THIS Hidden Mystery (HQ Nerds Wanted!)
🏐 SPOILERS for Manga-Exclusive Content & Chapter 387; Reader Discretion Advised (NO TLDR)‼️
Have you ever thought about the details in Haikyuu!! manga chapter 82: Rupture? Because what I’m showing you are two images of the same scene, only the first is from the anime adaptation many of you may be more familiar with, and the second from translated and colorized manga. You’ll notice perhaps a few differences in how Kageyama comes to find an advert for kids’ volleyball classes. And not just an, but THE advert, with its well-known significance for the storyline ahead.
I promise you nerds this gets interesting; bear with me, and you’ll soon have your titular Hidden Mystery.
So most obviously is the location difference. Anime Kageyama walks past what seems to be a public message wall or bus stop when the advert is revealed— notice the reflective glass surface and other notices posted to the wall, typical of bus stops in Japan; whereas manga Kageyama discovers it conspicuously placed in the genkan of his family home, atop a book titled in kanji. There’s also the type or size of each paper. The anime’s is a large poster fastened by its four corners to the outward face, but, in its original form, the advert is a handheld flyer.
Paying mind to these details, the next most important thing is to question the origins of both adverts. Because doing so will reveal one of Haikyuu’s smallest mysteries— that I believe to have the answer to. Now, the origin of the anime’s poster is no mystery; whoever posted it to the public eye is clearly a community member promoting volleyball lessons, and they remain anonymous as far as the viewer can tell. But the flyer— it’s specifically a handheld flyer due to the book beneath it. That’s right, the one with its title written with kanji.
I went through the trouble of transcribing and translating it, don’t worry. It reads “回覧板”, or “kairanban” in romaji. 回覧板 refers to an analog messaging system that circulates news through local Japanese communities via an assortment of documents all held in one 回覧板 “memo board” (that’s what the book is). The leader of a neighborhood association is responsible for gathering and sending out this news, and, as expected for the transmission of a physical item, it is the duty of each community member to pass along the 回覧板 to their neighbor. It is quite literally a process of walking to someone else’s door and delivering the book. When you receive it, you glean the information you want to read about (notice of a community meeting? warning about wild animals congregating near trash sites?) and pass it on ASAP. But it sometimes comes with papers you can hold onto for yourself, like magazines or flyers.
You may see now the relevance of such a book to the flyer Kageyama finds in his family’s house. But still you do not see the mystery afoot, for it has to do with a pair of shoes I’ve yet to mention (pun intended). Because you have to consider: for the kairanban book to already sit within the Kageyama family home before Tobio’s arrival, and for it to still sit there as a notion of its recency (remember: you can’t let the 回覧板 collect dust; if it’s found in your home, you better have just received it), that means somebody had to have gotten home shortly before Tobio, rifled through the mail, and left this flyer out for him to see. And while the poster in the anime could’ve been pinned by just about any regular denizen, the kairanban was handled by someone Kageyama knows— but who?
Ah. The mystery, there you go. Interesting yet? Good.
Now, I’ve also promised an answer.
The anime’s adaptation of this scene saddens me but for the absence of a crucial and particular detail. That is, the vacant pair of shoes in the genkan that the flyer, set adrift by Kageyama closing the front door, happens to land upon. These heeled sandals are not quite Kageyama’s style, they are not the shoes he wears going to or from practice or school, and you see they are not his house shoes either as (them being non-traditional footwear aside) he leaves them behind as he crosses the genkan. Suffice it to say, the sandals don’t belong to him. And yet there they are, discarded in the genkan in advance of his return home. Left by someone who made it there before him. Sound familiar?
Evidence of an unidentified character’s presence; the abandoned shoes; the collected kairanban; and also a stray house key that is visible on the entryway stand beside the flyer. These details are not random; they are a rare glimpse inside Kageyama’s home (what would be considered as his life’s largest reprieve from volleyball), shown almost randomly at the apex of one of the most decisive crossroads in the story about Kageyama’s volleyball career, and the scant elements we observe of Kageyama’s setting— ones that could hint at another character’s involvement in the events to come— are not merely set-dressing, but selectively chosen. Together, they compose the lead Kageyama follows toward his own major realizations and character development, and the one behind it all.
I believe I know exactly who is responsible for the flyer and, furthermore, why this presence was erased from the anime. After all, she doesn’t appear in the manga for another 205 chapters.
It’s time for me to talk about Kageyama Miwa.
IN THE NEXT POST. I’m sorry, it’s necessary! You can already tell by the length of this that I have plenty to say. Be patient with me once more. If I have made your while thus far, I promise to make it again. In fact, now that you’re reading this I’ve probably finished or am in the late drafts of the next post. At this very moment I’m probably fretting over engagement statistics and whether to prioritize writing replies or launching the second installment. Sometimes I have a life in the midst of that, too. It’ll happen, though, if this post reaches an audience of even one person waiting.
Speaking of, thank you from my heart of hearts for humoring me! Thank you for reading! You’ve no idea how dearly I treasure those who sit down with one of my passion-driven works; considering how long these works of mine tend to be, you folk are few and far between. All I wish is that I have offered you a moment of value.
And because this post doubles as a personal exercise on exposure, you can tell me. Did you find something of value here? Did you learn a thing or two about kairanban? Did you find this too lengthy for its subject matter? Did I miss the mark in my analysis? Did I entertain you, at least? We should share discourse! It’s my second favorite thing to do on here.
But that’s all for now. I’ve left an extra comment below regarding my transcribing trials and tribulations on the 回覧板. Believe it or not, I struggled at least an hour on that, and I still can’t read the English translation provided by my manga (the VIZ Media version). Take a look for yourself!
See you soon!