Sk8 starts as a very typical sports anime to lure you in and then about halfway through goes in an entirely different direction. Whether or not this is a good thing is if you can tolerate the rather extreme shift in the plot.

The story starts with Reki, a likable protagonist who loves skateboarding and wants to share that love with everyone. He's not the most skilled but he's having the most fun. Then enters Langa, a stoic foreign transfer student from Canada. Langa has experience snowboarding and Reki is quickly drawn to him and the two begin skating together. We slowly get introduced to other rivals like all of these shows tend to do. Then around episode 4 or 5, we get introduced to Adam, who is not only the main rival but just a straight up villain and it's here where the plot completely shifts from what you might have expected. Personally I expected this to be a story about Langa finding love in skateboarding after falling out of love with snowboarding and that sorta happens but man does it not go how I thought it would.

From here I'd say we get introduced into three sub plots that are going to dominate the rest of the season.

1. Reki's Character Development. Reki actually stays the course of most typical sports anime protagonists. He introduces Langa into skateboarding, realizes he's got a much more natural talent for it and loses his confidence and passion for it after feeling he's being left behind. I actually thought Reki's plot development was pretty good here. While at first it seems like he might just be jealous, I think the anime tries to establish with the S beefs that Reki isn't upset that Langa is better but that Langa isn't normal like he is. Reki is skating for fun and he's passionate about skateboarding because it's fun for him. He just wanted someone to share that with. All the other skaters we meet however are obsessed with skateboarding to a somewhat unhealthy level, to the point that they're not afraid to hurt themselves to accomplish whatever high they're chasing. That's something that Reki can't relate to. There's a lot of self-reflection and he realizes pretty quickly that he's not at Langa but mad at himself for not being able to accept that his friend's joy in skateboarding is so different from his. He spends a good 4-5 episodes just moping though so I can see why some people would be bothered by this.

1. Langa's character development. Langa's development is a little more sloppy in my opinion. He's having fun and a bit naive and sorta just relying on snowboarding instincts to pull off some ridiculous stunts. Then he meets Adam and gets a rush from Adam's reckless and aggressive skating style and becomes addicted to the rush. So much so that he misses the shift in Reki's behavior until the other starts flat out ignoring him. From here on Langa... well he actually doesn't do much of anything when it comes to Reki. I feel like they wanted Langa's foreigner/"doesn't know skating culture" setup to do the heavy lifting on why he doesn't try actually addressing what's going on between him and Reki and it doesn't make much sense. The comments various other skaters make about Reki and his lack of skill are direct enough that he SHOULD at least have an inkling but he's got tunnel vision and has his own stuff going on, like trying to figure out why he doesn't feel that same rush he use to when skateboarding and after what feels like too long finally realizes that Reki was why he enjoyed it so much.

1. Adam and his tournament. As mentioned earlier, Adam gets introduced not just as another rival but pretty much a villain. He's a reckless skater that doesn't mind hurting other skaters and a corrupt politician to boot. He's also obsessed with Langa and will do anything to race him and drag him down to his self deprecating level? To put it simply they try to do far too much with this one character for 7-8 episodes. Adam is the creator of their little underground skate club and is hailed as the prince or king of skateboarding. I found this pretty funny because it's less that he's got amazing skill and moreso that he'll just hop off his skateboard and smack people in the face with it to win? You can see where this might be a problem for some viewers, right? No one sees any problem with this behavior and sorta just... shakes it off, except Reki who thinks it's crazy. This is why I mentioned in his character development that he's pretty much the only normal one in a league of crazies. On top of his ridiculously violent skating which isn't actually skating 80% of the time, we also get a subplot of him being investigated for being a corrupt politician. Why? Who knows. I guess they wanted to establish that he's using skateboarding as an escape from his hectic, pressure filled life but yeah it just doesn't really work. His obsession with Langa also feels a bit forced. He sees Langa's skateboarding as reckless and aggressive as his whereas Langa is just sorta fearless and frequently tries to copy what he sees, whether he can actually pull it off or not. I think Adam's plot would have worked a lot better for me if the other skaters actually feared him instead of being his fans.

The tournament is our main source of actual skateboarding for most of the anime and while I enjoyed seeing everyone's individual and talent, it was weighed down by the fact that most of the skaters are cheating (or I guess have a no rules approach) to the races. So when there's AI, bombs or literally just punching your opponent so they'll hopefully be knocked unconscious mid-race, it's really difficult to take any of it as a serious competition. Not to mention the tournament solely exists just so Adam can skate Langa which... he probably could have done anyway?

All of that aside, there are some really great characters like our main rival skaters, some truly bizarre ones like Adam and your enjoyment is going to depend on how much you can tolerate the extreme, melodrama. I do think some of this might have worked a little better if it weren't crammed into 12 episodes. I'm curious where season 2 is going to proceed and if they're going to try to do even more with Adam or introduce another ridiculous villain.