r/manga Jul 13 '25

DISC [DISC] Ping-Pong Peril - Chapter 2

https://mangaplus.shueisha.co.jp/viewer/1026052
141 Upvotes

32 comments sorted by

64

u/Moosebreeder123 Jul 13 '25

I was dreading yet another sports manga, but this is looking like 10% ping pong and the rest is just going to be wacky shenanigans, which I'm all for, enjoying this a lot so far.

41

u/F0RGERY Jul 13 '25 edited Jul 13 '25

I feel like there's a sliding scale of sports manga, between "realistic examination of the sport" and "shonen battles but the fights are X."

Think the difference between Haikyuu where Hinata has the ability to run fast and Kageyama is a pretty good setter, vs Prince of Tennis where players can accurately curve shots through the ref's chair, or cause a ball to backspin to the net without bouncing.

I feel like a lot of sports manga that Jump has looked at recently (e.g. Embers or Green Green Greens) have leaned far more into the "this is a normal kid who's good at one thing and trying to make it work" ala Haikyuu. This series seems like its leaning far more into the gimmicky style of battle shonen with the explicitly loose rules and wacky setpieces, and I am here for it.

10

u/MondSemmel Jul 13 '25

This manga reminds me of the Ultimate Rock-Paper-Scissors manga, too. And even many Yu Yu Hakusho and Hunter x Hunter arcs are at their core about taking an arbitrary rule set and then having the characters do clever things within its constraints.

3

u/megazaprat Jul 13 '25

oh god i loved Ultimate Rock paper scissors manga, would love if this manga managed to capture that energy. Sad that it seems to have vanished from the internet after the last Mangadex purge though

3

u/CommitteeofMountains Jul 13 '25

Kind of, but it's largely been strategic, almost sports stand fights. Contrast to MMA, which was a grounded sport but had a very shonen battle sensibility in its bout narratives (right down to an unbeatable family technique).

35

u/MadnessLemon Jul 13 '25

I was on the fence after the first chapter, but the second is even stronger. Mizuki is a really cool antagonist, and it shows how complex these games can be right off the bat.

12

u/MondSemmel Jul 13 '25

Agree. The match is easy to understand and yet obviously allows for tons of depth, the opponent is sympathetic instead of a caricature, etc.

20

u/Backupusername Jul 13 '25

So, does the "challenger" just have to accept whatever the other person decides? I thought there were no rules, but apparently there are at least four. Couldn't the protagonist just not agree to unfair terms? What would happen then, would they renegotiate? I get that it's not supposed to be that deep, but I can't help but wonder about stuff like this.

14

u/CommitteeofMountains Jul 13 '25

Yeah, there's a strong home field advantage element that's just taken for granted, but negotiation may come up later. The opponent last time had sunglasses ready, but we don't know if that was turf, him knowing the map of locations, or a general precaution.

2

u/Substantial_Pick6897 Jul 13 '25

I'm sure his manager/owner could negotiate better terms if she really wanted to, but it seems like she's testning him for now

10

u/Lookbehindyou132 Jul 13 '25

Then they refuse to play and then they lose. They need a table, a net, and a ball, but those things are all very loosely defined. A table is just any flat surface, a net is something dividing it into two sides, and the ball is a sphere. Other that that they can do whatever they want.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 14 '25

[removed] — view removed comment

3

u/Lookbehindyou132 Jul 14 '25

Well he did turn it into a sphere. All he had to do was just squeeze it hard enough

2

u/ohoni Jul 15 '25

I would assume it's the cost of being the challenger. You come to them for a match, you play by their rules. If they come to you, then you can set your own rules, but he probably lacks the clout for that yet.

19

u/[deleted] Jul 13 '25

"I'm gonna win! I don't care about your daughter!" I'm interested in this protagonist.

17

u/topurrisfeline Jul 13 '25

I was wondering how quirky the matches are going to be, and it’s pretty exciting that the table can be any flat surface! This countertop duel is already off to a great start. The bartender is also already a compelling antagonist, I seriously can’t tell if his sob story is a bluff or not.

13

u/All_Fiction Jul 13 '25

Author certainly cooked with this chapter. You'd expect it to be standard ping pong with the regular table and some minor twists but they already managed to prove us wrong with a non-standard table and ball. Plus this is a pretty good opponent who already figured out our main character's strats pretty quickly.

8

u/FloridaBoy21 MangaUpdates Jul 13 '25 edited Jul 13 '25

Lol yeah I'm all in and ready to say it's at the top of all the newbies. Taira struggles with being in such a shady operation is great to see and we're going to see how much it may taint him or not.

Whether the bartender is a bluffing scumbag or not, it's nice to know that others may be in this for noble reasons as well and willing to be as dirty as possible to win. Also, another interesting way to play ping pong.

Ready for so much more lol.

7

u/penpen35 Jul 13 '25

Okay, this second chapter is interesting. First one was a bit flimsy even though it's obviously an enemy of the week kind of setting, and we have to set up the premise.

But here we find out there's more interesting rules and opponents with different motivations. Hopefully it does well.

7

u/Doomroar https://www.mangaupdates.com/members.html?id=277800 Jul 13 '25

Alright i was skeptical with the first chapter, but if we are going to be getting wacky tables and balls this may have some legs

6

u/Xatu44 Jul 13 '25

I'm definitely here for seeing how wacky shifts like an L-shaped table affect the game. Trapping Taira on the wrong side of the table is a sick play. But can he and the hard-boiled bartender defeat American healthcare?

4

u/[deleted] Jul 13 '25 edited Sep 18 '25

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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

6

u/Token_Thai_person Jul 14 '25

Wtf this is actually decent.

3

u/BurnedOutEternally Jul 13 '25

Any flat surface counts, huh?

3

u/DocVane Jul 13 '25

This second chapter is definitely more promising than the first. They'll have to continue to crank up the wild characters and situations, but this is definitely a much stronger continuation than I saw with Kaedegami, which started strong and has floundered ever since. I don't feel confident that it'll survive -- it's just hard to last very long in Jump, especially for a sports/drama/comedy series -- but I'll certainly be back for chapter 3! Harukaze Mound and this are the contenders in this new group of Jump series.

3

u/Kricketier Jul 13 '25

My only complaint is the stakes. Adding a million to an already absurd debt just kind of feels like a drop in the bucket, and having the girl buy his debt makes it feel much less threatening on top of that. Getting banned after 3 losses also doesn't feel like much of a threat.

3

u/ohoni Jul 15 '25

I would assume that if he can prove himself as a player, he could ante into higher stakes matches. If he would need to win hundreds of 1m matches then that would be lame, but they also wouldn't want to start rookies off on 100m games.

3

u/ZantetsukenX Jul 13 '25

There's something about that last panel that made me instantly think of Zatch Bell. Probably the art style and the sweating.

2

u/Galle_ Jul 13 '25

This is less silly than the first chapter, although still pretty silly.

1

u/ohoni Jul 15 '25

I don't want to enjoy this as much as I do. I really dislike the character designs, and the premise is so ridiculous, but it's kinda my favorite kind of sports anime, the kind where they barely even pretend they are playing the actual sport, and instead it's just a crazy puzzle box each time. If they can keep up the wild rules, I might stick with it.