In a world where adults don’t seem to exist, one lone spineless wimp navigates through the darkness of his past with a haphazardly explained time-leaping ability, getting entangled with a life he clearly was never ever built for. The horrific author Ken Wakui presents the trainwreck series Tokyo Revengers.

In all fairness to this writer of limited skill, the premise evokes intrigue and suspense. A 26-year-old waste of oxygen gets pushed in front of an incoming train and spontaneously leaps back 12 years into his 14-year-old body, and quickly finds out the so-called “prime of his life” was the hellhole that initially forced him away from his hometown, friends and girlfriend when a group of older kids viciously beat him and his gang and turned them into their lackeys.

As he’s trudging back home from the first of his many beatings, he realizes his girlfriend is currently alive and dashes off to see her. After a tearful “reunion” he leaves and ends up accidentally saving her brother from a group of bullies. After a short talk, he spills his guts about being from the future to his girlfriend’s little brother and after warning him of their impending deaths the two shake hands, mysteriously sending him back to the present where we discover the crybaby has been saved from certain death by an older Naoto, cue the premise of Takemichi going back in time trying to prevent Hina’s death.

In the hands of a more competent author, this could’ve been an interesting tale. We could’ve seen Takemichi slowly work his way up the crime ladder using his intellect to make up for any lack of physical might, slowly gathering information about the pending leaders of the Tokyo Manji Gang that led to Hina dying, but no, we don’t get that.
Instead, we get plot convenience and shoddy writing.
I would like to bring up five points I feel utterly decimate the premise.

1. Plot Convenience.
2. Divine intervention.
3. Plot armour
4. Plot-Induced-Stupidity
5. Takemichi

Plot convenience is used right from the jump with Naoto just happening to be into occult stuff. He even points it out himself that no one in their right mind would ever believe Takemichi’s from the future when Takemichi suggests just telling Hina her fate (which seems like a massive oversight on Naoto’s part given what we see. Hina was too blindly loyal NOT at least hear Takemchi out)

It only gets exercised more from there. Naoto just happens to know exactly which train station Takemichi was at when Akkun pushed him onto the train tracks. How? It’s not like Takemichi told him where he died, just that he was murdered. Takemichi even moved away from home to get away from his hellish life so Naoto knowing his exact location to save him is a large plot hole the series never explains.

Divine Intervention is used next when Takemichi plunges back into the past when hashing out a flawed plan with Naoto to somehow stop Mikey and Kisaki from ever meeting. He challenges his tormentor, Kiyomisa, to a fight once he saw Akkun draw a blade, remembering how his life spiralled out of control in the original unaltered timeline when he stabbed Kiyomisa to save them from their hell. Kiyomisa was going to town on Takemichi, battering him senselessly. Takemichi had no plan whatsoever. Just tried grabbing his arms while getting pummelled so divine intervention rears its ugly head, sending guess who? Yup, none other than the freaking leader of the Toman gang Mikey and his awesome sidekick Draken to bail him out from the fryer.

I’m not sure why they were there. Apparently, they wanted to shut down the fighting ring Kiyomisa was cruelly running using kids he had beaten into submission but how did they know Kiyomisa was doing that? Did someone tell on him? Why? And why show up then of all times when Takemichi is getting his stuffing knocked out?

The answer? Because the plot demanded it.

Just think how much more fun it would’ve been if instead of Mikey and Draken just happening to be around to stop Kiyomisa, Takemichi does so himself using his own wit. Instead of just grabbing his arms, he could’ve kneeled him hard on his family jewels and as soon as he kneels down to catch his breath Takemichi could rear his head back and smash it forcefully into his nostrils, toppling him over. Then he can climb on top of him and just wildly ram his forearm repeatedly into his head.

He would’ve battered him not just by being persistent but by being cunning. These are street fights and in street fights, a smaller guy can still triumph over their larger foe by using their head. This one simple change to Takemichi’s character would’ve made him a far more compelling protagonist to follow than the Walmart Naruto we ended up getting.

