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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.

53 Replies to “The Useless Character Hall of Shame: Mizuki Asami (Cross Game)”

  1. 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.

    • 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.

  2. 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.

  3. 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…

  4. [filler-comment]

    Cross Game, Major S1 or Touch…?

    I think i’ll definitly watch Giant Killing 😛

    [/filler-comment]

    Read at your own discretion.

  5. 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.

  6. 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.

    • 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!

    • 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.)

  7. 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

  8. 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. 🙂

  9. 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).

    • 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.

  10. 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.

    • 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.

  11. 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.

  12. 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.

    • “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.

  13. currently watching cross game for a third time, first in like 6 or 7 years and this dude appears and I have no idea who he is, useless character indeed.

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