Pierce through your opponents towards victory! note
"Get ready, ‘cause the Rainbow Bullet’s about to blow your head off."
— Lily Lipman
Birdie Wing (or Birdie Wing: Golf Girls' Story) is a 2022 anime produced by Bandai Namco Pictures. It's directed by Takayuki Inagaki. Tōru Inoue, Professional golf coach and Junior World Golf Championship Japan team coach, is responsible for overseeing the anime to make sure aspects of golf are as realistic as possible.
Birdie Wing is aired in Japan via TV Tokyo and various prefectural TV stations. Crunchyroll streams the series outside of Japan except for Southeast Asia, which is under Medialink. In some other countries in Oceania, South and Central Asia, Ani-One Asia streams it with regional subtitles.
The anime takes place in the country of Nafrece where two female golfers try to shake up the world of golf. One is a woman named Eve, who takes up golf-related jobs to provide support for orphaned kids. The other, Aoi Amawashi, is a Japanese professional who heads to Nafrece in order to attend an upcoming tournament.
A "second" seasonnote aired from April to June 2023, after being delayed from January 2023.
Two video games, one for Nintendo Switch and one for Mobile, were announced in May 2023, with the Switch game coming out on June 15, 2023
The anime provides examples of:
- Artistic License – Biology: Apparently, golf skills are hereditary. Eve being able to use Kazuhiko's trademark swing is taken as the ultimate proof that she is Kazuhiko's real daughter by Amuro and Seira. And while a flashback shows that Eve was taught by her father in the past, Aoi and Himekawa also trained under him and are pointedly unable to use it, further reinforcing that Eve can do it because she shares her DNA with him. Not to mention that Aoi was able to instantly master Amuro's golf style, despite it being different from the one she had been using until that point, right before the show reveals Amuro is her real father. Needless to say, genes don't work like that.
- Artistic License – Sports: The show takes several liberties with golf
- Eve's midriff-exposing outfit would probably get her banned from even entering most golf courses: khakis and a golf shirt are practically a required dress code. Subverted as she only wears such attire in unofficial games. For example, when she goes to official tournaments she'll wear more course-appropriate attire. Only to be double subverted because Aisha wears midriff-exposing clothing in the English tournaments.
- Because the process of swinging a golf club is so heavily tied to a player's physique and preferences, it'd be impossible for someone to lie about their identity and impersonate another golfer.
- Bizarre and Improbable Golf Game: Less of the 'play it where it lies', more in the improbable capabilities of Catherine's underground Golf Course, and in Eve's ability to plow a golf ball through most obstacles.
- Chekhov's Gunman:
- Juha Hamilail's name first appears on a scoreboard in the opening seconds of the series. 23 episodes later, she shows up as one of Eve's final opponents.
- Remelda appears to be just a golfer of the week, but she shows up again in the finale when she leaks Eve's criminal past on Karen's orders.]
- Chekhov's Skill: Even spent a lot of time playing against Aoi in VR, to the point of getting tired even though VR demands little movement. During her match with Rose later, she reveals she learned a slice shot, which she names "Purple Bullet", from Aoi when they were playing together.
- Costume-Test Montage: Eve goes through one of these during a Shopping Montage in Episode 10, which includes a maid costume and the 4chan-infamous Sneed farmer outfit.
- Crush Blush: Aoi has a tendency to get one around Eve, especially when she sees her naked after a shower.
- Defeat Means Friendship: After Eve beats Vipère, they strike up a friendship, and Vipère even caddies for Eve during her duel with Rose.
- Dirty Cop: Eve and Klein have to pay off Nafrecian police officers trying to shut down the latter's bar or else the orphans are going to uncertain places that may or may not have decent foster parents.
- Distant Finale: The last scene takes place four years after the rest of the story, when Eve's suspension from golf ends and Aoi's illness is cured, allowing them to finally have their match.
- Duel to the Death: Eve and Rose's golf match in "Purple Bullet" and "Final Bullet" is framed as such with the two constantly boasting about how they'll kill the other with their swings. Taken literally when Catherine orders hits on both Rose and Eve (with it implied that Vipère and Anri also got orders taken out on them) when she loses her bet.
- Elaborate Underground Base: Catherine has one...for playing golf. By entering a few commands into a computer, complex machines can quickly replicate any type of hole desired (length, terrain, angles, etc.).
- Evolving Credits:
- The logo on the golf ball at the end of the opening changes to a design relevant to the current storyline.
- The second season keeps "Venus Line" as the opening, but adds a scene of Ichina and Lily arm wrestling, reveals that the silhouetted golfer is Kazuhiko, and adds an "Arios" engraving on his golf club.