I would’ve been perfectly fine with Takemichi being incapable of throwing hands so long as he compensated for his lack of strength with his mind, but no, the author is so incompetent he created a character who had no weapons to combat the brutal world he was stepping into.
And because Takemichi is so unintelligent he ends up coming across as a surface-level thinker and a passive observer, made all the more aggravating with the premise. There are no do-overs when he leaps back in time. He’ll arrive and return to the past and present precisely twelve years on the dot. If a week passes in 2005, then a week would’ve also gone by in 2017. It’s a straight 1 for 1 ratio. He can’t rewind like Subaru from ReZero, so, you would imagine with such high stakes the protagonist would want to plan every meticulous detail to ensure he has the best chance of succeeding in his mission.

Apparently not.

Takemichi ends up going with the flow more often than not because he’s woefully incapable of doing anything but. He’s virtually a passenger inside his own story.
Exhibit A: The third captain of Toman’s divisions, Pah-chin, turns himself in for stabbing someone that not only viciously beat and humiliated his bestie, he also raped his bestie’s girlfriend in front of him. (It’s quite disgusting that he was guilt-tripped into turning himself in when the scumbag got exactly what was coming to him but whatever) A perfectly good plot of a Draken and Mikey feud was wasted. The Toman gang ended up being torn over Pah-chin’s arrest; with Draken’s side wanting to honour Pah-chin’s honour and Mikey’s side wanting to… buy his freedom I guess, even though that’s stupid because they’re kids and all they would accomplish is getting themselves apprehended.

Wakui knew this argument was nonsensical because he had Takemichi conveniently pass out from the severe ass-whooping Pah-chin dealt him for trying to stop him from fighting Osanai – the guy who badly hurt his friend and his friend’s girlfriend – without having a valid reason so he could cheaply fast forward time without showing Mikey and Draken’s fallout.

It's lazy writing.

The tone then hilariously inflates and deflates.

From Emma bawling her eyes over Mikey and Draken falling out.

To Takemichi’s friends laughing it off.

To Draken and Mikey visiting Takemichi at his home when he was discharged from the hospital.

To them breaking Takemichi’s stuff like they were trolling him.

All the way to Takemichi’s comedic breakdown which leads to him giving an ultra-cheesy, dramatic speech about friendship before bird poo lands on his hair, killing the erratic tension at once and ending their “feud” if there ever was one. The writing is painfully sloppy. Takemichi hardly even feels a sense of urgency throughout the whole thing as he all did upon being discharged from the hospital was build a puzzle.

Naturally, he pats himself on the back, thinking job well done, Draken’s saved, because he’s Takemichi and he was born stupid without the ability to process actual thoughts like a human being and gets caught with his pants down when his friend informs him that – surprise-surprise – Draken is still in danger because the actual root of the problem that led to his death wasn’t resolved.

Ugh. He’s so incredibly frustrating.

Even after he’s freed from the tape Kiyomisa and his gang cruelly tied him up in before going off to stab Draken by Hina, he doesn’t think to call the police! Seriously, all he would’ve to do to prevent Draken from dying is have Hina give an anonymous call to the police and tell them there’s a gang fight going down at such and such. He’s literally had an excuse for knowing this because he heard where everything was going down.

But no, the complete moron doesn’t even give Draken a heads-up that Kiyomisa was after him. Ooh, how can a main character be this incompetent? All he had to say was, “Um, Draken-kun. I overheard Kiyomisa say he wants to stab you.”

Then Draken could’ve relayed it to Mitsuya “Yo, Mitsuya. Someone has it out for me. Watch my back, yeah?”

“Sure.”

It’s not hard.

Instead, the brainless fool loses the tallest guy in the crowd (gang fights are chaotic but they’re not that chaotic and Draken is much taller than the average Japanese boy), wanders aimlessly through the clashing bodies, gets knocked down and finds Draken already bleeding out after a satisfied Kiyomisa walks past him. It's unbelievably exasperating how useless he is. Just giving Draken a warning would’ve made all the difference.

He had plenty of chances to do so. He could’ve been firmer when explaining to Mitsuya that Kiyomisa was out for Draken’s blood and that Peh-yeh was just a decoy, but no, he let Mitsuya cut him off, doesn’t warn them of the real culprit and can only find Draken already stabbed.
Thus plot armour has come into play to save this worthless main character.

With Draken barely clinging to life, Takemichi gets the bright idea to lift him onto his back and carry him piggyback-style without closing up his wound. This would’ve made Draken’s wound ten times worse if not for plot armour. Hina calls an ambulance but not the police because she’s only half smart and as they’re waiting for it to come, Kiyomisa and his crew show up to finish the job, driving plot armour and plot-induced-stupidity into overdrive to save this absolutely pathetic waste of space.

