I mean I don't want to undersell it Medalist is an extremely compelling psychological drama of a sports manga that focuses really extensively on mentor & student relationships and neurodiversity and self-esteem & self-hatred and public pressure and child abuse and trauma and the way it impacts people's lives and has crafted a narrative so compelling that it's titular childhood abuse survivor character won #1 in the popularity poll above both the protagonists and whose portrayal of cptsd and found family I find probably one of the most compelling ones in media that I've ever seen. It's just also extremely gay
Ohhh you’ve already sold it to me with that one lol. Honestly I was already considering checking Medalist out since it seems really intriguing: stories about child abuse that are both realistic & don’t try to push some kind of shitty reconciliation arc at the last minute in a way that feels slightly apologetic towards the parental figure(s) while undermining the victim’s suffering & right to be mad at them are extremely rare to find, and Medalist feels like a nice divergence from that route.
Honestly the only reason why I haven’t checked it out yet is because I genuinely don’t have the time & energy lol, buuuuut I promise that I’ll give it a try once I have a bit of free time. I just don’t know whether I should start from the anime or jump directly into the manga :P.
