Tokyo Revengers First Impressions

Spoiler Alert

This blog will contain spoilers for Tokyo Revengers (東京卍リベンジャーズ)

Controversy

Tokyo Revengers is a well-respected manga. It appears in Weekly Shounen, a magazine which is usually a different tone than Weekly Shounen Jump. An interesting note here is the manga title includes the manji symbol, since the gang at the center of the story is named “Tokyo Manji,” and the symbol was confused with the swastika symbol. The manji symbol is actually a holy symbol thousands of years old and represents good luck and prosperity. You see it appear sometimes in other anime and manga like in Bleach on Ichigo’s weapon in the Full Bringer arc. Although the manji symbols means well, there is a protest for the symbol to be removed from Japanese maps and other place of its culture. As a result, the manji symbol has officially been removed in the Tokyo Revengers anime on Crunchyroll.

Premiere

Now, as for Tokyo Revengers the anime, currently 18 episodes at the time of this blog, we will be discussing the beginning of the story and episode 1. The production is by Lidenfilms and the adaptation is straight from the manga with minimal to no changes, aside from the manji symbol mentioned above. And although the animation is not going to blow you away, it does not need to. As long as it is standard and consistent, the writing carries the series. This is proven off the bat in episode 1.

This looked like a classic time-travel scenario, but the implementation is exceptional. There’s subtleness in terms of the characterization, and what could be casual scenes are well-played and quite impactful. The protagonist, Hanagaki Takemichia, is a 26 year-old loser who was depressed as hell with his life.

He heard on the news that the only girlfriend he had which was back in middle school was murdered in a gang incident.

Following, we get the idea of how unfulfilling Takemichi’s present life is with the cheap apartment and its people, lousy job, no social life, and no ambitions.

The First Time Leap

The story takes a turn when we first see him approaching a subway line, but then was pushed.

However, instead of dying, he found him flashing back to July 4, 2005, 12 years in the past, second year of middle school. For Takemichi, this time was the peak of his life.

Now, the middle-school sequences are the best part of the episode, and they circled around the idea not that youth is wasted on the young, but that experience is wasted on the old. “If I knew then what I know now,” way of thinking, I’m sure we have all had similar thoughts. The moment when Takemichi sees a glimpse of his 14-year-old self in the mirror, he was shocked at how this was happening.

Where it all Began

Takemichi jumping back to this point was clearly no coincidence, but he figured this was just a reflection of his life when things started to go badly for him and his friends. His own gang of second-year delinquents goes looking for trouble at a big city school in Shibuya runs into the promising potential members of the Tokyo Manji gang.

They get beaten to a pulp and essentially get taken into slavery.

Takemichi felt this flashback was simply just showing how pathetic his life was before he died in front of the train in present time.

He thought of it as his life flashing before his eyes.

Although, this flashback trip also allowed Takemichi to see the lost love of his life, Tachibana Hinata one more time. The same woman who he heard die on the news due to an incident with a gang.

Takemichi went to her apartment and was in tears when he saw her alive in the past, knowing she would die in the future.

Hinata was confused but consoled Takemichi and we can see their love and adoration for each other is strong.

Takemichi is overwhelmed with all the feelings he had for Hinata rushing back to him.

The Promise

This flashback also gave Takemichi a chance to meet with Hinata’s younger brother Naoto as he was being bullied in the park.

Takemichi stood up to these bullies, something he would have not done if he didn’t have this out of world experience of flashing back in time into his 14-year-old self.

This scene stood out as the key one in the debut episode. Other than being very genuine, with Takemichi telling Naoto, “You can call me Takemichi” and Naoto replying, “I won’t, but thanks.” Takemichi spoke to him about Hinata, and out of utter desperation to save her in the future, he told Naoto about the time leap he’s experiencing.

Takemichi asked Naoto to promise him that he will save himself and his sister from their impending fate, 12 years later. He told him to remember the date of 4 July 2017.

As they shook hands, Takemichi is suddenly taken back to 2017, to his present.

He found himself on a hospital bed and asked a cop about how he was saved. The cop pointed out to a person in a grey suit.

The man in the grey suit introduced himself as Naoto Tachibana. Naoto revealed that he is alive only because of Takemichi’s warning in the past. He studied hard and became a detective, and also saved Takemichi. However, Naoto was still unable to save his sister, and clearly sets into motion the still-unexplained events which drive the story. This is how the premiere of Tokyo Revengers ended.

Overall, time travel is a premise seen many times, and this is a big reminder of Erased. Tokyo Revengers has a very pure, raw plot, and the pace is well balanced. Episode 1 gave an insight into the protagonist and his feelings. He was not made a hero of justice until he remembered his past. The story of Takemichi feels relatable, for we have all run away from things, good or bad, and eventually forgotten about them. Events in this episode occur in disciplined order, giving the viewers enough time and space to understand what is happening. This is not just a story of delinquents fighting, but of a person wanting to redo everything to save one person. Despite the simplicity, Tokyo Revengers Episode 1 and more will keep you on your toes.

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