Forum - View topicAce of Diamond (TV).
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Gina Szanboti
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And six years later, here
They picked up exactly where S1 left off, with a handful of repeated scenes from last season. New animation studio I think. OP and ED songs are ok. It might just be my imagination, but it seems like there's a little more effort to actually animate the action, though there are still plenty of speed lines and still frames to be sure. At least their artists seem to know what the characters are supposed to look like, unlike S1 where it looked like they were based on napkin sketches. As for the game, they won in a romp. Part of the other team's problem may have been their shortstop who is apparently blind, at least every time he batted. Maybe he was just having a seizure from nerves and his eyes were rolled back in his head. It's a character design I'm having trouble rationalizing. 
 (click for larger image)
Anyway, so happy we're getting more of this. I just wish it was in a less crowded season, as it seems to get lost even in a light one. |
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Edjwald
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This is another anime where I'm going to have to at least skim the first season. I just got back wiped from a family visit and have the day off, so today might be a good day to seriously crash on the couch and do that.
I remember liking the first season, but I've watched at least three other baseball anime all the way through since then (not including Catch me at the Ballpark but including two seasons of Mix which I liked even more) and I'm a little blurry. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12781 |
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::faints from the shock of another poster::
If you watched the first season (I assume you mean of the whole series), just read through all the posts here.  You can probably get an idea of what happened over the other seasons. Of course it's more fun to just watch the episodes, especially S2 (Act II Pt.1 was so low budget it was very frustrating to watch), but that's a lot if you're in a hurry.
I hope you stick around. It's been lonely in here. 
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Edjwald
Posts: 3682 |
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What I did was, instead of trying to watch keypoint episodes, I read all of the episode captions (which took a lot of time by itself) and got little memory flashes. Basically, I remember the coach, Miyiki, Furuya, and the team manager pretty clearly. I remember some rival pitchers but can't get their names and faces straight. And I distinctly remember feeling that every time it looks like Sawamura is finally going to kick @$$ and go on a blazing winning streak, someone or something happens to screw it up. And whenever things seem hopeless, a minor redemption arc starts up and they regain just a little more progress than they lost. From what I recall, watching the team try to move forward to the championship is like watching someone who doesn't know how to drive stick.
But I find it compelling. I found the first episode of..(it can't really just be season 2?) kind of ominous in that there wasn't anything too ominous about it. But I liked watching Sawamara and his catcher find their rhythm, and I like seeing Sawamara and Furuya's rivalry maturing, and I enjoyed watching Sawamura get to be an (fill in dramatic pause and cheesy inflection here) Ace of the Diamond. Yes, I know that was bad, but I'm not deleting it. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12781 |
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That's perfect. 
There are now 4 seasons: S1, S2, Act II S1, and the current Act II S2. So I'm not certain which S2 you mean, but I'll assume the current one. I'm serious about reading my posts covering Act II S1 for a quick catch up. Like I couldn't remember who Kawabata was when they were comparing him to Nara at the wind down of this episode, but ta-dah! I mentioned him during his little AIIS1 arc in Eps 51-52. Plus there are some fun links and info here and there, esp. post season. (/shameless plug) But yeah, this is far from the pinnacle of anime, but it is compelling for sure. |
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Edjwald
Posts: 3682 |
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I just know it's been a crazy number of episodes. But, I'll check out the thread fee sure. Hope people liked the coach.
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Ren-Ren#1
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Hiiii! I'm super happy we've gotten a new season after so long. It's so funny that I literally just looked up the series at either the very end of March or the first few days of April, saw an article from March 2025 that a new season was green-lit then a day or two later realized it was starting THIS season
If I'd had a bit more warning I'd have started working through the series again, but I did watch the last ep of the previous season and I think I'm pretty good to go. Though I feel embarrassed that I actually forgot Miyuki's name when he's probably my favorite character 
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Edjwald
Posts: 3682 |
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I'm kind of bummed that it sounds like they're gearing up for a Haikyuu! type move where the upperclassmen on the team are going to graduate. I don't know if that's the near or distant future in anime terms (I mean, you can easily burn three episodes on a single game), but I like Miyuki too.
