Krystallina: Komaba hasn’t been to school since the baseball team lost. What else is there to do but make cheese!
After that informative but somewhat random chapter, Silver Spoon turns its attention back to Komaba’s situation. Ayame (who’d I’d love to see attend Ezo Ag — come on, principal, giver her a best girl waiver or something so she can transfer) delivers the news: he’s not just skipping out of depression. Komaba Ranch is out of business.
Although Aki already knew, the news hits Hachiken hard. For a while, it looked like Hachiken was going to try to engineer a comeback for the Komaba family farm, but fortunately, the situation moves too fast for him to try to pull off a fundraiser or something. (Or start a life as a crab fisher — evidently, it’s a booming business.) Everyone else is rather blunt that although they feel bad, there’s not much they can do. Besides, almost everyone is in debt. So I’m glad Silver Spoon keeps these harsh reminders of how harsh life can be and that not all dreams can come true. Otherwise, this would have been one situation that I wouldn’t have mind seeing somebody slap the naivety out of Hachiken.
But this situation is better for the story for a second reason: it forces Aki to admit she’d rather work with horses than take over the family farm. While the Japanese take the idea of inheriting the family business more seriously than Westerners, the Mikage family has their own financial issues and are also the guarantors of the Komaba family’s loan. Komaba also turns down what would seem like a good solution: let him take over the Mikage farm while Aki goes to college and finds a job. The safe bet for Silver Spoon‘s ending still is Hachiken marrying Aki and taking over the business, but at least the manga touched on why Komaba couldn’t be taken in as an adopted son or whatever.
But Hachiken proves both that he really can’t leave people alone and that he really likes Aki: he agrees to tutor her to pass her college entrance exams. It’s a good thing they’re only first-years, as she’s only a few steps above Tokiwa. This may seem like a time for Hachiken’s personal growth to stagnate, as he’s already strong enough to turn down organizing another pizza party. His tutoring gig could also mean less time for events like the aforementioned cheesemaking. They may be somewhat random, but these experiences have been an essential part of the edutainment for Silver Spoon. But if anybody can keep a manga going strong, it’s Arakawa. If she can make a volume about someone going bankrupt good, I don’t think anything can stop her.
Krystallina’s rating: 4 out of 5
Justin: Maybe 1/10th of this volume of Silver Spoon displayed the humor that makes this a really fun manga. The rest of it? A level of really engaging drama that continues to show why Arakawa is a masterful storyteller.
…With a few jokes included here and there that work really well!
Silver Spoon volume 8 kicks off with the aftermath of the festival. While Hachiken and crew learn all about making cheese (and why it takes so long to make), everyone’s wondering where Komaba disappeared to after his team missed its chance on going to Koshien. Well, of all people, Ayame lets everyone know — he’s dropping out. As it turned out, his family’s ranch is in some debt, and with Aki’s family being guarantors, the only option was to start paying it back. With no real way to stop him, Aki’s in a situation she can’t solve. So how in the world is Hachiken, an outsider with no real connection to farming, going to?
Well, maybe it starts by helping Mikage achieve her dream…
After many volumes of leaving snippets, we finally understand what was not only motivating Komaba and Aki, but also why they didn’t want to tell Hachiken. It does make perfect sense for that to be revealed after you seem to lose your dream, which is for Komaba to go pro. But if you can’t get to a famous locale like Koshien, then it’s hard to show your talents, so between that and having to take care of his family, his options were limited.
Now whether he had to keep that to himself, and whether Aki also had to keep that to herself, is what drives Hachiken to find some way out of it. As Hachiken quickly learns though, farm life is filled with debt. Just one bad weather season can ruin it for a farm, and with tariffs and normal regulations, it only adds to the complications. Some happen to have that silver spoon, as we get the explanation in the manga where they’re rich enough to never have to worry about missing a meal, but for others it’s trying to do enough to live day-to-day and solve it. Hachiken ends up realizing this, and as he has no goals himself at the moment, there’s only one thing he can do — try and help the people he cares about accomplish their goals.
And right now, trying to find something for Komaba to do and getting Aki to work with horses is that at the moment.
This is Arakawa at her best. The drama went from low to blazing at the mention of Komaba being in debt, and since then many characters begin to reflect on their futures, and it’s done in such a way that’s incredible to read. Those teases regarding what those two were going through over the past couple volumes enhanced volume 8 — I couldn’t stop reading. I’m curious to see what type of resolution will come out of all this, and that only makes me look even more forward to reading the next volume of this wonderful series.
I am curious if crab will be the way to solve this problem though…
Justin’s rating: 5 out of 5