Silver Spoon

I browsed on the internet for about a whole day just looking for some feel good, slice of life manga, and I somehow got to Silver Spoon. I heard of this title earlier in my life, but I just never got to reading it, but with this.. ahem.. interesting year, I decided to finally read it. Don’t know why. Just did. I probably should say that this is my first ever review, but this manga hit me so hard, I just felt compelled to say something about Silver Spoon. Also, there will probably be some spoilers, I don’t know how to do spoiler free reviewswell yet, but I’ll try and keep it to the minimum and to ones that aren’t plot changing (I’ll say if I do give a spoiler). For those who don’t know, Gin no Saji, also known by the English title of Silver Spoon, is a manga written and drawn by the author of the Fullmetal Alchemist series, Hiromu Arakawa. It follows the story of Hachiken Yūgo, a high school student from Sapporo who has no direction and dreams for his life and a strained relationship with his parents. With this in mind, he was recommended/informed by his teacher of Ooezo Agricultural High School, also known as Ezo Ag in the Hokkaido countryside. Expecting to breeze by in school, the manga follows the story of initial struggles of fitting in, everlasting friendships, the persistence and results of hard work, and learning the ins and outs of Hachiken’s new world: agriculture. I think one of the most important things to me that stood out were the little things and details that Arakawa-san brought out from this story. One was about how much you could learn about agriculture. It’s like a watered down version of an agricultural class; I don’t actually know if it is, because I’m just a high schooler who likes anime, but I feel like you can learn a good percent about agriculture. You can hear bits and pieces of the way bacon is made, milk is produced, among others I probably forgot. You get to see the side of agriculture we don’t get to see often. We see the finished product. We just buy it. But so much time, sweat, and effort is put into getting these items to the selves. Like for example (SPOILERS), Hachiken put in so much effort just to make some pizza. “Pizza? Easy, just need cheese, pepperoni, batter, etc..” Is it actually easy? We tend to just put frozen pizzas in an oven or buy it. We don’t need to make it from scratch. Another thing that this manga made me realize is that we forget where we get our food. How much sacrifices people make to bring food to our tables. Hachiken’s reluctance to kill animals really struck a chord with me too. I tend to forget that the meat we eat comes from animals slaughtered, taken from their mothers, never living a full life. While it won’t fully affect me, there were reactions from Hachiken that really resembled how I felt, and made me realize that farmers shouldn’t, more like can’t, be attached to them. In a way, they have to be “cold hearted” and put their emotions behind their line of work. There is also the idea of dreams and goals. Hachiken didn’t have a dream, didn’t have a goal. His hard working, competitive spirit made him into a person that helped everyone, even if he didn’t have the energy and dropped dead, and tried to excel them to become the best. A running gag is him trying to help his classmates in core subjects like math and english. Let’s just say 9 times out of 10, their tests don’t go well. (SPOILERS for the rest of the paragraph) But it’s through his kind hearted nature that he finds his own dream, it’s through these trials and tribulations that he realizes that starting a business is his way forward. He built bridges and carved new paths for people, another way of helping. Another form of the theme of dreams comes through the form of Komba Ichiro. While Hachiken found his dream, Komba, in a way, couldn’t follow it. His dream of being a baseball player was crushed when his team couldn’t win regional qualifiers for Koshien, Japan’s premier HS baseball tournament. Koshien was a means to get scouted, to get signed, to get money to help his family’s struggling business which was in a lot of debt. His loss meant he had to focus on the business more now. Something that struck me was the importance of simple phrases like good work and thank you. It’s subtle, and it may just be me, but I think it’s something Arakawa-san put in on purpose. We always use these words, but do we truly mean it? Has the essence of simple gratitude phrases lost its meaning because of the constant repetitive use of it? Of course, it’s not limited to these simple phrases; it’s also other compliments and encouraging words. On a normal basis, I feel as though