Dogashi Kaden

Okay, I guess I hadn't really the foggiest idea about basketball at all, but... after reading Dogashi Kaden! the fog that - uh - fogged my mind kinda cleard up a little!

So much as for fog.

(this review might contain little spoilers, you've been warned)

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Now onto the actual manga, that surprisingly was an interesting read. Not only because it un-fogged my mind, but also because

* it has an interesting story.
Yeah, the story was rather good, kept me reading due to some cliff hangers and was easy to follow. Nothing special, though. General shounen and sports :>

Everything was introduced nicely during the first chapter (although the beginning let me hope for some bigger events to follow [heck, what was I expecting from 13 chapters anyway? oO]).

I don't know though if it could be considered as negative that the scenario focused on only one certain thing after the first few chapters; the author gives us just one ''serious'' match to nibble at (then again, what was I expecting from 13 chapters~).

Nevertheless, even though we get to see only one match, this was quite an interesting one! ''Quality instead of quantity" - would be fairly wise words right there!

* the art is neat, although some facial expressions were sort of overdone and the proportions seemed somewhat weird sometimes... Oh, and some panels were kind of confusing, especially when they showed the players doing teamwork and some special basketball-tactics - which I am, by the way, not familiar with... so maybe that's why it seemed so confusing to me!

* the main protagonist, Haruyoshi, is just an ordinary boy. Well, rather not! Apparently he's got, like, some mutant-legs, which allow him to run over the court in lightning speed.
No, not really. He's really just an ordinary boy with outstanding ability in brain-leg coordination, and he's fast.
Oh yeah, he's indeed fast. His developement is fast (horrible transition)! Almost rushed! His developement seems rushed, considering that the most of it happened through this one serious match, but at least there was developement, so no whining.

There isn't much to say about the other characters. The female's manager only purpose was to bring frightened little Haruyoshi-kun to the team (+ fanservice), because she saw invincible potential glowing all around him; the glasses-wearing captain was the threatening one that got the ''serious match'' to start; the team members pushed Haruyoshi with lectures and examples to where he is at the end of this short-story.
That said, they apparently were all a means to and end, period.

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I saw many compare this pretty little short-story to Eyeshield 21, so I will go along and do it too: DK! compared to E21 is just a bunch of.... ... ... .. .. ERROR. Oh oh oh you omnipotent, fancy christmas tree! :< I'm not able to do it! Why?!
Easy: comparing 13 chapters to 333 is. not. possible. Also; basketball -- Amercian football..? Plus, I never read Eyeshield 21. And even if I read it sometime soon, I won't compare it to THIS story. That would be ridiculous, right?

Sure enough though, this story will still linger in my mind when I read the next sports manga, because the few hours I spend reading it were worth it - even though I'm not into sports! It was sometimes funny, somewhat thrilling and even a little bit sad... :>