I Am Once Again Thinking About How Chapter 297 Is Titled Master And Student And Is Focused On How Kuroo

i am once again thinking about how chapter 297 is titled Master and Student and is focused on how Kuroo has been a mentor to Tsukki in regards to his blocking skills

and then the chapter ends with tsukki acknowledging that he knows kuroo is better than him and that he never had expectations of beating him on his own

only to then perfectly transition into chapter 298 titled Guide (!!!) where yamaguchi is subbing in to serve.

(god i have so much to say about this, it was genuinely difficult not to just paste the entirety of 298 when i quoted panels)

i mean, these next two panels make me crazy. the first one (on the right) is the last panel in 297 and it's the first time we've seen yamaguchi in the whole chapter and furudate has set it up so that it's right when tsukki says that he couldn't do this alone!! and THEN the panel on the left is from the second page of 298 right after kuroo says that while tsukki may not be trying to win on his own, yamaguchi sure looks like he's determined enough to do it—and not only does tsukki agree that yamaguchi probably is thinking of taking them down with his serve, but by saying the "he's always one step ahead of me after all" line he's also admitting that this is a quality of yamaguchi's that he admires and is likely inspired by!!! and THEN in the bottom left of that panel (which is where the eye usually goes last in the way the panels are laid out) we get the chapter title drop to emphasize that yamaguchi is indeed guiding tsukki (despite the implications from the series up til now that yamaguchi is seen as being in tsukki's shadow )

the rest of 298 goes on to essentially beat us over the head with all the ways in which tsukki has come to see yamaguchi as being that guide to him. and the way furudate achieves this is so so well done

in contrast to 297, Master and Student, in 298 furudate doesn't explicitly tell us that yamaguchi is the guide—the title drop and tsukki's 'walks ahead of me line' that i just mentioned are the closest things—instead, in order to get the audience to feel (rather than just know) the importance of their development (together and as individuals), furudate shows it to us.

first, yamaguchi gets a service ace right off the bat (the first one of the match, even before kageyama got one), basically proving that he can beat all of nekoma in a way (which is a nice subtle callback to earlier scenes in the series about how serving is the only solo weapon in the game, the only time you can truly take down the other team on your own)

so this little bit is great for a few reasons, 1 it confirms that yamaguchi's hard work in extra practices/dedication to learn the serve in the first place, is still paying off, 2 it confirms that his confidence in being able to take points on his own is warranted and 3 it confirms that tsukki's confidence in yamaguchi's skill has not been misplaced.

the chapter continues by transitioning to show how yamaguchi's serve can still lead to points even when he doesn't get an ace, by showcasing his and tsukki's first perfect serve and block combo. it shows the way the two of them are wordlessly thinking in sync, how mentally connected they are,

and then it shows us how, even though they haven't practiced it directly with each other, they've both been working toward this moment for a long time (a quick panel of bokuto calling tsukki's blocks wussy, cutting to tsukki having a monster block that mirror's kuroo's from chapter 297, and then a beat later a quick panel of yamaguchi overhearing ukai say that other than an ace, a serve and block is the perfect/ideal play)

but then, for me, the real magic of this is that furudate doesn't emphasize those moments as the most meaningful ones that got them here. yes those were the moments that allowed them to consciously start practicing the physical skills that they needed to pull it off, but those panels are small and more for context, because what furudate does want to emphasize is what emotionally and mentally led them (especially tsukki) to be here. the things off the court and away from the game that still contributed here

furudate (again instead of just telling us) shows us the payoff of tsukki saying "he's always been one step ahead of me after all," shows us how tsukki came to think that in the first place. which furudate does by redrawing, recontextualizing, and reframing moments that we've already seen throughout the series, but this time framing them to clearly be from tsukishima's perspective

there's no dialogue between the two of them in the whole chapter, and no narration in these few pages, just the new redrawn panels that show how tsukki has been aware this whole time of how where yamaguchi started, how yamaguchi was the one looking up to him, and how he watched as yamaguchi passed him by.

the audience has seen these scenes before, but never from this lens—some were small, or inconsequential, or they were important but, they were one-off events—before they certainly didn't seem connected. and now, we feel the moments again as tsukki feels them, remembers them; it puts us directly into his head, and imo, it makes the ending of the chapter hit even harder

because we've just felt the triumph that tsukki and yamaguchi felt in succeeding in that play, and on the court in the story kuroo too could see tsukki enjoying himself and he (teasingly) asks him how he's been liking volleyball lately

and this is it. this is the culmination of tsukki's character arc right here.

yes, his stuff block against ushijima was the moment that hooked him, but imo this takes it even a step further. (the moment in the shiratorizawa match was about his skill—his blocking abilities, his mental resolve to track the ball, to learn, trick, and bait the setter—and allowing himself to feel pride in his hard work despite years of telling himself that hard work didn't necessitate results)

but here, now, tsukki makes a point to emphasize that it's because of everyone that he finally has fun playing volleyball. chapter 297 talked about the importance of tsukki physically learning to be a better blocker from kuroo, and 298 showed us how he was inspired by yamaguchi's dedication to better emotionally/mentally commit to the game. and both chapters come together here and circle back around to one of haikyuu's biggest themes: connection, and connection as a form of love.

if yamaguchi hadn't told tsukki he was being lame at the tokyo training camp, tsukki wouldn't have gone to ask bokuto what he liked about volleyball, he wouldn't have asked kuroo for blocking tips, he wouldn't have had the skill to stuff ushijima, or to pull of the serve and block here with yamaguchi. and he wouldn't have had the inspiration to even try to care to do any of that in the first place. because for tsukki, it was never really about the skills. it was about not understanding why he should care to learn those skills in the first place.

kuroo taught him what to do, bokuto told him how it could happen and yamaguchi showed him why it was worth striving for at all. without those friendships, without those connections, tsukishima would have never found this happiness, this self worth. he may not have been able to truly reconnect with his brother.

without everyone, he wouldn't go on to play professional volleyball for a div. 2 team.

this still volleyball. all plays are connected.

and furudate put us right into the moment to let us feel it alongside him. across the net, through the page, we connect too