So I’ve noticed the terms “Tsundere” and “Yandere” floating around on various anime sites, and I started wondering, what’s the difference? Not to worry, gentle readers, I have tirelessly searched wikipedia over the past ten minutes to educate you!
We’ll start with Tsundere. According to the wiki article, tsundere characters begin cold and even hostile towards a person before slowly showing a warmer side. Usually this character will vehemently deny any feelings of affection for the love interest, even when it’s obvious. A little grammatical breakdown for you: The word is derived from the terms tsun tsun (ツンツン), meaning to turn away in disgust, and dere dere (デレデレ) meaning to become ‘lovey dovey’.
Some examples are Lum from Urusei Yatsura (though Rumiko Takahashi has tsundere characters in all her works)
And Naru from Love Hina
On the opposite end of the spectrum is Yandere. Yandere characters start out very loving, gentle, and caring towards their love interest, but their romantic devotion becomes mentally destructive, usually trough violence or brutality (again, thank you wikipedia). The term comes from the words yanderu (病んでる) meaning a mental or emotional illness, and deredere (でれでれ)meaning to show affection. Yandere characters are portrayed as mentally unstable, sometime downright deranged or insane, often using extreme violence and/or brutality as an outlet for their emotions.
Examples of Yandere characters are Kotonoha Katsura from School Days
And our old friend, Gasai Yuno from Mirai Nikki
Well, that’s tsundere and yandere. All that’s left is, what’s your favorite?