we use words like thank you because it’s expected of us, but with a half hearted feel to it. In Gin no Saji, these words are used when you truly deserve it, as a means to bring one’s spirit up, because they truly deserve praise for the hard work they did. The only fault I can think of is really just the epilogue. It felt rushed, but from what I’ve heard, with Arakawa-san’s health and long hiatus, I really can’t complain haha, at least it was satisfying. Even though there is so much depth in the plot and underlying themes in the story, Arakawa-san does very well of developing the whole cast. Hachiken, the main character of the story, character development is arguably the best in the series. From a boy with no direction, he found his footing, in an environment without experience nonetheless, not without a lot of help! At Ezo Ag, he met many people along his journey, from Mikage Aki, the horse-riding lover, easygoing, amiable love interest of Hachiken, to the rough and honest, baseball loving Komba Ichiro, to the carefree, yet hardworking cheese lover Yoshino Mayumi. There are some many characters you can fall in love with, and these three are just three of my favorites among everyone I like, which is... the whole cast... yea. In a compact 131 chapters of amazingness, Arakawa-san went through Hachiken’s struggles and dreams, growth and change, but also had other short, and even story long, side character plots. We go through Mikage and Komba’s stories, their struggles, their battles, their growth. We have shorter plot stories, like (SPOILERS) Aikawa Shinnosuke, Hachiken’s friend, going through his struggle of not liking to work with blood, yet having his dream of being a veterinarian. (Oh, the horses also had different personalities, which is a 10/10 in it of itself) I don’t completely know how to judge and grade art, but I loved the art here. There were moments of madness and it was conveyed nicely. I don’t really have a preference for an art style, I do still have standards :(, but this art was down my alley. I do love myself some simple art, and I don’t know if you’d count this as simple, but it’s very clean and detailed. Facial expressions, character drawings, background art all had a certain charm to them. The art style definitely complimented the feel good, slice of life feel to the story. I’m gladly happy that every character and every shot was drawn nicely, considering how many characters there were and so many things happening. Overall, there was a great balance of character development, plot, emotions, drama, art, among many. The characters were lovable and I can relate to some of them. I can probably say so much more about the plot and themes of the manga, this freaking review is reaching two pages on docs, let’s not add more. I haven’t read so many manga, but this has easily hit my top 3 manga, maybe even 1. While I think this isn’t everyone’s bread and butter, this manga is a manga I’d definitely try and recommend. For me, easy 10/10.

It was a very good manga , as it said about agriculture and Coming of age story . First time saw the anime 3 years ago and now finally read all the manga with the ending ! Yes somewhere half way get a bit boring but then take off again. The ending was a bit hurried but at least gave as a closure , and of coure hope some day(like in 2021 or 2022) for a new manga chapters even a few. *Hope some day like in 1,5 year to read it again in japanese (if have time) .... Gin no Saji or Silver Spoon is a manga by HiromuArakawa , the author of FMA too !

Gin no Saji created by Hiromu Arakawa is a very good manga that hasn't reach its full potential or more like not given a chance. It is more like the pace at the late part that feels like some things got change along the way. it makes me feels sad to think that it is probably not popular enough because of having 131 chapters only. Although I am only speculating here, there is a chance that it might have get discontinued because it got an end immediately making feel empty inside like there are still things that need to be explored. Like for example thatsideline business was supposed to be the only foundation and not really the final goal. it also got time skips that makes me feel like I skip a chapter. it still got a proper ending of course but not the way it is supposed to end All in all it is still good to read because it is all about farming and finding a new goal. I just really hope I got to see reach all their goal because it is my first time to feel empty inside despite reading so many manga. it is also my first time giving a review because I really like this story and its whole bunch of characters.

