Kimi ga Nozomu Eien

Kimi ga Nozomu Eien proves that if the core foundation of your drama is strong enough, everything else can be second-rate and it will still hook you.

I found nothing about the show to be outright bad, but most compartments had their share of problems. A lot of the conflicts could be resolved if a character just managed to speak one proper sentence to explain themselves – the industry standard. As a character, Takayuki is about as interesting as the color grey – rest of the cast I thought was good. There are some leaps of logic that could have used further explanation. Also, this ... story really didn't have to be an anime, I feel. The Visual Novel format probably served this tale a lot better than an anime ever could. Hell, almost any other form of presentation could have worked better for this subject matter. In this story, the scenes are often defined by their lack of motion instead of their motion, so going through the trouble of animating all of it feels almost pointless. The animation itself is a little inconsistent, but there's not much of a visual spectacle here anyways, so I suppose it's adequate.

The story is a good old love triangle, with a very cool twist. The real personal tragedy that is mixed into it, gripped me harder than what I was prepared for. The idea is maybe stretched a little thin, but I have no major complaints with the flow of the story. It's good.

It's been a while since I watched anything as grounded as this. Or even a show that took itself so seriously for that matter. I found a show like this to be very refreshing during this age of nonsense and visual noise.

What would you do if an important connection of yours was suddenly left hanging, stuck in time? Neither moving forward nor back? How long would you wait for time to start moving again, how would you decide when it's time to move on?

The premise to this show is arguably its strongest point - two girls, one guy, he ends up dating one of them with the feelings of the other girl lingering. But in good old RomCom-fashion, she holds back for the sake of the other girl, who is also her beloved friend. But when that girl falls into a coma after an accident and ... doesn't appear to be waking up again - she decides to support their boy friend throughout the following chaotic storm of emotions. Eventually, after three long years, he decides that it's time to move on and starts dating his supportive friend. But then - in an unexpected turn of events, shocking, I know - his girlfriend wakes up from her coma again, unaware of how much time has passed.

Please be aware that there will be spoilers from here on out, since most of what I liked about the show directly relates to its story and how the premise is handled.

The conflict is very believable (even if the circumstances are certainly convenient). Takayuki, our protagonist, has never had the chance to reconcile with his original girlfriend, Haruka. Their relationship was just sort of interrupted with him being left unable to communicate with her. And we as audience get so see that it's not like he gave up on her easily. He went to the hospital to be by Haruka's side every day for months, possibly years on end. We can see him slowly losing hope. We can see how it's tearing him up from the inside, with his other friend, Mitsuki, patiently staying by his side and caring for him. Eventually, even Haruka's parents tell him to stop visiting her because they can see how much it hurts him to see her not getting better. Likewise, we can see how much it hurts Mitsuki, and how she still builds a career and focusses on continuing her life. She keeps on moving whereas Haruka is frozen in time. So naturally, he eventually decides to move forward with Mitsuki.
It doesn't feel like a dick move. And that's an important part of how the story is presented; at no point is anyone acting like an idio or out of a misunderstanding. Sure, there is the character of Harukas little sister Akane who is misguided in many different ways, but even that is understandable. She is a teen in Middle School when the accident happens and clearly has to deal with a lot of her own complicated feelings - some of which are for Takayuki, of course, this was originally a Visual Novel.
It creates a natural flow to the story.

