The Useless Character Hall of Shame: Mizuki Asami (Cross Game)
You’d think a guy who spent his whole life training in the mountains couldn’t possibly be useless. Indeed, he appeared to be quite the badass when we first saw him.
Score
Too bad he’s totally irrelevant for the rest of the show. He sucks up to Aoba. Aoba is oblivious. Rinse and repeat. Nothing ever changes.
He could’ve tried applying his athleticism to baseball.
Too bad he did nothing athletic after his introductory scene, aside from randomly climbing a pole.
He could’ve challenged Kou for Aoba’s love.
Too bad he failed miserably time after time.
He could’ve been a useful device to help develop Aoba’s character in some way, shape, or form, seeing as he lived in her house, went to her school, and was otherwise constantly around her.
Too bad he mattered less to her than Nomo.
Adachi must be getting old. If he needed a new character to spice up an increasingly routine show, he should’ve brought back the same character he used for Touch: Coach Kashiwaba.
Word on the Street:
On the Bright Side:
He fixed a clock at some point. He also baked a cake.
Overall Uselessness Rating:
| Hindrance | 1/10 |
| Filler | 5/10 |
| Talentlessness | 0/10 |
| Failure | 8/10 |
| Disappointment | 10/10 |
| TOTAL | 24/50 |
Current Status: No change, no surprise. I’ve been abusing my eyes due to finals and the Patent Bar.
Tags: asami mizuki, cross game, mountain training, useless character hall of shame
51 people love sucking up to me
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Holy shit, a comment RSS feed!baka-raptor@baka-raptor.com
April 29th, 2010 at 4:23 pm
LMAO what a waste of potential.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
April 30th, 2010 at 5:45 pm
Such a waste I had to bring back a post format I hadn’t used in nearly three years.
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digital boy Reply:
May 2nd, 2010 at 8:17 pm
It’s a good format, though.
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April 29th, 2010 at 5:06 pm
I infer then that Touch is Adachi’s better effort because no such useless characters exist?
I remember when Mizuki showed up and at first, I didn’t think he’d play much of a role. To my chagrin, he managed to become annoying in the Jar Jar Binks mold since his antics were neither creative nor funny. Still, I suppose alongside some of the others, he’s better than most.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
April 30th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
Touch is Adachi’s masterpiece, though almost everything to like about Touch can also be found in Cross Game. If I had to reduce Touch’s superiority down to one issue, it’d be that Tatsuya and Minami are more compelling characters than Kou and Aoba.
Mizuki wouldn’t be the first character to come on strong and quickly fade into oblivion. What’s shocking is that Adachi let it happen. He’s known for doing better.
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April 29th, 2010 at 5:57 pm
Every time we had a random scene of Mizuki I’d just think “what the hell is the point of this character?” he just added nothing to the series.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
April 30th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
In his defense, he did bake a really sexy cake. But if a Valentine’s Day cake is never eaten by its intended recipient, does it have a taste?
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April 29th, 2010 at 6:12 pm
He should have known he had no chance with Aoba since he lacks both sideburns and balls.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
April 30th, 2010 at 6:05 pm
Unlike Coach Kashiwaba, who had sideburns and a white suit. Even Minami couldn’t hold back.
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April 29th, 2010 at 8:51 pm
This makes me want to see Cross Game. Good advertisement, Baka
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
April 30th, 2010 at 7:11 pm
Just as planned.
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April 29th, 2010 at 8:51 pm
Asami is a disgrace to mankind… for being completely useless and a failure at life.. He could of done beter… but nooo… He had potential, but he threw it away for what? nothing…
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
April 30th, 2010 at 7:18 pm
He obviously came down from the mountains too soon. He did the right thing and went back at the end. Maybe he’ll do better in the sequel.
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April 29th, 2010 at 8:54 pm
Mountain training just to end up like that? For shame!
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 3:07 pm
I know, it’s a gaping plot hole. Maybe his mountain training was all a dream.
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April 29th, 2010 at 10:33 pm
[filler-comment]
Cross Game, Major S1 or Touch…?
I think i’ll definitly watch Giant Killing
[/filler-comment]
Read at your own discretion.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 3:08 pm
Spoken like a true Brazilian.
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April 29th, 2010 at 10:45 pm
Now that I think of it, Coach Kashiwaba is pretty much you in anime form, seeing as you both have failing eyes. I pray that you are wearing aviators and coaching a baseball team mercilessly with a kendo stick. Not to mention the white suit.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 3:10 pm
I want to, but I can’t. Once I get my hands on a kendo sword, I won’t be able to stop myself from juggling it.
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April 30th, 2010 at 12:08 am
I think it’s pretty clear that Adachi introduced Mizuki to be a rival, but changed his mind and decided Azuma worked better. Mizuki was introduced as a cool enviable dude, but then somehow transformed into a dorky loser, that’s the only explanation I can think of.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 9:18 pm
Part of the problem is that Adachi already had his dorky loser in Senda. Ultimately, Mizuki wasn’t good enough to be the last man standing, the cool rival, or the dorky loser. Other authors can get away with leaving characters in No Man’s Land, but not Adachi!
