Toradora Review
This time I will be reviewing the ever so perfect romantic comedy, Toradora! This time I want to approach my review like Colton has done in his review for Erased. (If you have not read it yet, go ahead and do so! http://amasiangalaxy.wix.com/reviews#!Boku-Dake-ga-Inai-Machi-ERASED-Review/cu6k/56fc34550cf2e3ce9bb3b6f5 ) So with that being said our format for reviews is going to be a breakdown of the main storyline, the characters, the media aspect like graphics and music, and then our overall enjoyment of the series. We will also try our best not to write any spoilers about the series in case you do decide to watch it. AND if we happen to put one in a review we will do our best to warn you at the beginning of a review. Now that we have the boring stuff out of the way; let’s get to the good stuff.
Main Plot:
We are first introduced to young Ryuuji Takasu, who is a high school student and is obsessed with being clean and organized. Also Ryuuji shares many facial features of his father who is a man that he has never known. Unfortunately for him, his stern and sometimes scary face keeps his peers at a distance especially when it comes to the girls. So when you learn that he has a crush on a girl by the name of Minori Kushieda, one can imagine that this is only where the troubles begin. What only seems like a stroke of luck at the time, we are introduced to our other female lead Taiga Aisaka. Known also as the “palm-top tiger”. She is full of energy and sass, and also strikes fear into many of her classmates with her forward personality. In contrast to Ryuuji; they are polar opposites though. She is loud and messy, while he is quiet and immaculate. It just so happens that Taiga is one of Kushieda’s best friends, and then you learn that Taiga has a crush on Ryuuji’s best friend, Yuusaku Kitamura. A perfect set up right? Taiga and Ryuuji join forces and promise to help each other win the heart of their crushes. However with such clashing personalities working together there is bound to be several bumps in the road ahead. I mean who ever said finding love would be easy anyways?
Characters:
Ryuuji Takasu
So as I just mentioned Ryuuji loves to clean. It is one of the first things that you will learn if you choose to start the anime. I think you may actually learn his love for scrubbing away mold before you learn his name. Ryuuji also loves to cook. He prepares every meal of every day for him and his mother (and later a friendly rival). It seems like he is the perfect house ”husband”. Heck, I wouldn't mind if my boyfriend took some tips from him…haha…. His character is incredibly caring, and you can witness that through every relationship that he has in this series. Through friends, family, and romance. He also seems to me, to be incredibly mature for his age. Since his father never had the chance to be in his life, this leads Ryuuji to be incredibly independent and I love that about him. For a high school student, he has a great head on his shoulders. Throughout Toradora, Ryuuji will also learn how to be around girls and react to their emotions, and I think overall this developed him into an incredible male lead for this show.
Taiga Aisaka
Not afraid to tear up a classroom, or shout at whoever says something not at her approval is Taiga Aisaka. Not only does she have one of the biggest personalities of any anime character I have ever seen, but she is also one of the smallest. Standing at only four feet and nine inches tall! Taiga lives next door to Ryuuji in a big apartment building (that her parents pay for her to stay in by herself). She is also quite independent which is why I think I loved the two main characters of Toradora so much. On the contrary to Ryuuji though, she is soooooooooooooooo messy. She is also frantic, and stalkerish, and sloppy, and loud. BUT she is also super adorable and knows exactly what she wants and how to get it. These reasons are exactly why her classmates all call her the palm-top tiger. Tiny yet ferocious. I loved the moments in Toradora where you get to see Taiga’s walls come down and you can see her innermost personality. Her passion about everything is what makes her a great character, and the love that she is willing to give is even better.
Yuusaku Kitamura
This is Ryuuji's best friend and Taiga’s long time crush. He is also the vice president of the school’s student council and he is also popular among many of his peers. The teachers are even very fond of Kitamura. He is a very friendly guy, and at times he can be a bit eccentric which I think is one aspect that Taiga really likes about him. Well that and the couple of times you can find Yuusaku walking around without a shirt.. But he is also a great friend to Ryuuji and greatly supports his crush on Kushieda. Kitamura is also a good middle man for Ryuuji when it comes to people being frightened of his face, for he will remind others that Ryuuji is a good guy despite what his facial features might be saying. Overall I enjoyed his character and thought he played a good counterpart to both Taiga and Ryuuji.
Minori Kushieda
This is the woman that never stops going. Head of the softball team and working what seems to be like ten part time jobs is Kushieda. Ryuuji admires all of her hard work in everything that she does, and this influences his feelings for her greatly. She is always full of joy and trying to do her best, even when we all think that she should be exhausted. I’m going to be completely honest since this is in fact my review, but there were several times I found myself angry with her character. Minori is stubborn, as am I. And I think that because of this I was able to connect us, but in a way that made me frustrated. I wanted her to emotionally open up more than she ended up doing, or at least be more open to the idea of love. Despite that, I think that she is a solid character in this series and she is interesting to watch when it comes to her and Ryuuji.
