"You're weak with your backhand, your forehand is not refined, your steps are loose, your reflexes are sluggish, and none of your movements are decent. Do you still want to compete with me on the same stage? Make your dreams! ”
The above sentence is the signature in the animation "Ping Pong", in the original work, Kong Wenge from China was expelled from the provincial team (changed to the national team in the animation) because of a mistake, and could only go to Japan to develop, and as a result, as soon as he appeared on the scene, he was domineering and leaked, and almost all Japanese opponents of the same age were hung up like children, and this sentence also became the exclusive BGM of his character.

But in fact, this sentence itself is the tip of the iceberg of this sports-themed animation, and many viewers who fell into the pit because of this sentence eventually became fans of the main creator. As a spectator on Douban commented on "Ping Pong":
"God is on it! God is on it! God is on it! It's not ping-pong, it's life! It's not animation, it's art! ”
Standing behind this masterpiece are two geniuses (or ghosts) in the Japanese anime industry: Daiyo Matsumoto and Masaaki Yuasa.
Friends who are familiar with Japanese anime will have some stereotypes about Japanese sports anime, and in Japanese manga that pays attention to the two big moves in the blood, various brain hole descriptions are often fanaticized to the point of neuropathy. However, under the realistic pressure of sales, more authors have to go in a similar style, resulting in realistic anime has always been in a minority position.
But the original author of "Ping Pong", Matsumoto Onoyo, is not an ordinary author who likes to bow to reality, on the contrary, this manga artist known for his peculiar drawing style has always adhered to his unique style of painting and persevered with his amazing talent - the early Matsumoto was deeply influenced by manga artists such as Katsuyo Otomo, Seiji Doda and Mochiyoshi Taro, and the angular style and characters with distinct personalities are extremely impactful, as if a straight slam ball whistles through the reader's eyes. His 1987 book STRAIGHT was shortlisted for the Monthly Afternoon Four Seasons Award, his first appearance as a cartoonist, and it was at this time that he chose to drop out of school to officially enter the comic book industry.
In 1993, Matsumoto Created "Evil Boy", whose protagonist style has traces similar to Otomo Katsuyo's style, and in 1996, when he created "Ping Pong", which is the model of this article, his style began to gradually move out of imitation and enter maturity. Similar to "Bad Boy", "Ping Pong" also adopts the result of dual protagonists, and also uses a non-mainstream realistic and non-beautiful painting style in the environment at that time. However, the latter is more refined in the handling of details, the composition is more balanced, the shaping of characters and shapes is more concise, and the presentation of comics is more diversified.
However, Matsumoto's style of painting does deter many readers, it has no exquisite picture, the protagonist does not have a super high value, and many people even describe it as an "extremely rough and cheap manga" (but in fact, it expresses a more advanced artistic aesthetic). But if you look at it patiently, you can feel the author's intentions and enjoy the blood and emotion it transmits.
Matsumoto is a sports enthusiast himself, and he has been on the school football team from elementary school to high school, and even served as the captain of the school team in high school. The reason for choosing table tennis as the theme of the manga, according to Matsumoto's own words, is that both personal competition is more suitable for portraying the factors of character, but also takes into account that most people do not know much about the details of table tennis, and it is easier to make breakthroughs in content.
In the end, "Ping Pong" was only serialized for 5 volumes and then announced the end, but like Yuhiko Inoue's own initiative to complete the "Slam Dunk Master", the short length of "Ping Pong" allowed the author to retain his original intention of creating this manga as much as possible. And such a complete and no waist cut work has also received considerable praise. The fame accumulated over the years eventually led to the japanese animation industry's ghost director Masaaki Yuasa choosing it to produce his third feature-length animation.
Yuasa joined yassiya hall after graduating from university, starting with grassroots work such as the original painter. The original artist, also known as the main mirror animator, is the staff responsible for drawing the composition into the main shot. In addition to having at least one to two years of cumulative work experience as an animator and familiarity with the animation production process, an original artist must also have a certain level of research on lens photography skills.
Yuasa himself is best known for his ability to use lenses, he does not care about the traditional perspective angle, does not fix the perspective, and often reverses the screen to show the eclectic expression of a generation of geniuses.