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April 30th, 2010 at 6:50 am
Took me until the third picture before I even realised who you were talking about…
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 9:20 pm
That’s how useless Mizuki is. If I didn’t stick “Cross Game” in the title of this post, Cross Game viewers wouldn’t even know I was talking about a Cross Game character.
(That joke appeared in the original draft of this post. For some reason I decided it sucked and deleted it.)
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April 30th, 2010 at 8:15 am
That is so sad….
I’ve not caught up to Cross Game to see this character yet…. but now I know I’ll be sad about something once I start catching up on Cross Game….
… aaawww… he had been my type at first impression…. too bad
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 9:26 pm
Any guy who impresses the nee-sans is an ally of mine…until he starts chasing after his younger cousin…and gets rejected…a lot…
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April 30th, 2010 at 10:58 am
Hey baka, I don’t know if you’ve heard of Gakkou no Kaidan. The dubbed version is kinda funny. You should check out at least one episode.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 1st, 2010 at 9:33 pm
What a stupid title. No way I’m checking this out.
/checks Anime News Network anyway
What? This show aired from 2000-2001? Why didn’t you say so! I must check it out.
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April 30th, 2010 at 11:03 am
You could try to massage around your eyes every so often (kind of like stretching reguarly), just don’t ‘rub’ your eyes, to help with the blood circulation and may help lightening the darkness around it in long term. And a good brand eye cream is another possible investment. Surgery can instantly solve the problem short term, but you’d have to find a trustworthy surgeon first and even then it’s not the kind of risk one should take so lightly (and we’re not even talking about how expensive it will be).
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 4th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
First things first, doctors have to find a treatable physiological problem. Until they can find the source of the problem, any treatment I try could backfire. The best I can do for now is relax and try keep my mind off my eyes.
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April 30th, 2010 at 5:50 pm
THIS IS AN AWESOME POST. Also, my eyes are also painful more often than they are not. sucks.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 4th, 2010 at 11:57 pm
I would trade this awesome post for Mizuki to be an awesome character.
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April 30th, 2010 at 9:08 pm
You forgot the whole going the route of creepy stalker which he started by taking pictures of Aoba with his cell phone. Even that would have been better.
I think he was suppose to be funny? I say think, as I’m sure. He definitely wasn’t. I just wanted to punch him in the face to get him off the screen.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 6th, 2010 at 9:38 pm
I literally did forget that. I’d probably long since given up on him by that point. Oh well, at least stalking is useful in a storytelling sense, unlike baking a Valentine’s Day cake and not giving it to anyone.
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May 1st, 2010 at 1:54 am
I realize that everyone loves sucking up to me and that my analysis is 100% bulletproof, but still, what’s with all the concurring comments? I was under the impression that criticizing Cross Game is tantamount to criticizing kittens.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 6th, 2010 at 9:39 pm
I know, right?
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May 1st, 2010 at 1:04 pm
And that the VA was Kakihara Tetsuya (Simon, Fujioka) was really raping my ears. He defiled SImon….
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 6th, 2010 at 9:40 pm
Ah, Fujioka, another worthy candidate for the Useless Character Hall of Shame.
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May 3rd, 2010 at 4:29 pm
This may sound crazy, but maybe he spent too much time in the mountains. He spent so much time there be became desensitized to being bad ass. Maybe he was like a massive Red Giant but underwent gravitational collapse and became a black hole of uselessness. The mundane in his life became awesome and the awesome became mundane. He then set out to do a much more personal training. Learning how to bake and help out around the house he was bound determined to become the perfect oyomesan for Aoba.
His story is truly a tragic one.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 6th, 2010 at 9:56 pm
“Maybe he was like a massive Red Giant but underwent gravitational collapse and became a black hole of uselessness.”
Quote of the week. I do appreciate a good astronomy joke.
Maybe he was training to become a Maid Guy. Too bad he forgot the mask. And the balls.
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May 3rd, 2010 at 10:17 pm
Cross Game is great.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 5th, 2010 at 12:08 am
Get thee to an Adachi.
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May 4th, 2010 at 5:41 am
It’s pretty sad when you lose to the old man.
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 6th, 2010 at 10:25 pm
This isn’t just any old man. He’s been training too.
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May 9th, 2010 at 10:07 am
How can you be a failure when you can bake cake?
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 9th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
That’s why I only gave him an 8/10 failure rating.
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May 9th, 2010 at 11:34 am
I just saw it today, but Maddox has an update, did you already know?
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 9th, 2010 at 12:07 pm
Who do you think I am? I’ve known since the day it was posted.
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Gregor Johns Reply:
May 11th, 2010 at 9:01 am
I think you’re who you think you are. My question was actually rhetorical in your case
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Baka-Raptor Reply:
May 11th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
I assumed it was rhetorical. It’s just that my comment policy requires me to respond to every comment on the most recent post, even if they’re rhetorical questions.
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May 18th, 2010 at 1:31 am
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