Cheer Danshi!!

After suffering from a shoulder injury, shy first-year university student Haruki Bandou gladly takes the opportunity to give up judo, failing to find happiness in the sport regardless of his family owning a dojo. He did not expect, however, that his best friend Kazuma Hashimoto would also decide to leave their university's judo club at the same time as him. Despite Haruki's protests, Kazuma already has plans for a new and revolutionary activity: a cheerleading team made up of only men. Although heavily reluctant, Haruki ends up helping his friend set up the team. Through sheer determination, and with support from their newfound club members, Haruki and Kazuma persist in founding the Breakers, the first ever all-male cheerleading team of Meishiin University, slowly making history in spite of the feminine tag attached to the sport of cheerleading and the prejudices, physical challenges, and self-doubts that inevitably follow.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Bandou, Haruki Main

Yonai, Yuki Japanese

Hashimoto, Kazuma Main

Okamoto, Nobuhiko Japanese

Mizoguchi, Wataru Main

Sugita, Tomokazu Japanese

Tokugawa, Shou Main

Ono, Yuuki Japanese

Sakuma, Ryuuzou Supporting

Murase, Ayumu Japanese

Mori, Hisashi Supporting

Hatanaka, Tasuku Japanese

Chen, Zixuan Supporting

Bun, Yousei Japanese

Hasegawa, Gen Supporting

Konishi, Katsuyuki Japanese

Suzuki, Souichirou Supporting

Kuwano, Kousuke Japanese

Wataru's Mother Supporting

Satou, Shinobu Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Herek, Samantha Assistant Producer

Yoshimura, Ai Director

Kimura, Eriko Sound Director

Reviews

Jun 14, 2022

BabyGirl06301

Recommended

People tend to say that Cheer Danshi!! is a unique sports anime, and I'd kind of argue that that's because it doesn't carry itself like a sports anime at all. Yes, that means that the motivation for these characters to cheer is different than your standard sports anime, which is always to be the best team in the nation. But it's also the way this anime tells its story that makes it so different. I don't really know how I feel about this anime after watching it, but I think the conclusion I came to is this: it does well to make you fond of ... the characters but isn't that great at telling a story.

Before getting into all of that, I'm gonna talk about the animation for a second because it was very obvious where the effort was placed for this anime. The only dance-ish anime I've seen besides this one was Bakuten!! The way that anime handled the constant full-body motions of the characters as they practiced or performed was to make it completely CGI-based; but that anime still had practice scenes to show the characters in motion. Cheer Danshi!! didn't do that, and that was a bit disappointing. Their practices turned into a bit of a slideshow, and most of the anime is their practices, so it felt a bit like a cop out. Especially when the animation for the actual performances was so good. The art style itself is nice, but animation was often disappointing.

Back to the good stuff. The pacing--and I don't even know if pacing is the right word--of this anime was awful. There are definitely story elements to this anime that almost feel like they're broken up into baby arcs depending on the character or conflict being focused on. Many of those elements were nice to watch from a slice-of-life or drama anime perspective, but they slowed down the plot so much. Plus, because they were such short stints of story, I kept expecting a longer storyline to pick up afterward to tie the whole season together (in a better way than just "let's keep cheering" was holding it together). With the lack of a permanent story, this anime was completely hung on its characters, and that's what I hung onto as I completed it. If you think of it as a sports anime, that is. Since it's so focused on the characters and their conflicts, it actually makes for a decent slice-of-life. It's just that the anime made me expect cheering to be the focus of the series, not only the team on its own, which is how it's different from a normal sports anime. I actually think it could have made a very interesting and unique format had the pacing been done better.

The characters, like I said, weren't bad at all. There were probably just as many corny moments that were a bit hard to watch as there were meaningful moments, but by the end of these 12 episodes, I really liked the cheer team. There were a lot of scenes that drug the episodes down that I felt weren't necessary to achieve a likeable cast of characters, but this anime did still achieve that. Now, had the team been developed from the beginning instead of the way it was (to avoid spoilers, I'll just tell you that the team isn't all together for nearly half of the anime) it could have been more successful. These characters had real-world problems that reached into the story, which took up most of the last half of the anime (another reason it's unique among sports anime), and those problems worked to build the character relationships over the course of the 12 episodes.

