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| i liked this anime and the ending but i wouldn't repeat the anime again, it was a unique one but i was happy it ended to be honest :) so i will give it 8/10 |
| I can't believe it took me so long to find and watch this!! I'm quite the fan of rom-com anime so i have a few favourites but this shot right into contention with the best of them! The last few episodes were such a roller-coaster of emotions. I found myself wanting almost a fairytale ending so when Taiga all the drama hit I didn;t know how to feel xD. But this anime had a real feel to it, and the ending was beautiful! Easily 10/10!! |
| I really loved this Anime. I still wish they would make a Season 2 of just them still in their school life. I really wouldn't mind. :) |
| LethalBlackLotus |
| it would be nice if we got an after story like we did with clannad! I really liked the anime and the best part was that they ended up together or else the rating would drop a huge distance down (gave it 9/10) so why didnt I give it a 10? thats cuz Taiga moved and even changed school when they've finally gotten together she just disappears, then suddenly appears in his school months later? not even a hug or a kiss at their reunion. TL;DR I didnt like the ending! |
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| Are some people serious? What were you expecting, take the most popular romcoms and tell me how many of them end up with the MC getting together with the second girl? In fact, it doesn't have to be just romcoms, but I don't understand why people are bashing the anime as a whole for the ending that was standard and nothing surprising? I understand, obviously, that many people wanted the Minori route, (Personally, I did too, but even so, I still enjoyed this ending) but it's only natural that Ryuuji ended up with Taiga, it's not like they spent the last couple of episodes building up Ryuuji and Minori just to smack us in the face, we all knew it was coming. As for Taiga leaving, I'm sure someone has said this in the 39 pages of this discussion, but again, these creators aren't idiots, they do everything for a reason. Ryuuji said running away doesn't solve anything and Taiga left that note. He said that in order for them to get married, he wants the approval and blessings, and Taiga said that she would change. She probably knew that if she told Ryuuji, he would try to stop her, so she left to live with her mom in order to fix things up. This discussion is not as bad, but seriously, there are so many people on this website that are straight up "ignorant" and simply critical to the point where it's just insulting. (Yeah it's the internet, get over it), but look throughout the episode discussion on MAL and see for yourself. This is why I refrain from posting comments, usually just long pointless arguments. I'm getting way off topic, anyways, as for the episode itself, I thought it was a very nice ending, even though it left out a tiny part in the ending from the light novel. Overall 8/10 |
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DoctorAnime said: Obviously he would end up with Taiga (which I wanted actually) because they were the ones spending time together, beeing there for eachother, helping eacother so It would piss me off if they DIDN'T end up together. What I didn't like were the ending because she disappeared right when they've gotten together that I wanted to see all along then she suddenly months later comes back just to beat ruuyji up (no kiss or hug, only a love confession from his side and a punch from hers). I dunno it was good that she desided to fix everything with her family but just leaving like that was just a bad decission to please someone like me. |
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| I never thought I would watch this anime and it has finished. I want moree D: There's no season II? really? really really really? //cries Rate : 10/10 |
made by bunnyama |
| Nice anime |
| I absolutely loved the anime form start to finish and the build up for Ryuuji and Taiga to kiss at the very end. Although to me a perfect ending would of been a slight jump in the future where they actually DID get married. I really really wanted them to get married so bad. I guess in a way you could say that it was sort of self explanatory that they were going to get married eventually since she did come back to him. Either way, the Kiss was the best part of the last episode. When the credits started to roll my heart sank a bit because I thought Taiga was not going to show up again. But am so glad that she did, that saved it for me. |
| There's not much for me to say. I really did not like that she left.. But other than that it was an awesome anime. |
