Notes on The First Slam Dunk (with Spoilers)
The animated Slam Dunk film reframes the story through Ryota Miyagi. Why this structural choice works, and what it says about the sibling loss narrative.
The First Slam Dunk (Dir. Takehiko Inoue, 2022)
The original manga's protagonist is Hanamichi Sakuragi — the underdog who falls into basketball by accident and grows through sheer stubbornness. The film replaces him with Ryota Miyagi.
This is a significant choice, and it works.
Why Miyagi
Ryota is the smallest player on the Shohoku team, the point guard who compensates for his lack of size with speed and an anger that the film reveals as grief. His older brother Sota died in an ocean accident when they were children. Ryota was there. He carries the guilt of survival alongside the belief that somewhere inside him is the player his brother would have become.
The Sannoh game — the tournament match that ends the manga — becomes, in the film, not just a basketball game but the moment Ryota stops running from what happened and decides to inhabit his own life instead of a ghost's.
The Ocean Motif
The film's visual language returns obsessively to water. Practice is overlaid with waves. Key moments of breakthrough cut to the ocean where Sota died.
This is not subtle. But it doesn't need to be. The film is operating at the level of emotional directness that anime does better than almost any other medium — the acceptance that some feelings don't need to be coded or obscured.
What the Film Preserves
The Sannoh match is a famous piece of sports storytelling. Shohoku has no business competing with the number-one team in Japan. They do it anyway, and what allows them to compete is not some sudden access to talent but the coherent activation of everything they already were.
In the film, Miyagi understands this. He has been the smallest player on every team he has ever played for. He has never had the option of winning through size or power. The only resource he has ever had is himself, moving as fast and as clearly as possible.
The game is the proof that this was enough.