Mou Ippon! ("Ippon" again!)

The happy-go-lucky Michi Sonoda announces to her teammate, Sanae Takigawa, that she will quit judo for good after her final middle school tournament. This leaves Sanae in disbelief; after all, it was Michi's passion toward the sport that reeled Sanae into judo in the first place. Michi claims that a well-spent youth should be associated with things such as getting a boyfriend rather than sweaty tatami mats.

However, Michi's plan to end her fledgling judo career with a bang is spoiled after experiencing an embarrassing defeat at the hands of the talented Towa Hiura. Later, her plan is further derailed when she finds out that Towa has enrolled in the same high school as herself and Sanae. With the sudden appearance of her past foe, Michi may soon realize that she still has lingering feelings for the sport of judo.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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Background

Mou Ippon! was released on Blu-ray and DVD in four volumes from March 29, 2023, to June 21, 2023.

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Supporting

Miyamoto, Yume
Japanese

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Ueda, Tomoki

Producer

Kashimura, Emi

Producer

Oomatsu, Yutaka

Producer

Tanaka, Kouta

Assistant Producer

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Opening Theme

"Stand By Me" by Subway Daydream

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Ending Theme

	1: "Stand By Me" by Subway Daydream (eps 1)
	"Ipponmichi (いっぽんみち)" by Aoba Nishi Koukou Juudou-bu (青葉西高校柔道部)

Reviews

Jul 2, 2023

mushi_Jyou

Recommended

Starting off with personal opinion:
Mou Ippon! has too little attention, but can't say is unexpected. I love watching sports anime, typical shounen plot, typical suspense etc. And I have been looking for a decent group sport anime with female cast (female category sport), but is so hard to find one as the ones out there usually are ecchi/hentai domain, or just not shounen enough (No excitement, no suspense). Mou Ippon! is different. I went in apprehensively, but came out hoping for a season 2 in making. It has the typical elements for a good shounen sports anime: Determined MC (typically positive) who has mysterious ...

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Apr 27, 2023

qwqaqe

Recommended

Mou Ippon, the show where there are more flashbacks than moments that happen in current time. Wait though, don’t leave yet. That’s usually a red flag, but this one is actually good.

I will preface this review by saying that going in, I did not know the first thing about judo, but trust me when I say that it did not matter. This show has so much to offer that it is insane how low its numbers are.

The story focuses on the Aoba West High School judo club, from their banding together in the beginning, to practicing in the dojo, to their runs in a couple ... tournaments. As I said, my judo knowledge extends to what I learned from this show, but that didn’t stop me from being on the edge of my seat when a competitor fell, anxiously waiting to release my breath at the call of an ippon, or hold it in at the waza-ari. The matches were exciting, and they did a good job not making it obvious who was going to win. I felt like I was really in the stands. And that is not all that is offered. You get a nice package: from the sweet judo action, to the surprisingly well done moral dilemma of the right time to hang up the gi, to the fun slice-of-life. And that’s another thing: when we are not pedal to the metal, we are just hanging out, and those scenes flow so well. The humor comes naturally, and once again, does not feel scripted at all.

And to complement the surprisingly diverse storyline is the crazy good character chemistry. This, for me, is the best part about the show. The first six or so episodes are all about our protagonists, but as they start to go to competitions, the focus shifts to the other end of the tatami mat. These opponents aren’t just some wall that’s there only to prevent our main girls from winning. In this case, they are real people too, that just want to win the judo tournament as much as anyone else. Sure, some are more competitive than others, but they are all friendly, and with the help of Michi Sonoda, our “antagonists” often end up becoming good friends. Everybody’s so positive and enthusiastic, it makes me want to join a judo team myself.

Speaking of Sonoda, Mou Ippon takes an interesting approach to characterization where arguably the most static character is her, the central figure of the show. She instead functions as glue, bringing together and uplifting everybody else from the rest of the Aoba West crew to opponents like Erika, Natsu, and Midoriko. With this approach, I thought I might get tired of Sonoda by the end, but I never did.

Of course, not everything was perfect. I previously mentioned the amount of time this show spends in the past. It definitely helped the audience build empathy toward all these characters in just 13 episodes, but they didn’t have to do everybody this way. Characterization is for sure more difficult to pull off in the present, but when this show opted to try it, like when it focuses on Tachikawa Academy in episode 11, it was great. I wish there was more of it.

But overall, this show is excellent. It’s impossible not to like it. Please watch it yourself, get those numbers up, because I want a second season.

P.S. (And this is a slight SPOILER, so skip if you haven’t seen it yet,) For a show that tried to stay grounded in reality with its fights, that last French girl seemed extremely overpowered. I don’t know judo, but I do know the limits of the human body, and that seemed above and beyond what is possible. I like the move to have the gang lose here, but come on, with that kind of skill, how are they supposed to beat her in the season 2 rematch that will definitely happen? But I digress. Thank you for reading, and have a nice night.

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Jul 31, 2023

PixelB

Not Recommended

Mou Ippon! is a pretty generic sports anime. It doesn't try reinventing the wheel, but nothing is necessarily wrong. It's just that not a single aspect of the show stands out, and thus becomes highly mediocre. By playing it safe, the show suffers.

The problem is that this show has not a single thing that draws the viewer in. Let's first talk about the sport itself, Judo. Usually, when a show regarding a sport shows up, it should at least give a tutorial on the sport; the rules, how to play Judo, and stuff like that. This show doesn't do that. Okay, fine, but will the ... focus of the show be Judo? Well, Yes, and no. Compared to pure sports shows, it clearly has much less focus. There are no training regiments, and no real strategies other than observing the opponent's previous matches. The animation of the judo is a bit stiff and there are freeze frames, but overall, the animation is alright. It's just that there's not too much monologuing, but the matches themselves are long enough. It's not just someone "throwing" them down and that's the match. However, it's also not enough to carry the show. After all, there's no real "training" being done. A lot of the daily life of the schoolgirls is focused on training, but on what? Again, not too much strategy, not much of any focus on the actual sport of Judo. This gets reflected in the opponents themselves. You can see the lack of focus on the characters when you notice that opponents don't get an introduction. The show tries to characterize them mid-match, and it kind of works successfully, too, but again, just not enough to carry the show. Flashback no jutsu isn't going to magically develop a new opponent.

What about the main characters themselves? Again, they're all not bad. You have the shy captain that wants to improve themself while also taking care of the team, the bombastic protagonist, a reclusive expert Judoka that eventually learns to express their feelings, the best friend character that switches from an all-star kendo player to Judo in order to be with the protagonist, the senior that wants to make their last year count and a reliable coach that helps them along the way. There's nothing wrong with them, but when you don't actually see them train, their monologues, they can't carry the show.

Bamboo Blade, a similar show about Kendo instead of Judo, suffers the same flaws. There's a clear focus on Kendo, but it does feel a bit weak still, but there is also an equal amount of focus on slice-of-life interactions and comedy. This slice of life aspect makes up for the sort of whimsical focus on Kendo. So unlike Bamboo Blade, Mou Ippon lacks this slice-of-life interaction that Bamboo Blade does, which made it stand out more.

It's okay for this show to focus entirely on Judo, which it does, but it needs to be perfected. If Ookiku Furikabutte, a similar show that focuses entirely on baseball with a grassroots high school level team that wants to go to nationals shows so much more detail in character development, the training, and the matches themself despite having a 9-player roster, a manager, and a coach, then there's a problem.

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