PING PONG THE ANIMATION |OT| ( `´)°(ò_ó )/

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Thought the anime would just be for anime hipsters and armchair animators as that is typically what these are targeted too, so was surprisingly pleased to find that it was actually really entertaining, fun, and filled with potential friendship. Peco is my favorite personality of the group as his way of playing both at table tennis as well as outside of it makes me chuckle and also look surprised. I like the flashy fun play style.

Wenge and Smile though need way more time and to actually face at the game, if Smile can help bring back the fire in Wenge, excite him, make him feel passionate again then this may really do well to be second best sports series this season.

Best scene rooftop and hearing the playing while commenting on it.
 
Ping Pong - 1
The rad storyboarding and playful character writing gave this such an unshakably cool vibe. Even when animations are recycled, the show makes them work with good editing and pacing. I continue to love Nobutake Ito's character designs as well. Just a joy to watch.
 
Episode 1

I like it! It has a lot of charm and a bit of style to it's presentation. Peco and Smile remind me a bit of Mugen and Jin's relationship/dialogue in Champloo.
 
Loved every last bit of this! The coolest part was definitely seeing Wenge kick Peco's ass in that match. Can't wait to see how the rest of the series will turn out!
 
I liked this much more than I thought I would. Interactions feel really natural and there was a lot of emotion in the last match.

Hopefully it can keep this quality level.
 
So stylish. Lived up to my hopes, was a bit worried because I wasn't the biggest fan of Tatami Galaxy, but the animation was a perfect match for Matsumoto's art in the manga.
 
Wenge is so damn awesome at ping pong, he can guess the match just by listening to the sound of it.
The animation look stylish as hell
 
Episode 1

pingpong1.jpg


This is certainly hitting all the right notes as an adaptation of a Matsumoto classic, though it is kinda weird seeing Smile playing with a game instead of a rubiks cube but it's not that hard to connect the dots with that and both the promotional art and the overall thematic underpinning of the source material. Fuckin' Yuasa.

Can't wait for Kazama to show up and utterly dominate!
 
I couldn't get this to work via proxy on Crunchyroll. Am I doing something wrong? I tried 3 different plugins / services... Stupid region restrictions.
 
metsallica said:
I couldn't get this to work via proxy on Crunchyroll. Am I doing something wrong? I tried 3 different plugins / services... Stupid region restrictions.
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What proxy are you trying to use? The show is not available in the US on CR, so you'll need a proxy from one of the supported regions.
 
Ping Pong 1

Now this is what I'm talking about. That was damn good.
Absolutely fantastic storyboarding, fantastic art, the writing feels very natural, awesome soundtrack and VA. There's really nothing more to say about this.
 
I just have to say I love when shows work the title of the episode into the episode itself. When Kong says 風聲太大聽的不清楚 (
holy crap that took me way to long to type and I'm not even sure it's right. my Chinese is freaking awful
) and it goes to the black screen with the text it got me good for some reason.
 
duckroll said:
What proxy are you trying to use? The show is not available in the US on CR, so you'll need a proxy from one of the supported regions.
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I tried Hola, ProxMate, and Media Hint. I didn't see a way to change my region in ProxMate or Media Hint but I tried a few different ones in Hola that should've had the show available. I also cleared my cache / cookies, logged out and back in, and all that jazz.
 
Ping Pong - 01

Best first episode this season, without a doubt. It just flows so well, it's simple, but executed flawlessly in a way that leaves you wanting more. It's classic sport tropes but done a bit better and subtler than usual, with just a tad of that shounen addictiveness.
The visuals are great, they fit the tone of the show, the comic book style cuts were nice, and I'm quite pleased overall.
 
Ping Pong 1

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Well that was certainly a Yuasa anime. You could say that it's a pretty standard opening for a sports story, but the idiosyncratic visuals do set it apart from most of those. There was certainly a nice amount of sakuga in the ping pong animation.
 
Really enjoyable first episode. As a few people have commented it's interesting how Smile goes from being unlikable from his initial introduction to being, if not likable, certainly more than he appears. It'll be interesting to see why he is the way he is.

