__Before reading, please take into account the following:
__
-Full spoilers and some profanity ahead.

-I did not enjoy this show.

-If anything related to kids being in gangs and the repercussions of being in one, is interesting to you, I recommend that you read The Outsiders instead. That book, while not a manga, has very well written characters and is probably the first book ever to bring me to tears at the young age of 15. To this day, it is still my number 1.

-I haven't written a review in months, so my grammar may be shit.
____

I cannot tell you why I added Tokyo Revengers to my list, but hear me out. I try hard not to judge shows by the promotional art, but this is one of those times that I wished I had walked away at the first ten seconds of the first episode. There were plenty of red flags early on for me to drop this, but I went ahead and finished it. Why? I am not sure. The whole concept of kids in gangs has always been interesting to me, mainly because of the book mentioned above. Seeing just how much of a mess a kid's life can become if they choose to go rogue, and the sad realization that they may not be able to come back from that life, is the type of show/book/movie, that I am willing to see through. Tokyo Revengers presented the idea of a good for nothing having to go back in time, to hopefully fix his life and save his ex-girlfriend from her inevitable death in the present. This, on paper, is fascinating, but the execution of it all just ends as a waste of time, and I am honestly dumbfounded as to what the fuck even went down, and disappointed in myself for sticking through with something that looked to be and ended up being a big disappointment.

There are plenty of things wrong with this series. From plot holes to terrible characters, to some of the ugliest artwork I've seen in my life, this show maybe was doomed to fail for people who have never touched the manga, such as myself. A show like Tokyo Revengers, set in what you would say the real world, with the only element of fantasy being time travel, needs to focus on world-building and on characters even more than your average isekai. You need to make people care about these characters that will have the plot revolve around them. It is insane that after 24 episodes I care about nobody cuz the only two I ended up kind of liking are dead. Characters like Takemichi and Hina, who are the plot devices for the show and who we are supposed to sympathize with, are just terrible and their mere presence in any episode was enough to make me want to punch myself. Not a single character in this show is what I would call "well written", and you could say it isn't that big of a deal right? I liked SAO even with the stupid characters and boring exposition scenes, so why is it that with this show I can't find a single thing to like? well, that is because while the appeal of SAO was a fantasy world, this whole show revolves around the very one thing that it cannot get right. Character building. Everything else falls off when this one thing is shit. The main and supporting cast are equally terrible in my book, but Hina and Takemichi are the worst for me.

The manic pixie dream girl is nothing new. I had, however, never seen anyone this fucking bad (if there is another one even worse in any other show on my list, fuck me I guess). Maybe her being called Hina meant she was doomed to be terrible if I learned anything from watching Hinata in Naruto. Early on, Hina surprised me by having the guts to slap Mikey, a gang leader, in front of his lackey. She was shaking but still stood her ground while trying to defend her boyfriend. I thought, "Hey, this girl may not be so bad." Man, did she go downhill pretty fast. The main goal in the series, at least in the anime, is to save this girl from dying in the future. If this is the objective, why does the show never give a fuck to make the audience care about her? tell me why I should give a single shit about this girl when I know NOTHING, not a single thing about her. She exists for Takemichi to save, to cheer him on one episode only to fuck off afterward for 4 more, and...yeah that is about it. She is boring, has no personality whatsoever (no, being a goody two-shoes is not one), and she brings nothing to the table besides being the main plot device. Compare Hina to say, Eiji from Banana Fish. Eiji too was the love interest of the protagonist and was his moral support. What is the difference? Isn't Eiji too a good person like Hina, and there to offer guidance to their heartbroken and tired special someone? well, Eiji wasn't just the love interest. He had a personality and dreams and aspirations of his own, he didn't solely exist to be there for Ash. He wasn't just "nice", he also was: an idiot, naive, rash, depressed, present at every single time. By making Hina not appear in many episodes, and only bringing her back to participate in mediocre comedy and 3 seconds of encouragement for the protagonist, you are not doing her any favors. I don't care about her, maybe the manga treats her better, what the fuck would I know.

