Yankee-kun to Megane-chan ch84-86

This school Sports Fest is taking a little longer than it should, but at least now things are picking up. While chapters 84 & 85 deal with more cheerleading preparation business, the Sports Festival has finally arrived, and the true battle between the Red Team and the White Team commences!

「 Ch. 84 – T-Shirts Really Ain’t Your Style 」

I guess this girl "who can't be replaced" will be put into focus in later chapters, but I can't even remember her name...

It’s time to face their greatest enemy yet – a young girl’s overly strict Asian mom. To my disappointment they didn’t duke it out in a gangster battle (because the mom is pretty OG), and, even worse, no one was physically hurt. Talk about a bummer. In fact, this little obstacle proved to be very short and fairly trivial. All they had to do was yell at each other for probably less than a minute. But I do like that it was partly Kitami who gets them out of their predicament – albiet unintentionally - and partly the mother, who isn’t as strict as made out to be. The best part of this chapter is that now there can’t possibly anything more that can prevent them from practicing day and night – unless the school finds out they’re having night practices. Which they won’t.

Don't mess with this bitch, she's OG ):<

「 Ch. 85 – Someone’s Got a Lot of Free Time 」

Finally, classic Adachi 8D

Thank God that the mangaka decided not to use the obvious route of having a teacher find out about night practice, which would have dragged this side story on longer than it already is. Instead, the last chapter was more of an introduction to the White Team - despite having Adachi as their team leader, they’re actually doing very well - as the manga shifts to focus on them in this chapter. They’re confident and sure of victory, with seemingly non-existent troubles, but just to be sure, Izumi and Adachi decide to go spy on the Red Team for a bit… and, of course, this leads to more of that weird thing I’m not too familiar with – “school spirit”. Seriously, the last six chapters were just overflowing with that preppy, failed-inspirational cheeriness. I let it slide at first as character growth on Shinagawa’s part, but it’s feeling more and more forced. As someone who has to act as a leader/adult on frequent and various occassions and institutions, that perfect percentage of “YEAH LET’S DO IT” pep and partiticpation is completely unlikely. I know some of the best leaders, and even they cannot get a whole group of teenagers to give a crap. But now the White Team is infected with the Red Team’s school spirit, so the competitiveness is just as deadly as before.

You don't need school spirit to sleep in class. But you probably know that already.

「 Ch. 86 – It Feels Good, to be Honest」

Don't put all of your eggs in one basket. We all learned that in Harvest Moon.

Finally, the Sports Festival has started, and thanks to the White Team’s handleful of athletes, the White Team has a large lead over Shinagawa’s hard-working team. We don’t get to see what kind of events they do or what sports they play, and so far it seems the cheering event is the last (and most important) event. Their only hope is to make the gap as small as possible with the last two events so they can put their bets completely on the cheer. The three-legged race did not go very well, probably attributed by the fact they’ve only been practicing on cheering and nothing else. So, their last chance to close the gap is up. Finally - after the happy-peppy-perky-high-school-musical-esque crap - there will be an epic showdown between Shinagawa and Izumi in something known as the “human cavalry battle”, in a fashion true to the heart of Yankee-kun to Megane-chan. (I assume it’s human cavalry battle is a game of one student being held by three or so teammates while trying to knock down the other team’s cavalry.) Whatever happens, there will be blood. While I would have personally pitted Shinagawa against Adachi, since they’re both the title characters and all, and mostly because personal interaction between the two have been limited for a long while. But Izumi is in Shinagawa’s league, and Izumi shouldn’t be able to kill him so easily as Adachi would have (that girl is beast), so I look  forward to the next chapter regardless.

They don't seem to realize you can't finish a 3-legged race with 2 legs...

Things are finally kicking up, and if my guess is right, Shinagawa’s team will win the human cavalry battle to eliminate the point gap. By the way things are going so far, it seems the characters will have to pull out that, “We worked so hard for this, if we give it our all we’ll win for sure!” speech, and then one team will win; but, despite losing, everyone will love each other more and say this year’s Sports Festival was the bestest one ever and be all happy :| Regardless, the mangaka has thrown more interesting curve balls at us before, so I’m putting my full faith in her. But if the next chapter (which we’ll probably have to wait months for to be scanlated) doesn’t bring back the yankee of Yankee-kun to Megane-chan, I’ll be pissed as hell.

/ 4 Commentsleave a comment /

• Calpico says:

  May 20, 2010

  Man, Shinagawa looks so weird with black hair. I didn't even recognize him at first glance!

  I enjoyed chapter 86 in particular! I want to see more from Hime, she's been so minor character ever since the beginning D: At least she kinda shined, but whatever.

  Reply
  • Flags says:

    May 20, 2010

    Shinagawa? Black hair? Isn't that just Izumi in gangster mode? It's what happens when he takes off his glasses and leaves his hair disheveled.

    Reply
  • Vivi says:

    May 20, 2010

    Yeah, that's Izumi XD I completely forgot about his yankee-look though, it's been so long "orz

    LOL that part with Chiba & Himeji was kind of short and random, but it's nice to see them in the spotlight for a while.

    Reply
    • Calpico says:

      May 22, 2010

      OH, SNAP, IT IS?! ASDFPOUQWER my bad, BUT THAT STILL THREW ME OFF. I just thought Shinagawa because of the hair OTL

      Reply