| Well, Tenjou Tenge is, if nothing else, quite an interesting show.
Starting off with perhaps one of the dumbest opening songs I have ever had the privilege of hearing (complete with poppish boy-band-style dancing by the main characters of the show) you are thrown into what can't be designated as anything but a testosterone-laden brawlfest with a large side order of boobs. And I do mean large.
In this very beginning, we find ourselves in the company of Souichiro and Bob, two loudmouth idiots who raid a school in seek of a brawl, and find themselves on the receiving end of Maya's can of whoop-ass. At this point, you would probably be forgiven for thinking that Tenjou Tenge is nothing but a no-brainer, a double helping of male wish fulfillment.
And you would be... oh, about 30% right. But then, Tenjou Tenge is actually a bit more than its own first impression.
For a good six or seven episodes (it's been a while since I watched the first 15 or 16 episodes, so bear with me), we are basically taken on a huge rumble and introduced to the main antagonists of the show, the Enforcers. It's through them that we learn more about the various characters. For instance Maya's dead brother, killed by the head of the Enforcers, Takayanagi Mitsuomi.
It's this subplot that leads us into the first problem Tenjou Tenge has. The story about the main cast's past is quite extensive, but practically turns the last 2/3rds of the series into one gigantic flashback (with a short smoke-break in the middle). This wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing, but the problem is that the beginning of the show has already informed us of the outcome. The first part of the flashback is mostly about Maya's dead brother Shin, and how he slowly goes crazy. Again, it would have made for good drama, had it not lasted for SIX FULL EPISODES. It is, in fact, the meandering pace of the first flashback arch that eventually turned me away from the series for a long, long time. |
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