Anime Review: Why ‘Hanebado!’ Will Leave You Breathless

Hanebado is one of the most anticipated anime this season, due to its high energy well-animated badminton action scenes. Why did it take so long for us to have a sports-themed anime? But will Hanebado be worth to watch for you? Read more to find out.
This series is one of the earlier anime in the season. Meaning, you won’t have to wait, and you’ll also have time to get into it before the main showstoppers like Attack on Titan and Overlord arrive.

Compared to previous sports-themed series, Hanebado lets you experience a modern take on sports animation in anime.
Those sounds, that animation – oh my god
The sound effects in this show are superb! I regularly play badminton, and I’m sure a majority of you guys too. We commonly don’t get to hear the loud solid hits of a racket against a shuttlecock as beginners, but on a professional level, all that changes and we normally get to hear all the woosh and booms – just like Hanebado.
Watching the series and seeing all the sweat accumulating made me feel like I was panting and tired. The sound of rubber shoes rubbing against the court sure is refreshing for a sport that I usually do.

A realistic sports anime?
In every sport, there are skills and techniques. Compared to other sports-themed anime, Hanebado does not seem to exhibit impossible athletic techniques, like the pre-jump 3 pointer pass in Koroko no Basket. Heck if that’s even possible, we’d see it on the NBA every day, there’s no magic here folks!
But then again I’m pretty sure at some point of the series we’ll get to see a fictitious technique that won’t really make sense. Or maybe, the theme of this summer season anime is realism. Another show that depicts a realistic representation of their anime this season was ‘Hataraku Saibou’ or ‘Cells at Work’ We’ll put up a review on that soon so stay tuned.

The series started with the plot having all our characters on their lowest point, resulting in a lot of frustrations. This surely is the generic formula for plot building in a competition based storyline, but I think that formula is really well suited for sports-themed shows.
So why will it leave you breathless then?
Well, the plot stretches out the competitive storyline to a whole new level. The show didn’t even have the time to put a credits scene on their first episode just to show the rivalry between the two badminton aces.

NO CHILL
It was just episode 1 and the show had “no chill” written all over it. I highly suggest you watch the series as it will no doubt be fun to watch. If you’re a big fan of sports-themed anime then really, don’t miss out on this great series as you’ll miss a lot on your genre if you do.
I’m quite curious, do people like realistic sports-themed anime? Or do they like fictitious ones like Eyeshield 21 or even Shaolin Soccer.
We’ll post more about Hanebado. Don’t miss out on our reviews and recaps by subscribing to our newsletter below the website or following us through our social media sites, Facebook or Twitter.
Seems like the shows a keeper then. I’ve played badminton quite a bit in the past and really enjoyed it, so this one has definitely caught my attention.
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Yeah, it’s still on the world building phase. But I sure do hope it doesn’t suddenly go bad like DarliFra.
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It’s nice to see such a big blockbuster type of production about a sport that isn’t extremely popular here in the States. Hopefully it gets some people interested in the sport.
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It’s a complete concrete jungle here in Asia. So we usually have sports that take less space like badminton. Western sports like football and baseball can be quite pricey since you would have to reserve a field.
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I just realized I’ve made a perfectly looping gif, feels good man.
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