Tokyo Revengers

[MFauli]

episode 8:

Goddammit, Takemichi, dont live Hina-chan by herself all the time! I swear, I've never had such "hopefully she doesnt get raped" anxiety ever before :/ She's such a great gf. but there's all those assholes that will do whatever they want :/

Very careless of Takemichi to not stay by Draken's side until August 3rd was over. He's there for a mission, so fucking make sure to stay there until the date is August 4th. What he's doing is akin to Kyouma destroying the microwave timemachine after one time travel thinking "I'm sure that saved Tuturu". >_<

Ah well. I hope Draken doesn't die, he's actually a somewhat interesting character, moreso than Mikey.

[neflight86]

Yeah; kind of lax for Takemichi to lower his guard so prematurely. His lot in life (current day) is beginning to make a lot of sense. He constantly makes poor decisions and is largely led by his emotions.

[MFauli]

episode 9:

that big brawl became boring when all those "named characters" showed up on Mikey's side, whereas only one "named character" was on the villains' side. Eh.

I hope Draken survives this. If not, it'd feel like all of this was for nothing, history hasnt changed.

[neflight86]

Fights are not the main selling point of this series. If anything, the most interesting bits are where Takemichi avoids disaster in spite of his lack of power and influence- by the strength of his character alone. It's a shame that so much screen time is given to the flat, barely choreographed fighting, when the bluster and posturing that proceeds it is far more entertaining.

I expected the other 'leader' of future Touman to be behind the division and attack- not this rando dude from Moebius that is apparently able to fight Mikey and not lose outright.

[MFauli]

episode 10:

Honestly, I don't quite get why Takemichi and his friends are THAT weak. This is like the opposite of the usual "protagonist and friends are stronger than no-name characters" trope. It wouldn't have felt out of place if they had at least fought on par with the goons, only their remaining leader that Akkun fought should have been togher than the rest. Ah well. Looks like the story actually makes progress, with Draken being saved by an ambulance.

Takemichi was an idiot for not calling an ambulance himself when he was at the main plaza in the beginning ,though.And one of the girls could easily have run back and called Micky.

[shinta|hikari]

Mikey is still busy dealing with the enemy leader and thugs.

His group is shit weak because they don't actually know how to fight. They were just pretending to be delinquents to feel cool. The thugs on the other side, while low level mobs, still know how to and have experience fighting.

What Takemichi and his group should've been doing is training under Mikey or some other Toman leader to get stronger and be useful. That or carry pepper spray.

[neflight86]

Boy... I suuure do like watching Takemitchi get punched but not give up to solve his problems... not. Thank goodness for some progression, because that trick is getting very tired. Maybe the pacing was better in manga form, but here it just drags over scenes that may have well been from earlier episodes.

I missed how he mounted the big guy, but at least he beat someone for once.

Hopefully Draken is actually saved this time, and we can see a changed future that is twisted in some other way. Does the kid brother notice when things change in present day, or is it exploratory for him as well?

[MFauli]

episode 11:

Finally! Somehow it feels like it has been forever since I last got to see a good happy end in a serious anime. Well, let's hope it is a happy end, lol.

The most pressing question right now is: If Takemichi successfully changed Hina's death from happening, how can Naoto still remember?

Also, it's a little convenient that Takemichi's entire life played out the same despite the changes he made to his past life. It's like "stupid younger Takemichi" does his best to ruin any progress that "old Takemichi" made, lol.

My hope's for next episode

- Takemichi gets back together with Hina
- Akkun gives Takemichi his old hairstyle :P

[neflight86]

Yeah, time travel is almost always paradoxical so some extent, and I typically hand-wave those elements.

Surely that isn't the end of the story, though, is it? We haven't interacted with the other would-be leader of Touman at all, yet it seems everything is going well in the altered future. If that's how this season ends, so be it. I also like a happy ending, but I expect that the girl is somehow twisted in another way as a final season's edgy kicker. It feels like there might/should be some more intrigue in the past to claw through, though.

[MFauli]

episode 12:

Man, fuck Takemichi, he was super annoying this episode :/

Running to a public bathroom in THAT situation?! Nobody does that.

And FFS, go to the OTHER side of the car, it'd be so much easier to pull Hina out. Yes, we then learned that she's crushed anyway, but he didn't know that, and trying to pull her through the car over his seat was just annoyingly dumb.

Tbh the overall story is dumb, too, now. So we're to believe that present Tokyo is ruled by some mafia that does what it wants. We're further to believe that Akkun would kill his former best friend because he's scared? WTH.

I want to like the final scene where he swears to find a future where Hina lives, but ... it's unearned at this point. Takemichi needs to become smarter.

Ofc, his new goal makes for an interesting further series now: Becoming the head of Toman himself.I wonder how that's going to happen. Will there be a time jump of a couple years? But then again, Takemichi didn't really profit from any growth spurt, lol. So either he gets some serious battle training or he's gonna be the type of "heart of the organization", gathering strong guys like Mikey and Draken with him.

