Ro-Kyu-Bu! (Ro-Kyu-Bu ~ Fast Break!)

Subaru Hasegawa has the ambition to become one of the best basketball superstars of all time. However, this comes to an apparent halt when his school's basketball team ceases activities for a year. Shocked by the news, he decides not to involve himself in basketball anymore.

One day, his aunt Mihoshi Takamura invites him to coach the Keishin Academy girls’ basketball team on how to play the sport, and he reluctantly agrees. He meets sixth-graders Tomoka Minato, Maho Misawa, Airi Kashii, Hinata Hakamada and Saki Nagatsuki, and begins training them in the sport with one goal: to defeat all strong opponents along the way.

Ro-Kyu-Bu! follows the effort of five elementary girls and their coach as they improve their cute style of playing basketball.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

The series was simulcast on The Anime Network. Sentai Filmworks had planned a home video release, but in June 2012 it was announced that the production committee for the series would be buying back the home video rights for every region outside of Asia.

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Related Anime

Adaptation:	Ro-Kyu-Bu!
Sequel:	Ro-Kyu-Bu!: Tomoka no Ichigo Sundae

Oogame, Asuka
Japanese

More staff

Staff

Kawase, Kouhei

Producer

Satomi, Tetsurou

Producer

Fukuda, Jun

Producer

Kusakawa, Keizou

Director, Storyboard

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Opening Theme

"SHOOT!" by RO-KYU-BU! (Kana Hanazawa, Rina Hidaka, Yoko Hikasa, Yuka Iguchi, Yui Ogura)

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Ending Theme

"Party Love ~ Okkiku Naritai~ (Party Love～おっきくなりたい～)" by RO-KYU-BU! (Kana Hanazawa, Rina Hidaka, Yoko Hikasa, Yuka Iguchi, Yui Ogura)

Reviews

Jun 26, 2013

blaZofgold

Recommended

I'm somewhat perplexed by the number of 6's and 7's this anime is receiving. I was initially reluctant to watch this anime because of the score, but I'm glad I committed in the end.

Ro-kyu-bu is a loli/sports anime with a barebones plot and relatively static characters. While some might consider this points to criticize the anime on, I would like to point to the genre of the piece and remind everyone why we are watching this anime. To learn more about basketball? I should hope not. Sports anime is almost always a terrible representation of the actual sport itself. I will smack anyone who dares ...

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Mar 20, 2013

Orsonius

Mixed Feelings

I'm a big sucker for Lolis and when I found out about this anime I was pumped!

And after finishing it I can say I wasn't disappointed, rather very pleased.

If you are a Loli-lover this is a must watch and one of the best shows in that genre out there.

But lets get to the heart of the review and look on what this show did right and what it lacked in.

Animation
Ro-Kyu-Bu, made by Studio Blanc, which did nothing that I know of before did a generic job animating the show. To be honest, an anime in the SoL pseudo-sports genre will most likely look not that ...

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Jan 4, 2022

AnimeEnjoyer420

Not Recommended

Recommendation: Skippable unless you like the specific combination of basketball and lolis.

Positives:

+ Doesn't do much that's new, but effectively harnesses the uplifting sports movie vibe. It's sweet and heartwarming and you'll be rooting for the girls. Unlike many shows of this type, Subaru (the main character) isn't a loser or weirdo, he's a cool and nice guy, so it doesn't have to indulge in the usual harem shenanigans (though it sometimes does anyway, much to my chagrin).

+ Characters have varied personalities and all get individual focus at different times to develop their characters. When they actually play basketball games, it's thematically tied into ... the challenges that different characters face in practice and their personal lives, allowing them to overcome them in a satisfying way.

+ Nice use of background music and the OPs and EDs are all pretty catchy. Hanazawa Kana does her usual good work as Tomoka's VA.

+ Despite the weirdly romantic vibe that it often takes, Subaru and Tomoka's relationship is nice and more wholesome than you'd expect. While it's clear in the subtext that Tomoka has a huge crush on Subaru, the series is never tasteless enough to have Subaru openly reciprocate those feelings, and instead he simply respects her as a basketball prodigy and as a person.

Negatives:

- Creepy amount of loli fanservice. Many completely unnecessary scenes of the girls, who are 6th graders, in the bath, grabbing each other's breasts, etc...

- Cringeworthy and unoriginal ecchi bullshit. They even recycle the same "joke" multiple times, where Subaru discovers the panties of one of the girls on the floor while they're bathing and goes to drastic lengths to try to return them without being seen. I would've rolled my eyes at this in normal circumstances, but the fact that the girls are in elementary school makes everything worse and more uncomfortable.

- Aoi is an underutilized character. A few times she gets moments to do something, like when she coaches up a timid Airi on how to get over her fears, but she gets forgotten for long stretches and her crush on Subaru goes nowhere. Mihoshi, the basketball club advisor, feels similarly wasted and rarely even gets fun moments as a side character.

- The humor in general isn't funny and is overly reliant on Aoi or Mihoshi seeing a sexual misunderstanding involving Subaru and the girls and assaulting him like violent tsunderes.

- Basketball action is occasionally well animated, but is often reduced to being a literal slideshow. It's not like it looks terrible, and it actually looks nice when they put work into a particular scene, but they clearly didn't have the budget to animate this series properly. The overly cutesy "every female character, even the adults, is a loli with a fang" art style is also not ideal.

- The subtitles translate "scoop shot" as "floater", which, first of all, are not the same thing, and more importantly, neither would correctly describe the actual shot, which is in fact a finger roll. As a basketball fan, this bothers me greatly.

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Second Season of Ro-Kyu-Bu! Announced

According to Dengeki Online, the second season of Ro-Kyu-Bu! was announced at Dengeki 20th Anniversary festival. The title is "Ro-Kyu-Bu! SS". ("SS" doubly stands fo...read more

Oct 20, 2012 9:13 PM by dtshyk | Discuss (176 comments)

OVA of Ro-Kyu-Bu! Announced

According to the tweet of Aoyama Sagu, an OVA of Ro-Kyu-Bu! was announced to be bundled with the new game on PlayStation Portable. It will be released in the Spring ...read more

Oct 7, 2012 3:30 AM by dtshyk | Discuss (30 comments)

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Poll: Ro-Kyu-Bu! Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 ) tsubasalover - Sep 23, 2011	91 replies	by HiljainenSipuli »» Nov 15, 2023 8:20 AM
Poll: Ro-Kyu-Bu! Episode 11 Discussion tsubasalover - Sep 16, 2011	33 replies	by HiljainenSipuli »» Nov 15, 2023 7:57 AM
Poll: Ro-Kyu-Bu! Episode 10 Discussion tsubasalover - Sep 9, 2011	43 replies	by HiljainenSipuli »» Nov 15, 2023 7:34 AM
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Hakamada, Hinata

Misawa, Maho

Kashii, Airi

Nagatsuka, Saki

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Takamura, Mihoshi

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Ro-Kyu-Bu!

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Synopsis

Background

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Characters & Voice Actors

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