There are manga about tennis, soccer, and basketball. Well, we now have volleyball in the form of Crimson Herofrom Mitsuba Takanashi. Nobara Sumiyoshi, while being the heir to a high class ryotei restaurant in Japan, has decided to enroll at Crimson Field High School, primarily to play on their volleyball team. While there she falls for the Boy’s Team Captain, Yushin Kumagi, but unable to commit to each other due to their game, they decide to hold off their relationship until after the Spring Tournament.
Highlights
This Shojo/Sports title starts right in the middle of where the Volume 11 ended. Nobara and Yushin begin talking about their true feelings and how they have told their mutual friend, Keisuke Haibuki, another friend who has feelings for Nobara, that they care for one another. But Yushin vows to tell him someday and for Nobara not to say a word to him. Here you can see that they care for each other but they don’t want that to interfere with their respective teams. Nobara can’t have more problems with the girls' team. The upcoming Newcomer’s Tournament will be challenging enough, with their star setter injured, and an inexperienced replacement, but Nobara is also distracted. She has many challenges ahead of her.
Following the match between the Girl’s Team, we follow Yushin and the Boy’s Team as they attempt to win their match in the Newcomer’s Tournament. Here there is some drama added when Keisuke meets up with an old friend who gives him an offer. With a nice realistic touch, this has an effect on his playing. After the match, things really get interesting. Not only do the actions from the start of the volume become resultant, but one other scene from before comes to fruition. Though a bit predictable for me, it still was an interesting read just to see what would make what happen happen.
Overall
As a romance and sports title, I was a little wary of Crimson Hero. I was not sure how volleyball would work in this format, but sadly the volleyball aspect appears to be a side plot to the romance of the main characters. Even when we finally see the tournament, there are more panels of the main characters just thinking and talking amongst themselves, that I wished they would stop and show splash pages of the game.
The art was decent, though a few of the characters looked off, mainly with the proportions of some characters. Some of the character’s eyes would be too large in proportion to the rest of their face. One problem I had was that there weren’t enough scenes of the matches themselves. The scenes that we do see are either simplistic or close ups of the ball and characters as they participate in the game. From someone who is a fan of the sport, I would have expected a few larger scenes.
ComicsOnline gives Crimson Hero Volume 12 3 out of 5 volleyballs.
