「三角関係」 (Sankaku Kankei)
“Love Triangle”

Episode at a Glance:
With Lala officially transferred to his school, Rito’s easygoing school life comes to an end as he tries to prevent her alien identity from being exposed. During an outing with Lala and Mikan, the three get caught up in an incident when Peke’s power wears down and Lala’s clothes start disappearing. Rito and the others eventually run into Haruna and they all decide to check out the newly opened aquarium. There, Lala gets caught up in some wacky antics, which interrupt Rito’s perfect chance to confess to Haruna. Despite being unable to confess, Rito feels that he’s finally grown closer to Haruna, who evidently likes him in return. Unfortunately for him though, the very next day he trips and lands face first into her chest.

 

Next Episode:
「宇宙のLOVEエプロン」 (Uchuu no LOVE Epuron)
“The Universe’s Apron of Love”

PRECAUTION: If To LOVE-Ru is not the kind of show you enjoy, you need not read on. To the rest of you who enjoy an ecchi romance comedy for some laughs, please read on for some interesting relationship developments this week.

The main scene of interest for me this episode was the one we saw in the preview last time. As it turns out, Haruna was about to use this opportunity to confess her feelings to Rito. Now my original thought when I started watching To LOVE-Ru was that neither Rito nor Haruna would try to confess until near the end of the series (much like most romance comedies, let alone ecchi ones), so it was refreshing to see both characters show every indication of doing so early on. They were ultimately interrupted though, but I’m sure everyone saw that coming.

To me, all the ecchi-ness of this episode really took a backseat to the Rito x Haruna stuff, so if you’re like me and are watching more for the relationship aspect, you should be pleased to know that Rito’s not quite like the typical, spineless male protagonist you would expect from these kind of shows. In fact, he was smart enough to sense Haruna’s confession and try to do the “manly” thing by confessing first.

The other interesting thing I noticed this episode is how “relationship smart” Mikan is. Rito and Haruna were only able to get some time alone after Mikan sensed the mood. From that, I get the feeling she’s going to play a more prominent matchmaker role down the road. As for the ecchi comedy in this episode, it pretty much speaks for itself, so I don’t intend on elaborating about it here.

I stated back in my introduction post that romance comedies are one of my favorite genres. Although you may not believe me, the main reason I watch fan-service type shows like this is because they revolve around well… comedic relationships. To me, the ecchi touch is just a stylistic thing, which only means that the fan-service shots will be more abundant. Despite that, the main focus of these shows is still the relationships, much like this episode has shown us. While I’m sure there are people who watch this genre just for the perverted stuff, I’m fairly confident that there are others who see these shows as more than that.

In any case, Haruna’s character is quickly growing on me and I look forward to seeing what’s happening here next episode.

 

Cast:
– Yuuki Rito (結城 梨斗) / Watanabe Akeno (渡辺 明乃)
– Lala Satalin Deviluke (ララ・サタリン・デビルーク) / Tomatsu Haruka (戸松 遥)
– Sairenji Haruna (西連寺 春菜) / Yahagi Sayuri (矢作 紗友里)
– Yuuki Mikan (結城 美柑) / Hanazawa Kana (花澤 香菜)
– Peke (ペケ) / Arai Satomi (新井 里美)
– Momioka Risa (籾岡 里紗) / Yuzuki Ryouka (柚木 涼香)
– Sawada Mio (沢田 未央) / Chiba Chiemi (千葉 千恵巳)
– Fish breeding staff (飼育係) / Inada Tetsu (稲田 徹)
– High school principal (校長先生) / Ogata Kenichi (緒方 賢一)
– Arts teacher (美術教師) / Konno Jun (金野 潤)
– Catcher (キャッチャー) / Adzuma Masataka (我妻 正崇)
– Umpire (アンパイア) / Densaka Tsutomu (伝坂 勉)
– Couple man (カップル男) / Matsuo Daisuke (松尾 大亮)
– Couple woman (カップル女) / Sasaki Hinako (佐々木 日菜子)

47 Comments

  1. True, Kanokon does it better … heck the manga at least was not trying to do be “serious” (I given up on this without even finishing the first episode) and simply gone down the ecchi comedy route makes it far more worthy to see that this.

    Drakron
  2. > i like this show better when it was called URUSEI YATSURA

    I think this is actually why I like Toloveru–it reminds me of UY in a good way.

    Great write-up though, Divine–I like the short episode at a glance summary, short and to the point.

    suguru
  3. Well I’m rather skeptic about this at first. But, then I try to read the manga again and it
    was hilarious. I don’t think I’ll watch the anime though. But, who knows?

    ramiel_salbazier
  4. Yeah, I’m not too much of a fan of this show…but I think divine has done an excellent job on the blogs. The format and episode details are very thorough, and your opinions are definitely well-based. I’m glad you jumped on to RandC!!

