Touken Ranbu -Hanamaru- – 01

OP Sequence

OP: 「花丸◎日和！」 (Hanamaru ◎ Biyori!) by 大和守安定（CV: 市来光弘）、加州清光（CV: 増田俊樹）

「January」 (January)
“January”

Even though I thought non-touken players would have a tough time watching this show, I was pleasantly surprised. Not only was the show super fun to watch, everything about this first episode felt on-point and true to what I thought a Touken Ranbu show would be about.

Anyways, I digress. Getting back on topic, I absolutely loved everything about this first episode. Even with the significance placed on the slice-of-life side of things, I loved how this was a perfect look at what all our swordboys are doing whenever we’re not busy doing missions. Seeing the citadel in its entirety felt so damn good that it’s tough to even express the feeling with words. From the sword repair center to the side parts where you send your boys off to do remedial tasks, the nostalgia of not playing in a while hit me straight in the chest (in a good way). Not stopping there though, the show even tossed us (the viewers/players) some nods with references to Saniwa (us) and even Konnosuke (the adorable fox mascot), I nearly passed out from the euphoria of thinking how cool it would be if the game itself could integrate all of this into itself. Also, most (if not all) of the cast from the game reprised their roles in the show which was a blessing in itself (I wouldn’t have mind if the stage drama cast had done it though).

Now, for those of you who aren’t familiar with the game, I think the show did a pretty okay job at introducing all the main guys and giving you a pretty good idea of what goes on in the citadel. Essentially, Touken Ranbu’s story revolves around trying to protect history from being changed by the “History Retrograde Army” (I’ll use that translation of the group). In order to combat those terribly ugly and scary looking brutes, the spirits of all types of katanas throughout history are given form and given the duty to protect history. With that fancy golden machine of theirs, groups of up to six swords head out to various points in history to save it from being changed. Sounds like fun right?

Overall, it’s pretty tough to really talk about this show since you’ll either be a returning fan or a newcomer. As I said for this show’s preview, if you’re the former you’ll probably have a fantastic time and love every moment of it if you found the game fun. And for the latter, I think you’ll also have a great time albeit for different reasons. So long as you come into the show with a basic understanding of what’s going on (which the first episode handled pretty well) and enjoy the slice-of-life element of it all (ufotable’s fancy version is coming next year), this should rank as one of the better slice-of-lifes with a unique idea and a ton of back material you can flip through on various wikis.

In any case, I hope you enjoyed the show as much as I did! But, like I said in the preview too, my boy Kashuu is always the main character for these things so it’s like not I didn’t have anything to fear about. Luckily, with the likes of Imanotsurugi, Namazuo, and Maeda rounding out the smaller swords I like and the hope that other swords will make their cameos, you can bet I’ll be back to watch more!

 

ED Sequence

ED: 「明け暮れ日記」 (Akekure Nikki) by 大和守安定（市来光弘）、加州清光（増田俊樹）

End Card