Krystallina: Ayame and Tamako on the cover?! I approve. Although I’d bet Ayame would have something to say about not getting the cover to herself.
This volume of Silver Spoon is divided into two parts. The first is the school festival — well, rather, Hachiken not getting to see it or any of his friends. Fortunately, we do, including more Ayame goodness and Tokiwa’s secret show. But guess who Hachiken does see? His parents.
And, well, as far as his dad goes, no wonder his sons aren’t anxious to spend time with him. Lots of animanga dads are pretty distant and unemotional, but even when Hachiken tells his father he likes Ezo Ag, his father practically scoffs. Readers also learn that the comment about the bacon was pretty much a lie (wish?) made up by his mother. She doesn’t seem like a bad person, but maybe she needs to do more to figure out why her family is emotionally dysfunctional.
That’s going to be a topic throughout Silver Spoon, but perhaps the Aki-Hachiken romance won’t be taking too much longer. Aki has become more aware of Hachiken and her feelings, and her friends are ready to assist them (with violence, if need be). The couple heads out for their promised sort-of date, but despite the date defense squad’s efforts, of course they don’t end up alone. But I like how the two of them act more natural around each other now. Hachiken even manages to tease Aki about her country accent. He’s come a long way from his zombie days where it seemed like he was only crushing on Aki because she was the first girl to say hi.
They’re not the focus of the latter part of the volume though. It’s Komaba and the baseball team trying to work their way to Koshien. Arakawa checks in with Komaba himself at points, but most of the time we follow the other Ezo Ag students watching/listening to the game. This means that we see other things happening during the games. For instance, Hachiken keeps running off to help with cow births during one game. I know this isn’t a baseball manga, but the section was kind of boring to me. This is Komaba’s passion; I wanted to follow his journey and save Hachiken’s first time on a tractor for later. The volume ends with a cliffhanger regarding this storyline, and I’m hoping that Silver Spoon will focus on Komaba instead of being all, “OK, let’s talk about Komaba now and — Oh, look over there!”
So while the last couple of chapters weren’t as good as the rest of the volume, considering the high standards Silver Spoon has set for itself, it’s still an enjoyable read.
Krystallina’s rating: 3 out of 5
Justin: So remember when Hachiken had at least 10,000 things he had to do for the school festival? It wouldn’t have been shocking in the least if his body simply broke down. Well it did, and that landed him in the hospital. When he awoke, he definitely missed most of the festival.
He then also got to see his father again…which is the last thing he wanted to do at this point.
Silver Spoon volume 7 finally brings over Hachiken’s father as more than just talked about or briefly seen on a panel, and that brings forth as an emotionally charged confrontation that we all saw coming that involves Hachiken’s entire family. Not that we didn’t realize this already, but there’s clearly a rift within the family that involves his father since neither Hachiken nor his brother Shingo want to interact with him. From his mom lying to Hachiken about his father enjoying the bacon he sent to his father’s attitude regarding his studies, you can see why he wants to prove himself far, far away from him, and that his father’s methods are far too strict.
That all said, I will point out two things: one, that his father is likely doing this to ask the best of his sons but is indescribably bad at it. I think it’s reasonable for a parent to hope their child aims high, and being strict with studies isn’t always bad. But from the interactions so far in volume 7, I can see why Shingo or Hachiken wouldn’t sign up for it. This kind of reminds me of a character introduced in the GTO Live-Action Drama (2012). That character was so focused on the school being academically elite that they couldn’t even find time to get a breather or even do a school festival. For Hachiken’s father to not even be interested in it or what his son’s done is pretty disappointing, and probably suggests he’s far too stuck in his mindset that you must do things this way, etc. We are still lacking complete context in what has driven the two away from their father, but it’s at least becoming clearer and clearer as the manga continues.
But the second thing is worth wondering about. It’s definitely odd for Hachiken, who has no farm background, to suddenly go all the way out of the city to Ezo Ag for school. Since he wasn’t sure what to do, it does make sense to go somewhere new and find something, but going to a farming school is more than just new. So when his father mentions that Hachiken likely went to this school because he can look down on the students academically, that’s pretty harsh to say. But rather than look down on them, did he go to this school specifically to overcome that attitude? Again, we have the barest surface of what Hachiken was like in his other schools — did having to be smart affect how he interacted with his peers, his family, etc? It’s hard to know, though based on what we’ve seen so from him throughout this series, it’s hard to see him act like he’s above it all. I’m gonna guess something happened that made Hachiken realize he needed to find himself, and he wasn’t going to find it doing it dad’s way — hence the far out move. It is likely more complicated than that though.
While the family storyline is a major plot point, this probably affects a chapter, maybe two in this volume — after Hachiken recovers, he goes to take in what’s left of the festival, and after that, it’s all about the rest of the school. Well, specifically Aki, as she finally realizes that Hachiken actually might have a thing for her, and Komaba, as he tries to pitch his team to Koshien, and the aftermath of the results of their tourney run. We also get more insight into characters like Aikawa and why they choose what they do, and we also see Hachiken discovering that maybe he and cows just don’t mix. Like, they can’t ever be buddies basically!
And as this work continues bringing the humor while also displaying each character’s journey to really do what they want, or find what they want to do, it’s fair to say Silver Spoon is still continuing to be well worth the time to read.
Justin’s Rating: 4 out of 5