Haikyuu!! Riku vs. Kuu

A solid entry that gives us some real depth on how Nekoma plays and how effective they are as a team. It's nice to see the team come together little by little over the episode, though their opponents for much of these two episodes - Nohebi - is less interesting than most of the opponents we've seen so far. We don't get much more insight into Fukurodani either, though the show sets up another strong opponent at nationals that should make things interesting down the line... even if that's all we know about them. There's some strong animation and action here, which sets it apart ... from the other various shorts, though I suspect the best of Nekoma is yet to come.

This shows what happens right before Haikyuu!!: To the Top and Nekoma going through National Qualifiers with Fukurodani High School, Nohebi Academy, and Itachiyama Academy.


They changed up the art style in 2020... and I am really not sure how I feel about it. Whilst it looks a bit cleaner, the design that has stuck throughout just feels off and strays quite a bit from the series that I have grown accustomed to.


Not much to say about the sound for this. They play songs at the end but even though they are good - they are not anything I would go out of my way to ... listen to. The voice acting was solid but it was mostly just squeaking shoes with no background music.


Kenma Kozume - A 2nd-year and Nekoma's team setter and is the "heart and brain" of the team.

Tetsurou Kuroo - A 3rd-year and Nekoma's team captain and a middle blocker, known as the "Scheming Captain".

Lev Haiba - A 1st-year and one of Nekoma's middle blockers and the claims himself to be the ace of the team.

To clarify right at the start, I find real life sports boring and I think watching real life sports is one of the least entertaining things people do for entertainment. However, anime has ways to convert this boredom and to hype it up to the levels that make your blood boil with excitement. Sadly, not every attempt at this is succesfull.

Watching this Haikyuu OVA felt like watching a regular sports match. Though I get that it's not that easy to make valleyball exciting, as it's already not interesting even for sports standards. Sure, some might find the realistic feel attractive, but when the original lacks ... points of interests, emulating this lack of interestingness may not be the best idea.

Haikyuu fans will very likely enjoy this side story, but for me it felt like wandering into a gym by accident and being forced to watch a match between people I don't care about with stakes that I am completely indifferent towards to. The ill-timed attempts at humor that start off with a poo joke aren't exactly helping the case too. The exception was the last 5 or so minutes of the 2nd episode that had some actually interesting-ish interraction between the characters. Overal, the few scenes with the sisters were unironically the most entertaining part. And the animation is, of course, still well above the average.

Unless you're a fan of Haikyuu or real life sports of just a completionits, you might as well just skip this OVA. You won't be missing much except for the opportunity to waste 40 minutes of your life.