You don’t always choose who you fall in love with. When you fall in love with someone you’re not supposed to be in love with, you have a choice to make: to pursue it or forget it. After all, only you and the person you’re in love with are left with that choice. Nobody else can come in, nobody else can have a say. Even if they do, it doesn’t matter. That’s the kind of situation that Ryou Amakusa was faced with. And yet, even if it was highly unlikely, he chose to pursue it. He chose to give his everything to the person he loves, not to win her love but to simply love her. Because simply loving her made him happy. He didn’t expect anything else from her. He simply wanted to be in her life and give her his love and care.
It is no joke to say that Ryou Amakusa, the main character of KoiKimo was heavily criticized because of his behavior towards Ichika. But we want to really look at the kind of character that Ryou is and whether he is worth such claims.
The Beauty of Being Straight-forward
While the fact that Ryou kept buying gifts for Ichika even when she said she didn’t want it was definitely annoying, we think Ryou was drawn to her straightforwardness and couldn’t help it. Think about it. When we’re first introduced to Ryou, it’s clear that women eye him simply as a piece of eye candy, to be able to say that they’ve slept with a hot guy like Ryou Amakusa. Ryou is not blind to this fact either but in his loneliness, being a player is the only thing that fills the void in his heart.
Having received attention from girls from a very young age, Ryou learned soon that women flocked to him only for his looks. As an adult, Ryou has come to terms with the fact that the rule of the world is to use and be used, including humans. This is all demonstrated perfectly in the very first scene. That’s why when he meets Ichika at the station, he’s unfazed even though he found her kind. However, he is not in love with her yet because when Ryou meets Ichika again at his home, he applied the same rule that he accepted: Ichika helped him and now he needs to pay it back. That’s why he suggests many things a woman would like including giving her a kiss because that’s how women have always been around Ryou.
But this is where things change. Ichika is not a woman yet. She’s a high school girl, she doesn’t know how cruel the real world is yet. This is the conflict between Ryou and Ichika: Ryou knows how the world can be and Ichika, while smart, doesn’t have that experience yet. That’s why, when Ichika calls him creepy for asking her weird things like that, Ryou realizes how faulty his logic really is. He’s able to see that not all women are going to use him and leave him when they’re satisfied. That’s why and when Ryou falls in love with Ichika. She proved to him that there’s more to women and opened his eyes.
That’s when Ryou’s journey of redemption starts too. This journey is unfamiliar and that’s why it takes Ryou a whole 11 episodes to learn and change his ways slowly but surely. Ichika falls in love with him too for his straight-forwardness as she states in her confession.
Final Thoughts
The fundamental nature of being human is being flawed. And that’s what Ryou Amakusa is as well. We hope you enjoyed this character analysis of Ryou from Koikimo!
There’s definitely a lot more that can be analyzed about Ryou so if you would like to learn about his character, let us know in the comments below! Do you agree or disagree with this article? Is there something that you think we analyzed wrong? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!
Author: Evita Vincy
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