Toradora! - 02
OP: “Pre-Parade (プレパレード)” by Rie Kugimiya, Eri Kitamura, and Yui Horie - This song has its ups and downs, but it is pretty catchy. I just can’t get myself to listen to seiyu tracks on a regular basis; especially those dealing with Kugimiya Rie…
Summary:
During breakfast in the morning, Ryuji finds that Taiga has already become a regular visitor at his household. Further more, Yasuko believes that this is completely normal. On the way to school, Taiga makes Ryuji promise again to help her with Yusaku. When Minori sees the two together, she panics at the thought that they have become a pair. The two convince her that this isn’t the case, however, explaining that they simply live close to each other. When the two girls leave before him, Ryuji realizes that Taiga would not allow him to get close to Minori before she was able to get close to Yusaku. At school, Ryuji and Taiga quickly establish their plans to create opportunities for each other. These are constantly foiled, however.
In gym class after Ryuji and Taiga up together, the rest of the students begin pairing with members of the opposite sex. Yusaku gets paired with Kihara Maya, and when Taiga is not paying attention, she gets hit in the head by a ball thrown by Ryuji. When Taiga attempts to give Yusaku some cookies that she has made later, she loses the chance while he seems to rush through the school. Taiga almost falls down the steps while chasing Yusaku, but Ryuji catches her just in time. When Taiga meets with Ryuji in a classroom later, she wonders if she will always fail trying to do things because of her clumsiness. Ryuji comforts Taiga by having her give him the cookies that she made, eating them all and claiming that they are delicious. The two hear something from the classroom door afterwards, but no one is there when they look.
Rumors spread throughout the school the following day, stating that Ryuji and Taiga have become a couple. When Ryuji and Taiga enter their classroom in the morning, Minori quickly has the two come with her to the school rooftop for a talk. Minori formally leaves Taiga in Ryuji’s hands, then claiming that she would never forgive him if he hurt her. Making situations worse, Yusaku is also there to claim that the two look like they make a good couple. This leaves the two in despair at a family restaurant later, but after leaving, Taiga expresses how glad she is to have spent time with Ryuji. This is because of all the things she has done for her, as she even mentions that she had tasted her cookies before Ryuji ate them. In reality, they were quite bad. Taiga begins taking her anger out on a light post, wondering why no one understands her, but she is delighted when she has seemingly tilted the post. Taiga finally claims that she will confess to Yusaku the next day, ending the deal between herself and Ryuji afterwards. Before Ryuji can reply, Taiga leaves him with a simple farewell.
Taiga does not show up at the Takasu household the next day, only to Yasuko’s disappointment and boredom. When Ryuji sees that there is a lot of rice left when he looks into the family’s rice cooker, he obviously notices the change that has occurred. Ryuji passes by Taiga at school, but she does not respond to his greetings. When Ryuji enters his homeroom classroom, he finds it a complete wreck. The students inside soon begin to apologize, explaining that Taiga had come in to make them stop spreading rumors. Taiga had also convinced them that Ryuji is not as violent as he looks. When even Minori appears to apologize to him, Ryuji can only leave in frustration. He wonders why Taiga would worry about him on a day like this, when she was suppose to confess to Yusaku. In the meantime, Taiga catches Yusaku in the halls.
While on the steps outside, Ryuji panics when he hears Taiga talking to Yusaku. He quickly hides himself, realizing that she is preparing for her confession. Taiga is forced to make Yusaku realize that her being paired with Ryuji was a misunderstanding caused by Minori, but even after hearing this, Yusaku wonders what Taiga thinks of Ryuji. Taiga claims that she does not hate Ryuji, expressing how grateful she is to him for what he does for her, but she also gets to the point by confessing to Yusaku. Surprisingly, Yusaku only states that Taiga puts on interesting faces when she is with Ryuji. Despite Taiga’s confusion, Yusaku only claims that they can be good friends from now on.
When Ryuji meets Taiga after Yusaku leaves, he expresses his amazement that Taiga did not cry. When Taiga claims that she is going home, Ryuji offers to prepare a meal for her. Taiga wonders why Ryuji is still doing this, as he is not her dog anymore, but Ryuji simply states that he cannot leave her alone. He then agrees that he is not a dog, but a dragon. Taiga is a tiger, and since long ago, it has been decided that it is only the dragon who can stay by the tiger’s side. Taiga kicks Ryuji for saying such things, only leaving ahead while claiming that he should only stay by her either way. Unknown to Ryuji, Taiga puts on a smile at the fact that Ryuji had called her “Taiga.”
Preview: Sports and stuff.
