Contenuti
Intro
Haikyu!!! is an anime based on the shonen manga of the same name by Haruichi Furudate that debuted in “Jump NEXT” magazine on February 24, 2012. Haikyu!!! – the volleyball ace is composed of
3 Complete Seasons plus one in progress, produced by Japanese studio I.G production.
The story is about a young man, Hinata Shoyo, a boy who forms a team in his senior year of middle school and participates in his first volleyball tournament. However, his team is completely defeated in the first game against the powerful Kitagawa Daiichi school, led by the brilliant but oppressive dribbler nicknamed the “King of the Court,” Tobio Kageyama.
Following this disastrous defeat, Hinata enrolled in Karasuno High School and decided to join the volleyball club motivated by her deep and boundless love for the sport and her desire for revenge against the King of the court. Shoyo’s personal goal is to become“The Little Giant,” a nickname for his idol who, like him, played on the Karasuno High School team. His plans, however, are ruined starting with the discovery of Kageyama’s presence on his own new team.
To fulfill his desire to make his mark in the volleyball realm, so often considered the domain of the high and the mighty, Hinata must settle his differences with Kageyama. Only when Hinata learns what it takes to be part of a team will she be able to seriously join the race to the top.
Along the story arc, the focus does not remain on Shoyo alone, but instead allows us to witness different facets of the story through the point of view of secondary characters.
Haikyu!!! is the perfect example of how a simple story can only be elevated to the highest level with brilliant characters, strong characterization, and solid individual growth that flows into team development. All of them are so real and so sincere that you can’t help but be participating and involved until the end of the episodes.
Let us then go on to illustrate below the characters of this amazing animated series.
List of Characters
Hinata Shoyo
Hinata is the protagonist of the series and possesses the extraordinary ability to take superhuman leaps. In fact, since she was young, Hinata has been training her legs to compensate for her lack of stature. He joined the Karasuno High School volleyball team and amazed the team with his natural affinity as a dunker. Although he is a complete beginner and has never played on a volleyball team, he is growing rapidly match by match.
Hinata has a cheerful and energetic personality. He is a very friendly and outgoing guy, and it is this characteristic of his that makes him a real glue for his teammates. He is easily aroused and often speaks loudly. He is the loudest member after Nishinoya and Tanaka. He is friendly and can easily make friends with anyone, such as with Kenma from Nekoma High and Aone from Date Tech High.
Despite his accommodating personality, Hinata is extremely competitive, especially when it comes to volleyball. As stated by Sugawara, Hinata has very great fortitude to win and therefore does not give up easily during a match, no matter if it is a practice match or a real match. While he is always sunny at times, he can also show a very scary and intimidating face when people underestimate him. In spite of this, he is easily frightened, especially when facing bigger and stronger opponents than him. Despite this initial reaction of his, his willpower will lead him to take on anyone.
Tobio Kageyama
Kageyama is the second main character in the series. He was initially named the“King of the Court,” a derogatory nickname insinuating his autocratic nature, given to him by his former teammates at Kitagawa Daiichi during his last days of middle school. Kageyama is widely regarded as an extraordinary prodigy and an absolute genius by many players and coaches in the prefecture. After joining Karasuno, he is able to change his attitude for the better with the help of his new teammates, rediscovering the meaning of being part of a group.
Unbeknownst to most of his schoolmates and acquaintances, however, he is actually much more sensitive and childlike than he seems; he simply does not know how to control his frustration and express his thoughts and emotions appropriately.
Since joining Karasuno, he has become more respectful of his superiors (Sugawara and Asahi in particular), and has become more accepting of people whose abilities or opinions differ from his own. He will come to understand once again the importance of teamwork and mutual trust in the sport he cares so much about. This also helped him regain his confidence as a setter.
Tooru Oikawa
Captain and setter of Aoba Jousai High School Volleyball Club . Oikawa was also Kageyama’s senpai when they attended Kitagawa Daiichi. According to Kageyama, he is a very talented setter and volleyball player with a bad personality.
