JakCooperThePlumber

Quick warning, there might be major spoilers in this review, so read at your own desecration.

Welcome to a new show on my channel called Anime Favorites, where go in depth analyzing some of my favorite anime series of all time! First on my list is Hikaru no Go, a 75 episode Shonen, Sports, Tournament, Coming-of-Age anime series from 2001.

First I wanna say, I really wish I watched this when I was a kid. It has a lot of that classic Shonen feel, and honestly, it’s far better than most of them. The story revolves around Hikaru Shindo, a middle school boy who finds a Go board in his grandfather’s attic; after noticing blood stains on it, a spirit manifests into the world, known as Fujiwara no Sai, a Go Master from an earlier time. While Hikaru is reluctant to play Go at first, he eventually relents and visits a Go Salon; his first opponent is Akira Toya, the son of the national champion, and everyone is shocked when he wins; although it wasn’t actually him, it was Fujiwara no Sai. This is when HIkaru’s journey to learn more about and improve at Go begins, Sai being right by his side along the way.

The character’s are what makes this show; while each Go match is very detailed and elaborate, I wasn’t able to keep up with them personally, so the only draw for me to continue was the cast, and thankfully I wasn’t let down. Hikaru no Go provided me with some very complex, likable, flawed characters who I could really relate to and rally behind. My favorite was Sai himself. He was a Go Master from the Heien period. After being framed for cheating during a Go match, in which it was actually his opponent who cheated, he was shamed and fell into depression, walking into the river and never again emerging. Due to his unceremonious death, his soul bonded with the Go board he last played on. He awakened one other time, to inhabit the body of a person named Honinbo Shuusaku and help him one of the greatest Go players ever, just like he would eventually do with Hikaru.

Sai works on so many levels; he clearly cares for Hikaru, but isn’t afraid to tease him, (which can be pretty funny), and is unbelievably badass whenever he plays Go seriously; this is how you create complex characters, give them several different personality traits without them any of them contradicting each other, and continuously reinforce them throughout the show. And Brad Swaile’s excellent voice work definitely helps bring life to this character. Seriously, I love this guy. And I’ll be honest, I almost cried during episodes 60-70 when Sai disappears and Hikaru gets depressed.

I also loved Hikaru as well. It’s so easy to fuck up angsty kids in anime, and Hikaru is done well. He does have moments of being angry for seemingly no reason, even at his childhood friend Akari, and he does have his own depressive state for 10 strait episodes, but it never compromises his likability. For most of the series, I just got the impression that he’s any normal kid; I’ve personally seen countless kids exactly like him. And the depressive state he sunk in after Sai vanished was also justifiable because of how likable Sai was; both aspects made him very relatable, and not just another angsty, douchy teen.

Hikaru’s lowest point in the show is made even more sad by the fact that nobody else knew about Sai. Both Akira Toyo and Toyo Meijin felt like there was someone else inside of Hikaru giving him strength, but even they didn’t know the full story. If someone else did know Sai’s disappearance would’ve been easier on him because he’d have someone else to lean on for emotional support, but he has nobody, because nobody knew why he was acting the way he was, even though it was reasonable.

I also really liked Akira Toya and his father Toya Meijin. At the beginning, Akira Toya is a child who is attempting to go pro in spite of his age to follow in his father’s footsteps. After loosing to who he thinks is Hikaru at the Go Salon, with everyone watching, it affects him on an emotional level, and his primary goal throughout the story becomes not only improving as a professional Go player, but also to play Hikaru again, and win. He’s so selfishly desperate for a rematch that he joins the Go Club at Hikaru’s middle school in spite of his skill being far beyond theirs, and gets visibly angry when he feels Hikaru isn’t giving it his all--that is, when Hikaru is actually facing him instead of Sai--and when Hikaru disrespects the practice of Go.

Toya Meijin was supposedly the greatest Go Master in the world. He’s fascinating for several reasons, but the biggest is how they depict what I like to call “The Burden of the Master.” Digibro already discussed this concept in a vlog which I’ll link down below, but the general theme is when someone masters their craft, whatever it may be, it makes them unrelatable to others. This is clearly seen regarding the Meijin’s relationships with others; his own wife is baffled by him, and can’t understand why he would stake so much on what she sees as a “simple game,” and the nurse who looks after whilst he’s hospitalized feels the same way. The only ones who he can converse with as equals are the other Go Masters on the show, and his son.

