Reviews for Ahiru no Sora

I want to start by saying that a lot of people compare this anime to Kuroko no Basket. Completely Absurd, you can't compare the 2. With that said lets get Into the review (time of writing this review I have seen 18 episodes). The Animation: It's bad, It uses a lot of still Images and I'm thinking, Why, just why... why don't you animate that? Probably a limited budget but It's so dissapointing to see. Character Development:18 Episodes Is enough to get you attached to atleast 1 of the characters.

And since this anime doesn't have super powers like Kuroko It should be much easier.

They failed, atleast, so far. I can't seem to like any of the characters. Though Spike's backstory was kinda Intresting.

Most of the characters so far are kinda annoying IMO. Making the same jokes, or their overall personality.

Story:

The Paaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaacing........ Is probably the worst part.

It's so slow, you sometimes get the feeling, wait, what just happened In this 25 minutes. and you can't think of anything.

Soundtrack:

The Soundtrack Isn't bad, but It's boring. You don't get the feeling like something Is going to happen. It's just there because there should be something.

I loved the story of this show so much, the characters are the most real I've seen in a while; they make mistakes, they fall in love and they're not all perfect all the time. and they feel like they're people I know in real life. SPOILERS BELOW In the entire show I don't think I've seen the team win once which as a person who played basketball for 3 years I say that's the most realistic thing ever basketball takes a lot of time to learn and not a sport you can perfect in a couple of month and it's a given that a new formed teamwill struggle just as much as they did especially the three who just started playing and them wanting to quit at the beginning is something I myself have went through and know to well.

The music is amazing I added all the Ops and Eds to my playlist and also the ost is so good.

The only reason it's an 8 and not higher is the animation it didn't affect my enjoyment of the show that much but it could've been better.

An another sport anime, if you don't like those type of anime pass away, Ahiru no Sora didn't revolutionize anything. But If you like this genre then give it a try. I'll compare this anime in my review with Kuroko no Basket, same sport and popular anime. Date of review : 22/12/19 (will probably make some edits further the anime advance) Story : 7/10 A generic sport anime but not driving by the shonen spirit (for now).Player's skills seems logical, contrary to Kuroko no Basket, and character's background is interesting, again in Kuroko the characters background is kind hollow (IMO !).

I find more interesting to follow the progress of a team, as a whole, because it make the story more coherent and it make the characters more lovable.

Need to mention that's the anime explain the rules of BASKET (!) when in Kuroko I didn't recall to read (I read the manga) or watch (and watch the anime) the rules explained. It's nothing but I appreciate the efforts to, at least, understand the depth of basketball (don't practice this sport lol).

Art : 6/10

As always in the first episode the animation is good, have been bait by this, but globally it's VERY average animation even during a match which is a pity. Unfortunately it didn't got the same budget as Kuroko no Basket. But well expect a way better animation in important matches.

Sound : 6/10

Not a fan of the OP and ED.

In the seiyuu part, even if I am a fan of Kaji Yuki, his dubbing is "okay-ish" not spectacular as Eren or Silver Mask (Arslan Senki) where he push his voice to the limit but his character don't give the oppurtunity to express himself so I feel a bit disappointed (not his fault but well, I'm conflicted).

For the other it's good, the voice match with the characters (yeah I minimize the others unlike Kaji Yuki... :X ).

Character : 7/10

As I wrote earlier, the character's background is interesting. The motivation to push them to play and train is coherent and understable (for the key players I precise).

As a whole they don't have any default, except some stereotypes but well I'll give a pass because it's not really annoying.

Enjoyment : 9/10

My shonen spirit who was more or less dead, because of the disappereance of good shonen have burst with this anime. I repeat nothing spectacular and because I starve some shonen energy I overestimate this anime but I am really enjoying watching this anime.

I have followed the last season around 10 animes (more at the beginning but dropped some in the way) and this one, was my most awaited each week.

Overall : 8/10

I give a 8 because of the story, the consistency of the characters and the shohen spirit (totally subjective point).

Cant give an higher score because of the weak point inherent of the animation which is low.

So I recommend it if you're neutral or like sport and the animation is not a mandatory point for you. Otherwise pass away.

I never write reviews this is actually my first review and though i could have written a review for a top tier anime that would be a universal top 10 i gave my review virginity to ahiru no sora. With the hundreds of anime I've watched i can honestly say without a shadow of a doubt this anime is in my top 10. I love the story and the characters. My god the characters i love each and everyone of them like the friends i've never had. i have not found a cast that was anymore compelling to me not One piece, Naruto, SAO orAOT. Even when i went through a dry spell due to studying for the SAT and dropped ever other currently coming out anime this one specifically is the only one i didn't drop. I can't say that there are more than 3 other anime out there that i could do that for.

To those who had problems with the art style and animation as far as art style goes that is the most subjective thing you can judge on especially since this is based of a manga from 2003 (which i haven't read btw) and as far as animation goes there been very few anime that have given me problems with animation and i can proudly say this is not one.

All in all i could sing this anime's praises for months but i can say that this will be hit or miss for some people if art style is a problem for you don't watch it but i can proudly say i love it. Honestly though if we could reply to reviews i would have just replied to the two 3/10 ones and called it a day but since we can't here is my review.

TLDR Review at the bottom. Hopefully, that helped. Thanks for reading this review if you do. Ahiru no Sora truly wanted to be something. Ahiru no Sora had the story, the characters, but with most Shounen anime, high episode count = bad. You know, the Toei Animation disease. The problem with high episode counts is that there is too much room, way too much room. So much room that episodes get drawn out to add suspense for, well, “DON’T MISS OUT ON NEXT WEEK’S EPISODE”. With so much room you would probably expect a magnitude of plot devices here and there to keep the story somewhatentertaining, but instead, anime like so just stick to their ground with overdrawn development and action. It is almost as if the writers understood that there was no conceivable way to make a story out of something so very long to the point where they just gave a middle finger to the story and began writing a product rather than something that can even be considered a decent story. It happens all the time, DBZ, One Piece, Bleach, Black Clover too. They’re all just massive let downs because they decided that it would be best to continue as some over winded product rather than just let up and end the story where it is at. I really don’t think the future for long-running anime is looking too good in terms of pulling the best stories anyone has seen, it is just a curse at this point in which all long-running anime will inevitably fall in the same circle of continuously going through the same thing over and over again with writing slipped conveniently at the right moments to create the illusion of a grand journey. It is a big deception device that people will fall into since it sells well as a product rather than something with the intention of being a true story.