Impression:
Jeez, they freaking rushed through the manga chapters this week. Things like the gym and stairwell scenes, which had huge roles in the manga, were cut down to extremely short segments in this episode. This took out a lot of the dramatic impact that was in the original material, which kind of bothers me. The light post scene in particular, that brought me close to tears while reading it, was treated as almost nothing in this episode. I did feel emotion during some parts of this episode, especially in the classroom and post-confession scenes with Taiga and Ryuji, but I almost feel like I only did because of remembering the same scenes from the manga. Overall though, I definitely still enjoyed myself. If anything, it is refreshing to see a slightly different approach from the manga. Perhaps JC Staff is just going more for the comedy aspect in this show, which would make sense, since this is mainly a lovcom.
The only other thing I have to say about this episode is that I was delighted to hear more notable voice actresses, such as my favorite Nonaka Ai, this week. The studio is really going for quality with this show! Next week’s episode will already be going through material that I haven’t read in the manga, so I’m very excited to see more Ryuji x Taiga action from here on.
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Actually, the original material is the novel. The manga is a separate adaptation, though your point about rushing still stands.
Ah, my bad. I did have that in the back of my mind, but meh, I only read the manga. xS
Looks like Clannad afterstory next episode!
Personally I like this OP. It matched with the song really well. LOL’d at Minorin.
Damn, I noticed that too. How could they rush those scenes?
Personally, Volume 2 was rather boring because it had barely any of the scenes that made Volume 1 so great - the lightpole scene, the confession, etc… Really emotioanl scenes that really drove character development and interaction - what the series really shines on. I dreaded it for weeks, but it seems my predications were true - get Ami in the picture as soon as possible and get Miniri developed as soon as possible, and skip all the things that people really liked the series for to begin with, that is, Taiga’s overwhelmingly DAW scenes and Ryuuji’s special relationship with her. Well at least that’s how it was for me.
Hopefully JC Staff won’t screw it up completely and they’ll include some of it later on to make up for this blunder, because they’ve shown to be a lot more competent and professional for this series in particular, the director is a skilled one and seems to know what he’s doing for the most part, so I still have a little hope.
Looks like J.C. Staff has begun chopping. Time to see what they do with Volume 2, since that introduces Kawashima and HER little problem. Well, it’s more a big problem than a little problem… although I loved what they did with Minorin’s characterization, since it gives her nuances that aren’t apparent at first glance, and which show why she gets along with Aisaka.
DUN DUN DUN!
Warning! Warning! JC STAFF CHOP CHOP INCOMING!
Di Gi Kazune: It’s more like J.C. Staff, the past few years, has done the RAEP TIME eyes whenever they see original material that’s perfectly good, and try to ‘improve’ it, the American 4Kids way.
Basically, gut it, take out anything good and original, and add in 200% more Kugimiya Rie.
Stop trying to hurt my feelings. ;_; *sniffles*
I am waiting for them to introduce Hekaslut(tm) and Sabu-chan with his MAGNUM 44!
Oh wait… wrong show.
Seeing how the anime rush things, I suppose we can see Ami Kawashima sometime between episodes 3 or 4.
And that, will be the moment I will be waiting for. But from the preview screencaps I don’t think I’ll see that coming for episode 3… yet.
Hint: People who watch the OP sequence should already notice what I mean with Ami Kawashima. XD
Am i the only one to thinks the op song is kickass!?
I´m actually happy that they rushed the chapters, it leaves them with room to work with on original material, i just hate it when the anime adaption is just another frame by frame animated version of the manga. Now its all up to if they can make it good or if they will fail miserably.
Heres hoping.
( :
Having never read the manga/novel, I’m interested in gauging my response to the show as a first-time viewer. For me, a series still succeeds if it serves as good standalone entertainment, something that might be difficult for original fans to assess (since there’s always that comparison to the source).
I’m often guilty of comparison too. There are adaptations that I initially hated after having read some of the source (ef ~a tale of memories~, for instance. The writers moved at breakneck speeds, cutting out tons of character charm by compressing lengthy scenes into short half-minute exchanges. The adaptation was a bit of a mess, and they tried compensating with visual and theatrical style), only to end up enjoying them once the material was new to me. There are also times that I’ve stopped reading a manga just to avoid wrecking the rest of the anime experience.
As for Toradora, many manga readers are definitely disappointed. However, some new viewers seem to have enjoyed Episode 2’s pacing better than the first (which was honestly too slow for my liking), so I guess it’s good fun if you’re unaware of what you’re missing.
Dularc: So you’re one of the people who enjoyed ZnT then, I take it? Sometimes adding original material is good… but a lot of the time, they forget what the original story is about and then pander to their perceived audience, which is why Zero no Tsukaima gets called out for being cliche.
I hated ZnT
Dularc: That’s odd, then - that was ALL original, for the most part, the last season and a half, barring some events from the novels. It’s not a frame-by-frame adaptation of the source, but all-original work for the most part.
… which goes on to illustrate my point about how they can forget about the source work in favor of pandering to a certain audience. J.C. Staff’s becoming infamous for this, and they’ve done more chopping in Ep 2. Here’s hoping they don’t screw up Kawashima’s intro and Vol 3’s events… but this original filler, or possibly original filler, suggests that we’re on the road to ZnT Redux.