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EP. REVIEW: Tokyo Revengers


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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Thu Aug 26, 2021 2:14 am Reply with quote
MakiharaMeiko wrote:
I desagree with you, but it's ok!

I just hope the rhythm goes back to normal, because the latest episodes are going very slowly and it's irritating :_) (for me at least)

I mean, if you've read the manga you know the character better than me, so for all I know you could be right - I'm going by what I've seen so far, plus a dose of caution (fruit of experience Anime smile + sweatdrop ). In any case, I do agree that the show needs to get its act together because for me these last episodes have been a struggle to get through.
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thedarkemissary



Joined: 07 Apr 2010
Posts: 88
PostPosted: Thu Aug 26, 2021 10:43 pm Reply with quote
Was anyone else super confused on why Kisaki would need one of his guys to call him on his cell to report that Baji is coming up the pile of cars he's standing on? Was there multiple peaks? Is this like a report from base-camp of junk car Everest? I mean, you can clearly see the dude climbing the car pile right in front of you, can you not? Apparently not, since he's surprised when Baji shows up. Honestly, it was even more confusing than the non-bleeding stab wound.
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nightoffire



Joined: 17 Aug 2021
Posts: 7
PostPosted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 1:35 pm Reply with quote
SHD wrote:
In any case, I've already resigned myself to a reveal about how Kazutora is Not Really Bad After All, so I just hope they'll get to it quickly...


That was obvious since the flashback of him and Baji. Remember that part when he stopped and looked in the window of a normal family having a birthday party? He never had something like that, growing up in abusive household. Toman was the closest thing to a family he ever had, the best thing that ever happened to him. He really admired Mikey and wanted to give back to Mikey some of the happiness that Mikey had given him, so that's why his mental state totally crumbled after Shinichiro was killed. It's not just he doesn't want to accept blame, it's that he can't handle that he destroyed one of the only good things he's ever had and convinces himself it was never real to begin with and hearing that they only wanted Baji back and not him only reinforced that.
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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 3:10 pm Reply with quote
nightoffire wrote:
SHD wrote:
In any case, I've already resigned myself to a reveal about how Kazutora is Not Really Bad After All, so I just hope they'll get to it quickly...


That was obvious since the flashback of him and Baji. Remember that part when he stopped and looked in the window of a normal family having a birthday party? He never had something like that, growing up in abusive household. Toman was the closest thing to a family he ever had, the best thing that ever happened to him. He really admired Mikey and wanted to give back to Mikey some of the happiness that Mikey had given him, so that's why his mental state totally crumbled after Shinichiro was killed. It's not just he doesn't want to accept blame, it's that he can't handle that he destroyed one of the only good things he's ever had and convinces himself it was never real to begin with and hearing that they only wanted Baji back and not him only reinforced that.

Yes, I know. As I wrote previously, I understand all that. My problem is, as I wrote previously, that the way this is written, at least in the anime, is terribly contrived and silly. It's a good idea done badly.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 10946
PostPosted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 7:59 pm Reply with quote
I feel like Takemichi would be more popular if he didn't just stand around helplessly so much and need to get motivated to actually do something.

Well, that and do stupid stuff like being partially responsible for why Baji got stabbed in the first place.
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NeverConvex
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Joined: 08 Jun 2013
Posts: 2267
PostPosted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 9:21 pm Reply with quote
Ugh. Baji's show of trust for Takemichi in the latest episode feels completely contrived and unearned. The show seems to want me to believe that they've somehow developed a deep bond, but their interactions have been sparse and mostly involved Baji one-sidedly bullying Takemichi. And it of course doesn't help that Takemichi just spent the last two episodes passively staring empty-eyed at his surroundings, clearly baffled about why events are unfolding even after the key characters literally narrate their motivations explicitly to him.

