Revisiting To Love-Ru
We are often give up!
Ah, summer. It’s a very special time in a boys’ life, that magical time when breasts are school is out and spring anime shows begin to show up in DVD editions. Some are there just because they’re popular shows, some entice buyers based on the fact that their TV counterparts were shoddily animated commercials for the discs, and some… Some add the more “complete” fanservice (nipples) they always intended.
Some of you may recall my “Ecchi Deathmatch,” that lightly-perverted panty-fest of doom; still others may have noticed that it just kind of petered out. Sadly, it was just too one-sided: The Tenchi retread To Love-Ru really didn’t stand a chance against Kanokon’s onslaught of panties, handjobs, spankings, and anilingus. Even that sentence shocked me a little.
You and me both, kid. Try just not watching, it really has been great.
So in the name of faux journalism (boobs), showing my dedication to everyone out there, I grabbed a couple DVD versions of To Love-Ru’s first couple episodes, hoping that it might be able to redeem itself at least in the “tee-hee, boobies” department.
What’s different
First thing you’ll notice is the widescreen (boobs). If you’ve been following the TV episodes (which I stopped doing quite a ways back), those are 4:3. That can’t hurt.
Well, it could, I guess — because now there’s more TLR to see.
And how. The real reason for bringing out a shitty show like this to DVD is to make real cash showing the nipples you couldn’t get onto the TV. TLR did a “great” job utilizing the rays of the sun and shower steam, along with “creatively placed” soap foam and lens flares, to obscure the tits and ass naughty bits. This allowed for more nudity than Kanokon, but in essence provided more coverage. Example? In Kanokon, there were Chizuru’s heart-shaped pasties. Those things looked like nipples, and while Lala may have actually been nude in the corresponding episode, it’s obvious whose viewers got the better jugs deal.
So now, we get those same nipples, in those same scenes, neither obscured nor encumbered by anything other than their own horrid art quality. And, actually, there’s still a lot of fog and sunbeams, too, now that you mention it. So, you deserve a cookie for actually spotting the nipples. Well, I’m so pleased. Fucking banzai.
No really. Own peril. But the cookie awaits.
What’s exactly the same
To Love-Ru’s first couple episodes are just as mind-numbingly stupid the second or third time around as the first. Everything you’ve ever hated about a fanservice-laden quasi-harem show — the failed confessions by a wet blanket lead, the bad slapstick, the clichéd faceplants into crotches and the Nude Misunderstandings — these are TLR’s stock in trade.
No, not another crotch-plant! No, not another weak-ass harem lead! No, not — you get the idea.
The OP is still the hottest and most stylish (and thus, least characteristic) part of the series, no change there. But, what am I trying to say…
Basically, the show still sucks.
That makes one of us.
What you might have missed before
- Nipples. I think this is obvious.
- Haruna’s name is apparently spelled with “Spring and Canola.” Canola’s other name in English is rape, which will of course prove more relevant in a few episodes when the tentacle beasts start showing up.
- For at least a billion episodes, the only naked character is Lala, so if you’re in it for the fanservice, I hope you like her. That’s probably why she’s so generically appealing: cute face, pink hair, bold personality mixed with naïvete (stacked).
- Chichi means “father,” as in, that guy you call otou-san. It also means “boobs.” I’ve heard that Japanese is highly context-dependent, but I seriously do not understand this.
The tit-tacular conclusion
In spite of the fact that we often tout our animated entertainment as not being kids’ stuff, that applies to some anime and not others. 3×3 Eyes, for instance, will never be for kids, nor will Kaiba. But the whole fanservice thing really makes me think of a pre-pubescent, immature view on sex. In most cases, panties are the end goal, and in this particular case, it’s a few short seconds of nipples. Sex is something that never gets past the too-embarrassed-to-talk-about-it stage. Remember the nipples in School Days? No, you don’t, because there weren’t any. Instead, sex.
I suppose this could probably be chalked up to a target audience of immature Japanese otaku, or just plain cultural differences. But to me it seems more like Kids’ Stuff than say, Cardcaptor Sakura, which I can still pop in and enjoy to this day. But just watching these first couple episodes again turned me into a 12-year-old.
mmmhhhmmm. right. shore you do.
Tits.
