Anime/Manga Reviews

Anohana ♝

Written by: Mari Okada

Genre: Drama, Supernatural, Romance, Slice of life, Tragedy

Plot:

A group of six childhood friends drift apart after one of them, Meiko "Menma" Honma dies in an accident. Ten years later the leader of the group, Jinta "Jintan" Yadomi become withdrawn and isolated because of the death of Menma and his mother. All of them live a life without contacting each other again.

One summer day, Menma's older self appears before Jintan asking him to fulfill his wish so that she can go into the afterlife. Since Menma does not remember what her wish was, Jintan gathers his friends again so that together they can find what her wish was. Menma's parents once hindered their plan for fulfilling Menma's wish saying that they used her so that they can have fun with their selves.

Fulfilling Menma's wish resulted to some conflicts and revelations that they never knew before.

Some details: Wikipedia

Manga: Completed

Anime: Completed

Total Episodes: 11

Review:

Anohana: The Flower We Saw That Day is mainly all about teenagers learning to deal with past trauma about what happened 10 years before.

Story: The story is pretty straightforward. The plot is well constructed. The past is also seen to help us understand what really happened that day. It is an anime wherein the characters are coping up with the death of their love one. It shows a good example to us that past greatly affects the future beyond us. The last episode is somewhat heart-breaking especially when Menma leaves messages to each one of them.

Characters: All of the six childhood friends hides some truths and revelations about Menma's accident. Almost all of them thinks that they are the cause of her death and thinks that Menma's angry to them. They showed what friends are for in the last 2 episodes. Most of them believed that Menma is really appearing to Jinta while others thinks that Jinta is still obsessed with her that's why he's able to say such things.

Art: The art is good and the changes before and after 10 years are handled well. The changes are visible both physical and emotional.

Sound: Their seiyuu really did a great job. The characters really emphasize it's longing for the past, and their guilty side for having such emotions even though Menma's already dead. The ending song that was sung by the 3 main girls are really great.

If you are into slice of life animes, it is good to pick Anohana because the story is really great. ^_^