Hanebado!

Sports anime in general are quite subjective because everyone has a favourite sport and a lot of anime viewers tend to stay away from sports anime solely because they are just not interested, but... sports anime can be enjoyable if the story and the characters show their personality while playing their specific sport.

Hanebado! is a sports anime focused around a girl's high school badminton team. The series begins when Nagisa, the lead player loses a game 21-0. Nagisa's love and passion for badminton begins to fluctuate as she just lost an important game. Her opponent, Ayano Hanesaki, had obstructing thoughts about the sport and was questioning herself why she wanted to play badminton in the first place.

Ayano eventually starts going to school with Nagisa, and so they need to resolve their previous rivalry and grudges in order to perform better together with the school team. Ayano's mood and attitude about badminton and her new friends shifts a lot throughout the series, but the series overall concentrates too much about Ayano's emotions and does not dive deep into the other characters' emotions. 

One thing I enjoyed about this show was the animation during badminton games. The details put into the animation such as the feathers of the birdie or the perspiration as well as the dialogue of the players and coaches were very well done.

A more deeper dive into the characters and a bit more attention to the story would have made this anime much more of a 'timeless' or memorable feel.

Final Score: 6.5/10