Takemichi's situation is very odd. This character archetype is almost in every genre that you could think of. He works in the story that he is in, but even then it is impossible to not hate him. Takemichi is a crybaby, dumb, a good for nothing, fights with bravado alone, and a coward. This much is very obvious from his first appearance when he is watching TV while scratching his rack. Somehow, the show tried to make me care at the beginning about his ass, even though he was a delinquent looking for trouble. "If you go swinging your fist at someone, you better be prepared to be punched right back", is what god Gintoki says, and he is right. Why should I care about Takemichi getting his ass beat when he clearly is a clown getting his retribution? To boot, his motivation is flimsy, and I think this is why I just can't like him at all. Takemichi claims he loves Hina, yet he looked eager to cheat on her when Draken took him to the prostitution house. Why does Takemichi like Hina anyway? much like every single thing of interest in the show, stuff happens off-screen, and at least for me, it is very fucking hard to see any chemistry between Hina and Takemichi. Moving on from that "relationship", most of the problems surrounding Takemichi as a character, are the fault of the low production value of the show. Even with a bad character, even with the dumbest plot development, if you animate something nicely, it will have value. I would say that Takemichi's first character establishing moment was in the fight of episode 3 when he acknowledges his cowardice and finally faces his oppressor head on. This moment, however, is ruined by wonky character art, a mediocre fight scene with too many cuts, and a terrible performance by his voice actor. This scenario repeats itself throughout the whole run of the show and every time it gets a tiny bit worse. Is Takemichi a likable protagonist? No. Does he work for the series he is in? sadly yes.

If I had to say at what point this series went to the point of never return for me, it has to be when Baji was introduced by punching Takemichi. Baji leaving the gang because of an off-screen conflict is one of the worst decisions that the show could have taken. It came out of nowhere when supposedly the only internal problem was Mikey and Draken disagreeing over the member that had gotten arrested. Not a single hint or foreshadowing was given to assume or think that someone else in Mikey's gang was having issues and to suddenly show this man declaring war and leaving for a different gang, makes it seem like filler drama. Do not even get me started on how fucking convenient it is for Takemichi to find a charm that had a picture of the gang founders, that happened to be Baji's, just so that we can get exposition.

Overall, the Bloody Halloween fight just felt like a terrible "wow" factor of having shit happen just because. Add into the mix the guilt-tripping Mikey into forgiving Kazutora for killing two people, and you have a fucking disaster. While the flashback showing Baji and Kazutora breaking into Mikey's older brother's shop and then Kazutora killing him isn't bad, the aftermath is never shown and that could have greatly helped the show to finally characterize Mikey, who right now is just another terrible anime Gojou. Not only did this storyline suck ass, but it also came just like Baji leaving. At random. The show should have at least foreshadowed that a friend of Mikey's was the one at fault for the murder, but all we got was Mikey saying that his brother had passed away. Time and time again, this series tries to build suspense only for it to shit on its own story by either not showing what happened, throwing random crap in, or subjecting the audience to skits of cringe comedy. All I have left to say about that dumb Bloody Halloween is that Chifuyu and Baji's flashback should have happened when Baji was dying at his lap, not two episodes after. You have to make people care about a character while they are alive, not when they are already dead, much like in real life. Oh and Kazutora? he deserved way worse than he got. I feel disgusted just knowing that Mikey was literally forced to forgive him even though as much as Baji tried to say otherwise, Kazutora is the one at fault for both the brother and now Baji's death. Some things can't be forgiven, and some things shouldn't be forgiven. This is one of those.

I could go on and on about why I hate this show so much but in order to save my sanity, I just want to say that the finale was terrible. Maybe the whole 24 ass episodes were the prologue. Maybe the manga gets better. Maybe the manga addresses every single fucking plot hole. Who can say? not me. Takemichi and his story are both boring and as much as I want to see how this shit hole ends, something tells me this is going to be milked until it is powder so I am just never going to touch the source unless it is finished.

TLDR; terrible comedy, ugly artwork, stiff animation, mediocre OST, and half-baked characters make one of the worst shows I've had the displeasure of watching. Oh, to end this rant I just want to make a list of all the questions that I have after watching this garbage:

-Why does Naoto retain his memories but others can't?

-Does Kisaki know Takemichi can travel back in time? it looked like he was surprised to see him in the past, so maybe?

__-Is the story ever going to address the fact that Akkun told Takemichi early on that he was the one that pushed him onto the train rails? did Kisaki order him to do so? why?
__

__-If Draken is right, and Kisaki wants to get rid of everything dear to Mikey, why kill Hina? Hina is important to Takemichi, not to Mikey. Wouldn't Kisaki go after Takemichi, who is his friend, instead?
__

-Was Takemichi holding a Gucci bag in the final episode?

I probably have way more things I could bitch about but honestly, I just want to forget I even watched this at all. Good riddance.