Densha Otoko – 03

Short Summary:
The date between Tsuyoshi and Saori goes rather well, despite Tsuyoshi’s social ineptness. Although it ends rather uneventfully, he manages to call her the next day and set up another date. However, Saori calls him back later and asks if she can bring a friend. Tsuyoshi immediately agrees, only to realize immediately that he’s in a jam. He eventually overcomes his fears and meets her and her friend by a giant LOVE sign. Except that her friend turns out to be the woman he crashed into back in the first episode.

Tsuyoshi’s social ineptitude is just painful to watch sometimes. Of course, it is very interesting seeing him change and grow as a character, like being able to talk without stuttering (too much) to a woman. And the production crew balances it out with some rather funny scenes. During the date, Saori asks Tsuyoshi what he does in his free time, to which after some thought, he replies that he surfs (the net), but she interprets this as surfing (waves). They’re apparently going to take this pretty far, as we see him practicing this episode and the next episode preview shows them at the beach.
I was really cracking up in the final scene because they started to play the Imperial March when Tsuyoshi recognized Saori’s friend. When Saori showed up and they played the happy music, but then quickly went back to Imperial March when her friend entered the picture. That scene was just too funny. I’m looking forward to watching this second date next episode.
More thoughts later (maybe) when I’m not so tired (or when I’ve cleared some backlog).

Edit: Being the idiot that I am, I never noticed that I was reading his name wrong. It’s Tsuyoshi, not Takeshi.