Back to farineaz's Profile farineaz's Profile

This review contains spoiler


So Toradora was pretty good. Now I dont watch a lot of romantic comedy anime anyway and this genre is pretty hard to nail but this show does it suprisingly well. I cant remember the last time I enjoyed watching a rom-com as much as I did with Toradora. Why is that? well lets get started:

Plot: Toradora uses similar kinds of storytelling which isnt new, in fact its kinda cliche, but is still entertaining due to the execution being very good.

The show likes to use quite a few arcs which dont feel completely disjointed and help to grow and further along ... the actual story which is of two polar opposites slowly finding a connection and it is developed very smoothly.
Of course since its set in a high school you can assume you will have your typical beach arc/episodes or the cultural festival arc/episodes which happen in EVERY SINGLE HIGH SCHOOL ANIME IVE EVER SEEN thus far but its still executed good for the most part.
There were some nitpicks like at the end of episode 21, I thought it felt unnatural and felt like writers had written it quickly, if you have seen that scene then you will know what I mean (Taigas fall).

If you have seen my anime list tags of Toradora then will have seen that I thought one arc was kinda forced. That one is Kitamuras arc.

Its not bad but it kinda comes out of nowhere and Kitamura completely changes in a space of 10mins and all of a sudden hes depressed and he loves the student council president and im like "Where did this come from"? but never the less it doesnt drag the show down its just a problem I had.

Characters: Toradora takes, again, somewhat cliche character archetypes of the genre but manages to make them likeable and hell even memorable.

Theres Ryuuji who is your typical nice guy protagonist but hes got layers, hes reserved, hes nice but not too nice hes very much relatable, he has low self esteem about it himself but hes still funny and likeable and unlike other rom-com heroes he is NOT a total dick, he acts very much how someone would in this situation.

Example in episode 23 Ryuuji realises he kinda likes Taiga a bit more than he thought and handles the situation with the girl he was originally going for but instead of going, derpdy derp I dont know what to do, he handles it maturally and respectfully which I liked about him. Ryuuji is a pretty good guy and I liked him a lot.

Now onto Taiga our female lead, now I usually dont like tsunderes and its hard to talk about her because thats exactly what she is and thats how she starts off but in time she grows and becomes more understandable as to why she is so brutal and bad tempered which I wont spoil. Shes also the greatest drive of entertainment and I thought she was hilarious. Her realationship with Ryuuji is likeable, well developed and natural and funny.

Kitamura is likeable, nice, of course he does open up to in that forced arc but im glad the writers gave a shit to give him an arc and grow his character.

Minorin is actually my favourite of them all. She goes from generic, boring nice girl to quite interesting and I wanted to know more about her. i.e. in episode 3 its implied that she just puts on her cliche personality as a way to cover her deeper emotional problems and I wanted to know what they were and it kept me watching. That and her clapping scene made me really like her and made me want to really get into her personality and why she is like that.

Last one ill mention is Ami, now she starts off again as a cliche character but as the show goes on she, again, opens up and her mindset is interesting and different. Her rivalry with Taiga goes from cliche to quite funny and enjoyable. I liked her interactions with Ryuuji. I always looked forward to seeing her in episodes and im glad she was there.

Art: Animation is pretty good. Character designs are good enough that I remembered them months after watching the show. I did notice once that some characters looked off model but thats just a one off. i.e. amis neck looked too thin at one point. But it is pretty consistent.

Sound: the 1st opening is great. So catchy and awesome and how I cried when they changed it. WWHWHYYYY!!!!!!! the 2nd op is ok, taigas smile in the 2nd op always kills me. The rest of the soundtrack is pretty good and accompanies scenes very well in particular the final episode, the background music fit very nicely with what was going on and felt haunting but beautiful.

Enjoyment: Toradora is very enjoyable, its suprisingly funny and I ended up actually caring and liking the characters and plot.

Overall: Toradora is a pretty good show to watch even if you dont like rom-coms like me this one is well done. Of course I had problems with the story choices and characters saying things due to circumstances that kinda come out of nowhere, see episode 21,
(im trying to avoid spoilers so sorry if I dont make sense, message me if you wanna know what my problem with episode 21 is) I think Toradora is worth seeing and you probably should see it and I hope you enjoy it.

Do message me with feedback because I could always use some, you dont have too but still.. Thank you for reading.

You see, I recently started watching anime again and was hearing a lot of buzz about Netflix’s new show; Devilman Crybaby, I thought “what the hell, lets give this a go.”

So, to clarify. I don’t regard myself an expert on anime by any stretch, I know what I like and that’s what I tend to stick to. I usually like my anime over the top, bombastic and silly. So I basically watch a lot of Shonen. I went into Devilman Crybaby pretty blind, not knowing much about the manga’s origins in the 1970s and how it went on to be incredibly influential and go ... on to inspire things like Evangelion, a show I also didn’t really like. I’ve looked into it more after the fact, but It didn’t change my opinion a whole lot.


Watching this, it becomes pretty apparent pretty quickly that Devilman isn’t going to be a show for everyone. It’s extremely excessive in its violence, in its depiction of sex and its nihilistic themes. When the show starts off, it has a monster of the week kind of theme going for it, but by the end it peels off and becomes a look at human nature, relationships and our tendencies to hurt one another. All through the lens of Akira Fudo, a goodhearted young man who gains the body of a demon and uses it to defend humanity against other demons.

I don’t know though, it all felt too heavy handed to me. I suppose that’s part and parcel of the experience when watching anime. It does have good subtext at times, but then it beats you over the head with obvious symbolism at others, showing you the same flashback over and over, often times just explaining it afterwards anyway. I don’t mind bleak media, but the oppressiveness of it can really turn me off at a certain point, which was exactly how I reacted to this show by the final episode.

That wasn’t the only thing that put me off though, the other thing is the animation style. I’ve read enough reaction to this show to know people will be calling for my blood after a comment like that. A lot of the fans of the genre seem to revere Masaaki Yuasa for his animation style, which is often times rough and scruffy looking. Again, it’s not for me. At times it can be really effective, lingering on really well animated shots that give real gravity to a scene.

Then we get an extended action sequence that loots like I might have animated it. A sequence comes to mind; depicting a father discovering his son has become a demon, then killed his mother. As grim as the scene was, the visuals of the man trying to shoot the monster in front of him but being unable to kill his son, the anguish was palpable. Then you’ll get rubber people flopping about all over.

Some have said it’s a creative choice, that it’s supposed to signify the lucid and otherworldly aspects of the conflicts going on. Sure, that’s fine. I still don’t think it looks good, all it is is laughable cringey violence with no substance

If there is one thing about the show I did like it was its soundtrack. It’s something pretty unique, synthwave and gothic themes. It worked really well and was one of the other things that kept me watching. The show has a lot of style. Out of context there were a lot of sequences I really enjoyed based on visuals and musical choices, although this becomes less apparent as the series goes on.


Devilman Crybaby is a pretty pathetic show. Despite the fact that there are a lot of things to appreciate in it, and after spending this time writing about it, I have come to respect aspects of it even more. It tells a solid story and gets its ideas across very effectively, but it feels heavy handed a lot of the time and while I got the message, I couldn’t get behind it. So I wouldn’t recommend Devilman Crybaby at all