Hiromu Arakawa
Silver Spoon
Beginnings
- a fitting mix of light-hearted and serious
- great sense of humor
- very universal
- fans looking for something similar to FMA will get disappointed
| category | manga |
| genre | slice of life |
| author | Hiromu Arakawa |
| published | 2011 - present |
In 2010, Arakawa finished writing her opus magnum, Fullmetal Alchemist. History is filled with artists who, after completing their best work, either drift away from the profession or awkwardly continue releasing second-grade materials unsuccessfully trying to live up to the hype. Not the case with Hiromu.
Almost immediately, she began working on her new creation. Feeling that she needs to cut ties with the subjects people would expect of her, she decided to try something else.
What Hiromu came up with was no uncharted territory for her. Starting in 2006, she occasionally wrote chapters for her short manga Noble Farmer, which described her cow-alter-ego's daily struggles on a farm as a child and trying to adjust to life in Tokyo after moving to chase a mangaka career.
She decided to take that subject, but instead of depicting a village girl going to the big city, she went the other way around - a city boy went on a farm.
This time, the artist didn't project herself onto the main protagonist. An entirely new character was created, with his own personality and troubles waiting to be conquered.
Interestingly, the contract wasn't struck with Square Enix this time, which probably makes it Hiromu's first serialized manga not tied to Enix, with whom she enjoys a good and healthy relationship.
Instead, Square Enix's competitor Shogakukan (Shueisha's founder) was the company that managed to sign her under contract. All volumes were published in Weekly Shonen Sunday so far.
Story
Silver Spoon tells the story of a young boy named Hachiken, who after a tough period in his school capitulates and transfers to the agricultural school in a rural area. Depressed, lacking any idea as to why he is there and what he wants to be when he grows up, Hachiken is like an aimless arrow.
Lucky for him, he lands up in an environment which shakes him, straightens him, gets him to see life from new perspectives and hopefully grow up. Each person there has more practical life experience than him and has his/her life pre-planned already, so he carefully watches events unfolding around him and tries to make conclusions.
These villagers are more sincere and friendly too, so on top of learning about life, he also slowly begins to open up to others, as opposed to his old withdrawn self. There's even a wife material close by.
For a shonen fan accustomed to Arakawa's big swords, powerful magic, complex political themes and covering social issues, Silver Spoon story might come as a complete shock. Dropping almost all these things with which she was so good at, and to do what exactly? Write about a confused shy boy on a farm? That's practically a blasphemy!
What's more, the ties are brutally cut here. Very few of her hallmark themes, which found their way to most of her works, are here. Not a single person looks, or acts similar to anyone in FMA, or any other Arakawa manga. It is a completely new experience and fans need an open mind to appreciate it.
Characters
Hachiken Yūgo
Intelligent, great organizer, social and outgoing by nature, but all that sits contained inside a person who had bad experiences with humans both in school and at home. As he opens up more, we get to see what kind of person he really is. Loves animals and at first has trouble accepting that at the end of the day they are meat for consumption.
Aki Mikage
Hachiken's best friend, Aki also struggles to express herself and say what she feels needs to be said but is too shy to do it. While Hachiken is a screaming type though, she is more peaceful and humble. Easy to befriend, but never entirely opening up even to her closest friends. A serious relationship between her and the main protagonist can be felt in the air almost from the first time they meet, but both are too shy to make the necessary steps.
Ichirō Komaba
Together with Aki, Ichirō completes Hachiken's inner circle at the agricultural school. He is a jock type, but that doesn't scare our hero from getting close to him, even though their characters seem like a mismatch at first. Mentally strong and determined, Ichirō plans to launch a professional baseball career and inject the money earned this way into his family agricultural business.
Tamako Inada
So strong and independent that even Ichirō seems like a puppy in comparison. Goes through life like a hurricane. Tamako is the only fat girl in the entire school, but caring what others think about her (let alone her looks) is an alien concept to her. Clearly on a path to become a ruthless businessman, willing to do whatever it takes to succeed. Behind that toughness Arakawa paints plenty of life wisdom, and although there are many things Hachiken could learn from that girl, her predatory nature is probably nothing to be jealous of.
