YMMV / Captain Tsubasa

• Aluminum Christmas Trees:
  • Many people thought that Albese, the minnow team that Aoi plays for in Italy after Internazionale dismisses him, was fictional. Turns out it's real, and has played at the Piedmont division of Eccellenza (the fifth division of Italian football).
  • Hyuga debuting on Juventus wearing a number "1+8" (one plus eight) jersey may also seem outlandish, but it is based on Chilean superstar Iván Zamorano, who wore the number 9 shirt at Internazionale before Ronaldo, another wold-famous number 9, joined the team. This was done in order to let both players be the number 9 on the team^note Although Ronaldo played with the number 10 in his first season in Italy (1997-98) while Zamorano remained with the 9. Interestingly enough, the situation in the manga is reversed in which it's the newcomer that takes the amended numbering while the correct number is kept by the team veteran (in this case, Inzars).
• Americans Hate Tingle: As explosively popular it is in Japan, Latin America, and continental Europe; the series isn't that particularly well-known in English-speaking world. Even in the UK, where soccer was invented. Most of the time, it only comes up in terms of some Off-Model artwork or when discussing sports manga/anime and the absurd feats as depicted in them.
• Anti-Climax Boss: Netherlands in World Youth because the entire match was skipped because of Executive Meddling, as Shueshia decided to cut short the series to give space to new ones. It is important to note that the team had most of the build up due to having a manga volume dedicated to their first matches with Japan and later properly had the spotlight in Rising Sun.
• Angst? What Angst?: Several characters, among them Tsubasa, Aoi, Ishizaki, and Kumi (who bounces back really fast after having her crush rejected)
• Awesome Art: One of the main praises of the manga is its polished and dynamic artwork that depicts the football matches.
• Awesome Music:
  • The original series' opening Moete Hero is considered the theme for the franchise as a whole. It's popular enough to the point of making a return as the 2018 series ending theme (and the soundtrack includes different versions sung by several characters including Tsubasa, Hyuga, Wakabayashi, among others), and the Rise of New Champions videogame also includes a quite epic orchestra version.
  • The J series' opening Fighting! is another fan favorite, especially in Latin America.
  • Road to 2002 may bring quite the Broken Base, but no one denies that it has a nice soundtrack. Dragon Screamer, Our Relation and Keep on going come to mind.
• Badass Decay: Wakashimazu/Richard. In his first appearance he stops a Penalty Kick and rivals Wabayashi/Benji. By World Youth he has developed an inferiority complex because they plan to replace him with Wakabayashi.
  • The entire Japanese team often rely too much on Tsubasa. This happens both in the first manga and World Youth where they need to develop as individuals.
  • Tsubasa only goes through this in Road to 2002 where he is overshadowed too much by Rivaul/Rivaldo in Barcelona, resulting in being demoted to a weaker team and later nearly being replaced in the match against Real Madrid due to committing several mistakes.
• Base-Breaking Character: The main character Tsubasa. He's fondly remembered by many fans who grew up with the anime but some people see him as an Invincible Hero who always wins (which, not helping matters, is actually enforced by the author) and a Flat Character compared to the other characters.
• Delusion Conclusion: Among the Latin American fandom, there is a recurring meme about a fake finale where the whole series turns out to be only a dream of the main character, who also wakes up without legs.
• Die for Our Ship: Kumi suffers a lot of this from Tsubasa/Sanae fans, for daring to crush on Tsubasa.
• Draco in Leather Pants: While he has a pretty good Freudian Excuse, fangirls forget how much of an abusive jerkass Hyûga was to his rivals at first, as well as how many times his bad temper and arrogance has brought him genuine trouble after his Character Development.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • In Spain, although the series received a title that only highlighted Tsubasa and Genzo (namely Oliver y Benji, their names in the European dubs), Kojiro Hyuga (here known as Mark Lenders) is just as well remembered as those two, and it could be argued he's better remembered than Genzo himself given how many times the latter was Put on a Bus. Lenders was a lot of people's favorite character for how badass and cool he was, and almost every Spanish kid that played street soccer back then can remember having tried to replicate his famed Tiger Shot.