Story - 6:

Pacing. With a count of 50 episodes, do I need to say more? In all fairness though, while the pacing is so bad that you can literally forget what happened the episode right before even during a binge-watch. There is an actual narrative Ahiru no Sora has to show, and that narrative is actually pretty good. It all boils down to the story of the immense training of working towards your dream, via loss, and while this isn’t original, the grand scheme of the story is actually somewhat enjoyable to experience. While the story has a good narrative, the pacing suffers so much that it harms the story way too much. Honestly, one match takes up about 8 episodes, who the hell is gonna remember anything?

Art/Visuals - 5:

Zero effort. You can tell that someone was there at the studio going like: Still shot, add dash effect, opacity = 10%, pan camera. Over and over again. There was little animation half the time that it is not even funny, I genuinely think someone looked at Ahiru no Sora and thought, “Yeah bro, you give us this literal trash, so we are not even going to try anymore”, and when there was it would ironically be used for the most irrelevant parts and less for the basketball matches where people want to see some class tricks happening here and there. I don’t know what the logic is there but someone either couldn’t be bothered, or the studio had the same situation with Sonic The Hedgehog movie where someone looked at the design and thought, “Yeah, this is good”. 3D animation for the ball too, it wasn’t ugly, but it wasn’t good either, though, I would rather have the 3D animation kept in place than some “attempted” 2D animation of a literal basketball. I don’t know how Diomedea rolls especially how this is their only work that I have seen, but I am sure that they aren’t as bad as what they have given to the audience of this anime.

Character designs, however, were pretty good, it isn’t something that you see every day which gave it its unique style, however, it isn’t groundbreakingly good either. It has style but lacks power, the power to be successful as a standalone design.

Sound/Audio - 6:

Very basic sounds, used “in the moment” too, though, with 50 episodes to watch from, the OST easily because very easy to remember, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it was because the OST was good, there were merely just lots of space to throw in an OST whenever a match was played. The 4 OPs and EDs were pretty good but they were box standard in the realm of shounen anime. Nothing else to add onto that.

With VCs, Yuki Kaji on job with Sora and he did a good job at voicing Sora’s personality. Other characters had a good sense of character through VCs too, in that, this is an anime featuring delinquents. So the aggressive attitudes and voices conveyed that well.

Characters - 7:

The characters are the only thing I respect about the show, unlike the story which had horrible pacing, the characters did have some solid development, whilst it was slow, it still existed, and what made it better was that there was a sense of believable growth to these characters. People don’t just change overnight, and ironically, an incredibly prolonged story made for the best way to prove that statement. Through training, hardships, and dumbass mistakes, these characters went from zero and are still growing to this moment in time. In saying this, however, the only characters who get this kind of development were Sora, Kenji, Momoharu and Kaname (to some extent). That isn’t to say the other characters were just left out because why not, rather, they weren’t focused on much, yeah, there was visible development on them, but in something as long as Ahiru no Sora, you would think that there would be a good 20 mins dedicated for each particular character. Yeah. That doesn’t happen. I really think that the writers forgot half the characters in the show and couldn’t be bothered to do any more work to write them back in.

Enjoyment - 4:

Instead of writing why enjoyment was bad. I will leave you with a (rhetorical) question.

Would you really enjoy what is essentially 3/4 of a show being poorly animated basketball matches, with 4 developing characters and a slow story that gets worked on whenever the writers want to work on it?

Overall - 5.6 (6)

TLDR Review:

Story - 6: Good narrative, but horrible pacing.

Art - 5: Just panned shots with some effects whenever a basketball match plays, otherwise, decent in between

Sound - 6: Very basic OST.

Characters - 7: Actual good characters, but not all of them are developed.

Enjoyment - 4: Too long to enjoy.

Overall - 5.6 (6)

As someone who has never read the manga, I still have every intention to do so but Ahiru no Sora further emphasises that long shounen anime is not good. I know this isn’t battle shounen but these are just becoming products for people in the shounen demographic to just be like: “Yo, I’m gonna start playing basketball now to get as cool as these characters” or “Yo, I’m gonna starting fighting like some that hero so I can get really strong.” And does it work? Yeah. Sometimes I find myself in the position, but that doesn’t excuse that the fact that in anime, there are some genuine stories to be told and I simply cannot place Ahiru no Sora on a level like them as so.

Ahiru no Sora is a coming of age story about how easy it is to live an uncomfortably aimless life, with a cast that struggles with how listless living such a life makes them due to their isolation from living a youthful life, social problems and their own apathy, with the series emphasizing the importance of breaking out of that apathy and struggling to find a passion in order to at least move forward, regardless of the excruciating difficulty that would follow. Basketball is the vehicle used to drive these characters forward and plays an important role in these characters finding a way to bereborn, but what the series emphasizes is a need for introspection in order to do something you truly love and can push you forward enough to give you a purpose in life, regardless of the mistakes one might do or the pain that lies further down the road. It handles all this with an exceptional amount of nuance and subtlety, never genuinely shoving these themes down the viewer's throat and instead expects the audience to pick up on hints given throughout much of the first act of the series - covering around the first 33 episodes. This in and of itself is a problem; in sharp contrast to series like Haikyuu and Kuroko, which act more as hypebeasts trying to drag viewers in with gorgeous visuals and adrenaline pumping matches, whereas viewers watching Ahiru no Sora will be treated to lengthy comedy sequences as well as slice of life segments involving the main cast, which due to being very slow paced and often with mixed comedic timing don't endear the show to a wider audience.

