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Title: The Winner Is…
Series: Eyeshield 21 #31
Author: Riichiro Inagaki
Artist: Yusuke Murata
Rating: 4.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Sports Manga
Pages: 192
Format: Digital Scan
| Synopsis: |
The final 5 minutes between the Devil Bats and the Dinosaurs. The Dinosaurs make a touchdown and kick the ball for a 7point lead. Now there is only 2 minutes on the clock. Kurita MUST face, and overcome, Gaou if he is going to open a path for Sena to run through. Sena makes the touchdown and so the Devil Bats are only 1 point behind.
Their choice is to kick the ball for 1 point and go into overtime or to try for a 2 point conversion by running the ball and winning the game. With Hiruma’s fractured arm, Sena’s worn out body and the rest of the team utterly exhausted, the Devil Bats don’t have a hope in hell [ha, “Devil” bats & “Hell”, get it?] of winning in overtime. So a 2 point run it is. Hiruma does his tricky stuff and Kurita and Gaou faceoff for the final showdown and the Devilbats win.
The rest of the volume is Sena and Monta and Suzuna scouting out the competition for the Christmas Bowl. And what they find is an All Star Team with a female quarterback [at least, I think she’s the quarterback, it was hard to tell if that was what was said]. And not only that, their running back receiver is the son of the man who inspired Monta. Fighting against his idol’s son might more than Monta can bear.
Hiruma is aware of ALL the dynamics and has asked various members of the defeated teams to help train the Devil Bats.
| My Thoughts: |
Excellent. A fantastic volume.
Kurita’s battle against Gaou was great. It was everything he’d fought for and cried for and trained for and in the end it was Kurita’s experience AND strength that overcame Gaou. That was a pleasure to see.
The end of the volume with the 3 characters scouting out the opposition was kind of weird. The opposition was so confident that they gave them their play book of 1000 plays. I’m still a bit confused if the girl who carried luggage around was the quarterback or not. Sadly, reading this on an 8in tablet made some of the text rather small and hard to read. I’m getting older and diabetes sure isn’t doing my eyes any favors. After this series, if I read any more manga or comics on a tablet, I’m going to have to buy myself a 10-11in tablet. So part of me is hoping that she is, because that’ll add a really weird mix into the game. But on the other hand I don’t want that to happen. No woman should be placed in that situation, period.
I don’t know if the emotional punch I experience from this series is deep enough to stand up to a re-read. Honestly, I’d rather not find out. I think that I’ll read this, enjoy it immensely and move on. But my goodness, this initial read is SO GOOD!
★★★★ ½
Bookstooge's Reviews on the Road 
I honestly know zip about manga, and rely mostly on reviews of other bloggers whose taste I trust. So with that said, on to the list this goes!!!
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Well, I hope you enjoy it when/if you get around to it. The nice thing about manga is that you can knock a volume off in about 1/2hr, so it is not a big time commitment, for each volume.
And if you don’t care for the first couple of volumes, then I wouldn’t continue. Getting ahold of these might be an issue as well. I borrowed the first 15 or so from the library, so I knew I liked it.
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