Toradora! Ep. 9

[SimsHsia]

Episode 9: To the Beach with You

Recap from last time:

Taiga and Ami race in a 50m freestyle swimming competition. Taiga loses to Ami, despite racing unfairly, and decides to go with Ryuuji, Minorin, and Yuusaku to Ami's villa during summer vacation.

Key plot points:

• Taiga has a dream of asking Taiga to marry him, but it ends up in a disaster when he finds out Taiga gave birth to a litter of puppies and herself being a dog. When he wakes up from this bad dream, it was a result of watching a horror movie involving the birth of a human dog. Coincidentally, Taiga has a similar dream.
  
• Ryuuji and Taiga play badminton to figure out who will support who to get closer to their love interest. Had it not been for a large dog interfering in the middle of the game, Taiga would have been supported by Ryuuji to get closer to Yuusaku.
  
• Taiga tells Ryuuji Minorin's weakness: she hates ghosts.
  
• The group have a hilarious welcoming act when Ami comes around before they board the train.
  
• They reach the villa and everyone save for Ryuuji go around and have fun at the beach. Ryuuji, well, his cleaning interest peaked upon the mentioning of the villa not being cleaned in over a year.
  
• Taiga puts the plan into action, by scaring off Minorin with paranormal recordings on her MP3 player, the sighting of a dead body, and the slight touch of a "seaweed ghost" while conversing with Ryuuji.
  
• For dinner, Ami and Taiga argue about having the curry being spicy or sweet, respectively. Ryuuji will make a plate of sweet curry for Taiga, and Ami protests that none of the girls will like him because of this. However, when Minorin requests having the curry extra spicy, he agrees.
  
• As such, everyone's curry is extra spicy to Minorin's likings who requests seconds. Everyone else endures the spiciness of the curry, with one fatality of Taiga having a stomach ache.
  
• With Taiga and Ryuuji alone with their respective love interests. Taiga is treated by Yuusaku for her stomach ache; Ryuuji outside gazing at the stars with Minorin. Ryuuji builds up the courage to ask if Minorin has a boyfriend. She does not.
  
• Before Ryuuji goes to sleep, Taiga stops by his room telling him she doesn't have a stomach ache anymore, but her stomach tells a different story of being hungry.
  
• After both finish their second meal for the night, Taiga is disappointed that she has a nervous breakdown whenever she's near Yuusaku, even though she was looking forward to spending time with him, but is fine whenever she's near Ryuuji.
  

Episode thoughts:

Wow, this episode sure was a blast. Everyone sure was wacky that it made so many laugh 'till you fall-off-your-seat scenes. The marriage proposal and litter of puppies presented by Ryuuji's mom was unexpected. The (rather embarrassing) act of Ryuuji, Yuusaku, Minorin, and Taiga before Ami and everyone else at the train station was hysterical. Taiga describing how Ami looks like naked to Ryuuji with "BOING! and BOING! and BOING~!" was hilarious. The scene where Yuusaku shows up naked with only a towel covering up himself in front of everyone, funny because of Minorin's antics.

Ami seems to have figured Ryuuji out that he likes Minori, but it seems that she's half not-caring for him and half going after him. The conversation with Ryuuji and Minorin regarding ghosts comparing to people falling in love is just a dose at how Minorin thinks. Too bad there wasn't any advancement with Taiga and Yuusaku. I guess you could call me another advocate for a Ryuuji x Minori relationship, but there's a slim possibility that it will happen which I'm sure we'll see later on this season.

Right, next episode, Fireworks. Looks like the group go into a cave, most likely it's Taiga's idea, to scare Minorin out and initiate the Prince Charming (Ryuuji) saving the distressed woman plan into action again. Summer vacation, over? Not for another episode (or three)!