While in and of itself neither lengthy comedy sequences nor slice of life segments need to necessarily be a problem, the show ruins this with its dragged out, stretched pacing - a quick distinction from its manga counterpart, where dialogue often flowed naturally and games happened at a quick enough pace to not be dragged out. This made stretches of the show often a drag to watch, and while the slice of life segments don't suffer much from this, the comedy and games proper often do - this is probably why critical reception to the show was considerably worse than much of its recent long-running contemporaries like Haikyuu, Ace of Diamond or Kuroko, which all are comparatively high budget adaptations created by Production IG. By comparison, Ahiru no Sora was done by Diomedea studio, a studio with a prominent reputation for low budget production values and pacing issues with many adaptations they've done; while parts of the series are wonderfully directed, these parts come in-between stretches of very strangely paced episodes. On the flipside, the soundtracks is pretty great, with many standout tracks salvaging many games, and a particular mention needing to go to the various OPs/EDs in the series, with the fourth opening and third ending being my personal favorites. That said, none of the OPs or EDs are particularly bad and all of them are fantastic, which isn't something that can be said for every series with a multitude of OPs/EDs like this one.

Sora's character arc about his complex for his height is greatly expanded on over the course of the series; much about his character seems typical for the standard sports lead, but the distinction is in Sora's nuance. Sora often recklessly challenges delinquents - something used for comic relief - but this disguises a character often insecure about his own height and masculinity in a sport where both are associated with being a better player, with this being contrasted with his mom's upbringing of him which turned that very short stature into a strength instead of a weakness. This largely is what drives Sora forward as a character despite his poor treatment both by his would-be classmates and general student body, with his perseverance standing out in the ocean of apathy that is his school and driving the group of delinquents that largely comprise the rest of the team. However, his character arc is more about how he often defines himself by his mom's upbringing - and how this in return leaves him helpless to find guidance for himself, whose role Madoka fills up as the series continues, acting as the closest thing in the cast to an emotional voice of reason. A combination of his dynamic with Madoka as well as his own desire for independence mean that by the end of the series and after a fair few twists and turns, Sora has begun the steps to attaining his own self-defined independence, with his willingness to turn a certain lie into the truth and take responsibility for his own actions being a driving force.

Momoharu and Chiaki act as another contrast in this regard both to Sora as well as each other, with Chiaki's more extrospective personality concealing a cynical yet realist mind on the team and chances for success, while Momoharu acts introspectively yet concealing a certain hot-bloodedness that drives him to improve further. The two are brothers, growing up taking inspiration from iconic sports manga only to have that idealism crushed when facing odds that are against them, leading to Chiaki being disinterested due to associating his love for the sport with his odds for victory, and Momoharu slowly following by drowning in his own apathy, being discriminated against due to his appearance as well as attitude. Both brothers grow gradually over the course of the series, with Chiaki slowly understanding that he needs to broaden his horizons and reach for the stars rather than simply ground himself in seemingly objective expectations, while Momoharu's impulsiveness leads him to make several mistakes that lead to him slowly taking his passion for basketball seriously and discovering a love for the sport that has seemingly long been lost. Much of their characterization in this adaptation happens in the second half of the anime, but much of their negative traits (overplayed and emphasized as they are) fade the longer the series goes on.

Tobi acts as the closest thing the series has to a veteran player, being cocky and highly individualistic - which betrays a deep resentment of not just his school but most people around him in general, driven by a cynicism of being judged both due to his appearance as well as his estrangement from his broken family life, with his sister acting as the closest thing he has to a bond. He's cocky, arrogant and full of himself, yet these same negative traits conceal a jaded person whose life experiences have driven him to apathy to the point where he'd shun people away. And yet through his experiences joining the team, he realizes that there are players who have undergone troubling experiences yet come out smiling on the other side and being better than he is, pushing him not only to remain loyal to the team but often acting more and more selflessly the longer the series goes on. Much of Tobi's characterization is gradual yet consistent, with his negative traits not detracting from his likability as a character; it's beyond refreshing in a cast filled of delinquents to have a character that only very slowly defrosts over time, and Tobi - partially due to his growing dynamic with Sora but also his immediately sympathetic reason for both playing the sport and remaining loyal to the team - is my favorite character in the series, and I can't wait for more of his progression over the course of the manga.

Kaname is the final central character introduced over the course of the series, with his character arc acting as a foil to Sora's - being one where instead of being discriminated for his shortiness as is the case with Sora, instead being constantly pushed into a sport he grows to apparently dislike due to his height, with his teammates constantly ridiculing him for his low stamina and poor health. His character arc is partially about rediscovering his love for basketball independently of the very factors that pushed him to fall out of love with it, with the cast encouraging him to play to his strengths and be more assertive about his interests while also being conscious about his health. Also relevant is Kaname's subplot with a side character, and how he uses as a motivation his feelings for her in order to drive him forward to improve as a player and win games - making him increasingly become a more prominent player as the series goes on despite his physical weaknesses. Kaname's interactions with Sora are worthy of note due to the contrast between both characters, but there's a surprising amount of nuance and even a thematic point made in the series that what one of them possess the other lacks and vice versa, which grants credence to their friendship as well as their dynamic on the court.

Various side characters are also worthy of note; Sora's mom is a moral support who I loved from the moment she showed up on screen, acting as a kind yet firm voice to guide Sora forward despite her own health. Nanao is an unbelievably likable character whose main flaw is her self-centeredness in taking responsibility for the team's failings when she's the de facto manager upon herself, and yet grows stronger as she realizes that regardless of her tactical prowess, there's only so much she can do alone. Madoka's dynamic with Sora is my favorite in the series, with her acting increasingly as moral support yet due to her own awkwardness in approaching sensitive subjects - a weakness that backfires on her later on in the series - is often easily dismissed in-setting as shallow, when her introspective nature reveals she's anything but that; she bonds with Sora's family, growing ever closer to Sora as she understands his weaknesses and strengths, and grows to become a personal crutch to him as the series goes on due to her own caring for him, even if her consideration for his feelings often stand in the way (even if understandable in-context) from further emotional intimacy. Much of my favorite slice of life segments came from Madoka's interactions with Sora, with their dynamic growing naturally over the course of the series. Many, many characters can be laid out here; Shinichi, Chiba, Fuwa, Satsuki and Yozan all being noteworthy characters that grow over the course of the series.

