, it tells the tale of a mute loli called Shion, who’s mute only because her parents were murdered in front of her when she was much younger. Of course, she happens to be a prodigy, as genre conventions would dictate; to add to things, you have what seems like the murderer of her parents stalking her, presumably to do her in before she becomes the next, uh, king of shogi. Oh, and you have a trap playing in the women’s league, too.

What this all comes together to achieve is a whole lot of nothing. It looks, feels, and sounds like a distant cousin of Higurashi, which is presumably due to it being a product of Studio Deen. However, any attempt at all at taking its darker, more sinister parts seriously would be a long stretch of the imagination, at least for me at any rate, even if I find a grown man stalking a little girl to be nothing short of terrifying.

To top it all off, it isn’t even trying to turn this into shogi porn. I’m fully aware of how dangerous this might be, making what already seems like a dull affair even duller through blinding the non-player with jargon — unfortunately, when you’re lacking in the drama department, even jargon seems like a better alternative when you realise the other side of the fence is a weak attempt at inserting colour into a dull game.

So it fails on both accords. The shogi games aren’t as explicit as I’d like them to be, which means that it expects you to have an existing knowledge of the game in order to appreciate what I’m guessing are brilliant, captivating games on-screen. Any attempt at fleshing out what seem like two-dimensional characters are quickly overshadowed by the aforementioned murder mystery part, which hogs the spotlight yet gives so little in return.

Then there’s Chika Umino’s latest work.

it’s like she didn’t bother thinking up new character designs at all; you have a Hagu, a Yamazaki, and even a plumper Morita on the sidelines

March Comes in Like a Lion, also known as Sangatsu no Lion, does the opposite. It has a strong character-driven focus, and it’s evident even in the first chapter, where our Mayama-sque protagonist, who goes by the decidedly fitting name of Rei Kiriyama, has a shogi match against his teacher.

Through a couple of pages we get to know that he isn’t called Rei for nothing. His name, written with the character for “zero”, sums up his life so far; no parents, no friends, no home. He doesn’t even go to school. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Well, almost. Before this can sink further into despair of Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei proportions, suddenly the tone of things shift.

He has a talent for the game, for one, and a doting family of three sisters, who evidently hold a significant place in his heart. The story goes on, and we’re dealt the tale of a boy defiantly living apart from his adopted, shogi-playing father thanks to a combination of alienation and neglect, holding onto nothing much in life bar his 5-dan rank.

If you were worried about Umino moving on after H&C, well, fear no more. Her prowess at stirring up latent emotions are put to good use here. Unlike some visual novels or anime adaptations which tell you “Now Cry“, the impression you get from her works are a different creature altogether; unpretentious, doesn’t have designs on your tear ducts, and is anything but contrived.

It’s something I’d attribute to her insightful portraits of the human psyche — no matter how outlandish or bizarre a character of hers might be, the things they say are weighed with great empathy, so much so that you come off with a displaced, deja vu vibe of having been there and done that.

MCILAL is a good example of what a sports manga means, even if it deviates from the norm quite a bit: characters first, matches later. Those who might be potentially put off by the whole shogi thing need not worry, for her ventures into matches have been superficial so far, either punctuated by the odd flashback, used as a means for introducing more characters, or just mentioned in passing.

More importantly, what deserves mention here is the heartwarming, true-to-life story beating beneath the covers of this gem, and even if it has yet to show much shogi so far, it’s greatness. What do you look for when you watch a sports anime or read a sports manga? Are you the jargon or the drama type? I’d have to say I’m more of the latter than the former; for me, at any rate, the match played doesn’t matter so much as the character behind it does.