I started watching Prince of Stride last night.
And. I love it? Like? A lot a lot??
I swear, sports-anime are just my weakness. I love that team-feeling and the fact that there’s just... never romance in them. Like, sports-anime are about the only damn anime where female characters are allowed to just be... characters? Teammates and friends. Granted, there’s about one female in every sports-anime, but oh well.
I also really-really like the main character. Takeru is a lot like the protagonist from Free!. I mean, not just because of the black hair and exact same hair-cut and blue eyes, but Haruka and Takeru share that same stoic, single-minded focus and that desire to just jump right in and do more of the sports.
But damn do I also already have ship feels. (I’m three episodes in...)
I mean, TakeRiku is like the obvious one. Takeru literally carries the blonde into the club-room like “This one is mine now”. The two have a great dynamic. I’m normally never one to ship the “obvious” one, aka the protagonist and his partner (like Kuroko no Basuke’s Tetsu and Kagami or Haikyuu!!‘s Kageyama and Shouyou just never really swung for me). But I feel like I could make an exception to that rule for Riku and Takeru.
Though, legit the strongest ship-feels so far are Reiji and Takeru.
Literally from the moment they first laid eyes on each other.
To the first tentative touch of hands, which is literally such a fanfiction cliche but sue me.
And then that damn parting line. Like, really? Takeru made your heart flutter, Reiji? Please, tell me more.
Yeah no, I am 100% sailing TakeRei. Definitely. Really cute.
But seeeriously, I am currently regretting that I waited two damn years to watch this? Somehow, I scoffed and thought “Hah, parkouring as a sport. Suuure. That’s not gonna work”. It definitely works better for me than the ice-skating did because this is actually a team-sport and I just live for the team-dynamics and team-feels in sports-anime. That is literally why I watch them.









