Written by So a few posts back I mentioned that I had a huge post coming up about why I hate Itsuka Tenma no Kuro Usagi, well as you might have expected, this is indeed that post. When I originally did a First Impression of the show, I gave it a 4 out of 5 on my rating scale, I have since dropped it to a 1 out of 5. ( Also as a side note, I’m going to abolish that grading system with a better one.) So where did it go wrong? Well it would be easier to tell you where it went right, but that’s not what I’m doing. So in the words of Linkara “Let’s Dig In”.
Do, do, do. Do, do. Do, do, do. Do,do, Doooooooooooo Do!
Welcome To Atop The Fourth Wall, where bad comics bur- ohh wait I’m not Linkara am I? Never mind.
So first and foremost, I’m going to once again address my original issues with the show, in that Taito and Himea seem to have fallen in love in a maximum of 3 hours. Like I said last time, they met on the swing set and they were madly in love with each other by the time they were on the jungle gym. Again she waited 9 years alone in conscious supernatural suspension. However thanks to the comments of Ryan Ashlight, I have been informed that in the manga they did indeed know each other for more than a day, but the anime did a terrible job of showing that, and he backed me up on how I thought it was completely unbelievable anime-wise. And that hasn’t changed at all. We still know nothing about how these two met and why they’re so deeply in love with each other.
Also remember in my First Impression when I said the scriptwriter’s were going to have to be really good to not play up the “He can die 7 times thing” for drama every episode? I’m sad to say I was right, and they did, /sigh. Seriously writers, find some other method of suspense! Also the spell Himea placed on him that prevents him from dying only works when he dies. And apparently this guy dies, if he gets so much as a paper cut. Bit of an exaggeration, but not by all that much. In one episode he died once from losing a hand. I’m fairly certain you wont die instantly just from losing a hand.
In my First Impression, I said originally that Taito was not a Saint Protagonist. He has since proven me wrong. I’ll get to why I hate the rest of the characters later, but for now lets focus on Taito. This guy is honestly no better than from Rito from To Love Ru. He has girls that chase after him (for no freaking reason other than apparently girls are extremely attracted to guys who hate their gender as a whole), he gets pushed around by said girls on a daily basis, and hides in a corner sucking his thumb in the fetal position if you ever mention the words “Stand up for yourself”. Also another problem with Taito I have is that he won’t stop saying that he shouldn’t have forgotten about Himea, again and again and again and again. Dude SHUT UP, it wasn’t your fault! You had your memory erased by an evil twin of the student council president, you didn’t have any super powers at the time, and their was NOTHING you could have done! So for goodness sake, STOP CRYING ABOUT IT!!!!!!
Now as for the rest of the characters. I hate them too, with the only saving grace of the show being Mirai with her voice actress Iori Nomizu. Other than her, every character in the show has his or her own way of making me hate them. Take Himea for example. So first off, shes supposed to be the “oldest living vampire” or something, (Doesn’t that make her a Lolicon?) with all this fantastic power. So writers tell me why, in all your infinite wisdom you had her be the damsel in distress Every, Single, Episode??? Seriously Himea is freaking worthless, and hasn’t done one entire thing in the battle scenes, other than watch on the sidelines, or be the princess that Tito needs to save from the freaking dragon.
And I could go on and on about why I hate her, or just about any other character for that matter, but I want you all to know this anime has done something, I thought was not at all possible. It made the background characters of all people, piss me off. So it all starts when Haruka the childhood friend is trying to express her love for Taito through a bento box she made for him, to help her compete with Hiema for Taitos’ love. (Oh goody that character trope is back. Again.) And for some reason, the entire class is rooting for Taito to fall in love with Haruka and not Himea, and then this happens….
Seriously?!? I know most high schoolers have no life outside of being petty, shallow, and digging into other people’s love life ( I can say that now because I’ve had first hand experience), but seriously the whole class? Don’t they have anything better to do? Don’t they have their own love lives to deal with? Why are they rooting for Hakura and not Himea? Why? What is the reasoning behind this????
And one last thing about Hakura. She is one of the characters that anyone watching the show can point at and say “She doesn’t stand a chance against so-and-so, why is she even trying?” and I would agree with them. It’s painfully obvious that Taito would choose Himea if he was forced to pick while a gun with 7 bullets (or extra sharp paper) was next to his head. Even if he didn’t Himea would just kill him. She’s already threatened him multiple times in the show just for talking to her! This is another reason I love SnO. For a while at the beginning when Nymph was just starting to break out of her tsundere mode, I just kept thinking to myself, “There’s no way Tomoki will choose her over Ikaros.” But then they started explaining her back story, had multiple episode’s of major character development for her spanning from around episode 7 of the first season, to episode 3 of the second season. And in that time it becomes blatantly obvious that Ikaros was not the main love interest anymore, and that there was an equal chance that Tomoki would pick her, instead of Ikaros.
