Kimi ni Todoke 20 review; Chizu coming to terms with her disappointment.

      Well, this episode picks up with Sawako wondering if Chizu was able to give Ryuu his birthday gift. Later that night Chizu is laying in bed thinking about that very same thing when she grabs the gift and decides to head over to Ryuu’s to give him his gift. By the time Chizu arrives at Ryuu’s, Tooru has already left, and Ryuu and Chizu share some unkind words and Ryuu ends up telling Chizu to give up on his brother, and Chizu throws Ryuu’s gift at him.

       Later, at school, Sawako and Ayane both commiserate over their uselessness and their inability to be much of a help to Chizu in the current situation. Soon, Kazehaya joins Sawako and Ayane in a stairwell conversation over the whole Chizu/Ryuu/Tooru thing, and he sort of reassures them that Chizu should be alright since she has two friends that worry and care for her.

 

    When Chizu arrives in class, there’s a tension between her and Ryuu. Also, there’s a tension between Ayane, Sawako, and Chizu, but Ayane leaves Sawako a note saying to treat Chizu normally, and if she needs support they’ll be there if she needs to cry her eyes out.

        When lunch period begins, Kazehaya takes off with some of the boys leaving Ryuu and the three girls in the classroom. When Chizu takes off to buy some lunch Ryuu gets up and leaves a few seconds later leaving Ayane and Sawako to wonder if he went after Chizu. When Ryuu confronts Chizu in the stairwell he has to grab her arm to keep her from walking off. Chizu starts shouting at Ryuu drawing the attention of the other students including Sawako and Ayane. Chizu asks if Ryuu thought she needed to be rejected, yeah. Chizu tells Ryuu that she didn’t fall in love with Tooru to be disappointed and she runs off.

       Sawako and Ayane catch up with Chizu and Sawako starts balling and this leads to Chizu cutting loose. Chizu cuts loose with everything that happened, she lets it all out, and Ayane and Sawako are just kind of there for her. Chizu tells them of her anger at Ryuu, her frustration over Tooru, and that she’s most disappointed about how she threw Ryuu’s birthday gift in his face. Chizu ends up crying while Ayane and Sawako hold her, and on their way home Chizu says she feels a lot better and is ready to eat some cake. The episode ends with Ryuu placing a telephone call to his brother about Chizu.

       Well, in this episode Sawako seems to have learned another important lesson about friendship, that being, if you can’t directly help your friend, just be there for them.  Since the end of the last episode, and through most of this episode, Sawako has been agonizing about her inability to be any real help to Chizu even though Ayane tries to tell her there’s not much you can do.  Also, Kazehaya shows a remarkable amount of wisdom in this episode, and his words seem to really help Ayane and Sawako. But, it was also quite funny when he tells Sawako and Ayane that he would most likely be useless if he was in the same situation, sometimes there are no right words to help ease the pain.  In the end I guess it all worked out of the best with Sawako’s tears causing Chizu to let loose all her sadness and frustrations in the hallway. I think that Chizu letting loose of her emotions was very healthy and is the first step in her journey of coming to terms with her feelings and herself. Well, I’m looking forward to the next episode to see if Ryuu is going to manage to set something up between his older brother and Chizu that’ll help ease Chizu past this rough spot and lead to some emotional closure for her.

 

Kimi ni Todoke episode 18 review; love is tough.

         This episode begins in November with Chizu telling Sawako that she can’t wait of the New Year to arrive. Sawako tells herself that her feelings towards Kazehaya are advancing but Sawako also notices that others around her are having relationship problems. Sawako and Chizu notice that Ayane is having a problem with her boyfriend, he seems to be getting very possessive of Ayane by constantly calling her and demanding to know what she’s doing and whom she’s with. Well, Chizu asks why she’s going out with him. Ayane laments that he hit on me, and it’s always guys like him that seem the most mature in the beginning.

         Sawako also notices how alike Chizu and Ryuu are, how they even have the same aura, and she wonders if Chizu likes Ryuu.  Then the scene switches to Ryuu’s place where we hear Ryuu’s father tell Chizu that sometimes he wishes she was his daughter, and she wishes she could. Chizu casually walks in on Ryuu while he’s changing, and they hangout playing games and Chizu talks about Ryuu’s birthday. While they’re hanging out we see two things; firstly, that Ryuu has been attracted to Chizu since middle school, and secondly that Chizu gets all flushed and it’s not over Ryuu.