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| Meh. To start off there are actually 2 main characters, not 5. Next, I don't like that pairing. Taiga is a little aggressive bitch. And she didn't stop calling ryuuji a dog lol. That parrot was so unnessecary. Was it supposed to be funny? I liked Ami though - she was actually the only cool character. I didn't care too much about the rest. Minori was at times annoying too. On the other hand there was some good comedy and some interesting episodes and generally well executed, it's just that I hate Taiga. Ryuuji, you pedophile (yeah, I know Taiga is supposed to be 17 but she looks 12 max. The last scene just proved she's a kid). Anyways first half was very good so 7/10 (biased, I can't be objective here). It could be a 9/10 easily. |
AizixJun 29, 2014 11:16 AM
| What an amazing anime 10/10 |
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| I'm kind of sad Ryuuji didn't end up with Minori, but I guess it was predictable that he'd end up with Taiga. Apart from that I really disliked the fact that Taiga just decided to leave all her friends and not contact them in a year, just to reconnect with her mother. Why not both? :( I did really enjoy the anime though and I kind of have that empty feeling now, that I get after finishing a good anime. Guess it's unto the next rom-com. ^_____^ |
| Amazing anime in my opinion. This has to be one of the best love story anime I've seen. Yeah it's that good. The more I look back on it the more I think it's awesome. I wish there was a OVA or something that shows Ryuuji and tiaga once they get married. I would of really liked to see that. |
| I really hated what Taiga did. Leaving like that without any explanation or saying goodbye... It was selfish of her. Didn't she think how Ryuuji would feel? It's like she didn't actually love him. I really felt sorry for him. But I'm glad she's back and they were together in the end. However it was very short scene and I kind of feel unsatisfied. I'd like to see some OVA in which we could see Taiga and Ryuuji as a real couple. Overall it was very good romance anime, and I really liked it despite the fact I'm a guy :P |
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| I re-watched this because I saw that CR had the dub up, so it was a perfect reason to re-watch it XD, but I think I finished this anime too quickly. Gonna feel that void for a few days... I absolutely adored everything about this anime. The animations didn't feel half-assed, the music was so memorable, so much that I decided to learn one of the pieces on piano :). The story was well written and I kept feeling that "just one more episode" thing. One thing about the animations I feel I NEED to mention. The facial expressions, I've noticed after watching so many more anime that the facial expressions are just a little plain. In ToraDora, when I started re-watching, my eyes opens up real wide and I realize that something about this feels.... genuine, unique, and beautiful. Maybe I've just been watching the wrong anime, but I haven't noticed that kind of detail in a long time, that's for sure. The ending for this series felt so complete. Usually for some, I'd be screaming for a second season, but I think a second season for ToraDora just isn't needed. Needless to say 10/10. |
| This is a truly great anime. I just finished watching it and I'm overwhelmed with beautifull feelings I want to cry. I loved it from start to finish. |
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| Very good anime. Not a fan of the ending, though. 9/10. |
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Kalypze said: Very good anime. Not a fan of the ending, though. 9/10. You didn't watch past the credits, did you? |
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| *Fanboy appear* Best ending of the best anime ever. I love Toradora! |
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| Good post, Tawek. I agree with a lot of your thoughts. It really fell in at around an 8.5 for me, and a lot of my hesitation on whether to give it an 8 or 9 had to do with the ending (though I did ultimately give it a 9). That said, I am going to somewhat disagree with you on one point. Tawek said: And that these seventeen year-olds were ready for the commitments they were taking on for each other. That this was an issue was implied, when Ryūji suggested his grandmother might be being irresponsible in allowing them to sleep in the same room. But this was never followed through. It seemed blindingly obvious that they weren't ready. Ryūji or Taida could have acknowledged this, and that would have been completely in line with Ryūji's character. Instead, Ryūji made some superficial remark about how they should get the consent of their family, so their family could share the happiness. I think you missed where they did both realize that they were making a mistake, which I actually thought the anime communicated very effectively. Both of their parents kept running away from problems - Yasuko ran away from home (and then ran away again from Ryuuji after he got upset with her), his father ran away from his responsibilities to Ryuuji and Yasuko, and shortly before this episode Taiga's father skipped town with her stepmother and vanished after his business failed (don't remember if that