Photo/Provided by the interviewee

On April 20th, the movie version of "Slam Dunk" was released. 

"Slam Dunk" is a phrase that represents the youth of countless people. 27 years ago, the line "See you at the national championship" at the end of the TV series became a "regret" for countless viewers; 27 years later, the movie version finally "fulfilled" the youth of a generation.

As a manga created by Japanese manga artist Takehiko Inoue with high school basketball as the theme, "Slam Dunk" was serialized in Weekly Shonen Jump from 1990 to 1996, attracting countless fans. Along with "Captain Tsubasa" and "Touch", it is known as the top 3 Japanese sports manga. The initial sales of the single edition reached 2.5 million copies, setting a sales record at that time; in 2004, sales in Japan exceeded 100 million copies (including the complete edition).

"Exciting! Exciting! Exciting! Just hearing the news, Karen (pseudonym) couldn't help but feel emotional. "I liked many anime back then, but only this one, whenever I hear the familiar music, it will stimulate the secretion of dopamine." Recalling her feelings when she first heard about the release of the "Slam Dunk" anime, Karen told NBD. 

"Slam Dunk" has also opened up a larger market for derivative products. Several million peripheral products were sold out in less than two days! Even a single item of the Q version of Shohoku High School's small hand-made ornaments, priced at 129 yuan, brought more than 900,000 yuan in revenue to the movie production company Toei Animation flagship store in just one month.

As of 9:30 on April 21st, the Douban score of "Slam Dunk" was 9.1 points, and the cumulative box office exceeded 160 million yuan, setting a record for the pre-sale box office of imported animation in China; the media box office forecast before the release was 780 million yuan to 905 million yuan.