  • In some circles, Morisaki's Woobie streak has gained him more than one fangirl. Izawa, Ishizaki and Ishizaki's mother are others examples.
  • The anime original character of Otto Heffner is oddly well remembered in Spain despite his very minor role (and despite not many Spaniards being able to spell his name). His fame came mostly for his crazy hair, which made him stand out even in a series with some other weird hairdos, and for the spirited way he stood up to the Japanese team despite being a virtual unknown.
• Friendly Fandoms: Many Arabic fans who grew up with "Captain Majid" airing on Saudi TV also love Lady!!, since it aired around the same time. Lady was to little girls what Captain Majid was to little boys.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
  • Soccer is big in Latin America and Europe, and this is a show about soccer, so do the math. Even though the dub changed all the names and the name of the show itself, ask any Latino born in the mid-to-late 80s, or European born in the early-to-mid 80s, and he will tell you that one of his favorite shows was this (Supercampeones in Latin America and Oliver & Benji in Europe). You will likely get the same answer from the next generation or two thanks to re-runs of the shows (especially the old series and Road to 2002) in some of these countries, and even in present time there is a lot of pop culture infection related to the franchise. In fact, many real life soccer players (Andrés Iniesta, Sergio "Kun" Agüero, Fernando Torres, Zinedine Zidane and Neymar being only the main examples) have cited this show as their reason why they played the sport in the first place.
  • In the Arab World, where soccer is extremely popular too, many people would tell you fond memories of watching Captain Majid growing up. The mangaka was even invited to the Saudi Anime Exhibition.
  • Interestingly, the Captain Tsubasa category in Fanfiction.Net—created in the late 1990's or early 2000's—was populated only by non-English fanfiction for the longest time; one of the few categories to have the honor.
• Harsher in Hindsight: In the first anime TV series' All European Junior filler arc, the Captain of England's team Steve has been contemptuous towards Japan's team as a weak nation who has no place in the league due to Europe's legendary standards of competitive soccer. He openly gives racist remarks and even boasts England will win the game with 20 goals. While Tsubasa ultimately won (even if in a very close match with England that went past the main game's timer), Steve showed himself to be quite a gentleman who praised Japan's win with complete honorable sportsmanship. Contrast this with the recent 2020 E Urocup where despite being in a very close game and against Italy which is not only a white nation but one of the traditional superpowers of the entire soccer world beyond Europe where riots, vandalism, assault on foreigners, and other large scale violence took place followed after the immediate result of the game. Members of the black English soccer team faced racial slurs and were scapegoated for the team's defeat. The damage was so terrible that the bid for Wembley as the finale location for an upcoming World Cup has now been flushed down the toilet. Making all the entire situation worse as the fact Steve's trash talk at the start of the game was about showing the backwards Japanese team about the power of England as its the home of Football......... The beloved Football's Coming Home song was the main chant across the 2020 UEFA cup, sung so much during the tournament that it as used at the same rate as the United Kingdom's National Anthem "God Save the Queen". So for all his douche behavior during England VS Japan in the Junior filler, Steve in the end proved to be a true example of sportsmanship in contrast to how the Brits acted in real life in the 2021 continental cup.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • One of the movies takes place in the USA... and in 1994, the USA would host The World Cup. Even funnier when one recalls that the soccer craze took until at least 2010 to properly spread to the USA itself.
  • In Rising Sun. The Japanese team wiped the floor with the Mexican team at 8-0. In Real Life, Mexico suffered a crushing defeat against Chile in Copa America with only one goal less (7-0). The main difference is, while the real life ream was defeated abroad, in the manga the Japanese team defeated the Mexicans at home, and in the Azteca Stadium, no less.^note In Real Life, Mexico has hardly ever been defeated at home in the Azteca. Had either the manga Mexicans or the real life team been defeated in such a way in such place in Real Life, the consequences would've been nasty, to put it mildly (this kind of fallout has happened in real life with more believable scores; look up "Aztecazo" on Google and you'll see what we mean). It's very probably the match was a reference about a similar match between those countries during the olympic games in Mexico at 1968, when Japan defeated the host Mexico 2-0 for the bronze medal, and also in the Azteca. Ironically enough, the Mexicans would end beating the Japanese in their own turf in similar circunstances, 53 years later, at the Tokyo 2021 Olympics..