         The next day, after school, Chizu invites Sawako and Ayane to go shopping with her. Ayane begs off saying she has to see her boyfriend right away, so Sawako and Chizu head off to shop for Ryuu’s birthday gift. As Chizu and Sawako are leaving the school grounds they see one of Kazehaya’s friends (Jo) chase after a girl and confess to her only to be rejected in a humiliating way.

         While at the shopping center, Chizu picks out Ryuu’s gift, and the girls look at clothes. On their way home, Sawako sacks up and decides to ask Chizu if she likes anyone. Well, as Chizu tells Sawako about her unrequited love Sawako thinks its Ryuu she’s talking about but it turns out to be Ryuu’s older brother (Tooru). Chizu basically laughs off the idea of liking Ryuu in that way; she loves him like a brother and doesn’t think Ryuu knows she has the hots for his brother.

 

       Back at school, Chizu continues to show Sawako more pictures of mini-skirts wanting one by New Years. Well, Chizu drops Tooru’s name and New Years in front of Kazehaya and Ryuu causing an awkward silence.

       Then the relationship shit really hits the fan when Ayane walks into class with a bandage on her face.  Ayane tells them that she met with her boyfriend, told him her true feelings, told him she was dumping him, and he slapped her. She goes on to tell them that he told her stuff like I only have you, and she concludes that he didn’t even listen to her. She tells them it’s not like she wanted it to end this way, and Sawako thinks to herself that love is tough and comes with break ups.

        Later, Kazehaya and Ryuu talk about Chizu with Kazehaya asking Ryuu if he’s told Chizu. No, should I tell her. Yes. Then we switch scenes to the girls where Chizu says they’ll have a sleepover on Friday to help cheer up Ayane.

         That evening, Ryuu stops by Chizu’s place and enters her room, and Chizu is a little bothered when Ryuu enters her room in the same casual manner she entered his room. Ryuu sits next to her and moves in close for the confession when she hops away from him to stop him from seeing is birthday gift. Chizu then tells Ryuu to leave and hustles him out of the house leaving Ryuu to wonder WTF. As Ryuu is heading home we hear Sawako comment on how she never thought about love before, and that it must be difficult and this is because she’s fallen in love with Kazehaya. Well, that’s all for this brew of teen hormonal angst.

        Well, after resolving the Kazehaya/Sawako/Kurumi love triangle, and slowly moving Sawako’s and Kazehaya’s relationship forward, Kimi ni Todoke focuses its lens on Chizu and Ryuu. While Sawako’s and Kazehaya’s dance was one of shyness, longing glances and tentative touches, Chizu and Ryuu’s dance is more complicated and fraught with dangerous land mines.

       Chizu and Ryuu, childhood friends, as close as brother and sister, both sharing unrequited loves, Chizu loves Ryuu’s older brother and Ryuu loves Chizu. While both unrequited loves might be filled with equal longing, Chizu’s longing is for is a virtual stranger she hasn’t seen in two years, and she might find out that her love is for a shadow, a past image, a fondly remembered vision of a boy that’s now a man who might not still exist in the present. But, I feel that Ryuu’s unrequited love for Chizu is far more painful, his love sits right next to him in class, sits next to him on his bed, so close that he can feel the warmth of her body, smell her scent, so close that he can reach out and touch her hair. While Kazehaya advises Ryuu to come clean and confess his feelings to Chizu, it’s a dangerous approach that could backfire and drive Chizu away from him. I really liked how Ryuu decided to go for it and let the chips fall where they may but due to Chizu’s reaction to him almost seeing his birthday gift he was left even more confused than before, girls and women have that effect and it doesn’t get better with age.

       Also, Sawako continues to show slow but steady progress in her maturation into a normal teen aged girl. When the series began, Sawako never really noticed the subtle byplay occurring between boys and girls, but her newly awakened feelings for Kazehaya has made Sawako more aware of the world around her, and she discovers love is tough.

 

Kimi ni Todoke episode 17 review; just kiss for god’s sakes.

      This episode begins with school’s holiday starting and we watch Sawako pass her day by feeding the birds, going for a jog, picking up trash, and so forth. But, today is a special day because Ayane and Chizu are stopping by to hangout, so Sawako works on a homemade cake.

      When the doorbell rings, Sawako’s father answers the door and is a little put off by Chizu’s size and casual nature. He thinks Ayane is OK but she wears too much makeup, and has quite a few ear piercings. A few seconds later, Sawako gives Ayane and Chizu a proper introduction to her parents. After the introductions, Ayane gives Sawako’s parents some cake they brought with them and they head up to Sawako’s room.

