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Haikyu!! Second Season
Episode 12

by Rebecca Silverman,

How would you rate episode 12 of
Haikyu!! Second Season (TV 2) ?
Community score: 4.2

One of the strengths of Haikyu!! is that it doesn't keep its focus too narrow. That means that we know the team outside of the sport, at least to a degree, but it also means that even though Karasuno is the team we're rooting for, we still get to learn about their opponents as more than guys wearing a different colored shirt. This episode starts the qualifying matches for the Tokyo spring tournament, so Karasuno is up against some new opponents as they try to make their way back to the Kanto region. Their first match (they've been seeded in, remember) is against a team that appears to be made up entirely of thugs. Naturally Hinata has a run-in with one of their most intimidating looking players immediately; that it happens while he's singing a lovely little ditty about how he has to pee is just adding insult to injury.

As it turns out, both Hinata and the apparent thug learn not to judge by appearances, because it turns out that this team is no match for Karasuno. It's nice to see Karasuno actually winning again, all the better because of all of those weeks of lost games while they were training in Tokyo. It's really paid off, and even if this match isn't as intense as past ones have been, it's still exciting to watch. Partially this is because we mostly see it through the other team's eyes – and to them, it looks like Karasuno's playing is effortless. We viewers know better, but that's part of the fascination of the episode – seeing the group we've been watching so closely through the gaze of outsiders.

This also, as I mentioned above, gives us the opportunity to get to know the opposing team. It doesn't matter that they may never show up again; understanding that they have a tendency to get intimidated or depressed and just give up lets us infer some things about their play style and feelings about being at the tournament. Early on in the episode, outside the bathroom, Hinata is told that no matter how much he wants it, Shiratorizawa will just win like they always do. This basically sums up the entire team – they may as well just be happy being decent enough to get to the preliminaries, because that's as good as they'll ever be. And even if they're better, who cares? It's not like they'll really win anyway. The match with Karasuno (to say nothing of Hinata's crazed determination) helps them to see what their third-year captain was trying to tell them – that there's no excuse not to keep on trying.

Of course, the episode isn't entirely as serious as all of this would suggest. It opens with at least three members of Karasuno (Asahi, Hinata, and Yamaguchi) having a case of the barfs and Kageyama vowing to improve his insult vocabulary beyond “dumbass.” Later on, in what might actually be the best scene of the week, the team is freaking out while looking at their two-meter tall next opponent while Kiyoko, passing by, comments to herself that Tanaka looks really good with a banana. Presumably she means because he's like a monkey, but there are a couple of ways you could take it...

With another twelve episodes awaiting us, it seems pretty certain that Karasuno is going to win this next game, but I can't help feeling tense all the same. That big guy sure is big, and Karasuno has two very short players in its lineup; hopefully that will just make the other team underestimate them. (Or they could put a shark on Hinata's head to make up the difference.) It should be a good game next week when we officially move into the show's second half, bringing Hinata one step closer to getting where he wants to be.

Rating: A-

Haikyu!! Second Season is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.


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