Oikawa also often makes cheerful comments, but follows them up with serious or intimidating second thoughts. Despite his goody-two-shoes character, Oikawa is extremely intelligent and cunning, to the point that even his own teammates would not want to be his friends because of his insidious nature and ability to know others’ difficulties.
He holds a grudge against Kageyama, whom he mockingly calls Tobio-chan. This is due to her feelings of inferiority toward him, stemming from her time at Kitagawa Daiichi. Kageyama may unintentionally bring out the more childish or reckless aspects of Oikawa’s personality.
Yuu Nishinoya
Yuu is a very energetic and fickle person. His turbulent nature and crazy shenanigans can attract unwanted attention quite easily, which often bodes ill for him. Although he almost never worries about the consequences of his actions (and may even resort to violence to vent his anger on certain occasions), he is surprisingly respectful of his friends’ feelings and insecurities.
Yu can be extremely impatient, excitable and impulsive. As Ryuunosuke Tanaka says, “He simply gets too excited for his own good.” He does not bother to filter his words, and is therefore prone to blurt out whatever he is thinking aloud and without any tact. In the game, however, his attitude changes dramatically: he becomes incredibly focused and serious, remains calm, and does everything in his power until the end to provide the support his team needs. That is why everyone in the volleyball club respects him so much.
Kenma Kozume
Kenma has a very relaxed and calm personality. He almost never loses his temper and usually never gets excited about anything (with the exception of Hinata and video games). He is quiet and reserved and does not often express his opinions because he is afraid of how others would think of them. He is not the type who can make friends easily, and his only friend when he was younger had been Tetsurou Kuroo. Despite his modest personality, Kenma is actually quite skilled in volleyball, with his extraordinary sense of play and technique offsetting his power, speed, and stamina.
Kei Tsukishima
A member of the Karasuno High volleyball club, Tsukishima is very outspoken and has a habit of irritating people (usually Hinata, Kageyama, and even his senpai Tanaka and Nishinoya). He does not like “hot-blooded people” or making too much effort because of his older brother’s past experiences. Apart from others such as Daichi, Sugawara, and Asahi, he has little or no respect for his other teammates and is quite irritated by having to be in close contact with them. He can also be rude such as to Yamaguchi (the person closest to him)with whom he behaves in a highly spiteful manner. The second year thinks of him as someone with a distorted personality. He also teases Kageyama by calling him“the king.”
Tetsurou Kuroo
The captain of the volleyball club at Nekoma High School. Kuroo has a somewhat manipulative and shrewd personality, but he cares a lot about his friends and teammates. As Nekoma’s captain, he has a sense of responsibility and trust. Although Kuroo is a central defender, he also often uses offensive plays.
Koushi Sugawara
Being the vice captain, he has a reassuring personality for his teammates and serves as a pillar of support. Although he is no longer Karasuno’s official setter, he does not lose confidence in his own abilities to continue his sports career. As a deputy leader, he encourages himself and all his teammates not to give up, no matter how tough the situation may be.
Sugawara’s dedication to volleyball is evident, especially when he decides to continue the club’s activities even when most of the juniors choose to retire to focus on their futures. In one meeting, his teacher asked Sugawara why he is so determined to continue playing even though he is not a starting member, and Sugawara replied that he does not want to have any regrets in the future.
He is also quite perceptive and intelligent in that he can come up with useful tactics during the game.
Ryuunosuke Tanaka
Loud, hot-headed and easily angered, Tanaka is no stranger to fights. He is also a bit of a slacker, as evidenced by his less-than-stellar work ethic at school. Despite all this, he has shown himself to be caring and supportive of his teammates, and even protective of his younger teammates.
Tanaka, once he gets excited, is unstoppable on the court and also highly vociferous, as evidenced by his exaggerated cheering after scoring the first point in Karasuno’s game against Tokonami, which resulted in a caution.