tl;dr: A manga that has good character development and makes agriculture interesting, but drags on too long and meanders into its ending. This manga is about a boy named Hachiken who due to having a mental breakdown due to the pressure of trying to keep up academically, abruptly decides to attend Ooezo Agricultural High School. The thing is, having lived in a city all his life, it’s an entirely new world to him. Thus, he very much feels like a fish out of water, finding everything that comes across his path as surprising and having to get used to everything. However, he’s also “the man thatcan’t say no” so despite how hesitant he is, even fearful at times, he still ends up being pulled into various things and due to his serious personality, he gives everything he does his all. He forms a lot of bonds, casual acquaintances, deep friendships, and even a romantic relationship. In doing all this he goes through tremendous character growth. He starts off the series with a very narrow view of the world, unsure of what he wants to do with his life, and unsure of what he could even do. And furthermore, he has a complex about being so unsure about things and just directionlessly doing whatever he gets pulled into, which compounds on itself for an even stronger feeling of pressure. But over the course of the series, he overcomes that, coming to view his lack of a dream as the presence of endless opportunity. He comes to view his inability to refuse getting involved with things as a major asset and proactively tries to broaden his horizons. And eventually that leads to him finding what he too wants to do with his life and pursuing it at full throttle. Furthermore, while this is a story of major character growth, even at the start of the series Hachiken is far from a lame protagonist. He’s pretty unique in his class due to the fact that he’s attending despite not having a background in farming, that results in him having skills that others don’t and bringing a fresh perspective. He has moments where he does things that no one else is capable of doing and where he definitely shines. And just as much as others bring about character growth in him, he’s a key part in the stories of those around him as well. There’s an assortment of very unique characters that surround Hachiken. Most don’t really get much in terms of character development, though are still pretty likable and feel worth getting invested in due to the general group dynamics. But a couple, Mikage and Komaba, have very strong development during stories of their own. The agriculture aspect was also very interesting. It’s not a topic that I have a lot of knowledge about, with the anime adaptation of this being my first introduction to pretty much all the subject matter. It’s also not a topic I’m particularly fond of as, to be frank, I kind of hate nature in general and am a city slicker through and through. Despite that the writing in this was very appealing, written in a way that avoided getting too textbooky while also providing a lot of information. Hachiken being a newcomer to everything but immensely curious and very expressive about everything he learned helped tremendously with that. It was also well paced going through things fast enough that they didn’t get boring but slow enough they were easy to understand. And of course, the constant comedy sprinkled throughout was also definitely a plus. The manga also tackled various controversial farming related topics, such as factory farming or international trade, through a pretty realistic lens, wherein it presented a reasonable take on the different sides of the issue without getting preachy about anything but still allowing Hachiken to have his own opinions. My main problem with the series is that all of this applies to the first two thirds of the manga, the first year of high school. The last third, which went through the next two years with an epilogue carrying beyond that, was nowhere near as good to the point I’d say it was bad even. The first issue is that it essentially felt like everything was pretty much decided by the end of Hachiken’s first year. Character arcs were still going to a degree, but they had already passed through all the core parts so the trajectory was clear for the rest and in the last third it pretty much just follows through with what was already established in the first two thirds. As such, it’s not able to hit emotional highs anywhere near as strong the first two thirds. It kind of felt like it was just going through the motions of showing the characters as they continued to live their lives without actually trying to tell much of a story with them. The second issue is that Hachiken isn’t really much of an outsider past his first year, so there just isn’t anywhere near as strong a sense of curiosity or discovery, and it starts getting somewhat repetitive. The agricultural subject matter it delves into I also found to be far less interesting, being less general and more focused on narrow business uses without really tying all that well into character arcs. It also spends a lot of time focusing on things completely unrelated to agriculture, like college exams, which are pretty generic and weren’t written particularly well here so they were pretty dull. The third issue is the pacing, which was all over the place. It goes through time skips to go through the following two years within half the time it went through the first so it feels rushed in a broader sense, but in doing so it also feels like it often lacks a sense of direction or focus and thus at times it felt like it was moving too slowly. Because of the final stretch not being very good, the ending and epilogue, while really solid in and of itself, just don’t carry much impact and thus it kind of feels like the manga just fizzled out really slowly. Personally, I think it would have been better to have crammed a bit more into the final stretch of Hachiken’s first year and then gone straight from there into the time skip epilogue. The art I wasn’t much of a fan of. I suppose how it tackled the more technical aspects was somewhat impressive. But the character designs and art style in general were too simplistic and not all that high quality, and with the premise also being one where what’s being portrayed doesn’t stand out visually and is very grounded it very rarely had art that stood out.