Ahhhh. This show was so darned good early in its run! This is an ugly way for it to collapse.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 10946
PostPosted: Sun Aug 29, 2021 11:41 am Reply with quote
NeverConvex wrote:
Ugh. Baji's show of trust for Takemichi in the latest episode feels completely contrived and unearned. The show seems to want me to believe that they've somehow developed a deep bond, but their interactions have been sparse and mostly involved Baji one-sidedly bullying Takemichi. And it of course doesn't help that Takemichi just spent the last two episodes passively staring empty-eyed at his surroundings, clearly baffled about why events are unfolding even after the key characters literally narrate their motivations explicitly to him.

Ahhhh. This show was so darned good early in its run! This is an ugly way for it to collapse.

I wish we had gotten to see Takemichi and Baji interact more.
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nightoffire



Joined: 17 Aug 2021
Posts: 7
PostPosted: Sun Aug 29, 2021 12:24 pm Reply with quote
I think it makes the story more interesting because Takemichi kinda screwed up this time. If you knew he was always going to get through these things without anything bad happening, then that would take all the tension out of it. This is one death he can't fix. Sometimes people can die when they are killed, even in a time travel story.

At least, this time, the person who died was someone who was originally dead. Now if he let someone die who wasn't dead before he started this timeleaping thing, that would be really tragic.

NeverConvex wrote:
The show seems to want me to believe that they've somehow developed a deep bond


Takemichi basically said on the bridge scene some episodes ago that he doesn't really care about Baji but doesn't want him to die because Mikey would be sad. Takemichi's bond is with Mikey, Baji's bond is also with Mikey so Baji trusts Takemichi because Mikey trusts him. Since Mikey is so obsessed with Takemichi, Baji probably had to hear Mikey talk about him and his similarities to Shinichiro all the time.

It's for the best that Takemichi wasn't super close to Baji because then Baji's death could have destroyed him mentally and also would have made it harder for him to find the motivation to stop Mikey from killing Kazutora.

But yeah, Takemichi was pretty useless this arc because he keeps trying to do things on his own and as we've learned many times in shounen anime, trying to solve things alone is always a bad idea (as Baji learned the hard way)
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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 5:01 pm Reply with quote
Yeah, this was really stupid just all-around. I could get into exactly in what ways and how many times my eyes rolled so hard I thought they might just pop out of my head... but basically this was just stupid, and not even in a good way. Even stuff that otherwise would have been fun was just so tired and drawn-out and written and/or presented in a really underwhelming and contrived way, there was nothing here that would've justified all the time spent on this arc. (Perhaps if I was more invested in the characters, but alas, I'm not.) Really, I don't know if this arc is hugely popular with manga readers and that's why it got drawn out for so long, but a snappier execution would've helped it a lot.

(Also, I know that this is something I'm not supposed to be thinking too deeply about or the whole shaky premise falls apart, but... this whole thing could've been wrapped up without bloodshed and the original aim most likely fulfilled if someone had behaved like the adult he's supposed to be and called the police or at least an ambulance.)
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DRosencraft



Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 665
PostPosted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 8:52 pm Reply with quote
The handling of our "crybaby hero" has been abysmal. They took a decent premise and have driven it straight into the ground by making his role in events nearly non-existent. You could be forgiven for forgetting that he's supposed to be a time traveler trying to fix history. Yet most of what he does is stand around having inner monologues and then screaming shounen-hero style near the end without having done much. He has all this info, has time to come up with a plan, and in the end he just shows up and starts improvising as if he's completely unaware about what's going on. We get it, he's not a fighter. He's not some strategic savant. But they've gotta find some way for him to be more active in the story when it counts, not just backdoor narrating the events to the audience.
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MFrontier



Joined: 13 Apr 2014
Posts: 10946
PostPosted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 10:46 pm Reply with quote
nightoffire wrote:
I think it makes the story more interesting because Takemichi kinda screwed up this time. If you knew he was always going to get through these things without anything bad happening, then that would take all the tension out of it. This is one death he can't fix. Sometimes people can die when they are killed, even in a time travel story.