The gang silently agree to an honourable 1v1.

They don’t all pile in as soon as Takemichi begins choking Kiyomisa out.

They then don’t instantly dog-pile Takemichi and the bleeding Draken when Takemichi flukes his way to victory, using speedy footwork he’s never shown before.

And finally, they stand around and wait until after Hina and Emma have run off, called for backup meat shields and for those very backup meat shields in Takemichi’s friends to arrive and take the beating that would’ve led to their deaths.

It really stretches your suspension of disbelief.

Apparently, Wakui was in a gang in his youth. This I find utterly impossible to believe given that he showcases his blatant lack of understanding of what a gang is. Gangs aren’t honourable. Gangs aren’t prideful. They don’t care if you’re one small, fragile guy or a buff muscly guy. They’ll shamelessly dogpile you and beat you until you’re unconscious.
The fact that they didn’t do this despite literally saying they weren’t going 1v1 against him can only be described as plot armour and plot-induced stupidity.

It’s almost like having a god-awful main character that can’t throw hands and can’t strategize is a bad idea, huh? Who would’ve figured? Sure, Takemichi being stupid and weak creates a lot of tension but it’s also that inability to do anything without the plot bending over backwards to facilitate how unprepared and reckless he was is how Wakui constantly wrote himself into corners, turning what could’ve been a fun, suspense-filled mystery story into a trainwreck held together by the plot-convenience.

The characters –
Hanagaki Takemichi – Quite possibly the worst main character I’ve ever come across in all my time reading Shounen. He literally feels like Naruto stripped of everything that made him likeable save his indomitable determination and paired up with a fusion of Sakura and Hinata. Everything is so convenient for him. Mikey and Draken just happen to be there when Kiyomisa was kicking the snot out of him, he just happens to find Baji’s picture of Toman’s conception to calm Mikey’s wrath during the Bloody Halloween arc and he just happens to instantly find a younger Hakkai when he travelled back to the past in the Black Dragons arc. It’s hard to feel any sense of satisfaction in his accomplishments when he’s aided so heavily and blatantly by the plot.

Wakui tried to make a comparison between him and Mikey’s older brother, dubbed the “weak king” who still draws everyone to him with his charisma, but he threw that away in the Black Dragons arc by revealing Takemichi was always supposedly strong. (Hardly) The dodgy writing gets even dodgier when the Walmart version of Naruto charged the Black Dragons leader and repeatedly got smashed in the head several times with all the force of a sledgehammer before eventually nailing him in the ribs and bringing him to his knees.

Never mind the fact even one punch would’ve crippled him if not killed him outright. There’s a reason boxers wear headgear during a match. A lethal blow to the head can kill even a strong man let alone a weakling like Takemichi. Considering Takemichi’s been shown previously to struggle with no-name fodders (hell, a background character one-shot him in Kiyomisa’s fight club) Takemichi always being a tank is just not believable in any way.
Wakui proves what an utter buffoon he is. Because he wrote one of the most disgustingly unlikeable and incompetent main characters in Shounen history, he blatantly had to retcon his strength. All because he had no conceivable way of getting him out of the tight situations he himself put Takemichi in. He can't write for toffee.

It's also very frustrating just how immature Takemichi is. He's a 26-year-old that still acts like a whiny 7-year-old. You would expect an adult who leapt back into their 14-year-old body to at least keep a mature head on his shoulders and be the voice of reason in the hostile environments he finds himself in, but because he's allegedly suffering from PTSD he has to act like a whiny brat. (What was even the point of making him an adult if he was just going to act like a child?)

Tachibana Hinata – Just a sad husk of shounen cliches. Her character can literally be summarized as “every other female character” ever. She’s Akane Tendo, Keiko Yukimura, ChiChi, and Sakura & Hinata fused together. I said early in the review that Takemichi was the Naruto to Hina’s Sakura and Hinata and I meant that. If you’ve seen Ranma One Half, you’ve seen Akane’s personality traits in both Sakura and Hinata. Kishimoto basically took Akane’s character archetype, divided it in half and gave it to Sakura and Hinata.