[neflight86]

The little brother said it best: "I'm surprised you did it. After all, you're such trash..." I may have snorted a little.

This was a very awkward respite and it brings to question how memory is handled in this situation. Little brother had to research that the food stall death didn't happen, and apparently Takemitchi didn't remember dumping Hina (he apparently still had the old memory of her dumping him instead), so do only those two keep their memories? I don't expect a satisfying explanation of these mechanics, but I expect they will somehow play into things down the line.

Becoming head of Touman does sound more interesting because I don't see any feasible path to that- so crafting ideas has become fun again. This time, he's finally going to have to confront the other guy Touman leader. The story was wise to hold him back for this long. Someone new to interact with will make the next arc much more interesting.

[MFauli]

episode 16:

Ok, that was stupid. You're telling me that 2 guys who look up to Mikey so much that their sexuality could be questioned didn't know that the shop was Mikey's brothers? This is dumb.

Also, Kazutora is a psycho. The issue isn't that he killed (?) Mikey's brother, it's that he's willing to kill ANYONE at all!

On the flipside, everytime Mikey says "I'm gonna kill you" when he never does is rather cringe, lol. Just don't say "kill", it makes you look like a weakass bitch when you never follow through.

Anyway, fuck flashbacks.

[shinta|hikari]

Isn't he just intimidating people? That's normal. Following through is what is crazy.

[MFauli]

Isn't he just intimidating people? That's normal. Following through is what is crazy.

Considering how "serious" he acts in those moments, it's pretty cringe.

[MFauli]

episode 19:

FUCKING DOOOOOO SOMETHING, TAKEMICHI!

OMFG!!!111

I'm getting Gantz-flashbacks of characters that keep standing in place, watching as misery unfolds, instead of DOING something. God, I hated Takemichi's inaction in this episode so much. He's talking grandly about saving his gf and becoming the leader of Touman, yet he cannot even run up to Mikey to help him. Just throw yourself at one of the enemies, that'd be enough. Go let yourself get beaten up in front of Mikey to trigger his hero-powerup, lol. Just do SOMETHING.

sigh

[neflight86]

15-19

Well, he punched enough of Valhalla's fists with his face to inspire the other beat down Touman members to do the same, so he contributed in his own way- but yeah; the fight choreography and animation is frustratingly sparse and poorly paced. This is "anime time" at its worst, when internal monologue that in all likelihood takes 1/3 second has to be voiced over, and the resulting screen time lacks the sense of urgency those lines likely had in manga format, where you can abstract the passing of time. The same happens here; time isn't 'real time', but in animation with music, voice over, and scene pacing we don't control via our reading speed gives the illusion of sequential scenes being in real time.

Wierd how Mikey just completely dropped the whole 'bring Baji back or kill Takemitchi' thing without another word.

I was in abject disbelief when they brought in gang referees for this fight. El. Oh. El. What am I watching? This makes Westside Story look like a documentary in comparison.

On the bright side, things are happening, and this arc has actually been more interesting than the last one was (and quicker, too). I hope it wraps up next episode and doesn't pad this fight out too much so we can hurry up and see how the next event is what really changed the Tokyo Manji gang for the worse...

[MFauli]

Episode 20:

Dear fucking god, this anime suffers from the worst case of characters standing around, watching as something bad happens, but doing nothing since Gantz, for real.

My fucking god, this is so infuriationg. Takemitchi, you fuciking asshole, just don't keep standing at the bottom of that car pile, but climb up! Even if you wanted to let Baji do his solo-fight, just DONT TRUST THE SITUATION. Be ready to intervene whenever necessary!

Had he climbed up, he could at least help Baji now and punch Kisaki. But he waited at the bottom and now has no chance of helping in any meaningful way. FFS

This really frustrating to watch at this point.

[MFauli]

Episode 21:

"I couldn't do anything"

Man, fuck you, Takemitchi ...

[neflight86]

Like Miyazaki said, anime was a mistake.

This couldn't have been written nor storyboarded by adults, could it? The glacial pacing, lack of common sense, and ridiculous character motives and interactions should make this self-parody, but here we are... standing around and crying cuz a dude stabbed himself so the cause of his death would technically change from the mortal wound he already got to a self inflicted stab wound. That is not logic of the sane mind. And to top it all off, it was for friendship. Oh, no. Not that, please. Anything but that! This hurts to watch when it takes itself so seriously...

On the other hand, this does illicit some emotion from me, albeit the negative, meta, "how can this be handled so poorly" kind, so I'm engaged via frustration, so that's something.

I'm now annoyed when I see Takemitchi in the OP or ED without tears running down his face. That is not indicative of his actual character design in the show and thus constitutes false advertising... Please let this end soon.

[MFauli]

As you say, the opening and ending are actually really great and make it look like a wholly different show :/