Review
Changing subject so drastically made Silver Spoon a risky voyage. It not only needed to be done perfectly, but even that might not be enough for people to like it. Her usual male shonen audience were now offered a story that on paper is more tailored towards women (albeit with a male protagonist).
The subject is very universal, but men don't like to read mangas about these kinds of things nearly as much as women, so many of her fans could have turned this one down based on first glance.
Luckily, most of them didn't. With Silver Spoon, the artist brings in a whole bunch of shiny that we didn't know she possesses. In Fullmetal Alchemist, she could refer to personal and daily matters very well, but it's an entirely different game when everything surrounding it is epic and world's fate rests on the ability for the hero to overcome his issues and face the music. Here, it's usual, it's ordinary, so everything has to be strong by itself.
To some degree, everyone can refer to Hachiken, he is a likeable character and it's very easy to sympathize with him.
The story sounds very serious and melodramatic, but luckily the manga is actually pretty light-hearted and makes for a read after which we don't come out scarred and dirty. The only trademark Arakawa theme that is present here is her wonderful ability to mix the serious with the not-so-serious. Things never go as far as the goofy absurds of Noble Farmer, but instead are well-balanced.
At one moment, everyone can be laughing and the next thing you know, a serious subject strikes and everything shifts completely. These kinds of sudden changes never seem out of place and unnatural. Hiromu is a great mood conductor.
The sense of humor is great and so frequent that Silver Spoon is as easy to process as a comedy. You can read some pages while you eat, or you can digest the whole volume with full attention. There's no need to be "in the mood" for this manga, even when Aki's family troubles surface and things get very serious, the read still somehow seems effortless.
One thing making this manga stand out from the rest is how much Arakawa got into details when describing the life of a farmer and of an agricultural school student. Almost every volume is stuffed with details of how horses behave, how the meat is made, how farms operate, what kinds of classes do these students have, what do they have to learn etc.
The subject is not attractive to most people, but all is presented so well that sparks interest and the reader ends up learning a lot while he has fun.
It's clear that this is a work coming from someone who knows the profession inside out and not just a result of quick consultations. There's just too many of those references and they are too smoothly implemented.
The mood is great too. Because the school comes with living quarters, students share rooms with each other. Arakawa uses this setup to make the whole thing feel like a prolonged school trip. For people whose school days are long behind them, it's a great nostalgia tour. She captures so well how it feels to be teenagers jammed together in a rural area.
She actually did such a fine job with it that after Silver Spoon became popular, the number of applications to Hokkaido agricultural high schools strongly increased for some time!
Post-release
Silver Spoon is a Slice of Life kind of story, and those never top the popularity charts, so it was clear from the start that the manga will never be as successful as Fullmetal Alchemist. For that limited market appeal, it still managed to grab the attention of more people than the genre would suggest.
It won the 5th Manga Taisho Award (beating, for example, Shōwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjū, a fantastic manga that got a worthy anime treatment) and the prestigious Shogakukan Manga Award, in shonen category. That second trophy she had collected 9 years earlier with FMA, but it was a tie, an honour shared with Yakitate!! Japan.
The year 2012 saw it peaking in popularity, achieving the number 7 spot on the list of best-selling mangas in Japan. It was trending enough that converting it into other formats became a tempting option. One year after that popularity peak, the serialized anime adaptation started airing.
Even though it was drawn somewhat moderately, the kind of story that Silver Spoon is doesn't really need anything glamorous to shine, especially that dialogues are dominating the anime just as they do the manga. Directed by Tomohiko Itō, known for supervising the immensely popular Sword Art Online, the adaptation perfectly copies all the best aspects of the original manga.
Same can't be said about the 2014 live action movie, also with the same name. Troubled by poor acting, cheesy sense of humor and a story trimmed from all the secondary characters, making them occasionally appear in the background only, it is a lecture only for the most devoted Arakawa fans. And most of them will end up disappointed after the picture ends anyway.
The manga is still being released at the time of writing this article, and new volumes continue to match the very high level set by their predecessors.
Silver Spoon is the second best thing that came from Hiromu Arakawa and good and universal enough that it comes recommended to people of all ages, professions and tastes.
