No question about it – as I’ve said before, that first really great premiere (of a non-sequel, that is) of the season is an exciting occasion.  Some seasons go by and it never comes – more so than used to be the case as anime’s overall sea level of quality lowers inexorably.  It’s all the more true this spring because for me there’s only one sequel I’m legitimately excited about (Major 2nd), so any chance of the season being decent comes from unknown propositions.  And so far, all of those unknowns have landed squarely in the murky middle of maybes.  Until this one, that is.

I had fairly decent expectations for Yesterday o Utatte (as did you – it placed second in the preview poll), an adaptation of a seinen manga (which I haven’t read) by Toume Kei.  It was in my preview’s “Mid-table” tier, and on the sleeper list as well.  But I’ve had a creeping sense that something special was really possible here as we learned more about the adaptation.  The episode count (18 – still too few, but indicating the staff had a plan in mind), the staff list, the eye-catching previews.  You don’t want to jinx things so I left it as it was, but I almost let myself believe this show was more than a shot in the dark.

The previews were very distinctive, and they led you to peruse the credits more closely.  Director Fujiwara Yoshiyuki is not a huge name but clearly talented, but the real eye-openers were the names below his – Taniguchi Junichirou and Yoshikawa Maho as co-animation directors, and Studio Easter veteran Usami Tetsuya as art director.  It’s clear Doga Kobo is taking this one seriously, and they somehow managed to get a production committee to agree to 18 episodes.  That’s still not enough for a full adaptation of an 11-volume manga, but as I said, it shows they have a specific plan in mind – and gives them a fighting chance to achieve it.

Now of course, one episode does not a great series make.  But it does make a great premiere, and this was a great premiere.  I love the gently impressionistic urban (include green pockets of nature) backdrops, the nuanced facial expressions, the distinctive body language each character unconsciously brings to a conversation.  Yesterday o Utatte doesn’t look like any other series out there, mainly because it’s not trying to and has a group of individuals working on it who bring a strong personal style to the project.

Yesterday is also unconventional in being a slow-paced look at young adults dealing with the little dramas that are in fact the big dramas of our lives.  Uozomi Rikuo (Kobayashi Chikahiro) is a recent college grad who works part-time at a konbini after basically having punted on finding a “real” job after college.  He’s in love with ex-classmate and now high school teacher Morinome Shinako (Hanazawa Kana, refreshingly restrained), who’d moved to Kanazawa but is now back in Tokyo.  One of her ex-students, dropout Nonaka Haru (Miyamoto Yume) – who walks around with a crow on her shoulder – has been in love with Rikuo since a chance meeting on a snowy day five years earlier, one that he’s totally forgotten.

There are several others in the periphery of the story so far, including Rikuo’s musician co-worker Kinoshita (Suzuki Tatsuhisa), a punk rocker who asks amateur photog Rikuo to snap a cover photo for his amateur band’s CD.  But it’s that main trio the premiere revolves around, and they’re all immediately arresting presences.  Morinome-san is the biggest mystery so far, but it seems she doesn’t share Rikuo’s romantic interest – just as he doesn’t share Haru’s.  She’s a bit much to take at first with her self-aware eccentricity, which feels very put-on.  But then you realize, that’s exactly the point – the eccentricities she defines herself by are ones a teenagers would, and stamp her as being at a demonstrably different place in her life than the other two.

Yesterday o Utatte’s depiction of Rikuo is likewise very on-point, and really at the core of the story.  He does indeed set his expectations for himself exceedingly low because that way he can never let himself down, but at the same time, there’s an honesty in the way he (and Haru) don’t want to be generic cogs in a system.  In Japan, that’s a very hard thing to do – and when a society is constantly judging you, it’s difficult not to start judging yourself.  But changing who we are is not so simple as declaring yourself a changed man, saying “Make it so” and hopping on your bike.  And in the final analysis, that’s probably for the best.  It would suck to be that simple an existence.

If this were a different sort of series, I might be noting the fact the ingredients seem to be in place for a conventional unrequited love triangle.  But I’ll be very surprised if Yesterday goes in that direction.  Like its visual palette, emotionally speaking this seems like the sort of series that paints in shadings rather than primary colors.  And it’s exciting to think that so much possibility was teased out of just one episode.  It’s enough to give me confidence that the team behind this show can do wonders with 18 to play with.

OP: “Kago no Naka ni Tori” (A Bird in a Cage) by yourness