Synonyms: Tiger X Dragon
Type: TV
Episodes: 25
Status: Finished Airing
Aired: Oct 1, 2008 to Mar 25, 2009
Producers: J.C. Staff, Genco, NIS America, Inc.L
Genres: Comedy, Romance, School, Slice of Life
Duration: 24 min. per episode
Rating: PG-13 - Teens 13 or older
Toradora, I wasn’t really expecting too much from it. I thought it would be your standard school life love story we have all seen so many times before. But low and behold it came out to be surprisingly good, and has quickly become one of my favorite 2008 airing anime series. Yep, I ended up loving this normal but exceptionally good anime cause Toradora is made just the right way!
Toradora is centered around two high school students who happen to live next to each other: Taiga Aisaka and Ryuji Takasu.
Taiga, known by the nickname “Palmtop Tiger” at school due to the combination of her small stature and her fierce outward personality, has had a crush on one of her classmates, Yusaku Kitamura, for a while. She’s also the daughter of a rich family, though is currently estranged from both of her parents and live in a condo on her own that her father pays for. Ryuji, who is known somewhat as a delinquient at school due to his intense look, has a crush on classmate Minori. He also lives with his single mother, who works at a hostess bar to make ends meet and is largely a clean freak and good cook.
I knew Ryuuji would end up with Taiga even just by looking at the cover art without watching the anime!. But how do we get to that point is all the story.
Taiga and Ryuji’s story starts when Taiga accidentally puts a love letter meant for Kitamura into Ryuji’s bag, due to confusing which seat they sat in. Having found out that Ryuji now knows such an embarassing thing attacks him over it. However, Taiga soon finds out that Ryuji likes her best friend Minori and the two decide to create a pact where they each will try to set the other up with their crushes (as Kitamura is also Ryuji’s friend just as Minori is Taiga’s).
Eventually, this leads into a mess where Taiga likes Kitamura, but Kitamura wants to remain friends, where Ryuji likes Minori, Minori likes Ryuji, Taiga starts having feelings for Ryuji, but both Taiga and Minori try to push Ryuji towards the other beliving that’s who really likes Ryuji/who Ryuji really likes. Throw in a fifth wheel in the popular idol Ami Kawashima, whom is really selfish, though she covers up that part of her personality around others, and you have an overall good romantic comedy.
The only thing i dint liked was, Story has a very good pace but it took quite a while for both of the hero and heroine to fall in love. Yup, they fell in love...but it took so long!
The characters in this anime were actually the high point of this, because of the relations between them, thus the romance/drama and comedy. I must say at first I quite hated taiga for she actually is visually almost the same as Louise from Zero No Tsukaima. But personality speaking she is actually VERY different from her ,even if she seems the same at first glance, which made me absolutely love her. Plus, Ryuuji, is actually a very good character concerning his personality (his obsession is actually hilarious) and the development he actually lives trough is pretty nice. Plus the side characters are actually pretty interesting, Minori and Ami particularly, Minori being the very WEIRED, sport obsessed, over optimistic girl and Ami being the bipolar one. These two characters were actually the most interesting ones for quite some time in the beginning due to their charm. Apart from that, the other male character Yuusaku did not have an impact later on during the anime. The filler characters were pretty interesting even thought there were not that present enough from my point of view. Finally, this anime offered a great cast with their main and side characters, plus it offered a great character development.
While looking at the art, there is really nothing so bad or so good about it, although the backgrounds are sometimes unanimated, the artwork it pretty good. The music though all along the anime is okay but is really exceptional in the opening and closing credits, they are really addictive and all of them (except the first opening) give the light feeling that the anime radiates. Overall, the music was okay, and the animation too is acceptable.
While looking at the art, there is really nothing so bad or so good about it, although the backgrounds are sometimes unanimated, the artwork it pretty good. The music though all along the anime is okay but is really exceptional in the opening and closing credits, they are really addictive and all of them (except the first opening) give the light feeling that the anime radiates. Overall, the music was okay, and the animation too is acceptable.
Anime opening titles:
