I am a millennial, and I’m not just saying that because we are a narcissistic breed of adults eager to reassure ourselves of our own identities any chance we get. I am aware, however, that until I turned 29 I still determined my self-worth by comparing myself to my peers. I have to mention this, because my generation grew up watching some of the worst “best” TV shows. I’m talking about ‘90s sitcoms.
I’m not here to point out all the racism, misogyny, homophobia, and weird hairstyles in Friends, as that has been covered plenty. Although, what was up with those hairstyles?
Why did every leading lady look like they starred in a production of Lion King the night before and decided to shower but not wash their hair?
Except for Alyson Hannigan who is a timeless pirate witch with perfect hair.
10/10 would cut my hair like this today if I had the vaccine and could go to the salon
I’m here to talk about positive reinforcement. In the ‘80s and ‘90s, and truly every decade before, the idea of “going to therapy” was shown in TV shows as a punchline. In Sister Sister, one of my top five favorite-shows-about-identical-twins “It’s a Love Thang” (Season 2, Episode 5) shows Lisa, played by the inimitable Jackée Harry, going to therapy to learn about her attachment style, but accidentally winding up at a lesbian therapy group… oops! Naturally, jokes abound!
Dot. Dot. Dot.
Just kidding, there are no jokes. That is the joke…which is not a joke? It’s just a thing that probably happens.
I’ll never forget the scene in the post-American-Pie Jason Biggs movie vehicle Boys and Girls (don’t watch it, it’s not good!) when Amy, played by Amanda Detmer, kisses her best friend Jennifer, played by Claire Forlani, and immediately says, “I’m going to tell my therapist about this,” making me very confused about how therapy and best friends are supposed to work.
But I come bearing good news. Gen-Z is on the fast track to enlightenment, if their TV shows and character conflicts are any indication. I had never heard of Haikyuu!! before dozens of teenagers told me on TikTok to watch the Netflix show, but thankfully I happened to spend a lot of time alone at home last year, so I decided to give it a chance.
If you don’t watch this show, that’s okay. I started it with no interest in volleyball, anime, or really, anything. (Remember, this is peak pandemic and opening doors was a health hazard.) It’s about a high school men’s volleyball team through the eyes of an eager freshman named Shoyo Hinata (voiced by Ayumu Murase) who has never played on a team but is obsessed with the sport. I would be lying if I said there’s no volleyball in it, but trust me when I say that it’s not a show about volleyball. It’s about the relationships between the teammates, coaches, opponents, and so much more. Through the framing of high school volleyball, Haikyuu!! models self-actualization through effective communication for Gen-Z. The show breaks the mold of binary thinking that so many past TV shows rely on, creating a new form of storytelling that lets its viewers evolve alongside its characters.
Here are a few lessons the show teaches its viewers:
Lesson 1: Wholesome conflict where characters respect each other’s needs can be exciting
I’m certain that if I were to say half the things my highly accredited but very old-school writing professors in college taught me in a writers room today, I would not make it further than a staff writer. Traditionally, network sitcoms boil conflict down to simple, binary conflicts: Character A wants X and Character B does not want X, or wants Y, which is in direct conflict to X.
There, I just summarized all 180 episodes of Seinfeld, 236 episodes of Friends, and 264 episodes of Frasier. George wants soup. Rachel wants Ross. Frasier wants nothing.
The characters in Haiykuu!! want things too, but these things sometimes clash and sometimes sync up. In other words, their wants and needs do not need to be in direct conflict to keep the audience engaged. It’s more true to life, where one person’s success does not automatically indicate another’s failure.
In “A Toss to the Ace” (Season 1, Episode 9), the team is practicing for their next game when we learn that two seniors, Yu Nishinoya (voiced by Nobuhiko Okamoto) and Asahi Azumane (voiced by Yoshimasa Hosoya), left the team the year before due to an incident. Once Asahi and Nishinoya, or Noya as his friends call him, are introduced, we learn that the “incident” actually refers to a game they lost the previous season. Asahi feels he let the team down because his spikes were repeatedly blocked by the other team’s defense, while Noya feels it was his fault because he could not retrieve the balls after the defense returned them. Instead of the oversimplification of “winning” an argument by only having one character be “right,” the show handles resolution in a much more interesting way.
Though it’s clear that the boys all respect each other, there is plenty of tension to capture our attention and drive the story. Noya bursts out, “I couldn’t retrieve a single lost ball,” and Asahi responds angrily, “Why aren’t you putting the blame on me?”
At this point, there is no doubt from an audience’s perspective that there is rising conflict and action. Their exchange is authentic and the stakes are palpable. In fact, the others on screen can feel it too, and their teammate Suga steps in to say “lay off him.” Noya, in tears, declares that he can handle losing, but “I do not forgive anyone who up and quits on me.”
This moment adheres to traditional storytelling structure because the motivations of the lead characters are as clear as my dog’s plate when I make him fresh chicken. However, the resolution is not as apparent. This creates more intensity for us watching, because making up is not as simple as “tell the truth” or “don’t cheat on her. The characters are telling the truth, yet they still can’t figure it out. It’s gripping because it’s real.
When you fight with your friends in real life, you can both want them to get everything they want, and also not know how to make that happen. As a result, you feel frustrated and overwhelmed. Like hearing your best friend is getting back together with her ex girlfriend for the third time, you can want what’s best for her and wish she would take a sedative and stop saying, “you don’t know her like I do.”