was mentioned in the anime or just the books). They're already showing some doubts about what they're doing even before they get to his grandparents', but seeing Yasuko's reconciliation with her parents is when it clearly sinks in that running wasn't going to work. That's really what their whole conversation was about, when Ryuuji's saying that he wants to do everything right, and with both of their parents' blessings. He's indirectly saying that he doesn't want their "family" to be just the two of them against the world - he wants it to include all of them – Yasuko, Taiga's mother and stepfather and step-brother, and presumably his grandparents too now that he's finally met them, and that means breaking this cycle of running away from people and tackling all of their family issues head-on instead of trying to avoid them. It cycles back to when he was trying to prod Taiga into reconciling with her father earlier in the series, because he thought it was the right thing for her to do. That turned into a dead end because her father was a complete loser, but her mother apparently has some redeeming qualities, so there’s still something there that’s worth fighting to save (and he knows Taiga well enough to know that she would like to save it if she can). There’s also Taiga’s comment during their pretend wedding where she says, "As I thought, I don’t want a vow yet," which is basically her agreeing that they really aren’t ready to be properly married. Also, about your comment on trying to make the ending stay true to the novels, that wasn’t exactly the problem. The real problem was that when the series aired, the 10th novel wasn't out yet - basically JC Staff got input from the author about how she planned to end it, and fleshed out their own finale from the cliffs' notes version. Without spoiling anything, if you ever read the books you'll find that #10 handles a few things very differently (and at least one of your chief complaints - which was also one of my chief complaints - isn’t even an issue). I do prefer the anime's "first kiss" scene to the book's, but in most other respects I like the book’s resolution much better. And Book!Taiga is a lot less violent, BTW – it’s been a while since I’ve read them, but aside from the bokken attack, I can’t remember any other time in the books where she actually tried to hit Ryuuji on purpose (even on the first day when she uppercuts him in the anime, she just glares at him in the book and manga). I can only assume the anime deliberately exaggerated her "tsun" side for comedic purposes. |
WingKingSep 6, 2014 7:08 PM
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| Yeah, I just finished up my second time seeing it (the new dub release was the perfect excuse to re-watch - not that I needed one!), and it just gave me an even greater appreciation for how extraordinarily well-written 95% of this series is. Even the 2 or 3 filler episodes are woven neatly into the plot, with some of their events getting callbacks later on. The ending is still my biggest criticism, though - it was the reason I went back and read the books in the first place, because something about it just didn't feel quite right. And yes, talk about being rushed - book 9 ends at the point midway through episode 24 where they run from their mothers, which means the anime's equivalent version of the last book was crammed into about 1 1/2 episodes. I wish they'd either added one more episode to the schedule to do it all properly, or taken out one of the fillers instead (or even given us just one "after story" OVA that covered some of the things you mentioned, instead of that silly bento box OVA). I too would have liked to see more of Taiga's mother. But she seemed to get along okay with Yasuko and did have the courtesy to thank Ryuuji for taking care of Taiga, so that earned her a few points with me. This is basically me speculating, but I don't think she'd object to their relationship specifically - especially once she saw just how happy and well-treated Taiga was. I think what we saw in that scene was more about the situation and her not understanding why Taiga was suddenly putting up this unexpected resistance. I say "unexpected" because Taiga had known since the break between episodes 21 & 22 that this day was coming, so you have to assume she had previously agreed to the move thinking it would be the perfect solution to the love triangle problem - she leaves town, and Ryuuji and Minori are free to get together. But Minori's bombshell changed the whole equation, and then Mom showed up to collect her before she and Ryuuji even had a chance to talk about it. Since Ryuuji and Taiga still hadn't had a chance to even confess to each other at that point, there was no way her mother could know just how crazy in love they were - undoubtedly when they were arranging the move Taiga had passed off Ryuuji as just a "friend and neighbor" who helped her out, because she thought she'd never see him again anyway and was still trying to bury her feelings. The subject of their engagement status going forward is one thing that's never clearly addressed even in the books. I get what you're saying about that, but to me it's not really all that important and might have even confused things since the viewing audience could easily mistake "breaking the engagement" for "breaking up," which neither of them wants to do. When the time is right, I suspect that Taiga would want a more romantic proposal anyway than Ryuuji standing 50 feet away from her in a freezing river shouting "Marry me!", and their families might want a chance to celebrate the occasion with a formal yuinou (engagement ceremony) as well, especially given the efforts they plan to make to fully reconcile with everyone. |
