List of School Rumble characters
The School Rumble manga and anime series features a cast of characters designed by Jin Kobayashi. The story takes place mostly in a Japanese high school and revolves around various love triangles and polygons. The manga series is followed by a short parallel world story, School Rumble Z.
The manga alternates between several main protagonists. In the main storyline chapters, the protagonists are Tenma Tsukamoto and [|Kenji] Harima. The side chapters focus on many of the side characters from the main chapters, with most of them focusing on Yakumo Tsukamoto. While many of the chapters are gag stories, the central theme of School Rumble is relationships, mostly because of love, and as the series progresses, characters are introduced, and situations are misinterpreted. Hence the relationship web becomes more complex. Since the characters are unable to let their true feelings be known to the ones they like, tension and rivalries build.
Creation and design
Jin Kobayashi started writing the series School Rumble because he found the idea of a manga involving a delinquent falling in love interesting. Kobayashi's favorite character, Kenji Harima, is based largely on an amalgam of various friends, although he estimates "about 30%" of Harima is a reflection of himself. However, despite putting most of his personal feelings into the female characters, he stated that Ryuuhei Suga, a minor supporting character, is the most autobiographical. Most of the other characters are based on memories of former high-school classmates; As a manga author, Kobayashi also designed the cover art. Originally, the fifth volume's front cover was to feature Akira Takano, but after re-reading the volume Kobayashi concluded that since much of its plot in that volume revolves around Karen Ichijo, she should be on the cover instead. Desiring to feature a male character, he placed Harima on the cover of volume six.An anime adaptation of the series was never envisaged by Kobayashi, and he was skeptical of the project when first approached. Negotiations and preparation took some time, but he claims to be happy with the result. On viewing the first anime footage, Kobayashi was astonished; he recalls in an interview his emotions at the time, stating "I was incredibly touched by it. Completely overcome." Impressed with the adaptation of his work, Kobayashi allowed the voice actors who voiced his characters significant freedom to interpret them as they chose. There were a number of cast changes throughout the production; Ami Koshimizu, the voice actress for Tenma, had initially auditioned for the role of Yakumo, and between School Rumbles first and second seasons the voice actors for both Karen Ichijou and Yoko Sasakura were replaced. Mako Sakurai took over Karen's role from Yuuka Nanri, and Aya Hirano replaced Akiko Kurumado as Yoko.
Main characters
Tenma Tsukamoto
Tenma TsukamotoThe female protagonist. Short and fairly childish for her age, Tenma is often mistaken as being younger than her classmates and her younger sister Yakumo.
She does not perceive herself as particularly attractive to boys, although many of them acknowledge her cuteness. She aspires to be seen as a mature woman and endeavors to impress Karasuma through her cooking skills. One of her distinctive physical features are the little pigtails in her hair, which often wiggle if she is happy, excited and sometimes shocked. They also sag down if she is disappointed or sad. She is also slow and unreliable; she often misunderstands obvious situations. Despite her negative qualities, Tenma is good-natured, friendly, sweet, and very determined. She enjoys professional wrestling and, along with Harima, is a fan of the jidaigeki television show The Three For The Kill. Tenma also has relatively low academic scores. Both she and her sister have part-time jobs to make ends meet.
After knowing of Karasuma's disease, and even finding out that he lost all memories of her, she decided to transfer to the United States and continue her studies there in order to stay beside him. When she learns there is nothing that can be done, her life is given meaning and she decides to study medicine.
She makes her last appearance at the end of School Rumble Z comforting her sister.
According to the last Japanese poll performed by the publishers of the manga, Tenma is currently the fourth most popular character in the series.
In the anime adaptation of Natsu no Arashi!, she and Harima made a cameo appearance at the cafe as customers wearing their school uniforms.
Kenji Harima
Kenji HarimaThe male protagonist. Harima is a stubborn and paranoid ex-delinquent who is in love with Tenma who still retains some aspects of his former persona, especially riding on his motorcycle and getting into fights with other delinquents during the beginning of the series. Harima's name is occasionally mistaken for the name of another person in class 2-D, [|Harry Mackenzie], because of the similarities in pronunciation. Harima, like his crush, Tenma, is a fan of the jidaigeki television show The Three For The Kill. Harima lives with his older cousin [|Itoko], who is also Yakumo's homeroom teacher.