Ami Kawashima
A perfect model in a beautiful magazine is when we first see Ami, but then we learn that she is a childhood friend of Kitamura. She is not a main character of this series, but she does end up taking a break from modeling to transfer schools and become close to most of our main characters. I’m once again going to be completely honest and say that I didn’t enjoy her character very much. But don’t let my opinion sway yours until you’ve seen Toradora entirely to the end. Her split personality for me is hard to stomach, and she tries to often lure in Ryuuji away from Kushieda. However, I do like the “frenemies” aspect of her and Taiga. In the long run though, she does many things in this series to help the story line to its finish.
Yakuso Takasu
This woman happens to be Ryuuji’s mother. Let me first start of by saying that she is designed way too young and way too gorgeous to be a mother of a high school student. But, by that being said I love her character so much. She lives with Ryuuji, and works a night job at a hostess bar to financially support the two of them. She is a bit irresponsible, but having raised Ryuuji as a single mother says a lot about her. She is a fabulous mother and is very supportive of her son. There is not a lot I will say about her character because she is more or less a supporting role, but I thought that Yakuso was definitely one of my favorite characters and totally worth mentioning.
Media
For Toradora, there were two OPs and two EPs. The first opening theme is "Pre-Parade” by Rie Kugimiya, Yui Horie, and Eri Kitamura. I can say that I actually really enjoyed this theme song. It is very auto-tuned which in most cases I would reject, but for Toradora I thought it was appropriate. The song is very upbeat and quirky just like the anime itself, and was a good introduction to the series. Around episode seventeen they switched the opening to “silky heart” by Yui Horie, which is not uncommon in an anime that is 24 episodes long. In comparison to the first OP; this one wasn’t my favorite. And for a more specific reason why make to check out my top ten list of things I loved/hated about Toradora(DOES CONTAIN SPOILERS http://amasiangalaxy.wix.com/reviews#!Top-Ten-Things-I-LovedHated-About-Toradora/cu6k/56f4d9110cf213d90db55e3e ). I think the song is okay, but I much preferred the first songover the second.
As far as the ending songs went, I am in the opposite belief. I preferred the second song to the first. The first ending is “vanilla salt” by Yui Horie which despite what I just said, isn’t a bad song. In this instance I didn’t dislike either of the EPs. I just happen to like the second one, "Orange” by Rie Kugimiya, Yui Horie, and Eri Kitamura, better. However, I think that it takes a very special ending song to capture my attention though. As you will all come to know, I am super duper impatient. So when I finish an episode of something I immediately want to move onto the next one. With anime, the catchy music is the only thing that is going to get me to watch the rolling credits. So I won’t lie to you all, I generally only end up listening to the ending songs every few episodes just because of the fact that I am that impatient. There are however some ending themes that I will fall in love with and refuse to skip through. For example, the ending of Your Lie in April is a song that I will never ever skip over. EVER. I am also not one that is super into dissecting the intros and outros to find out what they are saying about the main story line. I am not poetic enough, and again not patient enough to figure all of those details out. So if the OPs and EPs for Toradora made any sense to the story at all; I am not sure.
Overall Thoughts
I am going get straight to the point. I loved, loved, loved this series. It was adorable and hilariously funny all the way through. The serious parts of Toradora were also very appropriately placed. This anime was recommend to me by Colton, and I can say that he did not let me down in the slightest. Ryuuji and Taiga to me are some of the best leading roles in a series that I have ever seen. They are such a dynamic and unique duo and I loved getting the chance to see them develop and work together. The negative comments I will make towards Toradora is the final episode. The series was headed in such a beautiful place in those last precious twenty five minutes. I was getting excited and then the storyline just seemed to hit a brick wall straight on in the middle of episode twenty four. I guess I just didn’t understand some of the decisions that they made for the final episode. But what counts is that the last few final minutes mostly made up for the disappointing events that came right before. Just to clarify, I liked the way the series ended just not the way the last episode was delivered. Other than that, the only relatively negative thing that I can say is that I believe that I could predict the outcome of the characters from the beginning of the series. But I also loved the fact that I was right. It was everything that I wanted from this romcom, and I am so glad that I took the time to watch Toradora. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a comedic and a romantic show to watch. And if you don’t, then I can’t promise what the palm-top tiger will do to you then!
Thanks again for reading, Taylor Stevens
@amasiantae
Keep an eye out for my Dagashi Kashi review next!