Tennis No Ojisama
Overview
Tennis No Ojisama(Prince of Tennis), follows the life of Ryoma Echizen, a young boy starting his freshmen year at Seigaku Junior High. His father, a former world tennis pro and student at Seigaku, has taught his son all he knows of the game and set him loose on the japanese tennis world. Hilarity ensues.
Storyline & Narrative
Seigaku has had a long standing tradition of no freshmen being on its regulars team. This basically means that while freshman are part of the team they can't play in the tournaments, only the schools top 8 players may. Well Echizen bypasses this rule completely. Combined with him are his team, the sanke like Kaidoh, Power hitters, Taka, and Momo, the acrobatic Eiji, the calculating and sometimes saddistic Inui, the genius player Fuji, the inspirational Oishi, and finally the cold-harded and demanding captian Tezuka. This team of misfits set off with one goal in mind, the All-Japan Championship Title, but no one ever said it was going to be easy.
Characters & Dynamics
The second thing that adds more to this series are its characters, both the players of Seigaku's team, and their rival players are given quite the character build, you get an idea on how each of them thinks, especially when you find many of the oppenents appearing again and again throughout the series. And when you get to know a character so well you feel you could be standing in their shoes how can you not like a series?
Animation & Visual Direction
Now anyone out there that isn't a tennis fan, I'm sure you'ld find the idea of sitting here and watching a tennis anime boring. I originally thought the same thing, but the animation was one of the 2 things that really made this series much more interesting. All of their shots and techinques are given a lot more depth do to the visual effects of animation, that you'll never find at a real tennis game.
Voice Acting & Soundtrack
I really think they did a great job casting their voice actors, all the voices seem to really fit the characters and their personalities. I don't have any information on the english voice talent since this series has yet to be licensed in America, but I'll be keeping my fingers cross, and hoping it comes to DVD here soon.