    KicktheShinn
  5. I almost dropped this after episode 2 …. perhaps we’ll actually give it the usual 3 episode probation. I can get my plotless wacky hijinks elsewhere but if there’s a bit of story…

    vexx
  6. can anyone say wtf to this? lol
    https://randomc.net/image/To%20LOVE-Ru/To%20LOVE-Ru%20-%2003%20-%20Large%2003.jpg

    I’m sorry but that is the most perverted alien on a unicycle sketch I have EVER scene, and I’m not even trying to be sick about it either… I don’t know if it was intentionally supposed to look THAT wrong but goddamn it really does, and I’m sorry for any little kids reading this, so if you’re lost by what I’m talking about, then you’re better off…

    IfOnlyYouKnew
  7. “I stated back in my introduction post that romance comedies are one of my favorite genres. Although you may not believe me, the main reason I watch fan-service type shows like this is because they revolve around well… comedic relationships. To me, the ecchi touch is just a stylistic thing,”

    I believe its the same reason why i watch ecchi 😛

    Looks likes a good episode.

    teutates
  8. we had Steel Angel Kurumi and Rizelmine all those years ago… now we got ‘ToRabuRu’ [Trouble]

    in the absence of Haruhi-party , Negi-party or Konata-party , we need all the m.o.e available for download… so Rito+Haruna really turned up at a good time. [plus1 we have Toshokan Sensou and Druaga no To, plus2 most of Haruhi-Raki*Suta cast members are on Macross F]

    ‘least me not doing fansubs anymore… phew, the load would kill me.

    tonbo
  9. Okay I finally watched some of it already,and its not that bad.I actually think its getting back on its feet after that horrible second episode where 90% of the episode was made up, anime original, storyline(which means its utter non-sense).I’ve been following the manga closely and I can say that I love this way more than Kanokon even while I was reading the manga.I think the main problem here its the time constraints.Episode 2 was supposed to reinforce Lala & Rito’s relationship but they chose the easy fanservice route.But in episode 3 they mannaged to cover up to chapter 10.And AGAIN they skipped alot of Rito’s character development,Haruna’s character development,and Lala’s character development.Its only reprive is that the studio apparently dropped the “making up stuff” plan in favor of the actual story but is still making fanservice its main theme.

  10. Good show, very good post Divine. You see this show in the right prospective, (although I can also enjoy the ecchi and comedy besides the romance) and you are now one of my favorite bloggers.
    Please ignore all the tasteless faggots above me. Funny how they find this show to be suck yet they worship shows garblob action shows like Soul Eater.

    Leviathan
  11. I don’t quite believe that anyone has the right to criticise a blogger because of what he/she loves to do it. Hey, maybe that’s why LOTS of bloggers have been leaving R.C. Because of a selected group of ‘delightful’ people.

    Anyway, I thought this is pretty refreshing (your take on such shows, that is) although personally I don’t find To-Love-Ru an excellent show. It still has it’s good points and flaws like every other show, just which one is more noticeable to the discerning viewer. While I’m glad for a positive take from you, maybe a little bit of opinion on the negative side as well, such as which points you don’t seem to find acceptable in your way?

    Thanks for blogging this show. 🙂

    Owaranai Destiny
  12. It’s a BLOG, it’s opinionated, that’s what it is. Don’t like it? leave. I’m still amazed at the level of hate this series generated ever since that review by Patrik, and *4channewfagotitis* seems to be contagious nowadays, as seen on some comments here.

    Keep it up divine, and don’t let those attention whores/trolls bog you down.

    Shinn Agami
  13. One problem with the anime is they’re going with more fanservice than the manga, and taking out some of the other developments… but it’s still better than Rosario and Patsu was. We need Ren-chan to show up soon, in order to kick things up a bit.

    Haesslich
  14. This takes me back to when I first started reading the manga.

    Indeed, these developments that happened in the beginning of the story were very interesting, and added a lot to the plot. The relationships between all the characters progress at a tolerable pace compared to a lot of other shows and that’s one of the things that separates ToLoveRu from other ecchi-romance-comedies.

    I stopped reading the manga around chapter 50, but at that point the i felt that the fanservice had become a bit formulaic, so that’s just something to watch out for.

    vedasisme
  15. vedasisme – Well, after about Chapter 60 or so they toss in a few new characters, so we get some development again, including Yami starting to actually relate to other people. It’s better than Kanokon at least, where the fanservice is on the far edge of ‘WTF’ and ‘So this is what the Kodomo no Jikan people didn’t want to write’…

    Haesslich
  16. @Haesslich:
    Speaking of Kodomo no Jikan, I actually really enjoyed that series. It touched on a lot of very “real” issues in life, so it wasn’t just all pedophilic comedy.

    divine
  17. I think this show is a lot better in compare with Kanokon :/ It’s suitable for a lot more of people who want some “decent” shows. For you who prefer Kanokon, true hentai may suit your taste better 🙂

    CuHoHipHop@ACVN

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