Wakui then took those traits and refused them to create his generic female character. Even her name is mundane. Hinata – the most common forename in Japan – and Tachibana – the most common surname in Japan. He put the barest effort into her character and that lack of effort extended to her romance with Takemichi.

Takemichi took a beating for her one day in her adolescence when she saved a stray cat from a group of cartoonishly evil delinquents and that’s it. She’s decided she’s going to love him for the rest of her life, without ever even having a conversation with him and finding out if they’re compatible. Her interest in Takemichi is ripped straight from Hinata’s backstory in “The Last” Naruto movie (and that wasn’t exactly original either). There’s nothing of substance to her character or romance with Takemichi.

We don’t know her likes, dislikes or interests outside of Takemichi nor what her dreams for the future are. This makes it near impossible to get invested in her being saved when her character is so incredibly shallow and 2-D. I also find it wholly unbelievable that a pretty girl like her would remain single after Takemichi dumped her. Does she not have a social life outside of Takemichi? The answer is, from what we see, is no, she doesn’t. She exists solely as an extension of Takemichi’s weak character, to give him a goal and provide moral support along the way.
And that’s truly disappointing.

Tetta Kisaki – Attempts to play the Aizen role and fails miserably at it. Through Kisaki, Wakui demonstrates his total lack of understanding of how any gang functions when he has Kisaki walk into Toman as the stand-in captain of the third division. In any walk of life, there is a hierarchy and this is most evident in Japan itself. There’s absolutely no way someone new could just walk into a gang as one of the heads without anyone batting an eyelash. The members that were there longer would be rubbed the wrong way. Apparently, he made a deal with Mikey that he would get Pah-chin out of jail if he made him captain of the third division.
It's as completely moronic as it sounds. Mikey should be asking him how a child has that sort of power and influence when not even the Yakuza could pull off such a thing. It also contradicts Mikey and Draken’s feud over letting Pah-chin serve his time too. The fool Wakui can’t even keep his own story straight.

Kisaki's motivations being built around Hina feels so absurd and weird. While his crushing on her since childhood does explain why she keeps dying no matter what Takemichi does, it makes him look like an unstable crackhead, far from the enigmatic schemer Waku wanted to portray him as. You would think an apparently intelligent guy like Kisaki would be able to understand Hina fell for Takemichi not because he was a delinquent bad boy, but because he was a good-natured kid that just wanted to save a girl. This would've made more sense if either Takemichi was a delinquent badass or if Hina was a Yakuza princess. As it stands, though, making Kisaki do everything he did, from orchestrating Draken's (first) death and Baji's and being the one behind Osanai's decision to batter Pah-chin's buddy and rape his girlfriend in front of him so Pah-chin would stab him, end up in prison and vacant his position as third division captain, all to become a high ranking gangster for a normal girl that was never about that life can only be described as lunacy.

His power was inconsistent, too. At first, he was presented as a powerful delinquent that could one-shot Takemichi (not hard really) and withstand a full pelt to the head from Baji with a steel pipe. Mikey's older brother, a physically fit young man, was killed by the deranged Kazutora smashing a pipe off his head. It becomes even more apparent that Kisaki never should've survived when Wakui revealed Kisaki was always weak but got by on his intellect. Bad writing is simply bad.

Mikey and Draken - The best characters by far and the only shining lights in this trainwreck of a series. The rest of Toman also provide great support to their badassery. This series would honestly be a hundred times better if it were just about Toman through the lens of Chifuyu (who partners up with Takemichi). He actually has a stake in the gang through Baji who rescued him from a beating. Making him the main character would spare us from the awful plot device that is Hina as well as Takemichi's incessant bawling. Having a main character that can actually think and strategize would've made this series ten times more compelling. As it stands, the series was carried on the backs of Mikey and Draken, which is why my interest plummeted into the abyss as soon as Draken died the second time and Mikey was revealed to be the final villain of the series. Mikey slowly slipping into the dark side because he lost all of his loved ones one by one is a far more appealing idea than Mikey always having "darkness" inside of him. His "dark impulses" makes him look mentally ill.

In conclusion: I just don't get why people like Tokyo Revengers. It's an absolute mess that feels like it was written by an elementary schooler and has one of the most unlikeable main characters I've ever seen.

0/10