I'm not sure what else to say about Cheer Danshi!! because a lot of it wasn't great and the elements that were are difficult to talk about. If you're like me and you like watching anime one right after another, this one might make you feel like it's dragging on and on without big enough payoffs at important junctures of the story. But if you like doing other things while you watch anime, this pace might suit you. I don't think this anime deserves the MAL score it has, but it's also just an average anime. Either way, it left me with a distinct impression of it that it isn't all that bad, so it must have done something right.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Aug 6, 2023

Mr_Socialite

Mixed Feelings

definitely a run-of-the-mill sports anime. There really isn't anything that separates Cheer Boys from the rest. That is not to say that it is not a good anime per se, probably just not my cup of tea. Frankly, I love sports animes, as they are one of the few genres of anime that I can watch and not get confused/have to rewatch to see everything. They are thoughtless animes, which is why they are so good for some viewers, you don't have to think when watching, all you have to do is enjoy.

Cheer Boys was an anime that took me over 3 months to ... watch from start to finish, and that is not a good thing, but also not a bad thing. I would do other things while this show played in the background because it was not something that caught my attention 100%, I had to do other things to get through it. It was a good anime to have one while doing homework, making dinner, or doing my hair, so for that, I am thankful (dubbed of course).

The animation was nothing special, the story did not develop the way I had hoped, and it was not the best anime I have ever seen, but it also wasn't the worst anime of all time. If you want to watch an anime that isn't trying too hard to be something, I would say that Cheer Boys is a good one to watch in the middle of other shows that you really like. It is a good palate cleanser. Honestly, it was the first episode that really did it dirty. The beginning is very much a pivotal point in any anime, and Cheer Boys did not make its beginning captivate the audience. I understand why people drop it, but with that being said, I am glad I followed through and watch till the end because it was a cute story about boys wanting to do cheer, which is not something you see all the time.

My main grievance with this show is that aspects of the story are never depicted in anime. That being men participating in societal feminine things, while also being college-age and not children. So many aspects could have made it pivotal to the anime community, and that is where it fell short for me the most. I am sad that this show was not more than it was, but it was the worst thing in the world.

All in all, if season two comes out, I will watch it, hoping that it is better than season 1.

Reviewer’s Rating: 5

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Oct 31, 2020

soccerrkidd

Not Recommended

Short version (no spoilers) :
Overall, an ok but cute anime; you will no problem watching this in a day but had major jumpcuts and lack story development. It would have been best as a 24 episode or two-season anime.

Long version (may contain spoilers) :

It was a cute anime and something you could enjoy if you're looking for a feel-good anime. However, since it was only 12 episodes, it was poorly done. The themes felt rushed and provided no background info, and the character developed was at best ok; in the beginning, the MC was still doing judo. Then the next episode, we just skipped ... to cheerleading, and it's never explained what happened to his shoulder. It's obvious that it was caused by judo, but some background of it would have been helpful.

The jump cuts that's one thing that really threw me off. For example, after they cheered at the school festival, the next episode showed all the new teammates who joined. At first, I thought I missed an episode since there were a dozen new people that were never introduced.

The anime lacked depth since it just cut from one thing to the next. The story never got the chance to develop, and when it did go deeper, it was really short. I'm used to sports animes like "Run with the Wind," who explored the characters and story plot a lot better.

The anime didn't show much of the character's lives outside of cheerleading; because of that, there was a disconnect, so you really couldn't relate to them besides the two MC's. Also, I'm surprised there wasn't more of a school aspect since this is set in college.

Some extra things, the romance was a shock, to say the least. That whole thing boyfriend's situation was unnecessary. And I hated Sakuma's voice (I watched in Dub). I understand they were trying to make him more feminine, but they overdid it. The whole "rival" with Hanasaki was terrible. It was so clear he was just a side character to boost the MC's and had absolutely no purpose other than running his mouth.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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	does anyone know if cheer boys/danshi boys is kid appropriate Haikyuu_ForLife - Jan 25, 2023	6 replies	by tinker3bellz1 »» Jan 26, 2023 5:28 AM
	Poll: Cheer Danshi!! Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Stark700 - Sep 27, 2016	51 replies	by Stormy_77 »» Oct 28, 2022 10:29 PM
	Poll: Cheer Danshi!! Episode 11 Discussion Stark700 - Sep 20, 2016	44 replies	by Stormy_77 »» Oct 28, 2022 9:33 PM
	Poll: Cheer Danshi!! Episode 10 Discussion Stark700 - Sep 13, 2016	27 replies	by Stormy_77 »» Oct 28, 2022 9:13 PM
	Poll: Cheer Danshi!! Episode 9 Discussion Stark700 - Sep 6, 2016	22 replies	by Stormy_77 »» Oct 28, 2022 8:54 PM