Feel the Wind-1
My interest is already much higher with this than any point with Ballroom so hopefully it recaptures some of that Haikyuu magic. Also thankfully while the OP is trash, the ED is fantastic.
This is a really great premise and setup that is hampered by bizarre directing. So the anime introduces the two MCs and then rapidly goes and introduces the rest of the team only to then jump backwards and explain how the two characters end up in the dorm. Why? It would have either made more sense to skip the background stuff altogether, save it for later, or simply use a chronological format. It's puzzling because the show hints at Kurahara having a shady past so I thought they were going to save that for an important moment later but then they go and explain his current circumstances almost immediately. It's almost as if the director didn't have confidence in either the material or audiences to still be paying attention if the eccentric dorm members weren't introduced immediately. As a result you have a first half that is too quick in its pacing and a second half hampered by that decision.
All of that is a shame as the premise is fantastic in that the cast is made up almost entirely of unwilling participants, many of whom physically can't do the marathon right now. That's a bit different from something like Haikyuu as here the resistance to do the running will be multitudes stronger. It's going to be a full-on fight. The two primary characters also show a lot of potential with Kurahara obviously having emotional issues from some track event in his past and Kiyose's obvious frustration with being unable to run due to injury. I'm finding those two to be significantly more intriguing leads than the characters from Welcome to the Ballroom. The individuals in the dorm also seem like fun and the party when they all were interacting might be an indication of the chemistry of the group, something important in a large cast like this. The dog is max cute too.
My interest is already much higher with this than any point with Ballroom so hopefully it recaptures some of that Haikyuu magic. Also thankfully while the OP is trash, the ED is fantastic.