      In Sawako’s room they share cake and coffee, and look over the pictures Ayane took at the party including some of Sawako’s and Kazehaya’s staircase moment. Ayane, not being one to beat around the bush tells Sawako to just confess her love to Kazehaya. Sawako is caught off guard and says she’s happy with things the way they are. But, Ayane tells Sawako that if she does that then they can go out as a couple. Sawako is still not convinced, and Chizu says another girl might step in and steal Kazehaya from Sawako. Eventually, the girls end up watching some horror flicks that Sawako rented.

      We switch scenes and see Kazehaya walking Maru when he runs into Ryuu near the river. As Maru and Ryuu are bonding, Kazehaya mentions all the messages Pin has been leaving on his phone. Kazehaya finally answers his phone and Pin says he needs to see Kazehaya and Sawako right now. It seems that Pin ran into Sawako at the video store, and Sawako warned Pin to take care of himself but he just ignored the advice and spent the night drinking and watching porno, and now he’s in bad shape. I think he wants Sawako to lift a curse that might have been placed on him. Ryuu tells Kazehaya that Chizu and Ayane are visiting Sawako, and doesn’t he want to see Sawako anyways.

      Back at Sawako’s place, Chizu comes downstairs and cleans up the plates and cups while talking with Sawako’s mom. She makes the observation about how Sawako inherited her features from both of her parents, and Sawako’s mom is now convinced that Ayane and Chizu are nice girls.

       Back in Sawako’s room, Ayane gets a phone call from Kazehaya about Pin, and Ayane hands the phone to Sawako. Well, everyone agrees to pay Pin a visit and see what’s up. Once they arrive at Pin’s apartment they find Pin looking like shit, and his apartment looking even worse.

       Well, Pin thinks that Sawako is going to use spiritual powers on him, but he’s just coming down with a bad cold. As Sawako begins to nurse Pin, Kazehaya gets jealous and nurses Pin. After Ayane puts Pin to sleep with a bedtime horror story, the kids clean up the Pin’s garbage dump apartment. While all this is going on Sawako admits to herself that she’s good at this and she likes to clean (hell, I wish my GF liked to clean my condo). As darkness falls, Pin wakes up feeling a lot better and sends the kids off. Before Sawako walks off, Pin pulls her aside and tells her that he knows Kazehaya’s and Ryuu’s weak spots, and he also whispers something into Sawako’s ear about Kazehaya.

       Once they reach the point where Sawako has to split off Chizu tells Kazehaya it’s dangerous so he should walk Sawako home even though Sawako’s says she won’t scare anyone. As Kazehaya, Maru, and Sawako walk quietly down the road, Sawako wants to thank him but can’t find the words. So, Sawako does what Pin told her to do, she grabs Kazehaya’s arm stopping him and she stands there with her eyes closed. Kazehaya slowly decides to take this as an invitation and moves in for a kiss, and just as he has her lips in range Sawako opens her eyes and jumps back. When Kazehaya finds out that Pin set this up, he gets angry and tells Sawako that if she does that again, he doesn’t know what will happen.

       As Sawako and Kazehaya continue their walk in silence, Sawako thinks to herself that she wants to be by his side, and Kazehaya asks Sawako to not look at him for awhile. The episode closes with Sawako thinking that that someday the day will come when she’ll want to tell Kazehaya her feelings. Well, that’s all folks.

      Well, basically we have another hanging with the friends’ episode with the only difference being that the girls hung out at Sawako’s house. At least we learned a few things about Sawako’s parents, number one being that Sawako’s father is much more traditional about how he expects girls to behave, and the second being that Sawako’s mom is more easy going and doesn’t judge on appearances.

      It was very funny watching Chizu unravel the secret of Sawako’s looks; it’s all about the genes, baby. I think the most interesting development of the whole episode is how everyone is working hard towards hooking up/advancing Sawako’s and Kazehaya’s budding relationship. Ayane tells Sawako to confess so they can start dating, Chizu tells Sawako to confess or maybe lose to another girl, Ryuu knows that Kazehaya wants to see Sawako, and even Pin in his own silly way almost got Kazehaya a taste of that sweet fruit.

       My only frustration with the progression thus far is Sawako’s inability to communicate her feelings to Kazehaya. Sawako’s come to the internal understanding that she loves Kazehaya, and wants to be near him, but she’s unable to even reach over and take his hand. I can understand Kazehaya frustration towards the end of the episode; he’s asked her out and basically confessed to her, and her response has been vague at best. Hell that young man needed to taste those lips or he’ll end up at Pin’s apartment with the two of them drowning their frustrations in booze and tissue paper.