It's not that I like you or anything! Baka!
Read the title...and if the first thing that came to your mind was tsundere, then yes, you've guessed the topic for this post.
Tsundere - (as defined by wiki) is a person who is initially cold and even hostile (tsun) towards another person before gradually showing his or her warm side (dere) over time.
In the course of watching anime, I've met many tsunderes and of course other forms of -deres (which I won't be covering in this article). Before I knew it, I've come to have a love-hate relationship with tsunderes, sometimes they add to the comedy factor of the show, while at other times they can come off as just being plain mean and abusive toward the poor male counterpart (though for some weird reason the guys seem totally fine with them getting 'hit on' literally by girls...I have no idea why...). I've asked several male friends about what the appeal of tsunderes are...and responses range from cute to scary.
Specificially for this article, I'm going to the cover the four tsunderes that are voiced by the seiyuu (voice actor) Kugimiya Rie a.k.a. the tsundere queen.
Let's start with the one that is most tsun out of the four. Introducing Louise Françoise Le Blanc de La Vallière from Zero no Tsukaima.
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| A pouting Louise |
First impressions:
Her name is really long...must be a ohimesama (princess) type.
Louise was actually the last of the four tsunderes I watched, I was hesitant to watch this anime as I heard about the massive amounts of (male) fan service scenes in the series as well as the fact that Louise loved to 'explode' her love interest, Saito with failed magic. Not to say that Saito didn't ask for it sometimes, but boy did she have a temper. Her blast of deadly misfired spells from the end of her wand, would require the male on the receiving end of this tsundere relationship not only to really really like her, but to also be a masochist.
Final impression:
At least, toward the end of the series she toned down on the tsun...or not...overall, she would be the definition of an extreme tsundere.
Moving on, we have Shana from Shakugan no Shana.
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| Shana! |
First impression:
Cold, distant and aloof...flaming sword=cool.
Shana...where do I start? She's was one of my favourite tsundere characters, she was badass and she was unsure about the whole concept of love. Which was probably why she had tsundere tendencies. Shana couldn't handle it when the one that she loves, was also somebody else's love interest. *cue in the trademark urusai* At least, the male protagonist, Yuuji, was not as dense as Saito, thus making the show much more enjoyable after the feelings were proclaimed and the action got on with it. I would say that Shana is a tsundere because of the situation she was in, where she was initially in an emotionally distant position and eventually had to contend with the trails of forming a meaningful relationship.
Final impression:
After getting her head clear of where she wanted to be with Yuuji, she was less of a tsun, and just went for the kill like the flaming haired hero she is.
Coming down from the super powers and magic, we enter into the world of Hayate no Gotoko with Sanzenin Nagi.
First impressions:
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| A casual Nagi~ |
Chibi... spoiled... and very reckless.
For Nagi I would say that she is low on the tsundere scale compared to the first two characters, after all she loves Hayate from the start and looked to him as a saviour. In this case, I find that I have a problem with Hayate's denseness, he just doesn't get it, the whole show is just about him not getting that Nagi likes him more than a butler-master relationship. But then again, the whole point of the show was to make a comedy at Hayate's general bad luck and awkward situations he gets into with the various girls in the show, so...forgiven...I guess.
Final impression:
Hayate is the cause of Nagi's tsundereness...
The final tsundere, would be Aisaka Taiga from Toradora.
First impression:
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| Another pouting tsundere...but that's what makes them cute... Right? Right? |
Whoa ho...she can fight...but she's cute.
Taiga, well, her classmates call her 'Palmtop Tiger' due to her being small in size and generally socially awkward, thus leading to her lashing out at most people she comes into contact with, except for her best friend Minori of course. Let's talk about her love interest, at first, she agreed to work with Ryuuji because they wanted to get into a relationship with each others' best friend and soon along the way they fall in love instead. For this story, I think Taiga had the same problem Shana had, which was going from zero relations to falling in love, and finally admitting that the one she loved was Ryuuji.
Final impression:
Taiga wasn't that tsun by the end of the anime and really showed her dere side, I thought Taiga and Ryuuji were a really cute couple.
So, that's a wrap for the four tsunderes voiced by the tsundere queen.
Do you like tsunderes? And who is your favourite?
Written by Neko
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