- For the first few episodes of Season 2, the second half of the ending only features the golfers involved in the doubles tournament. After that tournament ends, most of the other golfers are added in.
- Face Death with Dignity: In The Stinger for "Final Bullet", after a final meeting with Leo, Rose accepts her fate when a Mafia hitman comes to assassinate her as punishment for her loss against Eve.
- Foreign Exchange Student: Eve travels to Japan to see (and play against) Aoi. But when they finally meet, Aoi convinces Eve to enroll in Raiou Girls' Academy.
- Handicapped Badass: Even without her right hand, Rose is good enough to finish the hole and come within one shot of tying Eve.
- Inconsistent Spelling: In some translations, Nafrece is known as Nafres.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Eve secures a solid victory for Catherine in "Vipère". However, in "Purple Bullet" she learns that her actions may leave her and her adopted family homeless and herself assassinated, forcing a relocation to Japan to be with Aoi once more.
- Pyrrhic Victory: In the finale, Eve wins the tournament, but Karen exposes her past as a criminal golfer, causing her victory to be stripped from her and her being banned from golfing for three years. This in turn gives her opponent Juha her own Pyrrhic Victory, as she is declared winner by default and is clearly not happy about this tainted victory.
- Real-Place Background: The end of the opening song is the 18th hole at St. Andrews golf course, one of the most revered places in golf.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: In a Flashback at the beginning of "Final Bullet", Leo gives a brief one to Rose when he tells her he won't coach her anymore. It's especially brutal, because this is just after she's been stitched up after losing her right hand.
- Riddle for the Ages:
- What exactly happened to Anri after she pulled a Screw This, I'm Out of Here! after Eve's game with Rose? Did she successfully escape or did Catherine's goons eventually catch up and kill her due to being Rose's caddie?
- Eve's whereabouts during her self-imposed exile, neither the characters nor the viewer are made aware of what happened during the three years this occurred.
- Catherine and her empire after Eve's mafia ties are exposed never gets brought up. In fact, Catherine herself is a no-show when we see everyone's reactions as the news is outed to the public. The same train of thought applies to the rest of Nafrece's underground connections, as the possible effects on how wide-reaching the revelation might have been aren't brought up or shown.
- Rivals Team Up:
- Eve and Aoi have to team up for the double tournament.
- In the finale, after Aoi's illness forces her to withdraw from the tournament, she becomes Eve's caddie so they can combine their talents to let Eve defeat Juha.
- Running Gag: Whenever Eve calls Vipère "Snake Woman", Vipère always corrects her, rather indignantly.
- Serious Business: The anime shows golf as serious, albeit exaggerated at times. At the start, Eve is recruited to take over an injured female golfer named Chris Christina as a stand-in by wearing a latex-type mask. Rose mentions that she and Eve are underground golf hustlers who take up jobs from time to time to make money on the side.
- The anime does imply that most of the criminal underworld make bets by allowing their golf hustlers to play at underground contests on their behalf.
- She Cleans Up Nicely: While Eve is a true Unkempt Beauty in her daily outfit, she looks prettier and less wild once dressed with the golf outfit of Rose Aleon and having her hair properly combed when she joins the U15 tournament.
- Shown Their Work: Inoue's presence in the production enabled the anime to show how one plays golf.
- The design of the Euro used in Nafrece is correct, although that would depend on how the country that has adopted the Euro has it printed.
- Shout-Out: As an anime by Bandai Namco it peppers the series with various references to its creations and affiliate projects.
- Reiya Amuro is a reference to Amuro Ray, one of Tōru Furuya's breakout roles. It also references Pegasus Seiya, the protagonist of the Saint Seiya franchise.
- Aoi uses golf balls that have Pac-Man designs on them.
- Eve assumed Lily bet her chastity, but Lily the reveals that she bet a Gunpla, specifically one of the RX-78 Gundam.
- In a flashback, Couch Amuro uses an RX shaft, a reference to Amuro Ray's RX-78 Gundam.
- Aisha Khambatta's approach to all shots is the same as Happy Gilmore.
- Aisha's name is a pun on Ace Combat
- Aoi's first pro tournament is the Namco Classic, named after a golf game for the NES.
- Eve's final special move is "Over the Rainbow," a song from the movie, The Wizard of Oz.
- Birdie Wing's writer Yousuke Kuroda has worked in many references to other series he's written:
- Nafrece is also a country in Madlax and Valkyrie Drive: Mermaid.
- Eleanor Burton, Eve's mother, is named after the Madlax characters Eleanor Baker and Margaret Burton. This has the side effect of giving Eve the same surname as Madlax's deuteragonist.
