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Not too much going on in my personal life this month, thankfully. It’s nice to have a few calm weeks every now and again. My family has a lot of birthdays next month, so that’ll be a crazy time for us.
I guess this month I’ll just talk a little bit about the stuff I’m reading and watching.
Slam Dunk
I am still enjoying Slam Dunk tremendously. I don’t see why it’s not talked about more, to be honest. I think this is a really good anime/manga to recommend to people who are just getting started with it. If you’re reading this and you haven’t read it or watched it before, go watch an episode or 2 or read some of the manga and see what you think. I think it’s very good for beginners because it’s a straight forward story that is centered around something very popular in American culture. Dragon Ball and One Piece are great, and I do recommend them, but they have whole new worlds to learn and understand. It’s nice to turn on something and understand most everything that’s being shown. Most shonen are also very long. Slam Dunk’s anime doesn’t cover the whole story I believe but it’s only 101 episodes, compared to Dragon Ball’s almost 600 (for DB, DBZ and DBS, it’s more if you count the movies and GT) and One Piece’s 1118 and growing. The only bad thing is the anime is kind of old and it doesn’t have a very good English dub from what I’m seeing.
SPOILERS: The rest of this section contains spoilers for up to volume 21 of the manga, not sure about where that is in the anime.
I just finished up the Shohoku vs Ryonan game for the 2nd nationals spot. It was so hype, I was very excited the whole time I was reading it. This game was so bittersweet because you wanted so badly for Shohoku to win so Akagi and Kogure could go to nationals, but then they showed Uozomi’s backstory and his drive to want to go to nationals too so you wish they both could’ve won. The parallel of Sakuragi going up to Akagi when he was crying happy tears at the end of the game and the time Akagi told Sakuragi to stop crying when they lost to Kainan because of a bad pass was so amazing, I almost shed a tear. I love this series. They’ll be going to nationals next and have already been teasing some of the teams and aces for the tournament.
I’m going to take a little bit of a break from reading now, maybe a few days, just to kind of digest it all and watch some more of the anime. I have all the volumes collected now, so I can finish it whenever I want, which is really nice. The volumes are super nice, the covers have really nice art that changes from volume to volume. A lot of them are done in what looks like water color. They don’t reveal too much about the story either, which I love.
I’ve put REAL on a little bit of a hold too. Partly because keeping up with it and Slam Dunk was a little tough, REAL is much more depressing and a little more dense. I also don’t have volumes 4 and beyond, they sell out on amazon kinda frequently so I haven’t had a chance to get them. I’m going to buy some new bookshelves soon, so I’ll have the room for more and might collect the rest of the volumes.
One Piece
SPOILERS: This contains spoilers for up to chapter 1118 in the manga
These chapters with Vegapunk’s message have been crazy. Unfortunately, in true Oda fashion, it was cut short before he could finish it. There’s a few theories going around about what he was going to say based on the word that was cut off, but I don’t know how much that really helps. Obviously it was about the “D.” clan, but was he going to reveal the full initial? Was he going to explain why they’re called demons? So much mystery around 1 letter. And it has been like that for 20 years! But that’s what makes it fun, I’m happy to be reading at a time we are going to be finding that out. I wish I had started reading back before Whole Cake like my friend did, but I think I got in just in the nick of time to see the best mysteries being revealed.
In 1118 we also see Bonney use her powers to essentially unlock a gear 5 transformation. This has SPLIT the community, and many people are mad that this happened. I’m personally not mad at it. I think it’s been built up pretty well, and I don’t think it’s as powerful a transformation as people might be thinking. Saturn said that her powers will diminish in strength as she ages and her future is more set in stone, so it’s not like this transformation will get much stronger if at all. I think it’s just a nice thing to include, having a child born of a slave become liberated by THE king of liberation, Nika/Joy Boy/Luffy, and become as free as him.
I think everyone will just have to wait for 1119 or maybe even 1120 to see how it plays out. If her transformation continues to grow and be strong, maybe it’ll be better explained as to why that’s possible. If it’s short and weak, then hopefully a lot of people will stop complaining lol.
Monster
No spoilers in this section. I just wanted to say that I’m starting to watch the Monster anime. One of my friend’s favorite authors is Naoki Urasawa, and he’s told me several times about how he wants to collect his works (Monster, Pluto and 20th century boys specifically). I finally got curious enough to start watching it. It’s ok so far, I’m not very far in. The art is definitely unique, but it does have that 2000’s kind of animation style to it (not a bad thing). I think I’m gonna give it about 15 episodes (about 20%) and if I still like it I might start collecting the manga.
Relatively short and sweet post this month. I’ll see you guys in July!