(Note: I'm a British girl so I will be referring to 'soccer' the way everyone in my native country does, as football)

What an absorbing thriller of a series this was. Produced by Studio 8-bit they went all in creating some gorgeously creative scenes either depicting the characters’ talents, struggles and just about everything in between.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Blue Lock stars 17-year-old aspiring footballer Isagi Yoichi, based on the real life retired Italian pro Filippo Inzaghi, who just lost his chance at the regionals when he squared a pass to his teammate. His teammate loses his nerve and somehow blasts a bona-fide tap-in off the post and to Isagi’s horror, the rebound falls oh-so kindly to the opposition who immediately counter and hit the winner within the dying moments of the match, ending his chance at going pro.

Or does it?

Sometime later after the devastating loss Isagi receives an invitation to tend the title of the series, a glorified training camp installed with the sole purpose of producing the number one striker in the world that can lead Japan to world cup greatness. It’s here we’re introduced to the fantastic Ego-san and his surprisingly inspiring ideology. He believes a player’s inner’s ego is one of the main reasons a talented player goes on to reach global worldwide frame like the real life supreme godlike superstars Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, along with Blue Lock’s own fictional elite player, a Frenchman by the name of Noa Noel.

It's very fitting Kaneshiro-sensei made Noel’s nationality French considering all the prospects France is readily producing. I guess that comes with the territory of having many of their youngsters play football from a very young age. Not to mention France has become home of Africans who escape poverty and sometimes war to live comfortable lifes inside France’s beautiful walls, giving their babies the opportunities to make something special out of their lifes. It’s really no wonder France’s national team is beautifully packed to the brim with handsome Africans, but I digress.

Truthfully, you can’t really say Ego-san is wrong. If a player doesn’t have the ego to stand out among the crowd they can quickly find themselves swept away in the tide of normies. Football is a competitive sport at heart and Blue Lock revels tapping into that very nature of everyone vying for top spot. Each simulation stage the players undergo is designed in someway to bring out and mould their own ego. Blue Lock showcases its unpredictability in the first Survival of the Fittest game where players were tasked with tagging each other with the ball to make the hit player ‘it.’

The one who remains 'it' after the timer runs out is eliminated from Blue Lock. Isagi remained ‘it’ during the dying moments of the simulation and even with a downed player suffering from a sprained ankle spins and opts to take out arguably the strongest player at the time, one the series carefully built up as a one-of-the-kind talent, only for Isagi to smash the ball hard into his face and send him crashing out of Blue Lock.

It's a brilliant turn of events that keeps you guessing for the remainder of the series. Even better, the knocked out player justifiably freaks out in hysterical disbelief, looking for all intents and purposes like a JoJo character. It lends the series an infectious wackiness that ensues even if you’re not into football, you can still vibe with Blue Lock’s eccentric characters.

You could be forgiven for predicting it would be every man for themselves from here, even as the next stage tasks the remaining players to form a team comprising of all strikers, but no, Isagi’s team gets crushed in the first round after Barou – an opposing player based on Mario Balotelli – roasted their team and scored a solo goal. The opposition then built their team around him and began to mercilessly pick Isagi’s team off.

The only good thing to emerge from the humiliation was the later realization of Isagi’s high footballing IQ when he instinctively squared a pass to Kunigami – who was in a harder position at the time – to score a long shot and grab the team a consolation goal. Last round, Kunigami tagged Isagi with one of his powerful shots, and Isagi, not realizing it at the time, instinctively filed the information away for later, so even when he had a teammate in a better position his footballing brain told him passing to Kunigami would be the better decision here.

A large part of the fun is Blue Lock’s unpredictable nature, throwing curve balls at you when you least at expect it.

The characters

The beautiful ‘young lady’ Chigiri Hyoma – Often teasingly called “Ojou-chan” by the other characters due to his girly looks and exotic long pinkish-red hair, you could tell right away Chigirl wasn’t trying as hard as he could, having tragically obtained a potentially career-ending ACL injury in his earlier adolescence. A player damaging their ACL has disastrous affects on their mentality, especially knowing they could just as easily break it once more and never kick a ball again. Most players sadly never really recover from rupturing their Achilles. Chelsea’s Callum Hudson-Odoi looked like a frightening prospect under Sarri, at the time, but after breaking his ACL he hasn’t looked like nearly the same player.