- Eve's special moves ("[Adjective] [Color] Bullet!") is a reference to Kazuma's special moves ("[Adjective] [Number] Bullet!") in Scryed
- The fake name that Eve uses starting in Episode 8 is Evangeline F. Kimishima, a reference to Mobile Suit Gundam 00's Setsuna F. Seiei and Scryed's Kunihiko Kimishima.
- Per Kuroda himself
, Kaoran's coach Akihiro Date was named for Infinite Ryvius's Akihiro Miyabi. Senator Stein is likewise named for Stein Heiger from the same series. - Raiou Academy is named for the school that the protagonist of Pretty Sammy attends.
- Kaoruko Iijima is named for Kaoruko Sazaki (aka "Gyanko") from Gundam Build Fighters Try.
- Mizono and Haruka are named for characters from Please Teacher!.
- Kinue Jinguji is named for Kanade Jinguji from Best Student Council and Kinue Crossroad from Gundam 00.
- Chris Christina is named for Criff Cay from Ryvius and Christina Sierra from Gundam 00. Kuroda claims that her alias C.C. is not an Code Geass reference.
- Leo Millafoden is named for Karla Milla-Foden from ID-0
- Michael Burton's first name comes from Michael Trinity from Gundam 00, while his butler Allen Harvey is named for Allen Adams from Gundam Build Fighters and Laguna Harvey from 00. Michael's company Arios is named for the Arios Gundam from 00.
- Cheris Kay is named after Scheris Adjani from S-cry-ed and the Cay sisters from Ryvius.
- Remelda is named for Limelda from Madlax.
- The finale packs in one last S-cry-ed reference by replacing the opening with a montage of footage from previous episodes while the ending song plays.
- Snooty Sports: Golf is generally perceived as being an elitist sport, because of the time, energy, and especially money (for equipment, tee times, possibly even enrollment at a private school known for its' focus on golf) that is required to play it well.
- Star-Crossed Lovers: Eleanor Burton and Kazuhiko Hodaka. She was the daughter of the leader of the Arios golff brand/criminal organization. He was a golfer under contract with Arios's rival Athens and was obligated to marry Athens's heir Seira. To avoid conflict between their golf families, Eleanor cut ties with her own family and lived happily with her and Kazuhiko's daughter Eve (and Kazuhiko himself whenever his tours took him to Europe.)
- Suddenly Always Knew That: Lampshaded, Eve herself is shocked to discover she can speak fluent Japanese. It's Foreshadowing to the reveal in the following season that her father was Japanese.
- Title Drop: Every episodes title is said somewhere in the episode itself. Some examples:
- The episode "Rainbow Bullet" is where Eve uses the technique for the first time.
- "Vipère" has the character of the same name compete with her.
- "VR" has Eve play golf in a VR game. Aoi does so too and it's implied Rose made the arrangement for her to join Eve online.
- Train-Station Goodbye: The end of "Final Bullet" has Lily and Klein doing this for Eve as she departs for Japan and handing her her belongings.
- Wham Episode:
- "Purple Bullet" has Eve competing against Rose in order to save Klein, Lily and the other kids from being thrown out onto the streets. During The Stinger, it is shown that Rose has a prosthetic right arm...which breaks down spectacularly under the strain of her powerful tee shots.
- In "Final Bullet", Rose is killed by a mafia hitman, Eve wins enough euros to move her friends into an expensive home and get them into schools, and Eve heads to Japan to join Aoi in more golf tournaments/games in the hopes to flee from a potential hit order placed on her by Catherine due to winning the match.
- "The Strange Fates of Two Generations of Young People Who Were Caught Up in the Ego of Adults," Eve wins the tournament and regains her memories after using the Orange Bullet. She rediscovers that her father was Kazuhiko and her mother was Eleanor Burton, but her parents died and she lost her memories when the cruise ship they were all on sank. It's also revealed that Aoi's biological father is Amuro and that Kazuhiko married Seira on the condition that her father let her give birth to Aoi so that Kazuhiko could raise her as his own daughter.
- Wham Line: At the end of "The Reason Just Playing Golf Makes Me So Happy", as Eve finally gets her memories back, she has this to say:
- Where the Hell Is Springfield?: Nafrece's precise location is unknown. But it's known to use the Euro as a currency. Possibly, it’s an anagram of France.
- Whole Episode Flashback: "The Strange Fates of Two Generations of Young People Who Were Caught Up in the Ego of Adults" shows Eve and Aoi’s past and what happened prior to the events of the series, including the boating accident that killed Kazuhiko and Eleanor.