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12781 |
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That's a long way away though. Either they have a short summer and Miyuki's class graduates, leaving a whole nother year for Eijun to get to Koshien finally, or they have a long summer and then the current team goes to Koshien. The former option would just take too long and feel like starting the series over, except with Eijun already the ace. Since a goodly portion of this whole story has been seen through Miyuki's eyes, I can't imagine Terajima would kick him in the nuts and deny him his last shot at winning the Big K. It's only Eijun he enjoys tormenting with humiliating failures.
Welcome Ren-Ren! Is your sn a ref to Oofuri's Mihashi?  Since you have seen all of AoD so far, I'll suggest again that the earlier posts here are useful as crib notes to refresh your memory and get you back up to speed (even though we complained a lot early on  ).
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Edjwald
Posts: 3682 |
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Welp, I scrolled through the comments, and my main two reactions were (1) wow, there were a lot more posters around in 2015. (2) I figured that people were going to be rough on the coach. But it did remind me of a lot of things, as did episode two, which helped me connect the name Amahisa to the face I remembered. Raichi too, who for some reason I remembered as Hideroki.
As to episode, I was surprised to find the game between two rivals of Seido high as involving as a game with the MC. And that's in spite of the fact that I don't really care which team wins because a showdown between Sawamara and an ace pitcher or between Sawamara and a batting demon could be gold either way. That said, Amahisa's grin was looking a little strained there at the end, and they showed a stream of sweat trickling down his face as the scene ended. Also, I'm not exactly a baseball expert, but instead of choking up, couldn't the batters back just a little off the plate when Sanada is pitching? If Sanada still threw close to their chest, it wouldn't be in the strike zone anymore. If he threw close to their chest and it curved out, or if he threw to the outer right side of the zone, the batters could either swing or step in since Sanada's speed isn't his primary strength. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12781 |
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Yeah, the four years between Act I and II killed the discussion, in part because a lot of those posters just don't post here at all anymore, or rarely. I miss them.
 And yeah, I didn't much like this series at first because of how senselessly they treated Eijun, but obviously it won me over in the end.
Haruichi has used the stepping in ploy before, but I guess with Sanada it's hard to tell which way it will curve (even he's said he's not always sure) until it's too late, so a faster swing can help. Ep 2 Ok, forget what I said about this being slightly more animated than AIIS1. This episode seemed even less animated than ever. And too many off model shots, though not yet the worst (hope I didn't just jinx it). Plus every overhead shot of the pitcher's mound made it look more like an antlion pit than a mound. I think one of the problems with animating this is that so much is going on inside their heads during the one or two seconds their movements would actually take that speed lines and tornado-driven uniform flapping is not a bad way to freeze that time without totally freezing it. But it's like they thought, "Hey, we got away with that, let's try it everywhere!" I don't know why the subtitlers have changed Tahara's tic of calling his players "[name] boy" by making it "[name] m'boy." That was always part of his peppering his speech with slightly off-usage English ("Let's go and go and go!"), and normalizing it to "m'boy" just feels wrong. Wish we'd gotten to at least see Tomobe. He's an interesting fellow, kinda like AoD's answer to Oofuri's Tajima, except quieter.
I know I'm complaining a lot. I enjoyed the episode despite everything, I'm just disappointed that we can never get a better looking product compared to series like Haikyuu!! or Mix. Mizuno needs to up their sponsorship money!
Even though the spectators moved more than the players, there weren't as many eye-catching ones as last season. This pretty lady stood out most to me. 
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Edjwald
Posts: 3682 |
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That game had a lot of ups and downs to put it mildly. I had a feeling that Yakushi was going to win and stuck by that bet only to be proven wrong. I spotted every red flag where a player thought it was in the bag a moment too soon, but I didn't call the win. Just goes to show, it's a good thing I've never met a bookie.
I thought the comment that taking the lead early is its own kind of intense pressure was interesting. And true. I have to admire how the show manages to hyperinflate baseball games until they look like mythical showdowns between baseball titans. And there was a certain irony to poor Raichi looking like a Tasmanian Devil on fire for most of the game, fixating on batting so much that both losing plays involved his fielding (though that last play couldn't really be laid on him). Ouch. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12781 |
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Ep 3
Pretty decent episode with perhaps slightly more motion, or at least the illusion of movement. Even quite a few of the portrait stills were nice looking. At first I thought that double Todoroki hit over the 2nd baseman was caught because the ball just vanished mid-air. There's a single frame of it just past his glove, but unless it then kicked into warp drive there should have been at least one more frame of it before it flew out of the shot.
