It's kind of funny how this story about striving to make a wholesome dream come true came from someone with a wholesome dream of their own. Tsurumaikada, a doujinshi artist and fan of voice actress Natsumi Haruse, once declared on Twitter that they wanted to one day draw a figure skating manga that would get an anime adaptation starring Natsumi Haruse. If that were me, I would have left it at that, saying that that would be nice, but Tsurumaikada actually took steps to make their dream come true, even taking ice skating classes for research. This all resulted in the serialization of "Medalist", a manga that quickly gained the adoration of readers and even won some awards, including the Shogakukan Manga Award in 2023. This year, Tsurumaikada's dream finally came true with the release of the Medalist anime, but was pursuing this dream really worth it in the end? Let's find out.

Medalist begins when Tsukasa Akeuraji, a former ice dancer whose dreams of being a solo figure skater never truly got off the ground due to him starting late in life, starts working as an assistant skating coach at an ice skating rink. There, he meets Inori Yuitsuka, a fifth-grader with figure skating dreams of her own. However, due to her mother not letting her pursue figure skating and people her age being considered "too old" to start, anyway, Inori doesn't have the self-confidence to go beyond secretly practicing at the ice rink. Tsukasa sees great potential in Inori, however, and not wanting to see her give up like he did, he agrees to become her coach. Together, they overcome various challenges and work toward Inori's ultimate goal: to become an Olympic gold medalist.

The story told in Medalist is a very inspiring one with a strong message of "It's never too late to go for your dreams". Not the most original message, I know, but a good one, nonetheless. I've never had any interest in figure skating - I struggle with roller skating, so forget figure skating - yet seeing Inori and other characters skate almost makes me want to try; that's how inspirational it is. I do have one major gripe with the story, and it's a time skip that happens partway through the series. It made me feel like I skipped some episodes with some really important plot developments, although I guess adding the events that were skipped might have created a repetitive storyline.

I said that Medalist is an inspiring anime, but I don't think I would have said that if the characters were unlikable. I absolutely loved Inori as a character; the way she was so hard on herself in the beginning was very heartbreaking (and sadly relatable), which made it all the more satisfying to see her gain some confidence and really come into her own. Plus, her interactions with other characters, especially her fellow figure skaters, are pretty fun. As for her coach, Tsukasa, I also really liked him and the coach-and-student bond he formed with Inori, and the parts of his backstory that we get are pretty sad. There are also a plethora of supporting characters who are varying degrees of likable. Even Inori's mother becomes more likable as she becomes more supportive of her daughter, and she actually has an understandable reason for her initial reluctance to let Inori pursue figure skating.

When I found out that Medalist was being animated by ENGI, I'll admit that I was a little bit concerned. As some in the anime community know, ENGI isn't exactly known for producing high-quality anime; even their arguably best-known work, Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out, is okay at best animation-wise. (Same goes for other aspects of that series, but that's not the point.) Luckily, the animation quality here is very good. Most of the series is 2-D animated, and it looks very colorful and well-animated. However, during figure skating routines, CG animation is used for whichever character is doing the routine, which may scare some people off; I would like to bring those people back by saying the CG animation is very fluid. It is jarring when the series switches from one animation style to the other - which it does quite a bit to show other characters' reactions to a skating routine - but it's not too bad once you get used to it.

So, uh.... I may have mentioned Inori's Japanese voice actress at the beginning of this review, but since I could only find the English dub when I searched for Medalist on Disney+, I had to watch that version; thus, I can't really comment on Natsume Haruse's voice performance or that of the rest of the Japanese cast. Maybe I should have just watched it on Hulu.... Anyway, it turned out to be a mostly solid dub, with Madeline Dorroh being a suitable enough fit for Inori. However, I would like to advise Grace Lu, the English voice actress for Hikaru Kamisaki, to be more careful about where she records her lines, as there was a scene in episode 2 where her voice sounded echo-y in a way that felt unintentional. Her other voiced lines sounded fine to me, but that particular scene seemed like it was supposed to be more impactful than it was for me due to the echoes in Hikaru's voice distracting me.

Given how figure skaters perform with music playing, it's reasonable to expect the music in Medalist to be good, and luckily, it delivers. The opening theme, "Bow and Arrow" by Kenshi Yonezu, is a beautiful song that has an icy and mystical vibe to it; meanwhile, "Atashi no Dress" by Neguse, the ending theme, is as cute as the visuals that are shown while it's playing. (That is to say, very cute.) The background music and the insert songs were also very good. My favorite is probably "Go For The Gold"; the scene where it was first played was probably the most captivating scene in the entire series, and the song played a large role in that with how absolutely gorgeous it was. With how good Medalist is already, that's an incredible feat.

Although it doesn't feel right for me to rate it higher than I am, I can't deny that Medalist is a very good anime, and it's a worthy result of all of Tsurumaikada's hard work to make their dream come true. If you want a good coming of age story or just want to (at least partially) fill the void that the Yuri On Ice movie left with its cancellation, I highly recommend it. Let's just hope that the upcoming second season can keep Tsurumaikada's dream going strong!