It's a horrible injury to get. The way Studio 8-bit depicted Chigiri’s struggle to run full speed once more, to run past everyone with his explosive pace, with metaphorical chains created by his own mind shackling his once damaged leg, was beautiful. Blue Lock has plenty of visual metaphors that are just a treat for the eyes.

Bachira Meguru – As eccentric as the footballer he’s based on, Ronaldinho, Bachira loves dribbling, to skilfully weave past piles of bodies leaving them on the floor with his elegant close control; to play football with a smile on his face. He feared that there would be no one like him, with the same ego to grab the game by the scruff of the neck and play for themselves. He created a monster inside him and would ignore everyone else around him but this imaginary monster, relying on this monster’s ‘voice’ to give him direction. But he still longed for someone real to play ‘his’ football with and that led him to Blue Lock in search of others with monsters inside them. He connected with Isagi on an almost spiritual level, linking up with him like he’s never linked up with anyone before, scoring brilliant goals with him and truly enjoying his football.

That’s why it feels all the more crushing when in the 4th stage of the training camp, Bachira's forced to leave Isagi behind after a crushing defeat, turning into his enemy.

Nagi – Blessed with a natural 1st touch of the gods even when he had no interest in football, Nagi’s introduction into the sport came when his friend, another aspiring footballer, promised him an easy life if they go pro, thus he found himself in the sport. He was so lazy at first he had to be given piggy back rides, but playing against Isagi in the second stage opened his eyes to just how fun football could be and he soon found himself dropping deeper to initiate attacks instead of being the one to finish them. He found so much joy in his match against Isagi’s team that during the 4th stage when everyone were tasked of making teams of 3, he immediately wanted Isagi on his team. Isagi already had Bachira on his who he wasn’t going to leave so Nagi instead joins his squad, ditching Reo.
Reo may have introduced him to the sport of football, but it was Isagi who ultimately made him fall in love with the game and for that he found himself longing to play football with him. It’s a fascinating turn of allegiances.

Barou Shouei - Arrogant characters are really tricky to write. Get them wrong and they can end up irritating the audience (See Bakugou from My Hero Academia) Barou has been so meticulously written his ego feels infectious and charming instead of obnoxious. He's so true to himself that I can't help but strangely admire and adore him. Even when Isagi 'humbled him' he doesn't fall in line and become a team player, but gets back up and regains his throne as 'king.' It's absolutely awesome. He may become to respect Isagi, but that didn't mean he was going to allow himself to become his foil or cheerleader. He represents the players that seem so powerful when they first burst onto the scene when teams don't know how to contain them. That's why such terms like "one-season wonder" and "honeymoon period" exist in football. It's easy to look amazing when you're an unknown viable. (See Papiss Cisse who scored 13 goals from January, including a wonder goal against Chelsea before falling off the radar hard once teams knew how to deal with him)

Barou was brought down several notches from his initial godlike introduction once players began to man-mark him and not afford him any space to dribble into, and this forced him to adapt to stay relevant; to stay king. He's a superb character and I adore the added touch of him wanting everything to be neat and clean.

Isagi Yoichi – He truly embodies everything special about Blue Lock. I love that his talent – his weapon – isn’t something immediately flashy that stands out like Bachira’s dribbling or Chigiri’s explosive speed; it’s his mind, his spatial awareness; the ability to read the game in front of him and see the picture. He never feels like he’s overshadowing his teammates but rather complementing their strengths. Making Isagi such an intelligent player, one that needs to use his brain to magnify the strengths of everyone around him was a smart move on Kaneshiro-sensei. Too often in shounen the protagonist ends up becoming so powerful he diminishes those around him. With Isagi being the brains behind his teams’ plays, it ensues his teammates can still shine even among his clever brilliance.

Animation and artstyle - They're both gorgeously made and I so adore the imaginative visual touches portraying the egocentric monsters characters have inside of them with void-swirly eyes or when Isagi's eyes light up with blue flames and everything else in between. It's wonderful and really helped to elevate Blue Lock to another level.

Sound - Fantastically uplifting, melancholic and goofy when it needs to be.

In conclusion: Season one of Blue Lock was an amazing ride made with so much heart and soul and I can't wait to see more.

Final score: 10/10