But I always get a kick out of Raichi's baserunning antics. And frankly I'm surprised but pleased they showed his usual on-base restlessness even though he was in the background. They could easily have avoided doing that by just shifting the camera angle. I had to check the credits to be sure that Kamiya was still voicing Sanada. He just sounds so different, gruffer somehow. Could just be he's getting older. Wonder how he'll sound in Natsume season 8 whenever it drops. Looks like this season everyone is stealing fire from Furuya, albeit in different colors. His bursts of blue flames never got old for me, but if everyone starts combusting it just might lose its cachet. Despite all the crying in baseball, what I liked best about this ep was how much Kosei and Raichi really enjoyed their duels. Of course, I can't forget Kosei crushing on him in S1. Let the mass production of K/R fan fics begin! 
This week's non-generic spectators are this pair, especially the guy on the left. I still think these are people Terajima or someone on staff knows. 
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Edjwald
Posts: 3682 |
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I disliked Furuya for a good while - not actively disliked him, it's just hard to like someone when you're rooting for the MC to take him out. But I like how he and Sawamara are combining to create an Ace for the team.
It occurred to me that Amahisa's team won because he stepped up and excelled while batting and stealing - not his strongpoint or his comfort zone. Todoroki's team lost because he got complacent and didn't step up his fielding - not his strongpoint or his comfort zone. I just wonder if the writer was trying to make a point there. I liked the locker-room shenanigan's where Sawamara's phone got taken by force. I've seen Sawamara get @#$%ed over by luck or fate too many times to breathe easy, but I'm really hoping he steps up when he steps up to the mound. |
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Gina Szanboti
Posts: 12781 |
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Ep 4
Wow, they got a full 8 seconds out of that freeze frame of Mei just by reusing the spinning ball cells. Personally, I think it would've made a more interesting matchup to pit Seiko against Ichidai instead of Inashiro. Given the dustup between Kousei and Ogawa after the Seido/Seiko game, and Kousei having since learned just how it feels to lose a game because of him, I'd have liked to see them interact again. Btw, is this guy wearing #10 supposed to be Ogawa pitching? He used to be 11, and a lot of Seiko's guys look alike, so I'm not 100% sure. If so, it appears he's stopped plucking his eyebrows.  (click for larger image)
Heh, Sosei's pitcher looks like J. Conrad from the Wynd Youth team.
That was one sweet double play from the dynamic duo. ::flip!:: Our intrepid reporter Fujio and his gf Akiko are back. For once she didn't say anything overtly stupid. Somehow she got much shorter during the break, though she seems to have had a growth spurt during the game.  
"Unbreakable closer"? Was he talking about Nori?? As much as I love the boy and am happy when he does well or gets any recognition (from anyone besides Ōta), from the very beginning he's always looked terrified to be on the mound, and he nearly always falls apart in the clutch. That said, he does seem to have finally developed some self-confidence, which is nice, but can only presage disaster down the road, since this is AoD and nothing good goes unpunished. I have to say, they did some really nice work with Furuya's pitching animation. See, I can give credit where it's due. Let's see more of that please. And the comedy around Eijun's phone was good. Contrast his attitude now with his insane accusations when Miyuki just talked to Inashiro's guys.
Ok, complaining time! What the heck was that with Furuya's slouch toward  (click for larger image)
There were so many shots where it looked like the artists forgot that men also have waists and hips. Like our Lego boys here:  (click for larger image)
One more thing I've noticed in general about the art is how it always looks like the characters, moving or not, are just pasted over the backgrounds. Even when proportions are correct and on model, there's still this uncanny, amateurish look to it all that is keeping me at arms length, no matter how desperately I want to embrace it. It's like I can't immerse myself in it when the characters don't look like they exist within that environment either. If you're not seeing it, lucky for you! Really! I wish I could get past it.
This week's crowd theme is Shocked, shocked!! Again, I think the first guy on the left is a shout-out.   
@ Edjwald: I think I've almost always liked Furuya better than Sawamura, except when he let his ego get the better of him (and even Miyuki got fed up with that. ). If it hadn't been for all his injuries, he'd have left Eijun in his dust by now.
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