Daisuke is the seasoned, matured, brilliantly realized skater who's at his peak. He's da man, the art in men's figure skating. Daisuke has the warm comforting guardian fire, that warms and soothes, with controlled bursts of brilliance that simply delights and thrills. He controls the blue fire like a magician and a stuntman with imagination and craft. His Japanese Nationals was white hot, crazy amazing in the best way possible.
Hanyu is the future. Exciting, fresh, and full of potentials to be realized, hopefully by Sochi. He has already incredible artistry for his age, a deep appreciation and respect towards putting out technically challenging programs that are worthy of championships. He is certainly not the one to take it easy and rely on strategy or taking advantage of rules, or taking granted of reputation this year. He has desire to do it all. A quietly burning passionate young man, with his own sort of white fire and desire to do well. Great work ethics with infectious goodness to bravely race towards to the skating gods Parthenon, he is full of infinite possibilities! And I really want him to fully realize his potentials in the future with no injuries and health problems because these are the only things that can stop him rise to the top.
At the beginning of the year, many seemed to have had Artur = Hanyu much to my amusement (I basically thought they are barmy mad), may be due the scores/result had them closer than they should. The two are certainly no way on the same level. Hanyu is way ahead imo but did not have the momentum (newbie on the scene), the reputation building and the full backing from Japan at the time who has their own ranked skater to push for.
I have to say, I have never been really a fan of Kozuka. As amazed as I am at times by his technical wizardry, he ruined my favourite piece of OST for Nausicaä vally of the wind, which takes incredible achievement given it is one of the most haunting and lyrical piece of music around. Hisaishi even created a beautiful modernized version of the music just for him, yet Kozuka failed to make the connection from his 1st performance at Japan Open till the most recent. How can you skate to something you picked yourself, been bespoke for you and still fail to make the emotional connection to make it fly. It says alot about his deficiency as a musical skater, interpreter and in particular his lack of rhythm. His work has always been emotionally cold and detached for me to fully appreciate his performance. Which is odd, because I really enjoyed his Gala at last worlds championship where he was clearly let loose and enjoyed himself.
Oda... not my cuppa of tea, can't do maths, is he Asian?
Future .... probably Hanyu.