Yuasa was first responsible for the original painting in the well-known "Cherry Maruko" TV animation, and also participated in the production of the original painting of the theatrical version of "Robot Cat". In 1990, he left Asia Hall to become a freelancer, but relying on the connections he had accumulated before, he participated in the TV production of another famous work "Crayon Xiaoxin", starting from the TVA in 1992 to the first theatrical version of "Crayon Xiaoxin", he participated in 11 of the 16 theatrical editions of "Crayon Xiaoxin" so far, and served as a number of positions from original painting to painting supervision, which also laid the foundation for his exaggerated, peculiar and unconventional style after independent creation.
(Of course, Yuasa's eerie sense of lens and character design are also one of the direct responsible for the recent collapse of the so-called crayon small new painting style))
Yuasa has been a theater superintendent since 2002, and his debut film Game of the Mind, released two years later, won the Noburo Oto Award and the Japan Agency for Cultural Affairs Media Arts Festival Grand Prize, and the name Masaaki Yuasa and his eerie style of painting were finally known.
Before the remake of "Ping Pong", Yuasa was already a big player in the industry, and Miyazaki described him as "Japan's once-in-a-century genius animator". Although he is not as popular as Miyazaki and Makoto Shinkai, he is a god-like being in the eyes of fans. In 2013, he raised money from fans on a crowdfunding website to make an animated short film, and spent $200,000 to make a 13-minute short film called "Romeo and Juliet in Wrestling", and many non-fans said "$200,000 is to blind my dog's eyes"? Fans said "if you don't like it, don't watch it" and praised it as "the funniest short film of the year".
It is very difficult to complete the anime version of a very complete manga, but Yuasa's strange brain-draining style just fits in with Matsumoto, and coupled with his love for the original manga, Yuasa does not hesitate to take on this seemingly thankless job. However, compared with the manga version, the animated version of "Ping Pong" has improved many details on the basis of the unchanged main plot, and continued the style and exaggeration of the manga's "multi-map juxtaposition", with just the right background music and dubbing in line with the character's personality, not only perfectly reproducing the tense atmosphere on the field, but even making the original author praise it as "much more detailed than the original painting", which makes people have to admire Yuasa's ability.
The exaggerated painting techniques of the two men and the strange style of the storyboard itself have a strong expressiveness, which is also perfectly in line with the theme of "sports".
Compared with the general sport, the table tennis field is smaller, the audience needs to concentrate more to see the trajectory of the ball, and a round often ends between electric light and flint. How to vividly portray the game is actually a big problem for cartoonists. The answer given by the two is to divide the pages of comics into large and small grids, using the proportion of the size of the grid to "draw the key points" for the audience, which also allows him to portray the details of the ball's rotation, flight direction, character movements and demeanor in more detail, giving the reader a strong sense of presence and immersing himself in that tense atmosphere.
It is only the wild painting style of the two authors that is enough to support the expressiveness of the entire animation, and the enthusiasm of the movement and the author's emotions can be vividly expressed through the multi-storyboard painting technique and the wild painting style, so in the plot, the protagonist does not need to frequently enlarge the move to advance, which also allows the author to leave more brushstrokes on the portrayal of the growth of the characters off the field.
The protagonists in the strict sense of the story are only Ah Bian and Xiao Ye, but the author's description of the supporting characters such as Kong Wenge, Kazema, and Demons is not stingy at all, everyone has a different but very typical life experience, although their final destination is not the same, but everyone's image is very three-dimensional, plump and full. The interaction and conflict between these characters with very different personalities not only allows readers to feel the blood of sports, but also hides a big theme behind them: that is, in competitive sports, the relationship and contradiction between personal talent, diligence and enthusiasm, and how to recognize the facts and reach reconciliation with themselves.
If you want to achieve good results in a certain field, talent (ability), diligence (hard work), and enthusiasm (interest) are indispensable. Generally speaking, talent is a stepping stone to enter a certain field, hard work is a necessary condition for continuous progress, and love can be both the starting point of your career and the spiritual pillar that helps you survive the most difficult stages of your career. Specific to the animation of "Ping Pong", these three parts also determine the fate of each of them.
