Of all the ways I was expecting this premier to go… I certainly wasn’t expecting “Star gymnast attempts to retire but ends up taking in a foreign ninja into his home” to be how we started out the series. But hey! This unexpected twist was pretty fun and makes me excited to see what more the series has to offer. I’m interested to see if they are planning to take a more light-hearted tone throughout the series, or if we’ll flip between more series segments and comedy – I think there’s a lot of potential over all!
I was pretty charmed by the characters and their interactions in this episode, so I am looking forward to more interactions and more characters to be introduced. Sure some of them seem pretty weird and out of the blue, but I think they provided a good balance throughout the episode – and if anything, these stranger characters and interactions honestly bought our protagonist some time to let his own thoughts and feelings sink in. I appreciate that Aragaki is just a guy trying to keep a positive attitude and do his best. Yeah, his best could arguable be better, but it’s nice that we’ve already had a chance to see a bit of his internal conflict and dialogue. He’s stuck in a hard position from the beginning of the episode due to a shoulder injury essentially leading to his coach telling him to retire from Gymnastics – which is a big deal since it’s been a significant part of his life for a long time! It’s not going to be easy to make that announcement, and even telling his daughter? Who looks up to him for it? Of course, that would be hard!
That being said, when I say I was charmed by the characters and their interactions, I think the interactions between Aragaki, and his daughter definitely brought the most in terms of warm feelings. It’s tragic that his wife and her mom passed away, but I’m happy to see that the two of them still have a pretty strong relationship. They went on a trip together not only to the place of his honeymoon, but he also chose Edo Wonderland because his daughter is a big fan of Ninjas and that really makes me smile! I mean, in context he did in order to break some potentially upsetting news to her, but at least they went and did something fun that they would have both enjoyed. At least he was saved when government agents showed up to attempt to capture a foreign ninja. Well…. at the very least it bought him more time. And quite frankly it made the retirement thing much less of a priority in that moment.
And hey! While the Ninja, Leo, is a stranger in the house, I happy that he’s added into the cast because his personality is so energetic. Having him around, really shifts the mood from more sober and sad, to much more lighthearted. Of course, I will have to how that continues throughout the series… I can imagine him getting to be… a little bit too much, but we’ll have to see. So far, I think he’s a nice addition to their home and to at least keep spirits up for now. Plus, there is no telling where he’ll appear or what he’ll do, so he’ll always keep us on our toes! And quite frankly, I think Big Bird will get on my nerves first out of everything… In fact… I don’t really like that he’s there to begin with, but we’ll see.
Overall, I was pretty happy with this premier even though it went in a completely different direction than I thought it would! I’m interested to see if they will focus more on Aragaki’s recovery and development in the sport or if it will be more a found family situation with gymnastics as the tying factor – either way, I’m very excited to watch more episodes. I think it has the potential to be a solid series!
Possibility of Watching: Guaranteed!
Possibility of Blogging: Very High!
