Has the Tsundere character type shifted a bit?

Perhaps fittingly, I've long been tsundere towards tsunderes. :heh:

I felt I had some understanding of them, but I couldn't honestly say that I get tsunderes. Until, perhaps, very recently. Thanks to one very special character - Love Live!'s Maki Nishikino

Before continuing, you should know that this post will contain some slight implied Love Live! and UBW spoilers.


Maki is the first tsundere that completely resonated with me, as a tsundere. In other words, I could completely get why she's a tsundere, and why "tsundere" is appealing to many anime fans. Specifically, Maki did slightly abrasive shy denialism to complete perfection. At no point did I feel like her more abrasive moments could be taken at complete face value, figuratively speaking. I say "figuratively speaking", because Maki's face never failed to betray the desires and attachments behind the moments of slight abrasiveness. :heh:

But as much as Maki resonated with me like this, I wasn't sure how much importance to give to this, since Love Live! has no major male characters of note. Maki wasn't tsundere towards a guy, so maybe she's something of an unusual case within the archetype?

But then I watched UBW, and saw much the same with Rin Tohsaka as I saw with Maki. Rin Tohsaka's interactions with Shirou resonated with me in much the same way as Maki's interactions with the rest of μ's did. In both cases, the shy denialism consistently came across well.


One thing I notice with both Rin and Maki - Very minimal violence towards the people they like (what violence Rin gets into of this nature has a practical and understandable motivation behind it). And they don't run "hot and cold" so much as they have a consistent temperament of slight abrasiveness. They're more saucy than downright nasty, you could say. They're quite different from what I'm use to seeing with the KugRie tsundere.


So this has me wondering - Are tsunderes shifting a bit? Is it now more about shy denialism and consistently slightly abrasive temperament, then violent mood swings and/or actual violence?

To be fair, I watch very little harem anime, and I'd imagine that this anime genre is where a lot of tsunderes continue to show up. So it's possible that Rin and Maki are outliers, even recently. So that's one reason why I put up this thread. I'd like to get the takes of other anime fans based on a wider range of anime.

Is what I'm seeing in Rin and Maki reflective of modern tsunderes in general? Or are modern tsunderes more KugRie-esque?

Also feel free to discuss what "tsundere" means to you. What you think are the most important elements of the character type. And which tsunderes you like the best.

Has the Tsundere character type shifted a bit?