Free! Iwatobi Swim Club

Why yes hello! Welcome to Cup of Tea!

I am the Tart Pastry and I am here for another review, and on another hot button Anime that came out recently.

Now let me say this right now, I have rather picky tastes in what I choose to read, watch and indulge in, and this one is one of the few where I definitely don't usually enjoy a lot of the elements within it, and I normally would have glazed over it, but considering the anime is based off of swimming as a sport, it actually nestled into my heart due to my love of the sport in high school. (I was in it all four years of high school and enjoyed it immensely despite my lack of friendly peers minus a small handful). I'm pretty sure without that element to it I wouldn't have stuck with it, and I am certainly glad I did!!

Mind you, I still sort of eye twitch at the moe moe kyun sparkly desu bullshiznit that goes on in it every now and again but it's found a place in my heart.

It's based on those you see here in the picture, Haruka, Makoto, Rei, Rin and Nagisa.

Haruka, Makoto, Rin and Nagisa were in the same swim club as kids, and Rin, the red haired kid with a dream to swim in the olympics, ends up leaving for Australia to train, leaving behind his friends. It touches on it a bit when you watch the first episode, but it also hints that something happened between the main kid Haruka, and Rin by the end of the episode.

 Nagisa, the blond, is the obvious chipper cutie who is always excited, loves food and sort of keeps everyone together with his persistence and excitement. Makoto, Haruka's longest friend and one of the more level-headed of the group seems to keep everyone down to earth, and is actually revealed to have a bit of a phobia despite his obvious competence in the water. (You gotta watch to find out!!) Rei, the dude with glasses, may look suave as frickle frack with his bright red frames and serious demeanor but believe me he couldn't get any dorkier and that sort of made me love him more seeing as how he didn't fulfill the 'cool glasses type'. But he does not come into the circle until high school.

The basis is that Nagisa is wanting to go back to the good ol' days with his friends and start a swim team for the school. He manages to recruit his longtime friends and even find a club oversee, but the club can't be established unless they have a minimum of 4 members within the ranks. They manage to recruit Matsuoka Gou, who actually happens to be Rin's younger sister and the club is formed. But in order to actually swim, they need a fourth swimmer.

Which is where Rei comes in, who at first, repeatedly rejected the offer to join and was perfectly content on being on the track team. But he manages to change his mind later on and thus the club is formed. But in the very beginning you find out that SURPRISE. Rin is back from Australia and he is neither the nice nor friendly Rin that they all knew, but rather a much more uptight and prickly one was in his place. I'm pretty sure you'd feel better hugging a porcupine then facing down a bishounen with bright red hair and shark teeth. He challenges Haruka to a race and Haruka ends up losing, but Rin takes note that Haruka hasn't actually properly swam in years, and he refuses to accept the victory until Haruka is trained and properly suited for a race.

Thus the anime is nothing but a continuation of them training and trying to figure out why exactly Rin became the way he was and the obstacles they all face as friends on the same swim team.

Now if it weren't for the fact that this anime was a bit of another fan-service circus, it does actually have valid points that could easily pertain to real life struggles of teenagers. Big dreams sat on by reality, groups of friends torn within each other, encouraging one another, finding out that certain things are much harder then they appear and I must admit I wish the fanservice and need to be cute would be cut out to focus on that.

Despite all the fanart you see and the incessant shipping war with supposed sea animals, this anime is really centered around friendship and really it is hard to find some out there based on that.

These teenagers did something they loved, and just like in real life, time and interests change or morph and naturally being young just means you have lots of room to grow and develop. I believe that the writers properly portrayed character growth, believable emotions, friendship at it's finest and manage to have you follow along for the ride despite some of the obvious eye rolling bits in there. You don't need romance to elicit the emotions that I had while watching this, some sort of disgusting mixture of excitement, distress, sadness and amusement that managed to have me hiding my face behind my hands either grinning or groaning.

But on a random note-

In my honest to God opinion if Haruka could somehow have a relationship with the water, he'd put a ring on it and disappear into the ocean forever.

Or on less dramatic terms he'd just be a mermaid and unlike our favorite red-head of the sea, he'd turn his back on land and never look back.

I am not shitting you, those jokes of how he sees a body of water and he rips off his clothes is actually pretty spot on. As you watch, he actually nearly sits in a fish tank at the store and I had no idea what to do except screech and flail at my laptop because I was torn between laughter and jesus fuck why-

I digress.

I thoroughly enjoyed this anime, and although it may be due to my own personal association with the pool, I would recommend it if you like the average high school sports anime with beautiful animation, silly humor and a good heartwarmer that you need as a pick me up after a long and hard day!

If you're interested, please, take a dive and float along~ :)

This has been a review by the Tart Pastry, and thank you so much for reading!!