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| Great anime, left a good impression on me. Didn't expect at the beginning that in this second half would turn out that serious, but it really reminded me why I like love stories. Didn't understand why Taiga did that last thing without saying anything, but I'm glad they reunited reborn. 8/10 |
Tawek said: It's particularly interesting discussing this, because I have a hobby of writing stories (I hasten to add that I am nothing like as good as the writers of Toradora!). I find this critiquing of the storytelling in the series very thought provoking. Something that's struck me particularly, from discussing the series with you, is how important a consistent point of view is to the reader. This is something that is often said of the written word, but I think its also true of television and film. Really good writing, which brings the reader into the world through a single point of view, can be very powerful in creating the willing suspension of disbelief, and in making the reader relate to that character in a powerful way. While reading that story, for the reader, the character becomes, in a sense, a friend. If the reader is used to seeing the world through that single point of view, they'll feel very unsettled if they are thrown out of it. There are intellectual explanations for what happened and how the story's ending makes sense, and you give some of those explanations. But, whatever the explanation of what happened when, when it finished I felt emotionally dissatisfied, and I wasn't entirely sure why. Perhaps this was because my (sort of) friend had been made into a stranger. At the end of the story I wanted to say goodbye to him properly. But I couldn't, and, with him no longer a friend, any satisfying emotional resolution of the story was missing. Of course, this is all an excellent lesson for me! I must make sure that, if I ever try to write an emotional story with a single point of view, that I don't make the same mistake. Good thoughts. I think there's some validity to that; we are used to hearing Ryuuji's thoughts during the series, and that definitely gets sacrificed to the sudden change of pace during the climax. I also write too (primarily short stories), which is one of the reasons why I love so much just how well-written most of this series is. Your post made me stop and think about why exactly I thought things felt "off" myself, and the conclusion I came to is that I think it's because the ending is the first and only time in the series where it really feels like the plot is driving the characters more than the other way around. Everywhere else in the series the characters come first, and everything - the humor, the conflicts, the growth and evolution of their friendships and relationships - flows very organically from their inherent personality traits and their normal methods of coping with life. But after all that consistent character buildup, everything that happens in eps 24 and 25 - snapping at Yasuko out of nowhere, running away from home, the impulsive marriage proposal - is all pretty out of character for Ryuuji. Normally he's the more thoughtful, cool-headed one in the relationship - the "blue oni" to Taiga's hot-headed, impulsive "red oni." And on Taiga's side, while it's pretty typical for her to put up at least a show of resistance when he's the one trying to lead her into things, this time she seems only too happy to go along with all of his ideas no matter how crazy - no bickering, second-guessing, or offering other suggestions. So it's like both of them have temporarily swapped personalities with each other. And why would they do that when Taiga is perfectly capable of being the impulsive one and dragging Ryuuji away on a mad adventure, except that the plot dictates they must end up at Ryuuji's grandparents and therefore he has to be the driving force behind their escape instead? That feeling of OOC'ness is also reinforced by, as you said, our sudden loss of insight into Ryuuji's thoughts that starts at around the same time. Now I can see a justification for the change in them, up to a point. These are still two teenagers, it's been a crazy day with their emotions being yanked around all afternoon (first Minori's bombshell and then their parents figuratively slamming the door on