There some spoilers in this review, I don't write about the matches, the winners or the losers, but I write some things about character development and minor elements of plot. You're warned
I love GuP, It's one of mi favorite anime, but I know the limits of this franchise. I really have fun watching and re-watching the anime and the movies, although they are argumentatively simple and with a very low character development. I though that was the fate of the franchise, but Pravda and Ribbon Warrior showed me otherwise (as well some World Witches manga did the same with its respective franchise).
Ribbon Warrior explores a lot of different ideas, expanding the franchise universe, whether it's creating new characters or developing existing characters. Some ideas or events that in the anime are almost just small talk or are superficially treated, in this manga take a seriously turn around. The main event is the victories of Ooarai that are described like a "changing wind", a wind that started a process where a stagnated sport like senshado begin to change.
Ribbon Warrior is about Tankathlon, an indie and not authorized senshado. It's a category in what people with less resources can enter. Their limited rules counterbalance the economic and humanistic power of the big schools, giving more opportunity to small schools to win. At the same time, give them more freedom removing regulations (and in the real world Tankathlon will be seriously pursued because their dangers, but welp...).
And we need to talk about the protagonist, Shizuka Tsuruki, the f*cking Shizuka Tsuruki. She became one of my favorite character of the franchise. She take part of a two-people crew with her friend, crush, and horse (seriously, this element give me a little of cringe, but well, you will understand) Rin Matsukaze. Shizuka is a crazy wanabee warmonger addicted to sengoku period. She don't search the victory, she search the glory of the battle. She don't play senshado, she is waging wars. She is a expert of psychologic warfare, but she is not a bad person, she make their rivals develop through it. Your character need character development, send them to fight Shizuka.
Shizuka have a really close relationship with Rin. It's not just a friendship relationship, Rin really admire Shizuka, but, at the same time, they really love them mutually. Shizuka explains that her fate as children of a prestigious family is to be the bride of the one who will be the successor of the brewery, with a arranged marriage, at the same time, she is being pressed about keeping familiar traditions. She finds refugee of this in her hobby about sengoku period and in senshado, she is trying to feel free before something like that happens. As expected their relationship is just a bait at the end, but I really want to thing that in the future they will be together.
And following the previous section I'll talk about something really important in this manga: traditions. One of the main themes is the stagnation of senshado because tradition, and how the new generations need to change the ways of doing things if they want to keep existing.
Three new interesting characters of the previous generation of Nishizumi Shihu and Shimada Chiyo tried to teach that lection to these characters in the past, and various of the third graders try to teach similar lessons to their successors. Tradition is important, but it's just a guide, a path, to follow. You can't be blinded by traditions, you need to find your own way to progress. And the changing wind that Nishizumi Miho and Ooarai are will be one of the guides to that new era, but, at the end, it's a personal decision. The characters who understand that learn how to change, how to broke traditions, and how to revolutionize the learned to make them better.
And with this we can talk about legacy. In this manga the third grade commanders take part not as the protagonists, but as mentors of their kouhai. They want to learn their own way to make the things (Darjeeling and Orange Pekoe), they want to stop depending of them (Maho and Erika), they don't want to make their same mistakes (Asparagus and Marie), etc.
I think that a lot of this section can be resumed in Jajka, the second best character for me. She, unlike Shizuka, have a burden with their position, Shizuka is a solo player, he is making the things that make her feel freedom and passion, but Jajka have a responsibility with their team. She is frustrated about their failures and she don't want their team to keep failing in official Senshado, that is the reason because they went to Tankathlon. She is trying to carry all the burden of their team alone, without understand that a team need to have trust in themselves. And like some other characters, she had their character development warfare courtesy of Shizuka.
About the art. Takeshi Nogami make a great work, It's no the best art in the franchise, I prefer the one of Pravda, but is really nice and have awesome panels, mainly close-ups of faces in important moments. The tanks are well drawn and, without a lot of details, they give the correct feeling. But really give me chills and cringe all the panels of Rin as a kind of horse. Well, you can have the reference and is a plot element interestingly used, but the drawings are a little... welp...
It's very awesome the bunch of references in this manga. References about warfare and history are very frequent in the franchise, but this manga seriously have a lot. You need to read with a glossary or searching in internet trying to understand all the references. It's not necessary neither, you can have a fun and nice reading without them.
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