“Don’t look down on yourself for running. Make it meaningful by making something out of it.”
Silver Spoon tells the coming-of-age story of Yugo Hachiken, a studious teenager who enrolls in the agricultural boarding school Yezo High, in order to escape from his parents. There he meets a varied cast of characters, and through his interactions with them ultimately grows as a person.
I have a bit of a soft spot for well told coming-of-age stories. I thoroughly enjoyed Barakamon, and Hanasaku Iroha is one of my favorites. Characters are generally what I watch a show for, and watching the MC grow and develop over the course of the series is something I really enjoy.
Yugo Hachiken is a great example of overarching development done right. He’s unique in his own way, and is far bolder than I’d ever be, yet possess just the right personality traits that he’s not only someone you’d aspire to imitate, but also someone you could likely relate to and emote with. Hachiken is far from perfect, which is especially clear at the series’ start. His imperfections make him human, and sometimes those seeming flaws turn out not to be not flaws at all. As the show continues, we’re gradually revealed more information as to why Hachiken is the way he is and what’s shaped his life to this point, from his relationship with his parents to the relationship he has with his friends now.
I will point out that while I really do love Hachiken’s character, I could see that some people might find him a little too perfect in his strong-willed determination, that said, it didn’t bother me personally.
Hachiken is joined by our fairly large cast of characters. Sadly, however, it feels like a lot of the cast didn’t get their proper chance to be fully explored. This isn’t so much due to poor time management, but rather the lack thereof. Quite a bit of time is covered in these 22 episodes, and I wish there had been more episodes inbetween covering the side characters in a bit more depth. I found Aikawa and his determination to become a vet despite his weak heart to be especially interesting, and I really would have liked if that had been explored more.
During the second season in particular, two characters besides Hachiken are explored in more detail, that being Aki Mikage, and to a lesser extent, Komoba Ichiro, who while he is a nice, in this respect serves not-so-much as an in-depth character, but rather as an assistant for moving forward Hachiken and Mikage’s development in the latter half of Season 2.
Mikage is a very interesting character. Roughly put, Mikage is very different from what you would first think. She has her imperfections, and by the end of the show I found myself really caring about what happens to her. The dramatic aspects are handled realistically, such that you could really easily see yourself or a friend behaving similarly if you or they were put in her situation, and this makes it incredibly easy to sympathize with her. Even further, I absolutely love Hachiken and Mikage’s interactions, as it hits just the sweet spot at being initially cute and then gradually progressing to a deeper level of trust and true friendship, never falling into the absolutely awful total “blush-frenzy and nothing but” that is so common. If you’ve seen Space Brothers, I’d say it’s somewhat similar to the relationship between Serika and Nanba, though more developed.
What makes Hachiken and Mikage’s dynamic so effective though, is how their character traits and flaws play off of each other. Both have their strengths and weaknesses, with quite a few being on opposite sides of the spectrum, causing this very intriguing back-and-forth of reliability, as they open up to each other and help each other out. My main problem is simply that I wanted more. I feel the show would’ve benefited greatly if there had been more times where we see just Hachiken and Mikage interacting with each other. The show itself is surprisingly fast paced for a slice of life and could have done with some slowing down on occasion. Another factor to this complaint is that their development is interrupted by the rather jarring end to the series. It felt like we were finally getting some further development on Hachiken’s side after focusing on Mikage and her problems for quite a while, and then it just ends out of absolutely nowhere.
That’s right folks, this is a read the manga ending. :-(
Now I’ve rambled on about Hachiken and Mikage for a while (can you tell they’re some of my favorite characters?), but I should at least touch on the story that takes place during the first season, where the predominant focus is Hachiken and his conflicting morals on the farm life.
Put simply, it’s really well done. Now that doesn’t mean it’s for everyone, heck the first time I watched it, perhaps be it lack of experience or just mood itself, I found the show pretty boring. Yet even still I could tell I was missing something, that for some reason I couldn’t enjoy it but there was still quality there. Coming back to it quite a few months later, I find that I love this series. How it explores both sides of an issue, but never gives a direct conclusion. How it represents the feeling of working hard for something. How it talks about having a dream and working towards that. How it does everything, really.
Now let’s move forward, and touch on the animation for the series. They can make some legitimately good looking stuff, take SoRaNoWoTo for instance, but from what I’ve seen they also have the tendency to have massive quality drops out of nowhere. Silver Spoon isn’t the worst case among those, and for the most part is pretty consistent, but I still will never forgot those horrid CG cows till the day I die. I don’t care that they only used them like twice in the entire show, it was still far too much.
Besides that, the general aesthetic doesn’t stand out too much. The art style even in the manga was fairly simplistic, and the anime retains that. The character designs are fitting, though I will point out that Mikage’s face always tends to look a bit “off”, like it’s somewhat out of proportion or something like that. Thankfully though, she’s the only one who suffers from this.
I must give them credit for the animation on the food and animals, because for the most part it looks pretty darn impressive. There’s quite a bit of detail and fluidity, and the use of still shots was rarer than I expected, though obviously not completely gone. Even on the side of the characters, there are select moments where the quality spikes up quite a bit, at the peak moments of the show where it really matters. It’s no Unlimited Budget Works, but for the most part it does the job pretty well.
I can’t leave off without touching on the music, which is pretty solid overall. The OPs and EDs are all great, particularly the second ones, and the general OST has some pretty good themes. It certainly isn’t the greatest, as sometimes the music felt a little too forceful in trying to convey an emotion, rather than letting the show just portray it well by itself. However, when it does work, it works really well. When the tone of the show and music match, it creates some really touching and downright inspirational moments. The music overall generally does well to fit the setting and it’s mood, and as far as soundtracks go is much more memorable than most. I wouldn’t call it play-on-repeat playlist material, but it’s definitely above average, even if they did reuse the same themes a little too much for my taste.
Overall Silver Spoon is an incredibly captivating and memorable experience, and one that I feel I could come back to again later in life and get even more out of. The interactions, development, and themes present feels real, and it was an unexpected but incredibly welcome surprise. This is one little gem I wouldn’t pass up for the life of me, and one I don’t think you should either.
(Originally Written March 1st, 2015)
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