Don't Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro

Episode 8

There's still an inkling of relationship progression at the core of this week's Don't Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro, though things notably aren't as intense as the previous episode. After RPG asides and festival-night flights of fancy, things kind of feel like they're getting back to basics. We have Nagatoro and Senpai in the club room, her and her friends intermittently mess with him, and flustered reactions abound. I get the need to deliver consistent material in the vein this series is known for, but given how effectively things had escalated for the past couple of weeks, it feels like a bit of a let-down to coast into this one with little in the way of reaching new harassing heights. Save of course for the cold-open, which just kicks off with Senpai crouching down to let Nagatoro actually sit on him, because even at its most lax, this anime still has zero chill.

At least the pair's dynamic still evolves, even in the base setups for the sequences this week. Far from the early-series formula of Senpai just trying to utilize the art club room in peace by himself only for Nagatoro to forcibly barge in on him, now they just happily hang out together in the room as the default. It's a nice, simple way to illustrate how things have changed between them. That also works a bit with the overall point of this section, as Nagatoro floats the idea that Senpai's inconsistent study habits could lead to him being held back a grade or two, resulting in that most catastrophic contradiction: A Senpai who isn't a senpai anymore! As the initial discussion of this concept goes, it's yet another nice little insight into how appreciative Senpai and Nagatoro have gotten of each other's roles in their lives, as Nagatoro starts out clowning on the idea of being in the same class as Senpai, only to quickly talk herself into it, then find that he's not terribly opposed to the idea either. That part's cute in how flustered they both get over the prospect of genuine, unironic attraction to each other, necessitating them desperately trying to backtrack to their more familiar dynamic in response.

However, that bit worked for a minute or two there before continuing into a follow-up section, where Nagatoro's friends get in on the subject and produce an even lengthier imaginary scenario of how they'd treat their underclass upperclassmen. While there are some funny moments to this, the fantasy here doesn't come off much different from the kind of treatment they already lob Senpai with, making it all feel vaguely redundant. It's an extended sequence that makes up an excuse to present the same kind of material the show already thrived on, not helped by a lot of the humor for this stretch seemingly overly reliant on repetition, even by Nagatoro standards. It's baseline Miss Nagatoro, basically, which comes off very constrained now that we've seen the kinds of ridiculous highs it can really shoot for when it's trying.

Thankfully the second half of the episode has a bit more going on. It does open with yet another instance of the series' running gag about Nagatoro stressing that Senpai is cheating on her by letting himself be bullied by her friends, but if I took issue with odd complex fetishes I wouldn't be able to engage with this show in the first place. The important part is how Nagatoro takes this opportunity to try to recapture Senpai's attention by appealing to his nice-doormat sensibilities while also bullying him into it, vis a vis hustling him in rock-paper-scissors matches. Like I said, odd and complex. There are some fun bits just in the setup here, from Nagatoro's unintentional self-own at the beginning to Senpai trying to get their dynamic back on track afterwards. But for someone like me who's become perhaps too invested in the actual relationship between these kids, the payoff on all this is the best part.

The show's making a regular thing now of Nagatoro struggling with her interactions with Senpai getting too intimate for her tastes, and there are some strong flourishes of animation on her flustered reaction to how her hitching a ride on Senpai's back turns out (whole lot of Nagatoro riding Senpai in this episode…). It's some obvious gap-moe sensibility that indicates how this show has slid to being a more conventional romantic comedy since its infamously intense first episode, but there's a reason these kinds of stock appeal elements still work. And how this has carried on from that early setup continues to be an appreciable background detail even as our odd couple continue to navigate their actual feelings. There's something heartening about Senpai anxiously awaiting a nightly message from Nagatoro as he worries he made things too awkward between them previously. Sure, she spent the better part of the day sitting on you, dude, but you wouldn't want to make things weird.

That's the power-balancing act the show's dynamic is riding on by now. Nagatoro mainly calls Senpai up from the bath to try getting the upper hand back on him after losing her call earlier, but an accidental tap of the facetime button just leads to her owning herself again while still engaging his own embarrassment. They almost feel like they're on even footing for most of this episode, and it's kind of neat to see that an anime previously predicated 50% on overly flustered reactions can still be entertaining even when it extends that element to both its leads. It's all fun as an aside way to get us back to spec for the series at this point, but I do hope that Miss Nagatoro won't rest on its laurels for too long, and come up with some newly extreme escalations as we head into the last stretch of the season.

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Don't Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.

Chris is a freelance writer who appreciates anime, action figures, and additional ancillary artistry. He can be found staying up way too late posting screencaps on his Twitter.