Hanamichi Sakuragi

Hanamichi Sakuragi
Slam Dunk (manga) character
Created by	Yōichi Takahashi

Hanamichi Sakuragi (Japanese: 桜木 花道, Hepburn: Sakuragi Hanamichi) is the main protagonist of Slam Dunk, a sports manga by Takehiko Inoue.

Appearances

He serving as Shohoku's power forward. His jersey number is 10 and he is a freshman (grade ten) at Shohoku High. At the beginning of the series, Sakuragi is a slacker, good for nothing other than fighting. He is the leader of the feared Sakuragi Legion, which consists of his four friends Mito, Noma, Ohkusu and Takamiya. After being rejected fifty times by girls during junior high school, Sakuragi meets and falls in love with Haruko Akagi, a basketball fangirl who is also in grade ten.^[ch. 1] This and Haruko's encouragement lead him to join the Shohoku basketball team. However, as a complete beginner, he is not able to keep up with the rest of the team despite his outstanding height, athleticism, stamina, speed and leaping ability. He regards himself as a "genius" though, with self-confidence that borders on arrogance. Sakuragi's most recognizable trait is his red hair, though he later shaves his head as reparation for an error that led to a loss in the Interhigh Tournament against Kainan.^[ch. 133]

Sakuragi becomes infamous for his poor basketball skills as a beginner and his tendency to foul out of every game.^[ch. 1] However, his basketball skills advance throughout the series. First he develops his basic skills, such as dribbling and layups. Then, trained by Akagi, he becomes a formidable rebounder, which becomes his claim to fame throughout the latter half of the series. His jump shooting is then developed by Coach Anzai, who has him make 20,000 shots in a week. However, he also injured his back during the match against Sannoh when saving the ball from going off the court, and underwent rehabilitation after Shohoku's subsequent loss to Aiwa Academy. While considered by most to be an amateur's instinctual tactic, the tactic itself, coupled with Sakuragi's formidable athleticism, actually goes well with his somewhat unorthodox playing style. This allows Sakuragi to be in the right place at the right time to intercept more experienced players. Although his love for Haruko and rivalry with Rukawa are the main driving forces motivating him to succeed in basketball, his injury during the Sannoh match makes him realize that he has actually come to love the game, leading him to give his all for his team and bring them victory.

He has a habit of making fun of other players by giving them various nicknames, as he rarely calls his teammates or opponents by their real names. He calls Akagi "Gori" (ゴリ),^[ch. 4] Kogure "Megane-kun" (メガネ君) and Uozumi "Boss Monkey" (ボス猿). While he seems to be nothing but a trouble maker, he has his own dark past. He once got into a fight with four high school students, whom he single-handedly knocked out. Later when he went home, he found his dad lying unconscious. When he went for help, he met with high school students whom he had fought previously, with eight students this time. While neither the manga nor anime suggests who won the fight, it does suggest the fight delayed Sakuragi, and which resulted in the death of Sakuragi's father. In the anime he is voiced by Takeshi Kusao in Japanese and Robert Tinkler in English.

Creation

Inoue's experiences with basketball also influenced the story from Slam Dunk: as a youth Inoue started playing basketball to be popular with the girls, but later became interested with the sport in and of itself. This was mirrored in the character of Hanamichi Sakuragi, who starts playing basketball to be popular with the girl he likes, to later become truly fond of the game. When asked about his reason for involving himself in the film, Inoue stated that he was encouraged by the enthusiasm of the people who worked on the prototype versions and after seeing a good image of Sakuragi's face, he thought that getting himself involved would make it even better.

Reception

Anime News Network's Carl Kimlinger called Sakuragi an "inspired choice" for a manga protagonist as he is a delinquent with a wild temper and the wrong motives, but who does the "apparently impossible" and balances sympathy and extreme arrogance thanks to comic scenes. Carlo Santos of the same site instead argues that although Sakuragi is not characterized by the "stunning superhuman abilities" that are normally associated with the protagonists of the shōnen, seeing him become a sportsman and a decent person is equally exciting. According to Crunchyroll, both Slam Dunk's Hanamichi Sakuragi and Vagabond Miyamoto Musashi are similar protagonists being young, egotistical prodigies, but "Inoue’s Musashi is a force of nature." According to Sequental Art "The usually highly annoying Hanamichi" shows some character growth in later parts of the manga as "Not that he isn’t still stuck on himself or being a rival to Rukawa, but he does at least make an effort to be a team player." The eventual end of the match surprised him again for the way Inoue keeps developing Sakuragi's characterization.

According to Lorenzo Negri of Wired Hanamichi is a comical, excessive, frantic and enthusiastic character.. Takehiko Inoue had given him a boundless charisma and resilience, of self-centeredness and team spirit in an impossible balance, of a touching talent and emotionality and of an irrepressible and enthralling personality to such an extent that only he was enough to have a reason to read the manga of Slam Dunk. Hanamichi is not the classic spokon hero looking for redemption or with physical limitations but rather he is an aggressive and not too intelligent young man, which allowed him to be an unprecedented figure in the panorama in his debut reference.

Hanamichi Sakuragi received the magazine's Anime Grand Prix award Animage for the best male character of 1993 and 1994, placing 10th respectively and in eighth place.