I liked some of the visual cues as well such as the high shot being equated to an airplane going overhead and the deliberately boring games that China's team are playing in the background.
 
I didn't like the first episode (just made me want to reread the comic or watch the live action) but OMG YUASA YUASA YUASA YUASA YUASA YUASA still so happy he has a project and the source material is Matsumoto.
 
Episode 2
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Another good episode. I am however getting worried about the animations regarding the matches. They are doing their best trying to make them really exciting without much body movements and relying on the comic panels and it's working fine, I'm really enjoying them. But it's concerning me if it gets to a point where it will be just still images. The flashback scene was really well done and it's something I barely even remember so it took me by surprise as well.
 
Ping Pong Circulate The Animation Episode 2

If nothing else this is certainly the most visually stylish anime of the season. I am not convinced that it the anime of the season or even the sports anime of the season just yet. I'll be frank and say I really, really, really, really fucking hate Tsukimoto's attitude, not just towards Ping Pong but just towards life itself. Nihilism is one of the quickest way for me to hate a character and Smile is one a one way rocket towards that hate. It isn't a dealbreaker just because I find this show very unique and refreshing, especially in this season of mediocrity. However, I do need some deeper resonance for me to consider this the full package of the season and if I can't give a shit about what the MC is doing because he doesn't give a shit then that is a pretty stringent black mark. I really hope this is going somewhere other then the black hole of misery.
 
Ping Pong 2

Good episode. We got some interesting peeks into Smile's psyche, some more nice backgrounds, some Engrish, and some ping pong action! I'm a big fan of Yuasa's visuals in general, and this show isn't an exception. In particular, as survivor said, the use of comic panels during matches is a really cool touch.

Smile is an interesting character since he's technically the protagonist, but right now he hasn't really taken up a traditionally protagonist-y role. Right now it's mostly other people trying to get him out of his shell and break him out his nihilism.
 
Gazoinks said:
Ping Pong 2

Good episode. We got some interesting peeks into Smile's psyche, some more nice backgrounds, some Engrish, and some ping pong action! I'm a big fan of Yuasa's visuals in general, and this show isn't an exception. In particular, as survivor said, the use of comic panels during matches is a really cool touch.

Smile is an interesting character since he's technically the protagonist, but right now he hasn't really taken up a traditionally protagonist-y role. Right now it's mostly other people trying to get him out of his shell and break him out his nihilism.
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I think that is what the coach is angling for, he seemed to have dragged out the ruthless aggression out at a few points there, I do hope it continues.
 
Crocodile said:
I need to check this out later. Table Tennis doesn't super interest me but there is more than enough going on here that makes me want to check it out.



*rolls eyes*

ONE DUDE hated Kick-Heart.
Maybe two or three tops.
That thread isn't a hive mind you know.
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Impossible :P
 
Shard said:
I think that is what the coach is angling for, he seemed to have dragged out the ruthless aggression out at a few points there, I do hope it continues.
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I think it's fairly clear that that's going to be the overall thrust of the story. And the manga is fairly short, so I'm guessing it'll be entirely focused around resolving that arc.
 
Episode two was also great! I loved the mechanical sound effects when Smile finally started to beat his coach. That was a really cool touch.
 
This show is seriously too good. The Coach was even better this episode especially with the bwergwer pronunciation. The machine sounds were awesome and breaking Tsukimoto out of his shell hopefully won't take too long.
 
ヒーロー見参！！

The OP theme is not bad, but I miss the Supercar feels from the live action movie. :/

The ED theme is pretty close...
 
Episode 2

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Yeah it's rather hard to say much about the show other than "it's fucking amazing" after watching each episode. The way the visuals carry the character psychologies and play style is fantastic, and the timing in the matches and also in the dialogue between characters is really fantastic. Sogood.
 
The sharpness of the editing and of Yuasa's storyboards (the robot part in episode 2 was a particularly strongly boarded moment) are certainly what's carrying the show.
 
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