Ahiru no Sora is a really damn good sports series that has gone under the radar due to various issues I mentioned earlier and understandably so; unfortunately, this means that the manga remains the optimal version to experience Ahiru no Sora's story. What is being adapted, however, is still really good, just marred by all these production problems for those that are willing to give this series a fair chance and are unwilling to read manga for the optimal experience. There's much to love about this series, and considering material that comes later on, I certainly hope for a season 2 to come somewhere down the line, albeit admittedly I certainly wouldn't mind a considerably better production.

Nonetheless, I highly recommend this series and especially in manga format for those that are looking for a damn good sport series, and I don't speak that kind of praise lightly.

Thank you very much for reading.

I have watched a decent number of sports anime however until I finished Ahiru no Sora I had never completed a basketball anime. So, I don’t know how this show in particular compares to kurokos basket which I dropped mid-way due to the absurd superpowers in the show. Given this, the review will cover this show on how well it performed in regards to story, art an animation, along with characters, compared to other sports anime and how well it performed in comparison to notable drama series, the review will not compare Ahiru no Sora to other basketball anime. THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS Story: 5 Theanime revives around a rather tryhard short kid who wants to form a serious basketball team and play as a starter. His mom was a top tier female basketball player who inspired him to become the best he could be despite lacking the greatest asset in basketball, height. The first half of the story actually has very little basketball, its about a boy winning over a bunch of violent thugs at his highschool who at one point played basketball for fun. Sora, our protagonist, challenges various thugs to dueling him in basketball and tried to win them over with his skills, this was rather cringe and hard to watch but the show managed to get through this without making me drop it. Besides the cringe, the start of the series had a very meandering pace, although its important to develop the characters for most of the start of the series the show clearly did not know what to focus on. We had a mixture of perverted antics of Chiaki, random fist fights involving Momoharu, a number of side stories that genuinely had nothing to do with basketball, and an entire arc about a pair of basketball shoes. This helped develop the characters a bit, however it went on far too long and wasted nearly half the episodes the series had before any real game even occurred.

After spending many episodes forming his team, there was a rather lengthy training arc, lengthy might even be understating it. Nearly 5 episodes were spent just on a skirmish game with a girl’s team and then the characters realizing they have no chemistry so they need to become a team in spirit before they get on the court for a match. After the first skirmish match there was another against a male team that lasted nearly 10 episodes, mostly due to poor pacing and the usual cliffhangers to generate interest which sort of failed as it dragged on for what like forever. During this training period the characters definitely worked hard and it made it believable that this new team might actually perform decently despite having limited basketball talent and low levels of initial practice. The series also stays genuine to this ideal later on by not giving Kuzu highschool any easy wins, really, they got no wins at all in the entire show.

As noted earlier however, the lackluster games, the endless dragged on side stories, and the overall poor execution of a sports anime this series was leads to it getting a relatively low score for story.

Art: 3

Now if the story was weak but the basketball games were well choreographed and animated, I would give this show a pass, sadly this is not the case. One thing I will give Kuroko’s basket is that unlike Ahiru no Sora the games actually had impact and were not a series of power point slides and slow motion drives. From the general aesthetics of the backgrounds and the characters, to the many still scenes, to extremely boring and poorly choregraphed games, this series has some of the worst art and production value out of any sports anime series.

Early on there were more fluid moments, specifically when Sora watched the girls play basketball and when Tobi was doing drives on a street court, however the show steadily declined. This is likely due to the strained production schedule from having to air dozens of episodes back to back during a pandemic, so it makes sense to cut them some slack. However, due to even the highlight moments sucking and the endless reuse of backgrounds, the art rating just cannot be salvaged.

The sound: 5

The second opening was actually really good however for the most part the OST and the sound effects in this show were fairly mediocre. This especially hurts in a series that is supposed to be exciting and pumped during games, the OST just did not generate the hype it should have, the basketball sound effects were passable and decent for immersion but overall, they weren’t outstanding either. The best aspect of the soundtrack outside of the OP would be character voice acting, however this review will consider the voice acting to be part of the characters section.

Characters: 8

Characters are this show’s saving grace, every member of the main cast and even some side members are thoroughly fleshed out with back stories, interesting motivations and character quirks, they all have very real personalities that reflect stupid highschool boys. Yes the show is meandering, yes the arcs are random, yes the games sucked for the most part, but the characters that were developed through this snail paced bleak shit show, shine as bright as the morning sun, guess you really do need pressure to make diamonds.

Sora himself constantly strives to the best but remains levelheaded regardless of how much effort he puts in or how well he performs during a game, he never looks down on his teammates, and he remains optimistic regardless of whatever disasters occur. Sora is the perfect sports anime protagonist and he especially complements the rest of the cast in this series has the other characters start off either rough or dismissive, but he wins them over and is central to most of their character arcs. Every other guy also has a full on story either solo or in a group setting explaining why they decided to get into basketball, what they were doing with their lives, and their reasons for trying so hard to improve on a makeshift team with barely enough members to have a bench. Tobi’s family, Momoharu’s past as a basketball player, the delinquent trio wanting to do something interesting and new, everyone had a unique interesting reason but they call came onto court with their end goals aligned. Overall the development of the boys from rough thugs, dismissive guys, and guys who thought they were to good for the team, to becoming a part of something bigger and making friends along the way was enjoyable to watch.