As the protagonist, Ah Bian is the most talented table tennis genius in the play, enthusiastic, confident, arrogant, and loves snacks, but it is always difficult to meet opponents on the table tennis field. He does not lack a love for table tennis, often calling himself a hero of "from the table tennis star", and this strong secondary two plot comes from his passion for the sport.
But the joy of victory for a long time has made Ah Bian gradually forget the cruelty of competitive sports and the importance of hard work: since talent can sweep everything, what is the point of hard training? This is also a common problem for most geniuses when they are young.
Ah Bian's friend and one of the protagonists, Xiao Ye, has a completely opposite personality, introverted, calm, with machine-like precision and rigor. When he was a child, Xiao Ye, who was bullied by his introverted personality, came into contact with ping-pong balls with the encouragement of Ah Bian and has been out of control ever since. Xiao Ye's talent is on par with Ah Bian's, and his self-discipline and diligence ensure that he is serious and meticulous in his training. In the anime, opponents such as Kong Wenge and Kazema regard it as the biggest opponent and co-optation object.
However, what Xiao Ye lacks is the enthusiasm for winning: for Xiao Ye, winning on the field is never the purpose of playing table tennis, it is more of a pastime. He would try his own untrained quick attacks because he was bored during the game, (his exclusive coach's phrase "Will you hit the ball that aggravates the wounds of your teammates?"). So, as reflected in his classic line, which is disgusting to bet one's life on ping-pong, table tennis is only a part of his life.
As a childhood friend of Ah Bian and Xiao Ye, the demon Sakuma has long lived in the shadow of the two talented protagonists, allowing him to develop a personality of "practicing until the blood is defecated". From the perspective of talent and hard work, he is like the opposite of Ah Bian, no matter how hard the former tries, as long as the latter has a little force, he can throw it far away. Therefore, compared to the protagonist, he is more like our ordinary people, if you are trapped in the circle of inferiority for a long time, the reality is undoubtedly very cruel.
Chinese player Kong Wenge is the most brilliant supporting role in this film, in addition to the classic line at the beginning of the article, which he said in pure Mandarin, his foreign identity and self-confidence also touched many people. In terms of talent, Kong Wenge is far inferior to the two protagonists, but in the "Ping Pong Kingdom", he has the confidence of a fan, in his own words, "more than enough but not enough". When he first arrived, he did not look down on Japan, a small country, and only wanted to prove that he would return to China as soon as possible, which was also the purpose of his table tennis.
In this drama, the big boss Ryuichi Kazema is the king and big star of the high school table tennis arena, no one can shake his dominance, but he can't enjoy the applause and praise from the outside world. He does not lack talent and hard work, nor does he care about winning or losing like Xiao Ye. On the contrary, "the worries of constant victory, the pain of praise, the heaviness of carrying courage, isolation and distress" made his ping-pong world only allow success and not failure, so stressful that he had to hide alone in the bathroom before each game. Kazema forgot that the original intention of playing table tennis was "love", but instead regarded it as a climbing game: if it failed, it would fall into the abyss, so it could only climb upwards. His world is not fun, and victory and defeat trump everything.
Therefore, the most talented but neglected to work hard Ah Bian will be eliminated by the demons who only rely on hard work to break out of the sky, and the mentality collapses to the point of giving up table tennis; the uncompetitive Xiao Ye will choose to "give the ball" when he sees Kong Wenge's desperate expression; the demon with limited talent will fall into despair after defeating Ah Bian because he touches his ceiling; Kong Wenge will gradually see himself clearly after successive defeats, but the pride in his heart makes it difficult for him to accept the facts; the wind continues his rule. But the sense of responsibility for the team also makes his pressure increase day by day, and he is getting farther and farther away from the original intention of playing table tennis...
Halfway through the plot, all the characters fall into a state of screwing: Ah Bian chooses to give up self-exile, Xiao Ye is forced by the coach to practice competitiveness, the demon practices hard after losing but never makes progress, Kong Wenge still has a mysterious confidence in himself, and Kazema even wants to pull Xiao Ye into the gang after thinking about it for the team...
