Point guard Ryota Miyagi drives Shohoku High's championship push in The First Slam Dunk, Takehiko Inoue's 2022 anime feature built around speed, instinct, and a team's underdog resolve.

What is The First Slam Dunk about?

The film centers on Ryota Miyagi, a fast, sharp-minded point guard who reads the court a step ahead of everyone on it while masking the effort behind his calm. In his second year at Shohoku High School, Ryota takes the floor alongside teammates Sakuragi, Rukawa, Akagi, and Mitsui as the squad advances through the Inter-High School National Championship. Their toughest test arrives when Shohoku faces Sannoh Kogyo, the tournament's reigning powerhouse, in a matchup that pushes both Ryota's leadership and the team's chemistry to their limit. Writer-director Takehiko Inoue, adapting his own manga, frames the game through Ryota's perspective, tying the on-court tension to the quieter stakes each player carries into the match.

About the cast

The Japanese voice cast is led by Shugo Nakamura, with Jun Kasama, Kenta Miyake, Shinichiro Kamio, Subaru Kimura, Katsuhisa Houki, Asami Seto, and Ryota Iwasaki completing the ensemble.

Context & significance

The First Slam Dunk grew out of one of Japan's most enduring basketball manga franchises, and Inoue directing his own material gives the film an unusually personal hand on the animation and pacing. Its widely admired critical reception set it apart from typical sports-anime releases, with praise centered on how the film renders motion and rhythm during game sequences rather than relying on melodrama between them. At 125 minutes, it runs longer than most animated sports features, giving the championship match room to build tension gradually rather than compress it into a highlight reel.

Watching The First Slam Dunk on Ktime

The First Slam Dunk streams on K-Time with both Persian dub and Persian subtitle options, letting Farsi-speaking viewers choose how they want to follow Shohoku's run at the championship. Watching requires a free account login; the film's page is open to browse for anyone visiting K-Time's Farsi-language catalog for the Iranian diaspora.