On the other hand, the girls in the show got some focus as well. Madoka, who clearly stole the name of the magical girl, made for a pretty interesting side character as a girl who also played basketball and gives the team pointers, defends them when possible, and even falls in love with a character on the team. She also has a life outside of the guys and we get to see her interact with Sora’s grandma and with another group of guys along with her own team. The amount of attention a side character who doesn’t even play in the games got, was quite great, and really added to the well-rounded cast of the show. Nao, unlike Madoka, doesn’t get as much investment outside of the team, but her development as their advisor, her no nonsense never give up attitude, and the effort she puts into making them better were all excellent highlights of her character.The same can be said of the teacher who advises their team, he has a pretty thorough personality, and his own reasons to coaching the team. Nothing particularly negative to the rival characters either, most of them had interesting backstories, and in the case of the official competition Kuzu highschool actually played a team that was far more sympathetic than them and much more hard working which was a nice change of pace from the average sports anime.

Overall, the show is a 7/10, as long as we treat this series like a highschool drama instead of a sports anime, its actually pretty tolerable. However, this show is not little busters and the sport aspect is heavily focused on and the sport aspect is quite weak and due to this the show, itself is barely average. Worth noting that if you really care about the sports aspect your enjoyment of this show will probably drop to a low 6 or 5, as its very bad at delivering its core attraction.

As a former basketball player, and current coach, I have maybe a different perspective on this as a whole, as my whole life was in Basketball and will be forever. One thing is for sure, this happens in basketball. When you meet athletes you will notice that most of them are very positive people and the reason why is simple, sports are hard. I know it might seem easy to some, seeing people just playing a game, but honestly, when I was playing I was having two practices per day with my team plus at least one or two more, I was a bench warmer at best.To make it in basketball you need a lot of skill, a lot of heart, and a lot of luck. But let's get to the anime(whoever wants to know more about basketball write me).

The anime is your standard basketball anime, with a bunch of differently skilled guys who band together to form a team. What makes it a bit stand out is the comparison to birds. It's the first time I read or watched that players are compared to birds.

We see them face difficult challenges in their own lifes, as in the sport they love. Which for me makes it really realistic. I love kuruko no basket, and it does a great job portraying basketball as a realistic sport, but, some of the moves and things are really like magic, a bit too much emphasised.

Her we have pure basketball, with the pain of being short, the pain of lossing and the joy of being a team.

It really motivated me, and I must say, it is a fun show to watch, to see the other side that people don't often show for athletes, THE SACRIFICES!

Long practices in the night, putting aside games, fun adventures and other things for the sake of basketball and the team your on, a lot of those things aren't shown in most animes, while this one creates a great balance between the reward and the sacrifices/hard work that was invested for it.

In general this is a great anime for anime sports fans, for those who love motivating stories, and for those who enjoy watching someone overcome big hurdles and break the sterotypes. And it's not only the team we follow, but it seems like we get to see a bit more of struggle and happiness from the other teams. Unlike in other basketball animes, this is not focused 98% only on basketball, but on the life of them outside of it.

While Kuruko No Basket was mostly like pro high school players, this one is the underdog.

Ahiru no Sora is a great watch, and I hope you'll give it a shot.

This is not KnB. There aren't any "super powers" and "zone" in the show. Just straight up pure basketball. Please give this show a chance before you pass it up. People have been complaining about it's pacing but it's fine in my opinion. The anime takes time to actually develop all of the characters. Matches span over multiple episodes but everything is explained to the viewers. Every single quarter. Everything put in the show is intentional, none of it being filler. Every episode either moves the plot forward, or explores a character further. **I have watched a ton of sports anime before, and am currentlyup to the most recent episode (33) as of 5.31.20.

Story:

Very generic. It's about Sora wanting to play basketball despite being small. Nothing complicated about it but its written well. Refer to above on my comments on the pacing.

Art:

I love the artstyle. It's different and striking, and resembles SlamDunk in a way. The only thing I have a problem with is the animation. Some shots are minimally animated, therefore looking like a still frame. The action sequences are all fully animated, it's just some minor shots.

Sound:

Honestly, the tracks for this show is pretty good. It fits, and really strengthen moments within the show.

Character:

God I love every character in this show. Everyone is developed, even the minor characters. The characters have flaws, and are consistent. They feel real; and yankees playing basketball is honestly a very refreshing take on sports anime. I repeat. I love every character in this show.

Enjoyment:

I'm a sports anime fan. I eat up sports anime for breakfast, and boy I loved it. I'm invested in the story and the characters, and its artstyle is charming. The jokes are actually funny, and it really has you cheering for the main characters in the matches.

All in all. Give this show a watch. It's slow but its written very well. The realistic take on a sports anime is different and interesting to see in modern anime.

I have hardly posted any forums posts in my time on this site, but I had to vent my frustrations with this anime. So far this has been one of the most boring experiences I've had in awhile watching a show, and it really is a shame, seeing that I love both the sport of basketball and the sports anime genre. I came into this anime with decent hopes and expectations, hoping it could one-up the completely unrealistic Kuroko no Basket, but after 18 long, drawn out episodes, I've been boringly let down. It's realistic, don't get me wrong, but it's realism is so strong to thepoint that its boring and drags the show down. It interjects formation after formation that a brand new team has no business running, and boringly explains each one. The characters are passable, but no single character really sticks out and makes me interested in the show. Compared to the previously mentioned Kuroko no Basket, those characters, however cliche and overpowered they were, at least interested me.

Lastly, the thing that bugs me and bores me the most, is the animation. I can't stress this enough, the animation is god awful. If you are going to make a sports anime, you almost certainly need some at least decent animation. Kuroko no Basket had amazing animation to keep its audience interested, and to compare it to other sports anime, Haikyuu and even Free! had great animation to back up their flaws. I'd be able to excuse this glaring flaw if they had covered their asses with the previous points I have mentioned so far, but literally everything about this show has been poorly executed in terms of a sports anime.

You can excuse the lack of a good art style or decent animation quality to studio or budget, but I really don't care to. Like I said, this show has done nothing but give me reasons to dislike it, Maybe if i got a decent backstory or two, or maybe a cool scoring sequence I could rewatch on youtube later, then i would care, but for now, 18 episodes in, I'll remain this way.

I really hate to be that one anime fan complaining about a show online, but man this show just isn't good, and i needed to see if there was anime sharing my opinions. I'll probably continue watching for one or two more episodes to close out this arc, but after that there is really no point. I'd rather watch the shit show Kuroko no Basket all over again.

