A misleading title indeed, well not really it really did terrorize my mind but not in a negative way. It may come to a surprise, but Junjou Terrorist is my favorite pairing out of all the couples in Junjou Romantica. Eeew disgusting you may say, and I have weird tastes.
For those who aren’t caught up – Junjou Romantica is a boy’s love anime and manga that focuses on three couples and Junjou Terrorist is one of those pairings (Also if you’re curious – Yes that’s the official ship name). So, what’s disgusting? it’s just your typical Yaoi but, what if I told you their age gap is 17 years? Surprised? I know but that’s just the icing on the cake personally it’s how they overcome challenges and heavy character development that makes Junjou Terrorist one of the best couple in the series.
It's also worth to point it out that Junjou Terrorist has the least episodes out of the whole series a total of 4 episodes in a span of three seasons for your reference its as follows:
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Season 1, Episode 10
Season 1, Episode 11
Season 2, Episode 8
Season 3, Episode 4
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These are excluding episodes where all three couples are featured. I am unsure if they got more screen time in the manga but I have not yet read the manga.
Enough padding! Who are the main characters? Well I’m glad you asked reader they are Yoh Miyagi, a 35-year-old Literature professor and Shinobu Takatsuki, an 18-year-old college student.
Yoh Miyagi
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To be honest, Yoh came to me as an uninteresting character, in the early episodes personally I portrayed him more as a side character like okay he’s just one the main characters colleagues, so it really to my surprise when I knew he was also a main character. He is generally bland at first, and his character design was not that all distinctive – if you could put him on a sea of side characters and he would fit in.
He did play a major role on one of the other pairings in the series, as I mention he worked with one of the main character Hiroki Kamijou (to be specific Yoh is Hiroki’s boss). There is one episode which made me think there is something more about this character during that episode when Hiroki and his lover Nowaki is in a lovers quarrel, Yoh was comforting Hiroki and through the heat of the moment he almost kissed him only to be caught by Nowaki by the last moment and punched him.
Yoh’s backstory is an interesting one full of twist and turns (well not surprising since he’s old), during his teenage / early adulthood he was madly in love with his teacher so much that he used to visit her in the hospital and took care of her until her inevitable end, that moment where he lost the only person he loved broke him. After the teacher’s death he found it difficult to love someone again, he did marry Shinobu’s older sister Risako however after three years of marriage he divorced Risako because of she was cheating on him although her reason for cheating was she never felt that Yoh really loved her and that he’s still in love with his teacher.
Shinobu Takatsuki
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Nothing more can be said, Shinobu is a bratty young kid, but his heart is on the right place. He is somewhat a cold person always has a frown in his face. The only time he smiles is with Yoh (that’s cute though). He always forces himself to Yoh which most of the time works – don’t get me wrong he’s not manipulative but he speaks the truth from his heart. One of his best personalities is he’s always honest to himself, he would always confront Yoh about any doubts and trust he me this boy has a lot of doubts. Also, I am not sure what’s with him and Cabbages but he sure loves cooking cabbages not that he’s great at cooking (he’s not great)
The Story
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How they met was a funny coincidence or what Shinobu calls destiny. Shinobu was being mugged by two guys but was rescued by Yoh on the last minute, after that they both realize they’re both going to the same hotel and on the same room, little did they know that it was an introduction meeting Yoh is marrying Shinobu’s sister and from destiny to a crushing heartbroken, poor Shinobu devasted continued his studies in Australia.
Time skip to three years after learning about his sister’s divorce Shinobu flew back to Japan just to confess to Yoh that he loves him and its destiny. Yoh in awe and thought this was all a prank because why would a teenage kid fall in love in a old man like him but, Shinobu was really serious and wanted Yoh to take responsibility of his love.
As destiny was playing cruel fate Shinobu’s father is the Dean of the Literature department in the university in other words Yoh’s boss, he then asked Yoh if Shinobu could stay in his place for a while because ever since the divorce he has been very distant with his sister and he’s too young to stay in a hotel by himself, Yoh reluctantly agrees to this. Awkwardness fills the air for both men, Yoh tries his best to avoid the topic but Shinobu still wants Yoh to fall in love with him. One day, Yoh had enough with all this nonsense that he subdues Shinobu with the intent of breaking him – he immediately regretted his actions. Little by little Yoh’s heart opened to accept Shinobu’s love as he finally accepted Shinobu’s love before he got to his plane back to Australia (classic romantic cliché but I still love it).
Throughout their storyline a recurring issue arises as mentioned the reason Yoh and Risako got divorced is Risako felt Yoh never overcame the death of his teacher, this time Shinobu felt the same way as Yoh still keeps a picture of his teacher in his possession and Yoh did pick up on that, as he had an epiphany that he was similar to Shinobu’s situation where he was in love to someone way older than him – the conclusion to this is Yoh dragged Shinobu to visit the teacher’s grave and Yoh confesses to both the teacher’s gravestone and Shinobu that he loves him.
Another plot issue is even though they got divorced Risako gave multiple hints that she wanted to get back to Yoh however Shinobu’s reaction to this is really cute – telling his sister that he’s in a serious relationship with someone.
Thoughts
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Even though they had the least amount of episode there is a certain impact to their storyline. Those 4 episodes really did shine, no moment was wasted for nonsense filler every second is filled with heart wrenching moments and plot progression. Although I have to admit 4 episodes is not enough, they need more screentime, well this is hoping the manga has more content.
Both men when through a lot of trails accepting their age gap, confronting Yoh’s dark past, overcoming the issue with Risako and many more… In the words of Shinobu this truly is...
destiny
#Librarians_Of_Yaoi