Later in the episode, Asahi is pulled into a game despite his protests. At the moment of truth, he delivers this monologue:
“When things are tough and the receives are chaotic, a spiker can only move in after the toss. The toss exists because a receive kept the ball in play. I am not alone when I move in for a spike. Somewhere along the way I had forgotten the simplest most natural thing… I am not fighting alone”
And here’s the kicker, or I suppose, the spiker– they don’t even win the game! But it doesn’t matter. Winning is not permanent, and there will always be another game. But realizing your teammates are there for you when you are feeling insecure – that is transformative. It’s the difference between watching Mom and Dad fight over whose fault it is the kid got expelled versus watching Mom and Dad and the kid talk about how they got to this moment, and then working together on finding a more promising future.
Lesson 2: Two people can be similar and also completely different
The OC exists, so I know that two pretty blonde girls can exist in a TV world where they are part of the same friend group. But I’m not talking about two queen bees on one cheerleading team. I’m talking about core personality differences, as in Monica and Rachel, Felix and Oscar, Nigel and Frasier, and Lisa Simpson and that lamb her parents made her eat.
In the case of Haikyuu!!, when we are first introduced to Hinata, his foil is Tobio Kageyama (voiced by Kaito Ishikawa), a Type-A volleyball champion who is everything Hinata is not: composed, confident, and closed-off. They are both freshmen on the team and must learn to get along. By the third episode they do, because it would be exhausting and unrealistic if they played on the same team and didn’t. They continue to have opposing fundamental viewpoints and approaches to volleyball, but once they find their common ground, their relationship actually develops and grows in a satisfying way.
This type of storytelling sets a precedent for its audience: when you meet an indestructible wall, you do not always have to destroy it to get to where you are going. The writers don’t phone in this resolution, because the boys continue to clash over beliefs, such as Hinata’s willingness to befriend people on their rival teams. To Hinata, volleyball is the common goal, and anyone who likes volleyball is a friend. To Kageyama, success means being the standout best in any group. Through their friendship, their viewpoints evolve and affect one another without erasing or destroying either.
Then there’s Toru Oikawa (voiced by Daisuke Namikawa), the star player on their rival team. At first, he appears to be a foil for Kageyama. He plays in the same position, has equal talent if not more, and is better liked by his teammates. However, this is not lazy writing on the show’s part. It’s quickly clear that in spite of their similarities, they are completely different people. Oikawa is a flowery flirt and often gets distracted by fawning girls. He is talented, but also a diva. Like Mariah on a good day. If you told me to write a character that was a complete opposite of Kageyama or Hinata, I would never have written Oikawa. He is different, but in the way an Aries is different from a Sagitarrius.
Lesson 3: Characters can grow and change and the story won’t unravel
Imagine if Ross and Rachel actually went to therapy and Rachel addressed her attraction to emotionally unavailable men. That would never happen, considering sitcoms in the ‘90s were so good at unravelling their show after letting their characters “change” that whenever characters got married, everyone knew the show was jumping the shark. Imagine growing up with that pattern of storytelling modeled over and over every Thursday night at 8pm and not growing up with a fear of change.
Thankfully, our Gen-Z babies have a much more promising model in the characters of Haikyuu!! When Hinata first meets Kenma Kozume (voiced by Yuki Kaji), a player on an opposing team, Kenma claims to be completely apathetic about volleyball. Hinata and Kenma become friends despite being on opposite teams, and though Hinata’s energy is at 100 and Kenma’s is at 10, they clearly enjoy each other’s company and are curious to get to know each other.
As their relationship builds and they do get to know each other, they learn from one another. Hinata tells Kenma that he believes one day he will care enough about volleyball to want to win. In order to play this out, we have to believe they actually respect each other and want to be friends. It’s more complicated than a break up make up, will-they-or-won’t-they, move in move out situation. The change is gradual, over multiple episodes, and the interactions that drive the changes feel more authentic.
We are living in an era where we recognize countless errors of past generations, and though we want desperately to fix them for the better, we still cling to old beliefs and ideals in ways that slow us from progress. For example, what does happen if as a shy person your whole life, you suddenly tell your abusive boss to shove it where the sun don’t shine? Would your entire personality be a lie? What happens if instead of living alone in a five-bedroom house you moved to an apartment and paid for a few of your less advantaged neighbors to live in that same building, then used your extra house-maintenance money for, I don’t know, throwing parties with your neighbors? Traveling the world? Buying thigh high boots? There are just so many more possibilities when we resolve conflict and open ourselves up to growth.
Perhaps the time for dramatic growth for me has passed, as I’m still spending time unlearning the negative patterns that growing up in the ‘90s instilled in me, but new developing brains of today have a much brighter chance for accelerated growth. Instead of holding their baggage until it spills into every crevice of their lives as a full grown adult, shows like Haikyuu!! are teaching young developing minds how to process and resolve their relationship conflicts in real time. They are learning to reboot their algorithm in ways we could never fathom.
In Japanese, “haiyku” means “Let’s go!” or in some contexts, “Hurry!” I think this is very fitting, if this type of storytelling continues, I believe we’ll be on the fast track to normalizing empathy, respect, and honesty in relationships on and off the screen.
Post Script: If you really want to know why so many TikTok teens told me to watch this show, it’s because they said my hair reminded them of Kenma. Here’s a picture. See for yourself. But don’t @ me, I was a good little girl and didn’t touch up any of my hair during pandemic.
