Welcome To The Ballroom

It's late 1993 and I'm nearly two years out of high school. We, all of us, have just seen Swing Kids and there is something monumental welling up in us. We want to feel that excitement, that thrill, that passion—we want to feel whatever it was that made those kids dance in the face of the rise of Nazi fascism and shout out "Swing heil!" There was something in the music, contagious. Something in the moves. So we did everything we could to learn to dance. I mean, everything that didn't involve actual lessons. We recorded out all the dance sequences from Swing Kids. I obtained footage from Hellzapoppin'. And we watched it over and over and over. Pause play pause play pause play rewind. And again. My friend and I practiced the moves with each other. I'd play the man, then he would. We got the spins, the flips, the twirls, the big air—we got it down, man. And then we spread the contagion among our friends. We taught everyone we new. We acquired the music. We hosted parties. Swing parties. Dancing, music, acrobatics, and occasionally even romance. But mostly dancing. Or our approximation of it anyway. I was great at the tricks. The throws, the flips, the twirls. I had no sense for the footwork though. Our videos didn't teach that. Still, I won a contest (danced with my brother in a routine where we switched off the girl and guy roles) and had a lot of fun. I felt the fire. Haven't danced in two decades now. But I kind of remember.

At first glance, Welcome To The Ballroom might seem like a niche read, something for fans of the craft. It's ballroom dancing, right? and as the manga points out maybe at least once per volume, ballroom dancing is for upper-middle-class middle-aged people with nothing better to do. Fortunately Welcome To The Ballroom is much better than that and caters to a much wider audience.

This is a sports story and one of those sports stories about the prodigy player who got a late start on the sport and is going to quickly make up for lost time because he's that good. It's a common enough formula, but Welcome To The Ballroom performs its steps very well. It's graceful on the fundamentals while throwing in some delicious variations for a pizazz that serves to elevate the rest of the story. In the five vols I've read so far (I'm enamoured enough that I plan to continue with the series as new vols are released), fifteen-year-old Fujita moves from entirely inexperienced amateur to gifted would-be competitor. He begins the series aimless and struggling to find an interest as he is being pushed to choose a high school to attend. Accidentally, he finds himself in a dance studio with members devoted to competitive ballroom dance. While initially embarrassed and hoping nobody discovers him there (male dancers have about as great a reputation amongst other teens in Japan as they do here), Fujita sees a video of what competitive ballroom dance is actually like and in set alight. He has a direction now and will rocket toward it through the rest of the story, meeting obstacles and overcoming them or using his defeats by them to improve himself. (See? That sports story formula. AKA life story formula.)

If you've read sports manga before, you're probably familiar with the story beats, but where Welcome To The Ballroom shines is in its visual depictions of athleticism. In Polina, Bastien Vivès ably depicted his ballet dancers in spare, minimalist gestures, giving the dance a quiet fluidity emphasizing the grace and beauty of the form. Welcome To The Ballroom doesn't remotely attempt this. Takeuchi's dancers are vibrant, bursting with frenetic energy. They are electric and exciting and Takeuchi draws flourishes to highlight some of the emotional energy exploding beneath the skin. Fire will crackle off the clasped hands of a couple as they waltz. A character will be engulfed in flame to express his rage or passion. The skin of another will bristle and steam as their waning strength rejuvenates to pull out one last showstopper. And the sweat.

Takeuchi does one thing I've never seen in a comic about active characters before. They are drenched in sweat. Rivers of it pour from their hairline down their faces as they exert themselves. It's an incredibly small detail but it goes so very far in selling the world of these competitions. The beautiful, gorgeous women in this book do not glisten. They sweat. Buckets. It's perfect and real.

So far at least, Welcome To The Ballroom doesn't escape its tropes or formulae, but it's not trying to. Instead, the book is playing entirely within the established realm and doing so with verve. It's nailing all the steps and avoiding many of the pitfalls. It's sweeping across the floor getting it done and showing how to do it. Welcome To the Ballroom doesn't have the emotional range or sweep of Cross Game but does make its sport thrilling even for those, like me, who don't have much actual interest in the activity depicted.

 

 

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Comics by Seth T. Hahne