 | | ▪ | RELEASED BY: | | VIZ MEDIA | | | ▪ | AUTHOR / ART: | | TAKESHI KONOMI | | | ▪ | FORMAT: | | JAPANESE / BW | | | ▪ | PAGES: | | 163 | | | ▪ | RATING: | | A | | | ▪ | RELEASE DATE: | | 04/07/2008 | | | ▪ | REVIEW DATE: | | 04/05/2008 | | | ▪ | REVIEWED BY: | | SANDRA SCHOLES |
Ryoma earns his team jersey and continues his playing, but when the nationals are coming up Rikkai Junior High’s Akaya Kirihara, a tennis ace spies on Seishun Academy’s team to size up how good their players are when he bumps into Ryoma, the Prince, and after hearing all about the 7th grader, he feels he will be up against him in a match soon enough and will see first hand just how good he is.
Training is exhausting; Ryoma and the competitors are put through their paces with Shinji proving to be a dangerous adversary. Ryoma finds training and competing harder than he imagined. He has made a few friends but there is the taint of bitter rivalry among the other players and him. Sumire encourages the boy to keep training and he will realise his dream of being the best, but Ryoma is not so sure about this, and as there are more challenges ahead for him, he wonders how he will cope with this new life in the competitive world of tennis. By now Ryoma has come to the conclusion training is hard and he also sees what his father had to go through to prove himself in his own tournaments. The reader will get the impression he wants to show his dad his legacy of success has been left with him.
He has made many friends, and realises they are real, such as Takeshi who seems to have taken him under his wing and provided him with someone to look up to who will in a way protect him from the more crueller elements of the Academy. Ryoma is starting to hold his own among the players, and is forging himself a career in much the same way as his father did, though he does not realise that yet. Takeshi shows the reader the nature of tennis tournaments and the ranked players with their strange and demanding personalities. The sequential art is well drawn, fast and filled with much energy the fans will love. IN SUMMARY:
Over the net! Five stars for this hit. |