Tadashi Yamaguchi
Yamaguchi is a rather shy person who relies on others. Although he is generally a good person, he tends to giggle or join Tsukishima whenever he teases others. He also works very hard, as demonstrated when he did extra training alone outside the team after seeing how weak he was compared to his other teammates.
Asahi Azumane
Asahi, even before making the Karasuno High School team, attended Seikou Dai Junior High where he played as a dunker. In contrast to his appearance, Asahi is rather quiet and gentle and has difficulty accepting that he is Karasuno’s ace because he does not initially believe in his own potential. It is said that Asahi has a “glass heart,” that he takes everything said about him to heart and sometimes gets depressed about it. His strong-willed personality led him to decide to leave the team after losing to Date Tech, thinking he had deeply disappointed all his teammates.
Chikara Ennoshita
Ennoshita is a sophomore at Karasuno High and is a benchwarmer for slapper Hinata. He is usually quiet, reserved and can sometimes be seen with a gentle smile on his face, but he can also behave boldly toward other sophomores. Ennoshita is the only sophomore able to control Tanaka and Nishinoya . He has the ability to understand and relate to different people and has been noted to be a stabilizing presence for the younger members of the team; this characteristic makes him a good candidate to be captain. Despite this, he does not have much self-confidence, mainly due to his lack of match experience, and initially had problems while filling in for Daichi in the match against Wakutani Minami. He is, in addition, very intelligent as evidenced by his excellent academic performance.
Hisashi Kinoshita
Kinoshita is a sophomore at Karasuno High. He plays as one of the substitute hitters on the men’s volleyball team.
Kinoshita is a kind though somewhat shy individual. He gets along relatively well with his team and is not afraid to tease them occasionally.
During matches, he is very anxious, especially when he has to rely on his own abilities. Although he is not a starter, he is very supportive of his team and can be seen cheering wholeheartedly for them during games. Kinoshita demonstrated hard work in wanting to perfect his suspension serve to the point that Yamaguchi felt nervous about being replaced.
Kazuhito Narita
Narita is a sophomore at Karasuno High. He plays in the men’s volleyball club as a center. He joined the Karasuno men’s volleyball team during his freshman year of high school, but left temporarily with Ennoshita and Kinoshita shortly after Ikkei Ukai returned to the team because they were unable to keep up with the hard training methods and felt the club was no longer fun. However, they regretted their decisions and returned a short time later.
Ittetsu Takeda
Takeda is the counselor and head coach of the Karasuno High men’s volleyball club, although hands-on coaching is done by Keishin Ukai. Takeda is tenacious, a trait that helped him secure the role of the team’s assistant coach. He has an optimistic attitude and is rather modest and awkward. He is polite and respectful of others, as evidenced by his constant bowing to others to show gratitude in asking the boys to perform hard workouts. Takeda is generally cheerful but can become very intimidating when angry.
He initially has very little personal experience and knowledge of volleyball, despite being assigned as an advisor to the Volleyball Club. He is keenly aware of his limitations and strives to work as hard as he can for the sake of the students on the team.
Keishin Ukai
Keishin is the current coach of the Karasuno High men’s volleyball club. He is also an alumnus and former player on the team, having played as a setter.
His behavior is fairly typical of a man in his 20s. He smokes and drinks and is willing to casually talk about alcohol to minors, using terms like “a first sip of beer” to explain a volleyball tactic to the team. However, he has demonstrated strong coaching skills and is a very hard-working individual.
Ikkei Ukai
Ikkei is the former coach of the Karasuno High men’s volleyball club. He once led the team to nationals and was well known in Miyagi Prefecture and even other parts of Japan.
After being hospitalized, he stopped his job as a high school coach. Before Karasuno became famous, the name Ukai was already known. Ikkei led Karasuno High to its first national tournament with “Little Giant,” Hinata’s model player, on the team. Some time later, Ikkei retired, only a few months before Hinata and Kageyama joined Karasuno.
He currently coaches children, college students and adults of various ages at Lil’ Tykes Volleyball School.
