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Prince of Tennis Two Samurai The First Game movie

The Review

Overall Impression

At first I watched this movie simply because it was just too painful to stop watching Prince of Tennis at the end of the 178th episode. And in the end, I wasn't too unsatisfied.

The movie definitely brings back some nice memories of the unique characters of Seigaku's tennis team - i.e. Eiji Kikumaru's childish antics and the Momoshiro-Viper rivalry. Then there were the amazing tennis (but impossibly tennis) moves like Echizen's Cyclone Smash and Fuji's Four Counters. Other than reminiscing about the original 178-episode series, the makers added an odd twist to the story - Ryoma's older brother.

In many ways, this seemed to steer the original PoT story into confusion. First, the emergence of the older brother Echizen Ryoga criticized the original motives of the father, Nanjiro Echizen. According to the original series, Nanjiro quit his path towards professional tennis in order to raise his son, Ryoma; according to this movie, Ryoga was also learning tennis from his father, but for some reason left the nest at an early age (almost as if he were already independent) and disappeared from the Echizen household's memory. If Nanjiro cared so much for Ryoma that he'd sacrifice his own brilliant career, why didn't he also care so much for Ryoga? In the movie, it was almost as if Ryoga was simply a runt who was given little to no attention. What's more, this type of attitude was not questioned at all. So much for the family love theme that was so carefully developed in the original PoT series.

The second point is not so critical, but as someone who also has a sibling, it made me wonder a bit. How could Ryoma forget about his older brother? And how could Ryoga forget about his younger brother? That's just weird. Too weird.

All in all, the movie is a little more entertaining - all thanks to the crazy exaggeration of super-tennis moves. Somehow, during the match between Ryoma and Ryoga, their clothes fall off and they become fighting angels in the skies...a tall tsunami versus firey tornados. Maybe the makers just got bored and wanted to play around a bit, or maybe they really were just giving it their all when it came to showing how super powerful these two tennis players were (they even played water tennis). Overall though, it cracked me up.

The Artwork

A+ for sticking to the original style of Prince of Tennis the series. Everyone was familiar and recognizable. Another plus for the extra effort in detail - there's a lot more obvious movement in the OVA than in the original series.

Breaking It Down