their initial plans), and on top of that there's the sudden euphoria of newly discovered love and realizing that it's mutual. So it's totally understandable for them to be emotionally out-of-sorts and not their usual selves (we even saw the same thing earlier in the series on a smaller scale with Kitamura). But even if we accept that excuse, it's still pretty jarring to the audience when we see characters who have behaved consistently one way for 23 episodes suddenly behaving very differently, especially when it happens rather abruptly with no insight or explanation and we're left to try to make sense of it all on our own. And that I think also partly explains your feeling with Ryuuji that your "(sort of) friend had been made into a stranger," since in addition to losing access to his thoughts, for most of the last two episodes he's not acting like the character you got to know either. This isn't the first time I've seen this problem come up, of course. There was a book I read a number of years ago where the ending required the author to toss out every bit of character development his teenagers had undergone through the first 240 pages and turn them all into idiots, and I remember being completely disgusted by that because it totally ruined what up until then had been a great book. Obviously, he had decided before be began writing how it was going to end and then just shoehorned the characters in to make it happen. I'm sure you've run into the same thing too. Fortunately, for as much as I've scrutinized it, Toradora's anime ending isn't nearly that bad. It's perfectly watchable and some things about it (like the kiss) are still extremely satisfying - I just can't put it on the same "near-masterpiece" level as the rest of the series. |
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Zelgadis94 said: Great anime, left a good impression on me. Didn't expect at the beginning that in this second half would turn out that serious, but it really reminded me why I like love stories. Didn't understand why Taiga did that last thing without saying anything, but I'm glad they reunited reborn. 8/10 Yeah that really dampens the whole mood for me, I love the anime I watched it non stop, and then she just fucks off, and then it goes black and you're sat there as an audience member thinking 'How far in the future are we?' It quickly reveals how far, but I still feel that there was a big gaping hole missing from the story, which left me wanting more from the ending. I was so mad at the ending (at the time) I was in between crying and laughing hysterically, however I have calmed down now and can see why it is a lovable ending (still gets me a little bit annoyed :P) |
lowryder259 said: Mr_Gingee said: Yeah that really dampens the whole mood for me, I love the anime I watched it non stop, and then she just fucks off, and then it goes black and you're sat there as an audience member thinking 'How far in the future are we?' It quickly reveals how far, but I still feel that there was a big gaping hole missing from the story, which left me wanting more from the ending. I was so mad at the ending (at the time) I was in between crying and laughing hysterically, however I have calmed down now and can see why it is a lovable ending (still gets me a little bit annoyed :P) My first reaction was being annoyed too, but then once I thought about it more, it makes a lot of sense, including her going away without a word. When it comes to things that really truly matter, Taiga is very non-confrontational, and she was probably scared to tell them all that she was leaving. But I'm willing to forgive any shortcomings the end had for the things it did give us. Compared to a lot of Romance animes, that barely give you any taste of the main couples relationship after the series, we got to see a pretty good amount of interaction between Taiga and Ryuji after they were officially together. (This includes one of the greatest kiss scenes in all of anime if you ask me.) Yeah I defo agree now (If you look at the ending of my post I say I come around to it) Possibly the best anime I have watched, and I do agree with the ending now. Some anime don't know how to end, but this was as good an ending as any and I can see that now. |
| I cried. Don't have anything else to say. |
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| I knew it that they will end up together, didn't except they were getting married. Minori voice is annoying, liked Ami and ryuuji friendship. the ending was cute! 8/10 |
| I was about to hate the ending but then the last 15 seconds happened and i am so glad i watched this. xD |
| MAL: A community that thinks every anime is bad, but rates everything a 7/10. |
| Fantastic anime. Loved every minute of it, and the character development was great. All the characters were quite lovable, too. And I can agree with a post above, probably the best kissing scene I've ever witnessed. Was almost mad at the ending, but they patched it up. 10/10 |
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