To LOVE-Ru – 02

「婚約解消！？」 (Konyaku Kaishou!?)
“Engagement Cancellation!?”

As the episode title suggests, this week we find Rito desperately trying to annul the marriage engagement that he unintentionally made with Lala when he groped her breasts. As Zastin explains, on their home world Deviluke (デビルーク星), this is the “traditional way” to propose. Since Lala accepted Rito’s “proposal”, an official engagement was made.

Needless to say, Rito’s in complete shock when he hears this, but before he can say it’s all a misunderstanding, Zastin interrupts and strongly discourages Rito (sword at head and all) from suggesting that he touched the breasts of a girl he doesn’t even like. Zastin goes on to “persuade” Rito that this wasn’t an accidental proposal to a princess by telling him that if the king of Deviluke caught wind of it, this whole incident would probably lead to the destruction of Earth. (…quite a pinch Rito’s in.) Lala reassures Zastin that Rito isn’t that irresponsible (*cough*), to which Zastin says that marrying Lala means becoming the successor of the Deviluke royal family, whose king governs a galaxy of planets. This isn’t a role fit for a weak person, so Zastin calmly tells Rito to get a grip and be reliable.

At school, Rito tries to clear things up with Haruna, but can’t do so because she seems to be avoiding him. Lala later shows up at school in search of Rito and declares to a crowd of gawking guys that she’s Rito’s bride. To make things worse, Lala inadvertently angers the jealous crowd further when she mentions that Rito and her were “together” last night. This results in all the guys, including Rito’s friend Surayama, going after Rito’s head. At the end of a frantic chase, Rito and Lala manage to get away from the angry mob by teleporting (minus their clothes) into the girls locker room where Haruna just so happened to be. (Ah, nothing seems to be going right for our poor Rito.)

Back at home, Zastin has introduced himself and explained everything to Mikan, who seems to be totally fine with the whole alien marriage thing. Rito then pulls Zastin aside for an explanation on how one would cancel an engagement. (Figuratively-speaking of course, so Zastin doesn’t try to kill him.) He finds out that there’s a “Cooling Off” period valid up to 3 days after, during which an engagement can be annulled the same way it was formed (i.e. groping). (Zastin compares this to returning mail-ordered goods you don’t want, which the girls out there (all 2 of you) probably don’t appreciate. D:)

This results in Rito trying to grope Lala’s breasts for the rest of the day and the next, but failing to do so due to many inconvenient interruptions. With an hour left in the Cooling Off period, Rito finally finds himself alone with Lala, but is engrossed in her talk about running from home and her gratitude for listening/believing in her when no one else would. Reminded of Haruna, Rito begins to tell Lala that he wants to break it off, but the Cooling Off deadline expires right after. Poor Rito passes out in shock.

The next day at school, Rito relishes in the fact that school is the only place left he can rest, at which point he finds out that Lala just transferred into his class.

 

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

Well, this episode pretty much filled in all the background info on Lala’s status, Deviluke, and their marriage customs. I can only imagine what their planet is like when everyone is rushing to get married. o_O Comedy-wise, I did find Zastin’s pressuring of Rito to take responsibility pretty hilarious. For that, I’ll have to give credit to Koyasu Takehito‘s ability to completely flip between a murderous intent voice and a lighthearted one. In a way, it reminded me of his portrayal of Mu La Flaga in Gundam SEED, but mixed in with some Pesshe from Bleach.

It was also pretty humorous to see Rito determined to grab Lala’s breasts with no ill-intentions in mind. In that regard, I find it pretty ironic I how it’s so difficult for a character to do so when they try, but so easy to do so when they don’t mean to. This should probably be filed as a corollary to the “Law of Inverse Attraction” in anime. >_>

After a couple of episodes, I have to say that I have no qualms with Watanabe Akeno’s portrayal of a male lead. In fact, I find that she actually does a pretty good job of it. I might be a bit biased here since I’m already accustomed to her playing Al in the ARIA franchise, but regardless, she really makes Rito’s outbursts fun to listen to (…at least for me).

Finally, while I didn’t mention it above, Haruna dwells on the fact that Rito’s confession might have been for her, but tells herself that it probably wasn’t. Evidently, Haruna does have some interest in Rito. In the preview of the next episode, titled “Love Triangle”, we catch a glimpse of Haruna tugging at Rito’s sleeve, so I’m interested to see what brought that about. Personally, I’m looking forward to seeing more interactions with Haruna, so I hope she gets some more screen time soon.

 

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)
– Zastin (ザスティン) / Koyasu Takehito (子安 武人)
– Saruyama (猿山) / Yoshino Hiroyuki (吉野 裕行)
– Peke (ペケ) / Arai Satomi (新井 里美)
– Yuuki Mikan (結城 美柑) / Hanazawa Kana (花澤 香菜)
– Honekawa-sensei (骨川先生) / Asou Tomohisa (麻生 智久)
– Buwartz (ブワッツ) / Matsuo Daisuke (松尾 大亮)
– Mauru (マウル) / Konno Jun (金野 潤)
– Student (生徒) / Nishina Youhei (仁科 洋平)
– Student (生徒) / Oosaka Chikara (逢坂 力)
– Student (生徒) / Nishino Youko (西野 陽子)