  • In The '90s Takehito Koyasu voiced Takuto Izumi from Zetsuai (1989), an obvious Hyuuga Expy. Flashforward more than 10 years... and guess who voices Adult!Hyuuga in Road to 2002?
  • Many jokes are done that Japan would never beat teams like Germany outside this manga. Come the 2022 World Cup happened, Japan defeated Germany 2-1 on their very first match. Taken even further when, during their third match in the group stage, Japan also beat Spain (with the same result as in the Millenium Dream non-canon oneshot).
• Ho Yay: While this series was written WAY before the Bishōnen Jump Syndrome kicked in, it still was THE starting point of the biggest pillars from what would become one of the first generations of yaoi doujinshi authors. In fact, Minami Ozaki from Zetsuai (1989) fame began her career as a Hyuuga/Wakashimazu doujinshi author — it's still very noticeable in how Takuto Izumi, one of the Zetsuai male leads, is what Hyuuga would've been if CT was a yaoi series. (And hilariously, both Izumi and Road to 2002!Hyuga were voiced by Takehito Koyasu). The manga group CLAMP, who was originally a doujinshi group, also got their start drawing Captain Tsubasa BL. Then again, this is a soccer series where most characters are male and the players are mostly finely-built sportsmen.
• I Knew It!: Regarding the 2018 anime for Latin American viewers, the fans expected both the series being dubbed and with their original names intact, rather than changed, in this version. In a very interesting twist, not only both assumptions proved correct, but the series will also being broadcasted in Latin America with very little time of difference in relation to its Japanese run.
• Iron Woobie: Misaki, Sanae, Matsuyama, Leo, post-Character Development!Kumi.
• Jerkass Woobie: Hyûga, Santana, Espada and Levin are revealed as shining examples of this. They have extremely good reasons to not be super nice guys, bur that's not an excuse for the way they treat other people.
• Memetic Badass: The series' match commentator is this in countries where it was dubbed by a single actor. Given that the man commented every single match in the series, from 10 year old Japanese kids to Brazilian teenagers, it's popularly joked that he has superpowers, usually the ability to be everywhere at the same time. This get sometimes extended to the ability to hear people's whispers and predict a person's actions whenever they are continuity errors in the dubs.
• Memetic Loser:
  • Morisaki in Captain Tsubasa J PSX video game adaptation, due to the fact that he's the only Japanese goalkeeper (not counting the improvised goalkeeper Tachibana in the second RJ7 match) without one-liner in his attempt to catch supershots. It's bad enough that other goalkeepers who aren't even prominent characters in the series such as the goalkeepers of Taiwan and Street Team, the latter of which is a Canon Foreigner no less, actually did have one-liners. It doesn't help that Morisaki is also the only available goalkeeper in the notoriously difficult That One Level match against RJ7.
  • Speaking of goalkeeper, Japan Youth apparently got fourth goalkeeper named Sasaki during the earlier World Youth arc who is even more inferior than Morisaki. The sole reason he's even there was to replace Morisaki when the latter got injured by Hino Ryoma's Dragon Shot in the disastrous match against RJ7. While Morisaki at least only took 2 goals from RJ7 in one match until he was injured, Sakaki took even more goals in the next two matches against RJ7. He never got characterization whatsoever and disappears without explanation after said match, with the only possible explanation is that he resigned out of despair or shame for taking way too many goals from RJ7.
  • Kozo Kira, Hyuga's trainer (called Jeff Turner/Fleming in western dubs). Fans often like to exaggerate his disheveled appearance and drunkard habits, often joking that he is a full-fledged homeless, a junkie or something worse.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • From the anime, how the players take ages to run from one mid-field to the other led to jokes such as "Nothing seems to be as immense and infinite as the ocean. Except the field of Captain Tsubasa, that thing was infinite," or that the field can be seen from space. Some fans in fact calculated that, based on how long they take, the fields have to be around 18 Km/11.2 miles long!
