Trouble 125 – Planet Mistletoe
Continuing with the current story arc, it carries on with the setting up of the story, but at least it furthers it. The cast of Yami, the Deviluke sisters and Rito head off to Planet Mistletoe in search of the cure for Celine. Gets a whole lot more interesting at the end where we find out that the mist around the planet wrecks havoc with machines, which means that the strongest character… is not the strongest anymore (as Yami’s power is based on nano-machines). That’s not all; it ends with Rito and Lala being separated from the party and falling from high up… and Lala also losing her super strength. Intriguing…
Trouble 126 – In the Fog…
In this chapter we see that Rito and Lala had survived the long fall, and are on their own. They start to make their way back to the party. On the other hand, the rest are now facing the dangers of the planet, and we see how awesome a fighter Yami really is, as she still packs quite a punch even without her ‘trans’. It’s a fairly interesting chapter with a bit of action and good moments, Momo seems to begin appearing a bit evil, so I suspect that she might get really powerful when she gets angry. The ending shows a shadow following Lala and Rito, so I’m curious to see how well they fair when they don't have any power advantages.
Trouble 127 – Germination
Momo shows some of her powers here, although it’s more like the powers of deception (a bit disappointing really). The latter part then focuses of Lala and Rito and they have some sweet moments together, so that was quite nice, a few funny moments too. Chapter ends on another good note (gee, the chapters in this story arc all end with something dramatic making you want to read the next chapter) with a plant monster attacking Rito and Lala and back on Earth, Celine crying out and seemingly in pain.
Trouble 128 – Flower Petal Princess
The cure for Celine is a berry from a rare plant (that can walk), it’s a bit… err… coincidental and contrived on how they found it in the chapter, but then again… most of this manga has been contrived. In terms of story flow, it isn’t quite as good as the previous ones. They managed to find the cure and return back to Earth but seems like they were too late as Celine had dried out and probably dead.
I have to say, when I read the ending of this chapter I had a major “WTF” moment, I was just thinking that over and over, it’s something surprising, I’ll give it that but… yeah… anyway Celine ‘reincarnates’ (I use this term loosely) into a form that resembles a human toddler.
Trouble 129 – Pollen Telepathy
A bit of a random chapter, not that great, as the story feels quite forced. It’s about Celine and how she gets drunk from drinking cola, but yeah… not a good chapter…
Trouble 130 – For Whom the Bell Tolls
A chapter focused during the Christmas time, and how Rito really cares for his sister. I loved the ending where Rito’s mum even questions if Celine was Rito’s daughter, that was hilarious.
Trouble 131 – The Rebellious Queen
Saki runs away from home, pretty boring, the story is not that interesting. It was a bit weird with Celine trying to get milk from Saki though… errr, that’s something I didn't need to see.
Trouble 132 – The Return of the Queen
Finishing the story started last chapter, we get to see the ending, hooray and all that, thought it was boring.
Trouble 133 – A Hair-Raising New Year’s Party (or Trouble Game)
You might recognise the slightly familiar title, to the Trouble Quest story arcs, and it is kinda similar in that the cast gets transported into a game. The story is not as good but I thought it was still fun to read, there were some great moments, a lot of little jokes (nothing too major to make you laugh hard or anything like that) but worth reading, especially to find out what’s going to happen later…
Overall
A decent volume, a few big shockers in the direction of the story and cast (something we hadn’t had for pretty much most of the series). That said, still a fair bit of boring filler type chapters that adds nothing to the charm of To Love-Ru.