Hello, i will keep this review as long as possible. i will explain why. First it's an anime which i recommend to watch if you play basketball yourself. Second This basketball Anime is unique and way different from kuroku no basket or slam dunk. Why? Because this anime has something that other 2 don't, it's defeat. First basketball anime where you do not win without hard training, where non of people played basketball in highschool level. That is my argument why it is underrated. Story - 10: It starts with new 1 year student joining basketball club, well if you can call it like that, because noone playes basketball there and there are only punks who don't want to do anything. He talks them at least try to do so and starts to assemble team. They have a friendly match with few top teams in region. Later on basketball season starts and in first match they suffer a defeat. Basketball season ends there, but not for the basketball team. They start to improve their performance for next season. It's more realistic than other two basektball anime, here is more story buidling and character development which gives this anime 10 points from me. At first i didn't realy like it. Because it looked not so serious more like a comedy type, but the development with every episode was just too great.

Art - 6: It's fine i guess. But studio realy went cheap and created every character similar.

Sound - 9: It gives realy nice wibe when you're watching it, something like boosting your morale to do something yourself.

Character - 10: Every character has it's build-up. They aren not getting better with every episode, but more like in the long run. Motivation to play basketball is growing for them, motivation to get better. It's not like in Kuroku no basket that you instantly become way better than opponents when you encounter stronger opponents. NO! You lose, because you're not reay yet. They face harsh reality and have to overcome it by themselfs. That's why i give it 10 points. It's not fantasty that you will always win, but it's more like reality where you will more fall than rise.

Enjoyment - 10. Since it's most realistic basketball game it feels like i'm here with those people over the screen playing it. It gives me motivation to improve my own game. 10 because the enjoyment which it gives to me makes me want to play it myself. Improve and overcome something which is waiting for me in the future. It inserts me into their game.

Overall - 9. Why it's only 9 when i realy like this anime? Well, it's simple, it's math.

10,6,9,10,10,9=9 So i can't give it higher score even if enjoyment is something out of this world.

I've see alot of people compare this anime to other sports anime such as Kuruko no basket however it is very different from what we usually see in sports anime. story:8 Ahiru no Sora is unique as unlike other big sports anime like haikyu and kuruko no basket the characters in Ahiru no sora (excluding the MC) did not initially want to play basketball, we see them slowly learn more about the sport and develop their love for the sport. The characters are not necessarily good at basketball from the start but we get to watch them improve frm scratch. Art:6 nothing special sound:6 nothing specialcharacters:

as i said previously the characters are very different from the characters we typically see in other sports anime. the character development in this show is very good and the characters are very likeable. the main character, similar to hinata from haikyu, is at a disadvantage due to his height and therefore has to try much harder than other players

enjoyment:

this anime is very enjoyable and can even be motivating at times. the show is also comedic at times and very hype at times

overall:

i definitely recommend this anime, it is motivational, comedic and realistic and will not dissapoint

I usually dont write reviews. At the beginning Ahiru no sora was a cliche anime... with a very slow story. In the episode I´m I can say that the characters development in this anime is one of the best I have seen, they grow as players but as humans as well. The story moves very slow (sometimes it even turns to be boring) but because of the slow story you can appreciate every single detail in the characters, from the way they play, move or talk. I love how different the characters are from a lot of other animes I have watched, theyre not the typical talk andhandsome with a good life "quite of" this characters are different, they give me this vibe, the society doesnt spects anything from them and they got to belive it to, so theyre fighting for themselves for proving they can do something with their lives, to feel worthy.

The art style its not my favorite, but being different doesnt makes it bad, it brings a different flavor.

The third opening and ending are awesome, Im obsesses witht he Ed 3.

As time passes by I hope we get to be more attach to the story, right now its in the introducing fase...

Hi everyone, This will be my first review ever, please bear with me here. I am currently up to date with Ahiru no Sora at the point of this review, that is 41/50 episodes. Basketball is one of the most popular sports around the world, everywhere you go there's bound to be a park with a court there. As a basketball player that has played for 1st Grade basketball in Australian high schools, which is considered the highest level of high school basketball, with reps/clubs following. I thoroughly enjoyed this anime so far. Now, this anime is bound to be compared with Kuroko no Basuke,but I will try to refrain from that as much as possible.

Story: 8/10

So far while watching this anime, it has made me feel that basketball is only a small part of the entire story. The real story to me is how each character changes throughout the course of high school and most importantly, it is about relationships between the characters as we watch a team mature altogether. To me, it's almost like a coming to age story.

The whole conception of a "short guy can't play basketball" (I'm 190 cm myself) is executed well in my opinion. But in real life basketball, a player that is 150 cm tall can be shut down easily. Every shot he would take would be blocked in high school basketball. Due to this, I do believe there is some bias towards him. With the introduction of Yozan from Yokohama Taiei, it would be interesting to see how things play out.

One thing I liked in particular was that this anime went into quite a lot of detail about basketball plays, formations etc. Prior to watching this anime, I did not actually know what a "box and 1" formation was and learning it was quite interesting to me.

The major flaw of this story was the pacing in my opinion, it was extremely inconsistent and made me scratch my head at how the story was progressing. The most tiresome part was when Kuruzyu High had the prelimination game against Shinjotawa I think it was, and that game went on for what felt like 12 episodes; which is commonly the length of some newer anime that are releasing. During these episodes of endless self soliloquy's by the characters, I sometimes just wanted to go watch something else. However, I feel that they captured the thrill of sport pretty well and in the end, I still sat through all of it.

Art: 6/10

Personally, I feel that the art and animation in this anime is their biggest flaw. They sometimes use still images and animations look relatively choppy. Characters have this weird, hard to describe face; nose is kinda big and their mouth is drawn awkwardly...

Kuroko no Basuke has a LOT of basketball games and every move is animated out, shooting form, driving to the basket etc. However, in Ahiru no Sora, not much of the basketball action is animated. I don't often see players dribbling or any action animated out. There's the occasional shooting form and pass, but thats about it.