  • Since they always try to reproduce the dialogues and commentator's speeches directly from the manga pannels (which is in most part the reason for the "seemingly-endless field" described above), this also led to jokes that the players cannot do a move without having a flashback, such as "I'm going to score a goal. But first, I'll remember my whole life.".
  • Wakabayashi's excuse when Natureza score him outside of the penalty area, "The sun didn't let me see". This is actually a downplayed Beam Me Up, Scotty!, because Wakabayashi said in present simple ("The sun doesn't let me see") and it was when Natureza was about to shoot, not when the ball was already in the goal.
  • Spanish fans tend to joke that Hyuuga is a Gypsy, as he shares a lot of traits with the steretypical Spanish Gypsy Street Urchin: dark-skinned, punkish, pauper, with many siblings, and very skilled at soccer yet at the same time prone to fouls.
  • Yamada, a goalkeeper from Real Japan 7 in Captain Tsubasa J video game is known more as "Aboi" or "Amoy" to Indonesian fandom thanks to his peculiar one-liner when attempting to stop super shots.
  • Among the Latin American fandom, there is a recurring meme concerning a fake Delusion Conclusion episode where supposedly the whole series is revealed just the dream of the main character, who is also revealed to have lost both legs in the final scene. Some have applied a similar kind of ending to other anime series (such as Pokémon: The Series or Doraemon) or even Adventure Time, usually for Black Comedy.
  • Another Latin American meme comes from the dub of the first series, where Mr. Ozora claims that his son was "saved by the Virgin of Guadalupe" in one scene, leading to many sarcastic Youtube comments mentioning the Mexican soap opera La rosa de Guadalupe.
• Narm:
  • Who would ride a horse through the streets of modern Paris to reach a soccer stadium? Why, Monsieur El Si Pierre! This scene courtesy of Road to 2002, and made even more nonsensical when we realize how OOC it is for someone like Pierre according to his manga backstory.
  • Due to a limited budget most dubs use the same voice actor for the matches' commentaries. What is amazing about this is that there are times that two matches are happening at the same time and the commentator is the same. It's even more hilarious when this crosses into having the same VA fall in several cases of Acting for Two. The guy over here? Voiced by this guy. The kid over there? Voiced by him too. And the guy next to the dude over there? That's him too.
  • The original series and movies had the Japanese team wearing really, really stupid-looking formal uniforms featuring school-like blue blazers with red ties and white shirts along with shorts. WTH, Costuming Department? indeed.
  • The Latin-American Spanish dub not only had a huge Acting for Two problem, but for absolutely unexplained reasons, Munemasa Katagiri has an incredibly idiotic faux-German Unexplained Accent. Thankfully, it's dropped in Road to 2002.
• Narm Charm: The franchise as a whole. It's a completely unrealistic depiction of Association Football for many reasons, but despite this (or because of this) it was extremely popular. Even the biggest fans love to snark at the most ridiculous things of the series without affecting a bit their appreciation of it.
• Never Live It Down: Morisaki. We can't blame him for not able to stop Jito & Sano's trick shoots nor Hyuga's overpowered Tiger Shot, but thanks to Tecmo's game adaptions, where he is useless, he's sometime considered a Chew Toy by a fandom.
• Periphery Demographic: The series is marketed towards teenage boys (as a shonen) and, in later years, adult men who grew up reading it (as a seinen). However, it has always been popular with girls and adult women too.
• Recycled Script: Expect the Japanese suffering inferiority complex especially without Tsubasa or Wakabayashi suffering a big wound.
• The Scrappy: The Street Team from Captain Tsubasa J, especially the PSX adaptation video game. Not only that they are a whole team, not just a character, of Canon Foreigners, but their super shots in the game are almost unstoppable even by Wakashimazu (the best available goalkeeper at the time), let alone by Morisaki in the second match. And yes, you had to play against them twice. If that's not bad enough, they wear black uniform and their super shots are all evil-themed (skull, demon, snake, etc), as if to show that they are, well, evil. Considering that Captain Tsubasa is a sport series, their mere existence is just hilariously narmy and unnecessary Big-Lipped Alligator Moment.