I view all the other characters below those four; none of them are terrible, but they aren’t as good or memorable as the ones I just mentioned. Akari’s the generic childhood friend, whose only reason for playing Go is because of Hikaru, and at a certain point becomes less and less prominent as the series progresses, only showing up at the most important moments; Yuki Mitani was crucial for just like a few episodes early on, but started being almost non-existent after his development concluded; and no others are worth a mention. The story very much belongs to Hikaru Shindo, Akira Toya, Sai, and Toya Meijin, and the rest are just support for their development.

The best part of the show are the intense, exciting Go matches, which take up it’s largest duration. On one hand, it had the risk being horribly uninteresting to me because I don’t care at all about Go. However, I don’t care any more about Go than I did before watching, it remained interesting by delving into each player’s mind as they competed, and showing their strategies in full. I’ll admit most of it went over my head, but I don’t have to understand something to know how smart it is. And even if I did, the intensity is also apparent; especially when two pros are facing each other, such as when Toya Meijin is facing Kuwabara Honinbo, Seiji Ogata, or ESPECIALLY Fujiwara no Sai.

Hikaru no Go feels like three types of anime combined; Shonen Battle Anime in terms of the intensity and creativeness of the battles, sports anime regarding the tournament format of the show, and, to a lesser extent, a gambling anime, which covers the stakes of the matches. While the stakes aren’t as high as in, say, Kaiji, in which characters reguarly gamble body parts, precious belongings, or their very lives, the stakes are still pretty high because loosing means one of two things; early in the show it meant Hikaru wouldn’t become a Pro, and later in the show too many losses would mean he’d get his Pro status revoked. If either occurred, that would not only mean several years of Hikaru’s life would’ve been completely wasted, but he also had no backup plan, so he’d basically be fucked.

There were a few side plots that I wasn’t a fan of and I felt needlessly extended the length of the show. The biggest offender is Isumi Shinichiro. It’s not like he’s a bad character, but did we really need 4 episodes of him training in China? It wouldn’t have been that bad if it happened during the earlier episodes, but it happened right after Sai disappears and the most crucial part of Hikaru’s character arc begins, but we have to keep going between his story and Isumi’s story, and it really bothered me.

In addition to that, there was also the character arc of the compulsive cheater Yuki Mitani. Not only was it an unnecessary distraction from the main plot, but it was also just poorly written in general. It would’ve been better if they attempted to give him a, maybe not justifiable, but understandable reason for cheating. Let’s say, for example, if he had a sick relative, such as a sibling, parent, or grandparent, and he needed money to help them get better, and to do so he was determined to win Go no matter what the cost, even cheating. Yeah, it’s cliche, and it would take a bit more work to turn him into a truly great character, but it still would’ve been better than what we got, which was a selfish child who just cheated for the sake of cheating; sure, a lot of kids are like that, but it makes him very shallow and uninteresting. Not to mention, his change of mindset wasn’t properly developed either, it just kind of happened.

Probably the most interesting theme in Hikaru no Go is the difference between those with talent and those without. I already talked about Toya Meijin above, whose the prime example of someone with immense talent becoming disconnected with the rest of the world, but every character with what it means to be truly skilled at Go, and contemplate on multiple occasions if they’ll ever be able to become Masters. Of course all of the main characters do end up becoming Pros, because this is a Shonen anime at the end of the day, but it doesn’t happen without shit loads of trials, and characters almost giving up. I don’t think I’ve ever seen an anime that talks about talent and the struggle of both those with and without talent in this way, and I really loved it.

In all, despite it’s flaws, Hikaru no Go is one of my favorite anime. It’s a great show, with likable, complex characters, and the fascinating theme of Go which serves as a unique backdrop to explore these characters. Hikaru no Go can be viewed in it’s entirety in both sub and dub on Viz and Hulu, and I do recommend it. It can be kind of slow at points, but it’s an overall worthwhile experience, weather you’re a relative newcomer to anime, or a vitrine whose watched anime for years. 

FINAL SCORE: 9/10