Harima began drawing manga as a means of escape after realizing Tenma was in love with Karasuma. In his manga, Harima inserts himself and Tenma into various storylines where the Harima-like character often defeats the Karasuma-like character and always wins the heart of the Tenma-like character. Later, he became serious about it after deciding to enter an amateur manga contest which he gets an honorable mention. Yakumo becomes his editor as she becomes the only person he trusts reading his manga. This results in misinterpretations by others, especially Tenma, who think they are dating because of Harima's desire to keep his work secret.
Harima's appearance changes throughout the series. He begins wearing sunglasses with a mustache, goatee and with his hair is pulled back with a headband, leaving an ahoge. He originally adopted this look to avoid being recognized by Tenma. The year before, he saved Tenma from a thug. However, as Tenma passed out Harima brought her back to rest at his place and when she woke up, Tenma, while grateful for the help against the thug, accused him of being a pervert. While Tenma has forgotten the incident, and his appearance fools her initially, as the series goes on she comes closer to remembering the incident. To avoid this, Harima tries to distract her when she appears to be on the verge of remembering. As the series progresses, he undergoes several changes in appearance. He has a long beard for a time, a shaved head shortly following him shaving his beard off, and because Eri was mad at him for that she shaved the top of his head, and for a time has a shaved face because Eri accidentally cut it, and upon hearing that Tenma didn't like beards he shaved it off completely. Eventually he returns to the look the series started with. He also has his own finisher attack, named 'Hurricane Kick' which parodies Kamen Rider's Rider Kick.
In the anime adaptation of Natsu no Arashi!, he and Tenma made a brief cameo appearance with no spoken lines.
Oji Karasuma
Oji KarasumaKarasuma is Tenma's love interest, depicted as an eccentric enigmatic, but distant character. Although it seems Tenma's feelings for him are unrequited, he shows true concern for her in the story on a more subtle level. His parents live in the United States; in the beginning of the story, Karasuma was supposed to move there, which caused Tenma, in a fit of despair, to write him a love scroll which he reads all the way through, but ultimately decides to ignore because Tenma had forgotten to sign it.
As the school year continues, the two get increasingly closer thanks to Tenma's own incredible determination to be with him and occasional help by Harima. Eventually, Tenma reveals her feelings to Karasuma, but before she can get a reply he contracts a rare disease which causes memory loss to both his long-term and short-term memory. In chapter 273, Far and Away, before he completely lost his memory, he saw an illusion of Tenma and confess his love to her, that he had always loved her and promised himself that looking at her is just fine because he doesn't want her to be sad, but he couldn't keep the promise of him not falling in love with her. Tenma wasn't able to hear Karasuma's confession and decided to stay in the U.S. to become a doctor to cure Karasuma and hope he can remember about her and 2-C class. At the last chapter of School Rumble, he starts to remember more about Tenma and 2-C.
Karasuma is secretly a famous manga artist, publishing his works under the pen name of Jo Nijo. Harima, who really admired his manga, discovers this while pursuing his own manga artist ambitions. When he learns that Tenma was in love with Karasuma his respect turns into hatred, until Harima reconciles with himself internally that what he wants is for Tenma to be happy.
In School Rumble Z, years have passed and he only regained some memories, but he is happy with Tenma by his side.
Eri Sawachika
Eri SawachikaFrom her introduction onwards, Eri is characterized as having a dual nature. Talented, beautiful, wealthy, and popular, she is admired and envied by her classmates for the glamorous lifestyle that many believe her to lead. In reality, however, Eri uses this image and her outward confidence to mask her inward feelings of loneliness and insecurity. Her social status makes her unapproachable to many of her classmates and leaves her somewhat isolated from her peers. Even at home, her parents are away on business more frequently than not. The process by which Eri grows and matures, as she starts to develop deeper friendships and searches for love, forms the backbone of one of the main plotlines in the story. She also develops feelings for Kenji. She usually denies it, but as the story goes on her feelings for Kenji get stronger.
Eri is the illegitimate child of a prominent English businessman. Her mother is from Kyoto. Although Eri was born in Japan, she moved to England for her early schooling before returning to Japan to attend high school. As a result, her knowledge of kanji is limited, causing her to occasionally make humorous linguistic mistakes.
Eri's most striking features are her amber eyes and long blond hair, which signify her mixed British-Japanese heritage. While she is often admired for her looks, her origin is occasionally the subject of derisive remarks, such as during the class trip to Kyoto.
Kenji's nickname for Eri is Ojo, as a somewhat mocking reference to her status. In the English dub, Kenji would call her by the name "Rich Girl." Conversely, she addresses to Kenji as Hige, even after he does away with his facial hair. In the English Dub, Eri calls him "Whiskers".