English Dub Review: Hinomaru Sumo “The Dream Continues”

The final bout is here, but the dream never dies.

Overview (Spoilers Below)

The final match of the tournament begins with Hinomaru fighting Kuze for the team tournament title. Everyone sits on the edge of their seats as these two titans of the sport go at each other. Hinomaru the demon, the underdog with everything to prove, vs. Kuze the immovable god, the prodigy with the ultimate strength. The fight begins, and the two start going blow for blow with each other without any reservation. Each of them gives their all into it, pushing not just with their muscles, but with their hearts.

Both Hinomaru and Kuze reflect on their pasts as they fight each other. Hinomaru reveals to us what happened to his mother, who blamed herself for giving Hinomaru such a small body when he wanted to do sumo so much. Her death from illness inspired Hinomaru to push himself forward in her memory. Yet, it’s not just the past that pushes him forward; he reaffirms the core truth of his purpose in the ring. He fights for the love of it, with a smile on his face.

Kuze has a familial obligation to the sport as well, with his father being a yokozuna. Kuze always had to give so much of himself to the sport, but never found himself an equal. But in this moment, Kuze finds himself embroiled in the thrill of a real match, finally happy to find a worthy opponent.

The two struggle to the end, but Hinomaru grabs Kuze’s belt and initiates a takedown. However, before he can follow through, his wounded arm stiffens up, and it looks like it might be over. But Hinomaru pushes through his limits and ends it at last. With his underarm throw, Kuze hits the ground and the fight is over. Dachi High are the champions.

With the fight over, so ends Hinomaru’s time on the Dachi High team. Time passes, and Hinomaru is accepted into the pro league, though he only manages to take third place in his first tournament. Though Hinomaru moves on to bigger, better things, he makes sure to come back to Dachi High to fight with his friends once again, who are excited to show him what they’ve learned in his absence. The dream carries on.

Our Take:

After 24 episodes, Hinomaru Sumo has finished it’s fiery run with its head held high. This unexpected surprise has found its way into my shounen heart and won me over time and time again, becoming better and better as it went on. Its finale follows that course faithfully, giving us the final bout that we deserve to see and not dropping the ball at the last minute. While there may have been more creative ways to end the series with something a little more poignant or challenging, it’s still a great episode that follows through on exactly what I want from Hinomaru Sumo.

So the biggest creative choice here is to put Hinomaru’s and Kuze’s backstories against each other, revealing to us their innermost thoughts and histories while they fight for supremacy. This isn’t anything new, but by doing this well, the fight is not set up as just a battle between two wrestlers, but between two completely different ways of life. Both of these wrestlers fight for their lives, for their parents and backgrounds, intersecting everything that makes them who they are. Kuze the god vs. Hinomaru the demon, a thematic clash that carries an enormous amount of weight.

The only thing that seems to hold this fight back is that it’s over too quickly. I would have recommended giving another episode to the fight to develop it out more, but unfortunately, this battle is one of the more vanilla bouts that we’ve seen. That’s not to say that it isn’t intense or emotional, it certainly is, but it’s just a struggle played completely straight. I would have liked to see something present here to give the fight a little more edge.

All’s well that ends well, though. What small criticisms I have of this finale are lost to its overwhelming power and emotion. It does what a finale needs to do best, making the audience feel as if everything has built up to this one moment. The themes of the show are carried through to the end brutally and without reservation. I particularly enjoyed seeing Hinomaru’s past with his mother, talked about just enough to give another layer of empathy to Hinomaru. There will be other sports shounen for sure, there will be ones more spectacular and more complex, but I’m not sure there will be one that carries as much heart and spirit as Hinomaru Sumo.