In my opinion, if they animated scenes like this better, the enjoyment factor for many viewers would increase drastically.

Sound: 9/10

Now, hear me out here. All 4 openings for Ahiru no Sora have been FIRE!!! My personal favourite is Humming Bird... like DAAAMMMNNNN BROO!!

Background music is pretty good as well.

Voice acting is okay, I think the actors capture their characters pretty well and it also represents the thrill during actual basketball games.

Characters: 7/10

Characters are mediocre at best. Why, you ask?

They're all really similar, in that they all have some sort of ridiculous face they pull when another character says something stupid - or they deliver punchlines yelling. But, despite that, the characters get real when they have to. The comedy is repetitive, but I don't mind it. There isn't much character development in this anime, other than maybe Chucky, Nabe and Yasuhara realising how cool the sport is.

When I'm watching a high school anime, or an anime with protagonists around my age. I tend to think, could I get on well with these characters in real life? Or, how will these characters be like in real life? It sounds ridiculous I know, but this is how I analyse characters and rate their likeability.

Speaking of likeability, none of the characters in this show are too obnoxious. Except for Taro maybe, stop fawning over Nanao she's your cousin bro move to Alabama for that jesus... Oh yeah and Kite needs to stop being a jackass and work with his team.

Enjoyment: 10/10

Overall, I quite enjoyed this anime, but not purely from that perspective. I think the main reason to why I kept on watching this show was because of my own passion for basketball. Similarly, I have quite a few friends that play volleyball and yes, they like Haikyuu. When you're passionate about something, you want to consume more of it. On a rainy day where I can't go out to play, the latest episode of this show would do it for me. Now, you can say that I am biased because of that. You know what? You're right, but then again this is my review and all reviews are biased in some way.

This anime made its way into my favourites, but maybe not for the best reasons. I probably like basketball so much, anything basketball related just becomes a favourite of mine LMAO

Overall: 8/10

This was just the average of all the other sections LOL

I strongly recommend this anime if you're into basketball, or sports anime in general. But be prepared for a ridiculously long basketball arc and repetitive comedy.

Thank you so much for reading my first review! I hope it was somewhat helpful (I doubt it) and I hope you'll have a great day/night whatever it is for you.

When started watching this anime, I asked myself 'Why are their lips so big?'... I don't know, I have no clue. Anyway, the reason I'm writing this review is because I'm seeing a lot of people comparing this to Kuroko no Basket, rightfully so, they are both basketball anime. And there seems to be this idea that Ahiru no Sora is so much more realistic compared to Kuroko no basket. Well, I'm here to tell you the opposite. 1. Basketball is a fast-paced game, where as the anime doesn't seem to understand this. Characters repeatedly stop during a game to talk and discuss stuff, they arewasting time. No one playing basketball competitively is having a conversation while playing. And they take forever to get from one side of the court to another. It should take like 4 seconds max. Basketball courts are small.

2. Sora's shooting mechanics are absolutely dreadful, terrible, what is he doing. In real his percentage would be much lower.

3. High schoolers playing like middle schoolers. They're garbage, where is the pick and roll?

4. Not enough switching and screening. Pass quicker, they 24 seconds in a shot clock. Why are they taking their time.

5. Not enough offensse, sora is spending too much time chasing down what his name when he should be shooting off the pick and roll

6. Why is a little girl coaching the team?

7. Too much incest

8. The basketball going into the rim looks terrible, very unrealistic

On a good note, I really like Kite. His character was pretty interesting, thats why this is a 3 instead of a 1.

Here we are with another sports anime. I don't mind that since I dig that genre but since I watch them so frequently this show kind of disappoints me. At first I was hooked, liked the premise of the small main character in a sport where height is key like in Haikyuu!!. Nothing special but gets you the feeling of cheering for the underdog. The art of the series is the absolute biggest low of the show. In games the movement is lacking fluidity. The pacing in those basketball games feels so weird it's hard to enjoy the matches. The game always stops after one move happened andgives us the the mental reaction of all the characters.

And if that wasn't enough the ball falling into the hoop is so unnatural with the weak 3D mechanic.

The characters are fine but the MC kinda falls flat after a while. He isn't as interesting as Hinata of Haikyuu!

Since the games are the bread and butter of sports anime this show is at best mediocre. It has no flow, bad animations and a weird power balance. In one move one character appears to be a god and in the next scene he's lower than basic. It's so weird.

I have never written a review before, but after the latest episode, I feel that I have to. This show has had 3 basketball games in the course of 36 episodes and the drama in the show has been full on bait-y the entire time. It's actually infuriating, as I want to like the show, but you really just can't enjoy it. They set up characters specifically for them to not exist or be important in the following episode. Every game takes roughly 8-10 episodes, with some episodes covering less than 2 minutes of game time only to show the backgroundstory of a character that will literally never be seen after that episode. A sad moment? Good thing they basically told you it was gonna happen 10 episodes earlier and just slowly teased that it was about to happen for all 10 episodes so that when you finally get there, you just don't care anymore. Love interests? Yeah, those are complete bait and switches. If you see two characters with chemistry that seem like they are clearly into each other, the girl will just randomly confess to being into a character that they've had no interaction with. It's like they are purposefully making you not care about what happens each episode. I have not watched a less satisfying and more infuriatingly unenjoyable show in my life. I've watched hundreds of shows, and this will be one of VERY few that I drop.

Formal and Dramatic (Warning: this review contains important spoilers, be warned.) I really liked how Ahiru no Sora manages to act as a collective test of endurance between characters and viewers. The protagonists do not win any game during all 50 episodes. The weight of the practically certain defeats, of the changes that the characters suffer, of the early elimination at the beginning of the championship, all the disappointment experienced by the characters who fail to achieve small conquests is always reflected to the public through a dramatic formality in small details. The anime during matches gives a very significant importance to some more dramatic devices than theoccasional one. There are several things happening at the same time in small details. The anime frames the scoreboard with a distressing relationship. Each basket has a very significant weight, whether the point is for or against the characters, or if they are winning or losing a match.

