Well well, it’s been a little while since I’ve written again. I’ve been finally finding some things to keep busy with and have also been keeping up on my anime. Until I wrote things down I didn’t realize I’ve got quite a few shows I’m either finishing up or watching. To name a few: Clannad After Story, To Aru Majutsu no Index, Chaos;Head, Nodame in Paris, ef-a tale of melodies, and the list goes on… I’ve decided to write a little bit about Toradora! since it’s one of my favorite this season and caught me a bit off guard.

I’d have to say that this show is actually really fun! At first I was expecting a lot of typical high school anime shoujo etc and then the tsundere main character girl and stuff….well it just seemed to fall into too many typical stereotypes to offer anything unique, but in fact it really does. Taiga, the quirky, clumsy, angry little tsundere is a bit annoying for the first 10 minutes of the series, but after that she starts to grow on you quickly. The dynamic between her and Ryuugi is really what makes it great, in my opinion.

Our protagonist, Ryuugi Takasu, is an OCD cleaning freak with a kind heart, a mother that works nights in a host club, and the eyes of a murderer. I thought this was an interesting joke since they draw his eyes as tiny little eyeballs in the classic insane anime style. This constantly causes problems for the poor guy because everyone thinks he’s going to kick their asses or that he’s mad dogging them. In reality…it’s just how he looks.

Later on he comes across the “Palmtop Tiger”, a very petite girl with a large attitude and a loud mouth. Turns out she lives right next door, wonderfully coincidental. Despite the convenience of it things work out to be much more entertaining. The two of them have crushes on each others best friends, which in turn brings them even closer together in order to achieve their goals.

There is a good bit of frustration for me though, which is basically what the show is about. The two of them are a perfect couple and seem to be a match made in heaven, but they have their hearts set on these other people that are totally not the right matches at all. Ryuugi has it bad for this girl Minori who is a sweetheart, but totally a good friend type. Not to mention she’s a bit of a spaz and way to damn happy all the time. And Taiga is obsessing over Ryuugi’s best friend, the geeky glasses dude.

Other things that are worth mentioning is the good OP and ED songs. The ED has me addicted already… Vanilla Salt by Horie Yui. The animation style is very good, and the rest of the characters so far are also pretty entertaining and have interesting personalities. Also, the VA’s are great and do a really good job! I was just very surprised at how good this show actually is compared to what I expected from reading a description of it.

I think a big draw for me is that I’m watching some other heavy/serious things and at the same time and going through a lot of heavy/serious things in life. With all that it is still really a joy to watch Ef or Clannad, but Toradora is a nice break from that drama and manages to put a smile on my face pretty regularly. I’m sure that this is something that most people won’t have a hard time enjoying.

Anyway, that’s all for my Toradora! rant. Check it out if you’re looking for something fun and cute with a touch of romance! I’ll probably write about Ef-A tale of Melodies soon…I’m still trying to sort through how I feel about it all, one of those shows that really makes you think introspectively.