Finally, to be honest I couldn’t even enjoy fanservice in this show. Because aside from the occasional panty shot (and I do mean occasional) there was little to no fanservice in this show. Now don’t get me wrong, I usually disapprove of fanservice, but only when it’s being used to substitute a little something called plot. But in a case like this show, when the plot is terrible, it could have benefited from some more fanservice to at least keep me entertained.
Now you may ask “UO, is their any redeeming factors about this show?” Well the animation is still very nice, but I have been spotting small issues with it lately, and of course like I said before Iori Nomizu is in it, but I can watch her play Nymph or Haruna and be surrounded by likable characters in other anime’s.
Anyway that’s all I have to say about this steaming pile of dung, and I think it’s time for me to implement the new anime grading system I told you about earlier. I will freely admit I’m stealing this idea from Totalbiscuit’s old podcast “Gaming The System” where when he reviewed a game, he told you how much he paid for it and how much he would pay for it. Now I watch my all anime for a $7 sub on Crunchyroll, and there’s a lot of illegal anime sites with free anime, so I can’t really talk about price. What you do pay for with anime is your own personal time, so I’m going to grade it by if it’s worth your time to watch it or whether you shouldn’t watch it at all. The scale goes from 0-7 and theirs a new page up detailing what each level means, so check that out at the top of the main page.
Watch Priority: 3
-A decent show, might be worth your time if you are out of anime to watch. (You can only say this after watching Sora no Otoshimono!)
EDIT: O.K. so it seems this review just kind of devolved into a list of problems with the show, but I feel much better now that I have all that out of my system. 
My congratulations on exemplifying a number of solid reasons as to why Itsu-Ten’s anime is made of crash and burn.
With the series nearing its end, it’s here we find an increasing divergence from the main plot that truly separates the anime from the manga/light novel.
To begin, a matter we’ve already discussed in some detail before… Taito and Himea’s love for one another. Indeed, the anime has done quite a poor job of laying out the foundation of their relationship; so much so that we simply can’t believe it with any true degree of sympathy or understanding. Given that it’s such a crucial point of the story to which the anime has seen fit to exploit time and time again, you would think that their beginning be given all the more attention specifically because of that.
Something that’s just recently come to my attention is that Zexcs (Itsu-Ten’s anime producer) felt the need to nix the entirety of volume 3 from the anime. This is a decision I, and I imagine anyone else who wanted to delve more into Taito and Himea’s love for each other, took issue with because it’s here that we finally begin to understand why.
In a recently translated chapter of Itsu-Ten’s third volume, we learn that there are several reasons why Himea fell in love with Taito; and while those revealed might seem a bit cliche at first, we also gain a bit of insight into the character herself. There are profound reasons as to her feelings and why she does what she does. Without this insight, it becomes almost impossible to regard Himea well, hence many viewers’ distaste of her.
It’s also worth noting that Gekkou, another who I feel didn’t get near the treatment he deserved in the anime, received some development here as well. Knowing what I know now, he’s made himself a little more awesome in my eyes.
Moving onto the issue of our little love triangle with Himea, Taito and Haruka, I can only say this has been woefully underplayed in some respects and vastly overplayed in some others. There was so much potential for some real conflict and character development here, and yet the anime squandered it. Instead we’re reduced to tried and tiring rabbles of carefully made bentos, unnecessary classroom interference (this I found particularly annoying), and an overall lack of originality that makes you want to facepalm.
Zexcs, a quick recommendation. Leave the love triangle to someone who knows how to get the job done. Kagami puts the whole lot of you to shame, IMHO.
Now I can’t say much about Taito as I really haven’t read far enough along in either the manga or light novel to get to know his character well. Judging by how the anime has treated many of its other characters though, I take what I’ve seen with him thus far with a grain of salt.
As for any redeeming factors about this show, UO has already touched on what few there are. Though if I had to add one, it would be Itsu-Ten’s first awesome ending, “Utsusemi” by Akiko Shikata. Being the only thing about this series I really looked forward to, it comes highly recommended.
As a faithful reader of the original works, I simply can’t recommend this adaptation. As a whole it simply doesn’t do the series justice at all, bringing into painful light a good deal of what’s wrong in today’s anime industry.
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I could not agree more.
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In any case, Itsu-Ten’s anime has likely hit its breaking point. Even those devoted fans of the series have grown bored commenting about it now. I can understand how they feel.
By the way, did you ever get around to reading either the manga or the light novel?
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No I sadly did not, but I will after I finish reading Shugo Chara!
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