• Ships That Pass in the Night: Though there was a bit of Ship Tease between Yukari and Ishizaki in WYC, it was easy to miss it until he asked her out while laying on the infirmary during the match against Brazil. To be fair, the Last Minute Hook Up scene in itself was really adorable.
• Spiritual Adaptation: Of Kunio-kun's Soccer League games.
• Unintentional Period Piece: Many old episodes and even story arcs in the series which feature outdated soccer rules such as two players kick-off^note which was changed into one player kick-off starting from 2016 and golden goal^note which was abolished with extra time being restored back to normal 2 x 15 minutes starting from August 2004 will probably look weird for the newer fans who are used to modern football game.
• Unintentional Uncanny Valley: The original manga has a couple of instances where the male characters are depicted with extremely tiny heads, or having massive legs, resulting in them having almost alien-esque proportions. The anime adaptations tend to avoid this, making the characters have more normal proportions instead.
• Values Dissonance: Several of Hyuuga's in-story conflicts cross with extremely Japanese views of teamwork and sportsmanship, so it's very easy to misjudge either him or the ones he's clashing with. I.e., when he was "grounded" by Kitazume for having run away from the team to train, this was supposed to be seen as an example of the very Japanese "never put your own interests over the team's, and if you do, you deserve punishment" viewpoint. However, Western viewers sided with Hyuuga instead as they believed that Kitazume was unreasonably severe since Hyuga did everything because he wanted to recover his lost fighting spirit. This scene happens mainly in the manga; in the animated adaptations, this was toned down or skipped completely. However, in WYC they call out Hyuuga for STICKING with the team to try and help them, and have to force him to leave to increase his individual abilities. Kind of makes the above seem like a Broken Aesop.
  • Matsuyama goes through this in World Youth where his girlfriend is victim of a car accident and leaves the team to stays with her. He eventually returns for the Sweden match apologizing to Tsubasa.
• Values Resonance: Possibly overlapping with Accidentally-Correct Writing from the mangaka's side, this happens with the Mexican team: Espadas and friends' attitude towards Tsubasa and the rest of the Japanese team can be seen as overly racist. This might have not looked like a big deal back then, but nowadays does, especially if you take into account that unfortunately many real life Mexican soccer players are infamous for having the same attitude.
• Wangst: Short but in one scene Carlos Santana believes the ball is betraying him.
• The Woobie: Misugi, Aoi, Morisaki, Akai, and Roberto once you learn his Dark and Troubled Past. And specially, Yoshiko Fujisawa.
• Woolseyism:
  • In many dubs, every single name in the series was replaced with a more local name. Although this might look rather odd being everybody from Japan, the names stuck, and to this day, none of the old fans answer to Tsubasa Ohzora, Genzo Wakabayashi nor Kojiro Hyuuga, but to Oliver Atton/Atom/Tsubasa, Benji Price (Thomas Prince in France) and Steve Hyuga (Latin America) or Mark Lenders (Europe). This came to the point that Spanish editions of the manga were forced to include an editor's note with all the name changes in order for the reader not to get confused.
  • This situation was also found in Hong Kong, although a smaller range of characters were renamed. In the three names mentioned above, Hyuga was kept, Genzo Wakabayashi was renamed Lam Yuen-sarm by dropping the kanji of "waka" and pronouncing the rest of the name in Cantonese. Tsubasa was a more extreme example: he was called Dari Chi-wai, which nobody know how that name came from (although it might have been named after the actor working for the TV channel that dubbed the anime, who also belonged to the HK Stars Soccer Team) but stuck nonetheless. Misaki Taro was also changed to Mak Tairoi with only the 'ta' kept, probably in part because one of the kanji in the surname is pretty much Japanese exclusive.
  • In the Arab world, while everyone knows Captain Majid, few people know it's really called Captain Tsubasa.
  • There are games adapted from this series made by Tecmo where everything was changed.