Warning: Profane language, sexual imagery, potential seizure trigger like whoa, alcohol
Title: Drink Responsibly
Editors: King Redeem, GlitzerAMVs
Audio Source: South Park
Anime: Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon, Re:Zero, Redline (film), Keijo!!!, Black Lagoon, Yuri!!! on Ice, Gintama, One Punch Man, Natsume Yuujinchou Shi
I’m probably as shocked as you are that I decided to go through with this show and talk about it. Rest assured, I intend to talk about this show about a seriously as it takes itself.
(Just take deep breaths, and you’ll get through this.)
Last year, I figured that it would be fun to watch the show on April 1st as a joke. I knew I would be home from grad school and I figured I would get some laughs from it. I started it too late to marathon it that day, so I picked it back up on June 9th because I have less creativity than I’m given credit for. I’d finish it a few days after that.
To be honest, it’s an okay show. I doubt anyone thought this show would end up becoming the next Ashita no Joe or Haikyuu (RIP), but I was expecting something with as crazy a concept as this show to be much worse than it was. I don’t plan on revisiting it, but it kind of bums me out to know we’re not getting more of this story. (Only kind of.) This might be the subject of another post, but I’m not a huge fan of ecchi or the ecchi discourse (especially as it pertains to Fairy Tail). This show did little to convert me to the dark side.
What did strike me as interesting about this show is that it takes itself seriously. I can’t stress this enough for the people who haven’t seen this show. With a concept like “ecchi sumo”, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Keijo is a joke sport. I mean, who would take this kind of thing seriously?
Apparently, the people in the series universe do.
This show takes place in an academy where girls go to learn the sport. One of many schools where people learn the sport. Once they graduate, they join professional groups and can win prize money - a big motivation for the main character - and widespread fame. They have special training exercises and gear. The main team takes part in a competition to be in the advanced class where they get special perks, eat better food, and join in a training camp to compete in a competition with the other top school in Japan for Keijo in the country.
The show starts with an explanation that keijo has developed as a new form of sports betting. When I saw this, my mind went crazy trying to find a way for that to make sense. I’m sure that this would make an interesting subject for analysis as, at least in my case, it tints the actions of this world in a pretty weird light.
And then the special moves came up.
Yes, their are special moves in this series. I don’t mean like the freak quick in Haikyuu, where it’s at least somewhat grounded in reality. I’m talking DBZ level special moves and modes are adopted and treated like the different styles of magic in Fairy Tail. It’s like “oh, that’s your power” rather than “that’s even something we can do here?”. If you want to be in the professional leagues, you have to come up with some kind of ability. Or have an ability that copies a number of abilities.
Around the time I started to draft this post, I saw a clip from one of the games, known as races, and figured I’d check out the comments. One person made a comment that struck me as interesting. Essentially, one of the problems with the series was exactly that it played itself seriously despite the crazy things happening in it. And that was another thing I saw people complain about in regards to this show. Why would anyone take this type of thing seriously?
Then again, why wouldn’t it take itself seriously?
Goofy premise aside, Keijo is a sports show. The sport requires a level of training, skill, and coordination to execute on any meaningful level. Anyone who has ever done any sport knows that it’s important to use the right technique or risk injury. That’s a real part of the show, especially given special moves are a thing and the one the main character uses is known to end careers.
Consider that this is coming from a blog primarily about a series that presents magic and dragons as realities. We often have to accept the wacky and insane realities of a series in order to get any enjoyment from it. this concept is commonly known as suspension of disbelief. We suspend out disbelief of an element in a fictional work. Personally, I like to think of it as an economy of belief. Am I able to buy into this element working?
Keijo serves as an interesting test of the individual abilities of a person to buy into the elements of its series. Of course, I imagine the average person isn’t able to buy into the idea of a world where keijo is a popular sport, let alone that this same world has its special abilities. Part of the reason I don’t love it is because I can only look at this show as a joke. A well-directed, decently well written, beautifully animated joke. But a joke nonetheless.
At the same time, I don’t know that it’s bad that a series like Keijo does exist and does take itself seriously. It’s definitely a novel take on the sports anime. Kuroko no Basket was big and it revolved around basketball players with special abilities. (Though it confined them to a select group of special people.) And Keijo is the second anime focused on women’s sports with ecchi elements I’ve seen. (Third, if you count shows I’ve seen one episode for.)
In one of the weirder Monkey’s Paw tricks in my life, I’ve been getting more interested in sports series since seeing Keijo. I had already finished a number of sports anime before Keijo. However, I started more actively seeking sports shows, aside from the standard recommendations and current airing shows. I read my first sports manga, Teppu, and have a few other series I plan to get to. I’ve definitely come to enjoy the tropes sports anime are built around.