The result of these formal choices is never related only to the match being played. These small details are very well suited to this dramatic relationship that is very well developed and correlated with Basketball. The main characters already have a relationship linked to defeats and personal problems, or caused by themselves. Instead of the anime victimizing these actions and difficulties, it recognizes and uses them as a means for them to overcome and be able to move on.

Even though the dramatic development is sensational, the way it ends in a few moments disappointed me a little. The truth is that anime most of the time works with this in a very subtle way, and even manages to finish it in the same way in some moments, but in others it does it in a very glaring way, which ends up sounding very appealing.

I do not know how anyone can honestly give this anime above anything above a five. This anime is 50 episodes of useless flashbacks. Flashbacks being overused like this probably can work in a manga, but watching a five minute flashback of nothingness while someone is mid jumpshot or layup is absurd. Towards the end of the anime random characters were getting their own flashbacks and monologues. This would be okay if this anime had interesting characters- which it does not. I will review each of the main characters; the starting five to be specific. 1. Sora (PG/SG) - The main protagonist. He is short, about5 ft even which is straight up unrealistic for even high school basketball. Sora is absurdly boring. Absolutely no development as a character even after something tragic happens to him. it doesn't really change him. He is the exact same character from episode one all the way up to episode 50. His basketball skills are very poor besides his shooting (his good shooting doesn't make up for all the other shortcomings), he doesn't have any real positive traits like being smart or anything. He's as boring of a protagonist as Gon from HxH.

2. Momoharu (PF/C) - The team captain...who can't play a lick of basketball. I watched 50 episodes of this guy being a complete moron. I will admit he did change from through the season for the better- sort of. He is still an idiot academically and his basketball skills did not improve at all through out the 50 episodes. He was one of the characters that made this anime hard to watch. He is so bad at basketball. I think 50 episodes is more than enough to show improvement of a character's skill. Even Hanamichi (Slam Dunk) showed improvement faster, but Hanamichi was the only garbage basketball player on his team.

3. Chaiki (PG/SF/C) - Easily my favorite character. I don't exactly know what the writer(s) were trying to do with Chaiki. He was already naturally good at basketball having great point guard skills and the ability to score. He made this anime somewhat watchable. He didn't make me groan whenever he got screen time.

4. Tobi (Natsume) (SF/SG) - This fake Allen Iverson wannabe made the anime so irritating. This is one of the worst generic character types to have in an anime. The "too cool" arrogant jerk. At one point I would consider him the best player on the team but I'd honestly say Chaiki is better than him just for being more useful on the court. Tobi is easily just a merchandise seller. The most random thing about Tobi is that towards the end his basketball skills completely vanish. He played like garbage.

5. Shigeyoshi (C/PF) - Honestly I don't have much to say about him. He isn't terrible at basketball, he has his flaws like his poor stamina and anxiety, but he was not infuriating to see on the screen. He came in pretty late in the anime so he didn't get a fair chance to grow imo.

Save yourself the time and trouble and just watch Kuroko No Basket or Slam Dunk. If you seen both of those, skip this one. It is boring. This anime tried to steer away from being like the other basketball anime, but does it so poorly. I'd rather a knock off of Slam Dunk or KnB than this mess. Why would anyone want to watch a sports anime where the roster is terrible at the sport? Even so, the characters aren't even interesting! It would be okay if the characters were interesting, but just bad at the sport. Slam Dunk is about 25 years older than this anime, and does everything so much better. We actually watch Hanamichi grow from some degenerate thug into a hard working athlete. I know some people will either tell me to read the manga or wait for the next season, but that is not acceptable. 50 episodes are more than enough to tell a story. This anime can be summed up as poor writing and pacing. I knew this anime was a going to get a 3-4 from me around the 30th episode mark.

I'm a sucker for sports anime; there are few that I don't like. It's not the action that I enjoy but the relationships between the characters and their motivations to achieve a common goal that gets to me. Ahiru no Sora does it really well and in my opinion rivals other notable sports anime like Haikyuu and Ping Pong the Animation. I'll run through a few categories like the story and characterization to elaborate on my opinions. For the story, it's not intense like Kuroko no Basuke in terms of action but it does specialize in emotional breadth. There isn't a villain/rival that threatens the maincast or gorgeous animated combat scenes to excite the viewer. This anime in contrast provokes sympathy for the characters when they meet an obstacle they can't overcome with the usual sports anime kit. That kit being a new special move they've been working on, or a latent talent suddenly sprouting in the heat of battle.

Instead, the newly formed basketball team of delinquents takes what they have (some raw talent/interest in the sport) and puts it all on the grind stone. Whether their efforts will bear fruit is never certain. The power they draw from their ambitions is transient and as fragile as real life (they're only high school students). The MC has a genuine love of the sport and lights a fire in the other members to join him, but basketball quickly proves to test everyone's mental and physical strength. Watching the cast bond and develop a network of trust during those slumps was inspiring for me.

Leading into the characterization, this is where I feel that it really shines. The Kuzuryu basketball team's small roster is held together by that network of trust and proves that it can accomplish some incredible feats. When those inevitable bumps in the road hit hard, the show explores the psychological state of the cast in meaningful ways that deepened my emotional investment.

When it dives in, you find that each character's reasoning for playing is its own separate arc and is all tied together through the MC. He's like the open sky that the others watch in awe; that boundless resilience of his serves as a platform for each of them to soar up and above to find what they're seeking in life. The threat of falling out of that sky and plummeting back down is terrifying, but man; if that ain't life. The maturity and growth gained from those experiences is what it's all about.

The life lessons this anime offers are valuable in my opinion. I find it incredibly enjoyable, so much so that hearing the beginning of the third OP, "Hummingbird" by Blue Encount, makes me cry instantaneously. I'm a big softie and this show is what I've looked forward to most each week. I'm elated that it's getting 50 episodes and will dearly miss it when it finishes airing. Highly recommended for viewers with patience and life experience.