The key to solving this "screwed" state is to recognize yourself, but the authorities are obsessed, and if they want to do this, they often need to rely on external forces to achieve it, and several protagonists with very different personalities are external forces to help each other solve contradictions from their own standpoint.
The laughing master who looks down on the victory and defeat will tell the demon who lacks talent, you just don't have talent, why shout, the demon who wants to chase the genius recognizes the reality after the painful epiphany, and chooses to give up;
In turn, the demon who lacks talent will scold Ah Bian who wasted talent and say, "I am just a mortal, but you are different, you are a talented person." If you had a tenth of my effort, it would never have been like this. "As a result, a move to wake up Ah Bian."
Ah Bian, who did not forget his original intention for table tennis, used his enthusiasm to infect the wind of falling into the "magic obstacle of victory and defeat", and finally untied the heart knot of the star player, showed a long-lost smile on the field, and began to enjoy the fun brought by table tennis again;
Kong Wenge also realized the limitations of his rigid self-positioning (the invincible coming to Japan is to abuse people) after losing to his former subordinate Ah Bian, and began to face victory and defeat with a more relaxed and peaceful attitude, which also allowed him to better integrate into the new environment;
In the final final, Xiao Ye welcomed back the omnipotent "ping-pong hero" in his heart, reaffirming the fact that all he needed was to be able to play table tennis quietly, and his purpose of playing was just to spend time with Ah Bian happily.
So ask for benevolence, love table tennis, talented Ah Bian became a world-class player after hard training, the table tennis as a pastime of Xiao Ye as a table tennis coach, the devil gave up table tennis to live the wife and children hot kang head of the day, Kazema will no longer lock himself in the toilet when he fails but go to Xiao Ye to talk, the correct mentality of Kong Wenge also step by step, although he failed to represent the Chinese team, but finally stood on the Olympic stage as a member of the Japanese national team.
However, what makes many viewers most emotional is not these five characters, but the "Watching Hai Brother" named Jiangshang, who has only appeared three times in the film, is even more moving: he is a table tennis player who has no unrealistic goals, is down-to-earth, mediocre, and participates in the game just to win one or two games, at least not to lose too ugly. Unfortunately, he met a "cold-blooded" smile in the first round. After a meal of operation, the gap between geniuses and ordinary people is clear at a glance, and the defeated river is in a slump, choosing to wander all the way, from the seaside to the mountains to a foreign country, and finally returning to the audience, seeing more and more powerful opponents on the stage, tearfully saying "my favorite is still table tennis."
I believe that everyone has heard a famous quote from Edison when they were young: "Genius is 99% sweat plus 1% inspiration." However, in previous years, some people said that this sentence was taken out of context, because there is another sentence that follows: "But that one percent inspiration is the most important, even more important than the ninety-nine percent sweat." ”
Although we may know that "inspiration is the most important" is nonsense, many people prefer to believe the second half of the sentence, because human nature always tends to benefit and avoid harm, so they like to blame their failures on external objective uncontrollable factors, rather than admitting their internal subjective deficiencies. In order to resist this decadent atmosphere, in recent years, the chicken soup industry has become popular again, "with the low level of effort of most people, it is not the turn to fight talent", but is this the truth? I'm afraid not, at least in the author's eyes, being able to continuously work hard for one thing is also a talent in itself.
One of the three proverbs of the Temple of Delphi is the most widely circulated phrase, "Know thyself," which is said by the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates, and Nietzsche wrote in his interpretation: "The one who is farthest from everyone is himself." In the animation of "Ping Pong", the author may want to express a point of view: more important than "hard work" or "talent" is how to recognize yourself, and after recognizing yourself, how to accept the less perfect self.
Outside of the protagonist group, the reason why the story of "Seeing Hai Ge" can move many people is because it tells us that liking a thing does not necessarily mean doing it to the extreme or exchanging it for profit, as long as it can be done, it is already happy enough. The same is true of life, for most people, we should learn to accept reality and try to accept and enjoy it, rather than drilling the horns and putting ourselves in a state of pain all the time. This is not a sign of evasion or cowardice, but rather as the classic Quote of Romain Rolland:
"There is only one true heroism in the world, that is, after recognizing the truth of life, you still love life."