But speaking of the Visual Novel background of the Anime - that is where the first of quite a few weaknesses come into play. Almost every scene contains two characters talking without much else going on. The animation doesn't need to be super exciting for a more subdued tone in a show, but with how super stiff it can be, the Director seemed to have run out of ways to make dialogue scenes interesting to look at.
Another problem is the structure and the role of some of the characters. The anime chose to focus on only the two main heroines - which was a very good choice, mind you - but that kind of downgrades some characters cearly having an own route in the game just spouting catchphrases by the side of the road and not much else. Any character backgrounds are only hinted at very, very vaguely, time which could have been better spent fleshing some of its main cast out.
Because this is the third and biggest problem; Outside of their role in the story, nobody in this show has any personality. Haruka is the frail, innocent girl that is victim to circumstances, whereas Mitsuki is the person who pretends to be strong, but is doubting herself constantly and is seeking reassurance in a very frail relationship.
I like that the characters have lifes outside of the central romance - since they're all young working adults and not high-schoolers anymore - but these lifes and occupatiosn tell me nothing about them. During the course of the story, both Mitsuki and Takayuki end up skipping a lot of work, too, or getting there visibly distraught and only making problems for everyone around them. How much patience all of their coworkers have for them - with never really being told the situation these two are in - it feels like the show might as well have been set in school.
And the kind of compromised realism continues with Haruka.
She wakes up from a 3-year-coma, and is able to perfectly articulate herself again after only one month. Sure, she can't walk properly, but then seems perfectly fine with sitting for long stretches of time. It's a very "pretty" version of a coma aftermath.
And I get it, the idea is more than Haruka is "frozen" in time. And I don't think the show would've been better off for intrudingly showing Haruka being unable to move or speak. But it feels like it's making the whole sitauation looking much lighter than it is. It adds to Harukas status as a frail girl that she looks like a pretty doll most of the time and that her doctor insists that everyone keeps the truth from her. You'd think that a hospital dealing with coma patients would have a therapist or something specialized in slowly preparing her to face reality. It also breaks immersion when you try to imagine what Haruka does all day - we're being told that she is not allowed reading since it's "too much of a strain", but there isn't a television or even a radio in her room either. Is she just staring at a wall blankly until someone comes in? I'm no expert on the subject, but I highly doubt little to no stimulation to the brain will help a recovery process. It makes her feel like a very passive character, and pity aside, makes it hard to root for her sincerely.
Admittedly, by the end of the show she does bring her own drive and strength after a supposedly final meeting with Mitsuki and it's a beautiful moment. Her final goodbye with Takayuki is also very well done. But for most of the time, she's treated more like an obstacle to the romance of Mitsuki and Takayuki, which is a bit of a shame.

Now Mitsuki, the "true" heroine in this anime, is a different breed and kind of has the opposite arc to Haruka. She starts off accepting of her role as supportive friend to the romance of Haruka and Takayuki, and it's kind of pull-and-push with her after the accident. Her whole personality is "I like Takayuki, but I don't want to betray Haruka". She keeps going through cycles of feeling guilty, warming up to the idea that this whole situation isn't her fault and that it's okay for her to be with Takayuki, then going back to guilt after Haruka wakes back up, a bit of a possessive streak - arguably due to the massive insecurities her guilt caused, which is believable enough - which leads to her character arc of realizing that Takayuki is her everything, and her leaving him in order to be her own person.
Which, would the story go through with that arc, would've been pretty cool, but no, by the end Takayuki begs her to get back together with him because he now realized she's truly what he needs. I kind of doubt it would be a happy relationship, given how much guilt Mitsuki still has to deal with. EVery new conflict would sway her again, since Takayuki is also kind of more willing to ignore conflict until they disappear rather than speaking about his feelings openly. It feels like a bit of a cop-out for Mitsuki.

And then there's Takayuki, and naturally, being a VN-Everyman-Protagonist-Guy, he has the least personality between the three of them. He has a tendency to get really hung up on everything and has no idea what to do with the new situation - with basically two girlfriends. The only other thing with him is being offered a full-time job after only working part-time for a while and him hesitating on whether or not to take the opportunity. Both of these tie into the "Frozen time vs. moving forward" motive, but that's it. His choice doesn't feel like something he makes on his own, but rather a decision made by his two girlfriends. It feels kind of unsatisfying.

So at the end of all this, the story did take time to establish everyone's feelings really well, not so much anything else about the characters. I enjoyed my time with the show, and I did end up excited for how the story might develop so much that I watched the whole thing in like 3 sittings within a week. But I have no doubt I'll forget everyone's name as well as most of the story within half a year. It's perfectly serviceable, but ultimately, kind of a forgettable show due to its forgettable cast, stiff presentation and basing a good part of its premise on convenient selective logic.

Have you ever came across cheap Spanish telenovels? Yeah, this is basically Japanese animated version of one of those.

Never in my years of watching anime I had such a problem to finish any show, not even shows which I rated lower then this creation. What Rumbling Hearts does very well is exaggerating situations in order to make fake drama. This fake drama should evoke emotions in audience at any cost only to be dealt in most stupidest way to make you even more angry, sad or anything. As a result, it establishes totally unrealistic wannabe flawless interactions and is losing it’s credibility. Narrative of show ... was promising and at first I was really curious about the story, unfortunately execution was so poor mainly in second half, that I even regreted to waste my time on this.

STORY: 2/10
Pacing of the story is standing on cheap dramatic interactions. No doubt it tries to be unique and aim to more matured audience in terms of not being childish, always happy, not having pitiful problems or being shallow yet, I just didn’t believe almost any of it’s situations because it was overplayed just to make it more dramatic. More so stupidity in which story progresses thanks to it’s even more idiotic characters overshadows all these efforts. Setting of the show tries to be perfect which even more degrades it’s crediblity and reality aspect. Story progress relies on artificial flawless conflicts and plots which are often trying to be with perfect outcome, but instead the solution is as much stupid as it can be, mainly thanks to Narumi AGAIN! Finale and "great" story climax is just as dissapointing. Characters which were worst and in the end did not take any responsibility for their terrible decisions are getting the happiest ending. This is unreasonable icing on the cake which make me sure to hate this show.

