Medalist

Episode 10

I was surprised by the time jump at the start of this episode. The show has sufficiently established that Inori is a fast learner, and it probably wasn't necessary to see Inori pass every one of her tests. Still, so many of these kinds of stories go step by step with the progression that I was expecting to see each test treated like its own competition. Instead, we jumped about a year from Inori's last competition as she's made her way up to Level Five and is now one test away from being able to stand on the same stage as Hikaru. As nice as it would have been to see Inori rise more gradually, I won't complain about the show opting to avoid wasting time, and as we see with this episode, Inori still has quite a lot to prove to her rivals.

However, rather than simply focusing on how Inori's skills have grown in the past year, a lot of this episode shines light on a different character. After deciding he wants to get away from his current skating school for a while, Rioh temporarily switches to the same one as Inori and becomes another one of Tsukasa's students when Hitomi recommends him. Since Rioh is the son of a former Olympian named Shinichiro, and Shinichiro was Tsukasa's biggest idol growing up, Tsukasa tries to turn them down since he doesn't think he's up to the task. However when Shinichiro asks Tsukasa about taking on the job directly, the sight of seeing his idol bowing his head is enough to talk him into it, and he takes Rioh under his wing.

Up to this point, the most we've seen of Rioh is being an angry little twerp, and having an obsession with Hikaru that's made him hostile towards everyone else. Especially Jun, who we see him butting heads with as the catalyst for his desire to switch schools. As we spend more time with Rioh though, we start to see what's driving a lot of that angst and how big of a chip he's carrying on his shoulder. When he arrives, he's more interested in catching up with one of his old friends at Inori's school than Inori herself. It's hilarious seeing Inori going from looking like a deer in the headlights after recognizing him, to trying and failing to be friends once she learns they are at the same level. As Rioh is quick to point out though, there's a big gulf in what's expected of men's skating versus women's, and while he's able to do jumps Inori can't, he's still behind a lot of other boys his age.

That makes it all the stranger for him when Tsukasa praises his jumps, and when he sees that praise comes from observation rather than flattery, he gets embarrassed quickly. He isn't used to getting these kinds of compliments from adults. While it's cute to see from an otherwise angsty kid, it's also sad when you realize how much that's probably damaged his self-esteem. Thanks to that, rather than simply accepting Tsukasa's praise at face value, Rioh takes it as a sign that Tsukasa can't possibly know what he's talking about. Especially since he's constantly comparing himself to the talents of people like Hikaru and Jun, and can't help but feel like he'll never measure up to them. When Rioh learns that Tsukasa was only ever an ice dancer, he doubles down on his assessment of Tsukasa and warns Inori that she'll never have much of a future as a skater with him as her coach. Needless to say, Inori doesn't take this very well, but rather than feeling devastated by his words, she's fuming mad, and it's the angriest we've ever seen her about anything. She declares right then and there that she'll master a double-triple combination before he can, and then go on to beat Hikaru at their next competition.

Since Rioh has already convinced himself that there's no beating Hikaru, this sets him off even further. While Tsukasa intervenes before things get too heated, Rioh decides he wants nothing to do with them. Meanwhile, when Inori tells Tsukasa about her intentions, he can't make sense of why she's in such a rush to learn this and warns her against being in too much of a rush when she's already made a pretty insane level of progress over the past year. Fortunately, he changes his tune pretty quickly when Inori shows that she's already capable of doing a double axel on land, and decides to hold a training camp so she can start learning the double-triple combination she's after. While this certainly wasn't the setup I was expecting for a new training arc, I'd be lying if I said it wasn't funny. Given how generally timid Inori is, it's adorable to see her being so uncharacteristically stubborn about defending Tsukasa's honor. Especially since she's insisted on being coy as to why she and Rioh were arguing in the first place. This episode didn't do a lot to make Rioh more endearing, but I feel sorry for him at least. After seeing how his attitude is rubbing Inori the wrong way, I'm curious to see how things will develop between them.

Rating:

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Medalist is currently streaming on Hulu.

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Disclosure: Kadokawa World Entertainment (KWE), a wholly owned subsidiary of Kadokawa Corporation, is the majority owner of Anime News Network, LLC. One or more of the companies mentioned in this article are part of the Kadokawa Group of Companies.