The God of High School Episode 5

The God of High School Episode 5

Ronde/Hound

Now that we’ve gotten to a Daewi episode, The God of High School is actually turning into a show that I want to watch. We still haven’t really gotten a background for Jin, but I don’t see his being any better than Daewi’s. As I’ve mentioned before, his motivation for fighting simply seems to be finding strong opponents.

The reason I brought up Jin already is that while this episode does focus on Daewi’s backstory, it’s also the episode in which Jin and Daewi fight in the final round of the preliminaries. And while I think it was obvious that Jin was going to win here — because he’s the main character — it made me realize that there can only be one winner.

That might sound obvious, but when the three main characters are introduced in a preliminary tournament and there can only be one winner, it makes you wonder what will happen to the other two. Daewi and Mira can’t just be removed from the tournament altogether, right? Because then there would be no point in their characters anymore.

Jin and Daewi from the anime series The God of High School
Jin and Daewi

And it’s not just Daewi and Mira. What about all the other side characters who were named throughout the preliminary tournament and who were featured in the OP? Surely they’ll all be playing some sort of larger role (except maybe for Kang) beyond the first couple episodes of the series.

Although this wasn’t stated in the anime, I’m betting that there’s actually a point system in place for determining who gets through to the main competition. It’s probably something like, anyone who made it through the initial free-for-all automatically earned enough points to move on.

Either that, or we’re about to get an entirely new cast of characters within the next episode or two, which would be a strange thing to do mid-cour.

Daewi and Seungtae

Moving back over to Daewi’s backstory, it looks like he and Seungtae hadn’t actually been friends for very long before the God of High School tournament began. It was implied that they met at some point in middle school. But since they didn’t look like middle schoolers, I’ll assume that they were in their final year.

At this point, we know Daewi is in high school. And I think it’s fairly safe to assume that he’s a third-year. I mean, considering he looked the same as he does now in middle school, it’s very possible he could be a first-year. But the fact that he has a job and seems to be fairly put together tells me this is his last year of high school.

Also, I’m pretty sure it was stated in the previous episode that Mira is 17, so she and Jin are likely third-years as well. Or at the very least, second-years.

Seungtae and Daewi from the anime series The God of High School
Seungtae and Daewi

What I’m saying with all of this is that Daewi and Seungtae only knew each other from anywhere between one and three years. Of course, a deep friendship can definitely be forged within that time. But it’s not as if these two were childhood friends who grew up together or anything.

The reason the friendship between Daewi and Seungtae was so deep comes down to what I’d like to call the “Naruto effect.” In this situation, Seungtae was the Naruto-like character who’s personality pulls people towards him. Of course, this can be said of many shounen series protagonists, but that’s not what Seungtae is.

Since basically everyone has seen at least through the chunin exam arc of the original Naruto series, think of it this way: What if after “saving” Neji, Naruto died? That would have a pretty profound effect on Neji’s outlook on life, and that’s basically what we’re seeing here.

Friends

While the whole backstory with Daewi and Seungtae was good, the best part of the episode came afterward, when Daewi and Jin were able to finally fight each other with clear consciences and as equals. Obviously this was the part of the episode that had the best animation and the majority of the action, but it goes beyond that.

Fights are always more entertaining when there’s meaning behind them. Sure, standard tournament arcs can still be fun to watch, but you’re not really invested in them unless there are personal stakes beyond simply winning or losing. By including Daewi’s backstory before and during the fight, his fight against Jin became meaningful.

And, just as I had predicted (possibly last week, I forget), this was basically Daewi’s “Sasuke retrieval arc.” Due to his circumstances, he was momentarily lead astray, but thanks to his new friends, he’s been brought back into the group.

Jin vs. Daewi from the anime series The God of High School
Jin vs. Daewi

I do want to point out that I like the vague attempt to give Mira some importance here by being the one to bring Seungtae’s letter to Daewi. And by like, I mean I thought it was funny that they would give her a job like that rather than actually developing her character in any meaningful way.

It really makes me wonder what Mira’s role is going to be throughout the rest of the series. Is she ever going to be considered on par with Jin and Daewi? Or is she more of their sidekick? I don’t see her playing any major role unless she’s used as a Deus ex machina.

Conclusion

What did you think of The God of High School episode 5? Do you think Daewi’s backstory was good? Were you hoping there would be more to it? Did you think Daewi would defeat Jin in the final round? Let me know in the comments.

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My review of the next episode is available here.

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