Saki A 7
Probably because of the Avengers movie, but I can't stop thinking about how the Saki franchise is basically setting up for a massive final project that gives us an ultimate showdown between four teams that people are at least invested in in some way. The cameos popping up in this essentially amount to Nick Fury showing up at the end of Iron Man 1. It's kind of amazing.
I just wonder if there's an end game to all of this, because of the Saki OG manga is so far behind, they're either going to have to wait another two years to adapt the other side of the story or they're just going to have to go it alone.
Of course, I'm sure in reality no one on the anime side has thought about a grander plan and that this show is probably a one-off to promote the manga, but it would be hilarious if all of this stuff set up a Saki movie in 2016 or whenever.
Um... no. This is wrong. From what I've heard, the Saki Achiga-hen manga was started because they wanted to do another anime, but the main series wasn't nearly ready, so Saki Achiga-hen, with a different artist but still written by Ritz Kobayashi, was born. I believe that the manga is basically the template for the anime, and I don't know if the manga would ever have been started without the desire to do another anime project. I would suspect not, myself.
Beyond that, given that Ritz writes and draws Saki, and writes Achiga-hen as well, why would the endgame NOT be thought through? It's all by the same person! I guess you mean the writers of the anime adaptation, but it's all based on her work, so no, that doesn't make any sense.
I do agree that it's likely to take a few years to get to the climax, though, with the pace that Saki chapters release at. That's part o why Achiga-hen exists, I believe, as I said.
But yes, that this anime will probably end like right before the finals, but then it'll take a long time before we see what happens next in animated form, IS of course frustrating. But... it was like that before too. I mean, the first anime series ended right at the beginning of nationals. That's a cliffhanger ending too, if I've ever seen one. And while the manga continued from there (the first anime went through all available manga material up to that point and added some new stuff too), it was a few years until the second anime, Achiga-hen, came around. And it still isn't an animated version of Kiyosumi's matches in the tournament, as they are in the manga, which is understandable given that the Saki manga hasn't even finished the quarterfinal match yet. You know, their equivalent of the current match in the Achiga-hen anime. It's right near the end of the quarterfinal, so it'll be over soon, but it's not quite there... and then there's the semifinals too, before the Saki manga gets to the finals.
Maybe in the interim they can do an anime based on Saki Biyori, a 4koma gag manga with the various schools from Saki, and another Saki spinoff started last year. That wouldn't continue the plot of course, but it is amusing.