I'm not necessarily against Takemichi screwing up, but I feel like it would be more believable if we could see him trying to do more or make better use of his situation than he does on-screen.
Quote:
But yeah, Takemichi was pretty useless this arc because he keeps trying to do things on his own and as we've learned many times in shounen anime, trying to solve things alone is always a bad idea (as Baji learned the hard way)

I don't think it's just because he's trying to do things on his own but that he's nowhere near competent enough to actually figure out what to do in a meaningful way.
SHD wrote:
(Also, I know that this is something I'm not supposed to be thinking too deeply about or the whole shaky premise falls apart, but... this whole thing could've been wrapped up without bloodshed and the original aim most likely fulfilled if someone had behaved like the adult he's supposed to be and called the police or at least an ambulance.)

Mitsuya had someone call an ambulance.
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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Wed Sep 01, 2021 2:17 am Reply with quote
MFrontier wrote:
Mitsuya had someone call an ambulance.

Mitsuya did. Not the one who is technically an adult and also has a very good idea of what is going to happen and what needs to be avoided...

(edit for typo)


Last edited by SHD on Wed Sep 01, 2021 4:16 am; edited 1 time in total
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Kirki



Joined: 11 Jun 2019
Posts: 296
PostPosted: Wed Sep 01, 2021 2:44 am Reply with quote
There are so many things to be said about Tokyo Revengers, both good and bad, but I agree with everyone saying that the one worst thing is the handling of the "hero". The story tries to up the stakes but it costed it the entirety of its MC's supposed development. Takemichi has had a knife through his hand trying to protect someone from being murdered, has seen his girlfriend have her legs crushed and then blown up, has seen his best friend murdering his girlfriend AND committing suicide twice, but OH NO he's such a crybaby hero, he can't handle a delinquent fight and he runs around crying and blindly waving his fists and somehow that inspires all the other hard-boiled delinquents around... For God's sake he knew he had to protect Baji and he ended up holding him down for the other guy to stab!!! The fact that Baji held him in such high regard at his last breath is not "cheesy", it's completely against any kind of logic. I think the most infuriating thing is that the story is trying to convince us through the other characters that he's got impact when it has horribly sidelined him in order to build some suspense. It's plain bad story-telling and there are no excuses at this point. As the story progresses I'm supposed to be rooting for our MC, not grow increasingly convinced that the fact that he did not succeed later in life was less the result of his middle school trauma and more of a direct result of his own lack of potential as an individual.
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tintor2



Joined: 11 Aug 2010
Posts: 1804
PostPosted: Wed Sep 01, 2021 9:24 am Reply with quote
You know, something that is bothering me a bit too is the handling of Mikey. The cast treats him like the second coming of the messiah and this whole arc started because they wanted to give him a bike when he was around 12. Then the character is ridiculously strong during battles but thankfully Takemichi at least did stop him from fighting (when he was having his ass kicked...). While Takemichi was a bit of a disappointment in this arc, the handling of Mikey seems too exaggerated sometimes.
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SHD



Joined: 05 Apr 2015
Posts: 1752
PostPosted: Wed Sep 01, 2021 3:29 pm Reply with quote
tintor2 wrote:
You know, something that is bothering me a bit too is the handling of Mikey. The cast treats him like the second coming of the messiah and this whole arc started because they wanted to give him a bike when he was around 12. Then the character is ridiculously strong during battles but thankfully Takemichi at least did stop him from fighting (when he was having his ass kicked...). While Takemichi was a bit of a disappointment in this arc, the handling of Mikey seems too exaggerated sometimes.

Yes, honestly, I don't really get what makes Mikey so awesome. I don't know if it's about the anime not getting his charisma across properly or something, but every time a character treats Mikey like he's the most amazing person ever I'm kind of scratching my head. Yes, he's strong, but there's got to be more to that and I'm not getting it.
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