Tokyo Ravens 1 – Dat Sexual Tension

It takes a special kind of anime to make me feel giddy like a teenage girl from the very first episode!

Summary:

Our two (sexy) male characters Harutora and Touji just finished their summer class.

As they walk home, Harutora gets ambushed by Hokuto, who’s angry at him for ignoring her phone messages.

Hokuto forces him to buy her shaved ice while they pass the park. Yes, I picked this scene to show Hokuto’s lack of panties.

Hokuto reminds Harutora that he’s supposed to become a shaman. Harutora, on the other hand, wants to part of this shaman business.

As they part ways, even Touji tells Harutora to consider being a shaman.

On his way home, Harutora runs into Chitanda Natsume, an old friend from the past.

Natsume gets angry at Harutora for his indifferent attitude towards their families’ master-familiar relationship, drops her bag, yells at him, bids Harutora farewell, walks out, remembers the bag she left behind, picks it up, and bids him farewell again. Comedy gold right there.

Meanwhile in Tokyo, this…happens…

Just needed to post this picture of Harutora’s doge.

Later that night, Harutora, Touji and Hokuto enjoy the town festival.

Hokuto gets Harutora to play the shooting gallery to win her a prize. She tells Harutora that she’ll kiss him if he gets it, and sure enough, he gets it.

All she actually wanted was the ribbon on the prize and for Haru to call her cute.

Somewhere else, some blonde girl with an awesome whistling theme song buys a chocolate banana with a credit card.

Somewhere else, Harutora catches Hokuto making a wish that he’d someday become a shaman. Haru gets mad which get Hokuto mad and she runs away.

A few minutes later, chocolate banana girl appears and asks Touji (actually meant to ask Haru thinking he’s Natsume) if he’d like to be part of her Taizen Fukun ritual.

Suddenly the MIB appears to arrest her and she summons her familiar(?) to protect her.

It turns out, she’s badass.

Chocolate banana girl captures Harutora.

Hokuto appears to try to save Harutora.

Realizing that the person she caught wasn’t Tsuchimikado Natsume, Chocolate banana girl threatens Harutora with penile incineration.

Suddenly, NTR.

Thoughts:

Here’s the thing: I didn’t pick to review Tokyo Ravens because I liked it or anything. It just fit my schedule. If I do things right. It’s two days after Sekatsuyo(BOOBS) and two days before Kill la Kill. That’s really not me being tsundere. I really did pick Tokyo Ravens because of convenience. I really wanted to do Gallilei Donna but that airs the same day as Kill la Kill. Anyway, I was fully expecting this to be another generic “Shounen Shaman” anime, and I got just that, and more. In a good way. In an OHMYZOD THE ROMANCE IN THIS ANIME. THE FEELS. THE PHALLIC IMAGERY. Yes, needless to say, I enjoyed the first episode Tokyo Ravens more than I should have. One, the main character isn’t a joke or fueled by angst from what I can tell. Sure, he’s indifferent to the world like most teenage protagonists are, but at least he’s not Yuki Kaiji a.k.a. Ouma Shu from Guilty Crown, Amata from Aquarion Evol, Haru from Accel World, Alibaba from Magi, Hanemura from Zetsuen no Tempest, and most recently Eren “Everyone’s Bitch” Jaeger. Collectively known as the League of Angsty Protagonists Who Shout Too Much. The other characters of the anime are okay as well. Touji seems like a bro. Hokuto may be the typical genki girl but she did shine in that shooting gallery scene which had me fangirling -actually- You know what? I think it’s time for a lesson in the Filipino language. Kilig is a Filipino word. It’s what I like to define as the “sensation of love”. It’s the euphoric, spine-tingling feeling you get when the girl you confessed to said yes. For you younglings who have never experienced that though, you can liken kilig with the feeling you get when senpai notices you or when your OTP from your favorite anime actually comes true. It’s that wonderful feeling. That’s what I felt when I saw the scene with Hokuto telling Harutora that she’ll kiss him if he hits the prize. I felt kilig. Also, Hokuto doesn’t wear panties which is an instant A+. Then you have Natsume. You know at this point, I’ve been hearing Kana Hanazawa’s voice for 3 straight years and I’d like to believe that her moe has lost its charm on me. Back with Asobi ni Iku Yo, yeah, I fell in love with Aoi despite the fact that she’s a character in a shitty harem anime. Fast forward to 2013 and Sasami-san@Ganbaranai’s Kagami and her ~fu-nyaa~ had absolutely no effect on me. Then Natsume does the whole “get mad-forget bag” skit and awkwardly stutters goodbye and suddenly I’m in love with a Kanazawa character again. To be fair, it was more on the brilliant writing in that segment than hearing Kanazawa’s overused voice again. Then there’s doge who is a winner at life. Finally, there’s Chocolate banana girl who in one appearance: entered the scene with a badass whistle tune with an eerie atmosphere, made the funniest mistake a bad guy has done in a while, fellated a banana on PG-TV (then again, Hokuto flashed a bit of vag in this show as well), made the most adorable gesture one could possibly make while threatening to burn someone’s penis off and then NTR’d the protagonist in front of his almost-girlfriend. I know I usually rip on over-the-top characters with no backstory but godammit it was everything she did being awesome. One gripe I do have with this show is the terrible CG used. The 3D texture doesn’t blend with the 2D at all but at least the fluid motions match the rest of the show. So in the end, the first episode of Tokyo Ravens brought a pleasant surprise. For this show, I do hope they continue the cheesy but charming romance between Haru and Hoku, and I hope they keep up with Chocolate banana girl’s character.

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