CHARACTERS: 2/10
Except of Haruka there isn’t single main character which I could relate to or even emphatize with. Rest of the main cast must be accountable and intelligent as your average girl walking in Pattaya Street in 2AM. Their decision making corresponds proportionally to their mental development which is stucked since they reached puberty. Main hero Narumi or should I say disgusting SIMP which cannot make rational decision for himself and in consenquence of that hurts everybody around him. His whole character is so stupid, because only thing he does whole show is pitty himself. This pathetic fool doesn’t even know who he loves or not so he decides to date girl which is crazy in love with him only to toy with her feelings and see outcome, because he doesn’t want to hurt anybody despite the fact that this is exactly what he is doing. This is what kind of person he is. Short after when he finally pull his shit together and confess to Haruka it doesn’t even feel real, because it looks like he is doing so because it’s expected of him and not from his own desire, FAKE.
When Haruka falls into coma he’s having a hard time, but what about her parents, sister, they having even more hard times yet they aren’t acting like spoiled hurted child. I was heartbroken from love, lost my brother and father all in 2 years time period and seeing him acting like that was so annoying and unrealistic "thanks" to my previous painful experiences. All he should do in lot of the situations was communication. Do I think he is the worst character? No, no, no there is even worst piece of crap and not one.

Let’s talk about Mitsuki and Shinji. Mitsuki should be rated between top 20 worst female charaters in romance anime. Let me tell you why... She slept with her best friend boyfriend even if it was on purpose to "save him" while her best friend is in coma. Sleeping with someone is not only way to help hurted person. Do you see where am I going? She made it completely from her own selfish desires.
She basically seduced him in his weakest state, although she could help him as friend. Authors probably thinking that only thing your friend of opposite sex can do to help you is sleep with you. Later after Haruka’s waking from coma she becomes jealous and lonely so first thing she does is going after first man she encounters to sleep with him while being in relationship. This part is actually similar to situations which happens in real life, because hoes often apologize they’re cheating with loneliness. Then she has that audacity to tell the MC not to blame her or Shinji? STFU it’s mostly your decision and your fault. Ofcourse there are always two sides of coin and Narumi bears part of the blame, but that doesn’t apologize your cheating! Mitsuki is manipulativ, self centered, selfish, evil character which is one of the main drawbacks of this show.

Now worst character of all is MCs "best" "friend" Shinji. When Mitsuki doesn’t get the opportunity to throw herself on random guy she jumps on her boyfriend best friend and HE doesn’t stops her. Shinji short after encounters Narumi and has the audacity to speak some moral shit on him and even punch him? Bro you are the biggest crap yet you think you did some kind of weird favor, because
his girl didn’t slept with random guy but you? It’s even worse because he wasn’t betrayed by one, but two persons close to him.
Again all you could do is to talk things through with her and be emotional support to Mitsuki as her friend instead of sleeping with
your best friend girl. God, I was so mad at this point that I was thinking about quiting with this crap.

There are some positive characters which I like mainly Haruka and her family which were most credible for me and easy to understand. Especially her sister which has every right to be angry on that blue haired traitor chick. I loved how devoted and supportive she was to her older sister and I found her character development also most interesting after that 3 years time skip. Side characters are allright but nothing to be praised for. Unfortunatelly main characters destroyed whole piece so much for me, that this is only small plus in compare to that cons.

ART: 5/10
Meh, it looks okay I guess considering it’s older anime, but I could name a lot of even older anime which looks much better. Thing which I didn’t like was motion of the characters it looked weird and funny. On the other hand I liked how creators worked with shadowing and colors of the sceneries.

SOUND: 3/10
Not my cup of tea and mostly generic romcom type of stuff.

Enjoyment: 2/10
To be fair I enjoyed first 3-4 episodes where main plot was starting to build and I didn’t know what type of crap is about to come. When characters started to act brainless and plot basically stop making any sense at all, I also started to have serious issue to finish it.

Overall: 2/10
If you are lover of generic drama shows which are downright dramatic without being credible go for it. In fact I cannot understand how anyone can say it relates to the real world, because you must be living in some fucked up reality man. Everything what is happening in this show is exaggerated and pointless with even more stupid outcome, while at the same time having much easier solution. CHEAP DRAMA!!!

There are plenty of much better anime in it’s own genre, so my suggestion is don’t do this to yourself and look for something which won’t lower your IQ.