As a lover of the found family troupe in media, I tend to find myself drawn to media with a lot of characters working together. This means that I consume an insane amount of sports based fictional media. My current watch is “Kuroko’s Basketball.”

“Kuroko’s Basketball” follows a talented basketball player named Kuroko and his high school basketball team, Seirin, as they strive to win the Interhigh Championship. Kuroko, his partner Kagami, and the rest of the team, must go against the “Generation of Miracles,” a group of highly skilled basketball players that played together in middle school with Kuroko and now all play for rival teams. The rivalry is heightened because of the shared history between Kuroko and the other members of the “Generation of Miracles.”

The first season of “Kuroko’s Basketball” is currently available for streaming on Netflix with an English dub. Sadly there are two more seasons that are not currently streaming on Netflix.

I tend to flip between dub and sub when watching anime situationally and I have found a personal preference for the “Kuroko’s Basketball” dub, mainly because I think it is easier to follow the games the team plays while listening to the commentary from other characters. I also really love the art style used in this anime. It has always been a favorite of mine and cemented this show as part of my watch later list the first time I saw the show cover.

I am currently 22 episodes into the first season out of 25, and I am not disappointed. Unlike “Haikyuu,” a different sports anime, the Seirin team gained a lot of skill very quickly and defeated power house teams on their first try. This frustrated me until a midseason shift that included their first real loss. Their loss shocked me. I kept telling myself they would win with a little more team work, and watched as all the ways they tried to adapt and win failed. It was a huge moment and possibly one of my favorites.

“Kuroko’s Basketball” has a nice balance between intense game play and cute filler episodes. I personally love filler episodes because you can see the characters as teenagers rather than champion players. Kagami is an incredibly funny character when you watch how he interacts with others off the court.

My younger sister, Autumn Leber, has been watching the show with me and mentioned how “the graphics are really nice and I like the art style.” She continues by saying how “when they are playing basketball the artist captured the intensity right.”

Debi Kane, a family friend, is also watching with my sister and I. She “likes the dialogue and how the characters are thinking in their heads about the rival team.” She explains how this dialogue “gives explanations of what is happening in the game to people who don’t know anything about basketball.”

Overall, I love “Kuroko’s Basketball” and have my eye out for when I can get my hands on the next seasons.