Shoko Komi experiences extreme anxiety in most situations that require interaction with people. However, on Sports Day, she thrives without stress.
Kodoani.com – WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Episode 10 of Komi Can’t Communicate.
Sports Day is a national holiday in Japan that promotes an active lifestyle and is celebrated by many schools and businesses on the second Monday of October. Given its importance in society. In Japan, many anime and manga series have at least one episode dedicated to the event, and Komi Can’t Communicate is no exception. Episode 10 of the anime adapts the manga chapter devoted to the national holiday, which sees all of Itan private high school students participate in various sporting events such as sprinting and tug of war, during number of other things.
Under normal circumstances, Shoko Komi experiences crippling anxiety in almost any social situation. When it comes to athletics, however, she’s surprisingly chill. This aspect of her was first observed in Episodes 4 and 5 of her school’s physical exam and fitness test. In both episodes, Komi is shown to have athletic prowess, making her highly competitive classmate Makeu Yadano jealous. Episode 10 of Komi Can’t Communicate continue to build on that foundation with the Sports Day event.
During Itan Private High School’s 23rd annual Sports Day event, every class prepares for the day’s activities on the athletic field, which means Komi and her classmates be able to interact with students from other grades, including upperclassmen. One of the upperclassmen they met was the highly competitive sophomore Chika Netsuno, who rated the “hot” of the other students by degree. When she meets Komi, she judges her timidity as cold and becomes super confident that she will be unrivaled. Ironically, she underestimated Komi’s athletic ability.
While Netsuno’s arm around Komi’s shoulder caused her anxiety to flare from feeling uncomfortably excessive closeness, it didn’t take away her ability to participate in any of her Sports Day activities. little. In fact, Komi ends up hitting Netsuno in the first activity of the day, which is group exercises. Although Komi doesn’t think or put in the same effort as Netsuno does to score as high as possible, this causes Netsuno to redouble his determination to beat Komi for the rest of the day’s sporting events.
In a game of tug of war, Komi once again put no thought or effort into the game and just went with the flow of the competition. Unfortunately for Komi, her presence still cost her class points. While Komi did nothing wise to put her class in a losing position, her popularity still caused many of her classmates to lose their ability to cling to the rope and pass out. As it turned out, being near Komi made her classmates agitated and unable to concentrate on the task at hand. This was especially evident with Ren Yamai, who was the first to fall like a domino before her classmates did.
When komi is not participating in any sporting events, Komi is seen assisting her friends when it is their turn to enter the field. Even though Komi couldn’t scream and cheer beside Ren and Najimi Osana when Hitohito Tadano was feeling nervous during a track and field sport, she managed to stammer “ganbatte kudasai,” which means “try your best.” do your best.” Tadano couldn’t hear Komi in the distance, but seeing her lips move sent him sprinting at full speed, taking third place in the game.
When it’s Komi’s turn to enter the relay, she is – for the first time – not competing with her classmate Yadano, for whom she receives the baton to continue the race for her class. Unfortunately, Komi is still up against Netsuno, who is determined to crush her on the track and nearly succeeds when their close proximity causes Komi to trip and fall. While Komi was temporarily discouraged by the fall, seeing her friends cheering gave her the courage to regain her composure and continue the race. She managed to catch up to Netsuno on track and field, although not in time to take first place. So Komi ended up winning the reward for second place for her class.
Despite Komi’s extreme social anxiety, she is surprisingly good at sports. Although she still doesn’t like being touched or stared at by groups, she is able to devote herself to sporting events without stressing about her current duties. In most cases, Komi doesn’t really think about what she needs to do – she simply does it. On the other hand, when her friends cheer her on to succeed, it’s time for her to work harder to win; not because she wants to win, but because it makes her friends happy to see her win.
Via: Kodoani.com