First Impressions – Yesterday o Utatte

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

 

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14 comments

  1. d

    I didn’t expect much but was pleasantly surprised.
    A beacon in this somewhat dry season (as BNA spends some time on Netflix jail).

  2. Definitely best premiere episode so far for non-sequel shows. Looking forward to watch more of this.

  3. D

    the manga is quite old, but still feel fresh in execution.

  4. The cassette tape gives away that they didn’t change the setting (which I rather like, actually).

  5. L

    But what about the e-cig the geezer was smoking? Those are relatively new (post 2000) right?

  6. Well, that’s true. Maybe mixing the two was an in-joke?

  7. L

    Enjoy it while it lasts. If it’s anything like the manga, the characters will frustrate you so much the rage cells produced alone would be able to purge the brandofcrapbeervirus from your system without medication.

  8. I found it extremely dull and depressing. The manic pixie dream girl who likes crows didn’t help. Maybe it’s just not my kind of series though. So far Arte and Appareranman are my favorites this season.

  9. B

    I’m with @Bokusen, although at this point for me they are yellow flags, not red flags yet. Rikuo’s apathy and aimlessness are aggravating, and Haru is perilously close to manic pixie dream girl territory. If she’s destined to die from some terrible disease, just tell me now so I can bail right away.

  10. If anything Haru is the exact opposite of that to me. I think we’re supposed to feel sorry for her because of how sad and pathetic she is.

    We’ll see what happens, but if one sets expectations for this series based on 2020 anime tropes yeah, I suspect it’s going to disappoint. But it’s a seinen manga written in another decade (mostly) – like an 18-episode count, it’s a square peg. An oddball.

  11. I liked this first episode, I don’t know about the manga other than I found the drawings appealing but I’m in fear of how it will develop. I’ll be cautiously optimistic abut it.

    Hanazawa Kana who’d moved to Kanazawa. Say that three times fast.

  12. B

    I do not think that 2020 eyes are automatically to blame here. I have been personnally advised by a friend to take a look at it as he read the series when it was still published in France (unfortunately, not printed anymore). But other friends who also read it at that time gave me the same warnings than @Litho here.
    Premiere was sympathetic but let’s see further…But I should say that I appreciate the fact that it will 18 episodes rather than 12 as I had read.

  13. P

    The age of Josei is over, the time of Seinen is now

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