Yagate Kimi ni Naru

Yuu Koito has always been entranced with romantic shoujo manga and the lyrics of love songs. She patiently waits for the wings of love to sprout and send her heart aflutter on the day that she finally receives a confession. Yet, when her classmate from junior high declares his love for her during their graduation, she feels unexpectedly hollow. The realization hits her: she understands romance as a concept, but she is incapable of experiencing the feeling first-hand.

Now, having enrolled in high school, Yuu, disconcerted and dispirited, is still ruminating over how to respond to her suitor. There, she happens upon the seemingly flawless student council president, Touko Nanami, maturely rejecting a confession of her own. Stirred by Touko's elegant manner, Yuu approaches her for advice, only to be bewildered when the president confesses to her! Yuu quickly finds herself in the palm of Touko's hand, and unknowingly sets herself on a path to find the emotion which has long eluded her.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Koito, Yuu Main

Takada, Yuuki Japanese

Nanami, Touko Main

Kotobuki, Minako Japanese

Saeki, Sayaka Supporting

Kayano, Ai Japanese

Maki, Seiji Supporting

Ichikawa, Taichi Japanese

Kanou, Koyomi Supporting

Kohara, Konomi Japanese

Kodama, Miyako Supporting

Mori, Nanako Japanese

Koito, Rei Supporting

Komatsu, Mikako Japanese

Hakozaki, Riko Supporting

Nakahara, Mai Japanese

Doujima, Suguru Supporting

Nogami, Shou Japanese

Hyuuga, Akari Supporting

Terasaki, Yuka Japanese

Yamashita, Shinpei Producer

Ogata, Mitsuhiro Producer

Isogai, Noritomo Producer

Kimura, Kaori Producer

Reviews

Dec 28, 2018

Stark700

Recommended

Love takes shape that the universe may never have a precise answer on. Can we all agree that human emotions can never be truly understood? What does it mean to be in love? Why do people fall for each other? In our world of imperfection, we will never know the truth to this question. Humans are imperfect and we were built that way in the eyes of our creator.

The art of anime adaptations is a fascinating subject that takes many forms. I’m very open minded with just about any genre although when it comes to yuri and shoujo-ai, I’m rather indifferent about it. Recent adaptations ... of the shoujo-ai genre hardly made an impression on me such as Citrus or Netsuzou Trap. Both of those shows let me down big time with their aggressive stance on relationships. I wanted to see a softer side of the shoujo-ai genre without subscribing to sexual same gender relationships that relies on shock service. Thankfully, Yagate Kimi no Naru is the answer.

I’m not too familiar with the community related to shoujo-ai works but it’s clear that the manga has popularity. The series was launched in April 2015 from the Monthly Comic Dengeki Daioh and in the present, it has over 500k printing copies and ongoing. However, I was also curious about the anime adaptation after seeing the staff involved. Director Makoto Katou made a rather interesting impression back in 2015 when they directed a mystery light novel adaptation called “Beautiful Bones: Sakurako’s Investigation”. While this series doesn’t contain much mystery, it definitely made me wonder if it has a similar mystique. Indeed, watching Yagate Kimi ni Naru (Bloom Into You) finally gave me a shoujo-ai that I desired.

Right off the bat, we meet Yuu Koito, a first-year high school student who has a love for shoujo manga. From her perspective, it’s easy to see what love is on a fictional level. It isn’t until a second-year student named Touko Nanami comes into her life that she really begin to experience what life and love is. Similar to Yuu, Touko also has trouble experiencing love although it’s clear that her mind is set to understand it. As a student, she is very admirable for her dependable personality and someone the freshmen look up to. However, all this seems to be masking her insecurity. The truth is, Touko has many weaknesses underneath her cool persona. It’s shown throughout the series that she feels loneliness due to her past and Yuu becomes the only person that she trusts in. On the other hand, Yuu seems to be more wary about love and wants to experience it. However, her view towards love is not as dedicated as Touko. She wants to experience love but often denies feelings of it. Yuu’s personality is more the opposite of Touko’s as she is indecisive at times, including her own future. So to say the least, how can these two develop a genuine relationship?

Honestly, I think the main draw of the show isn’t to see if the main characters can get together as a couple. Rather, it’s about how characters experience love and what love really means to them. Realistically, both characters views love in different ways although it’s clear that they lack experience in it. Touko is the more obvious with her insecure personality where she often isn’t sure what to do to make happy moments with Yuu. On the other hand, Yuu often believes what she experiences to be more of a fantasy than actual love. I guess part of that comes from reading all those shoujo manga although as the series progresses, she begins to grow out of her shell. The storytelling continues to test the two’s relationship on many levels. It’s a show that capitalizes on bringing in drama and thankfully, I can say that it accomplishes that very well. The drama sells with the character personalities, behaviors, dialogues, and realistic feelings. I’m also more pleased to say that everything in the show felt very real. Characters behave like humans do especially for high school students of their age. It’s a time period when young people want to get the best out of their lives and love is often a prominent part of growing up. To me, this show manages to capture the essence of character growing up while discovering what love is about.

While Yuu and Touko are the most prominent characters, it’s hard to take eyes off of some of the others. Sayaka Saeki is a good example as someone who used to attend an all-girls school and became a close friend with Touko. The two work together as part of the student council but it’s very clear that Sayaka sees her more than a friend. Love is the easiest way to describe it. It’s also easy to see why she falls for her too considering their similar personalities. Both Sayaka and Touko are hardworking individuals who are willing to help others. However, Sayaka is perhaps less outgoing compared to Touko and thus, not as easily as approachable. The series doesn’t dedicate to their relationship but it’s interesting to see Sayaka’s vision of love. In essence, she hides her feelings and is not someone that’s easy to read on the surface. This is a contrast to both Yuu and Touko as those two tends to say what’s on their mind. On a lesser extent, we also get to see the relationship between Miyako and Riko which is shown to be very healthy in nature. Their relationship is relaxing and almost like a contrast to the drama that we see so often in the story.

As for the shoujo-ai genre, I think it’s pretty easy to recognize that pretty much all the main characters are lesbians in one way or another. Some are to a lesser but it’s pretty clear from the start. What were you expecting though? The anime advertised itself as such with the same gender relationships so be prepared to subscribe to that from start to finish. But as a show with a lot of drama, I should say to watch this with a careful focus on the characters. Watch for what they say, how they behave, and their intentions. For me, I find the most complex character to be Yuu since her personality is often sarcastic and believes too much into fictional love. This is true especially in the beginning where it became hard to know what she really wants. The more I watched though, the more I came to accept Yuu for who she is and her quest to discover love. And that’s what I find so entrancing about this show.

In perhaps a coincidental timeline, we also get Troyca as the studio. It's the same one that worked on Sakurako’s Investigation with the exact same director. As my first impression, this anime managed look colorful and vibrant with its character designs. There’s a feminine charm for the majority of the cast that really brings the elegance out of the characters. The emotional context are captured with the vivid details of body language and human expressions. The background visual quality is also stellar with a certain degree feeling of photorealism. Some of the scenes during the mid-season episodes like the ones with the bridge stands out the most. Last but not least, I would like to mention that character voice mannerism for the main cast is portrayed with supreme talent. Not only did I feel attached to their personalities, these characters also sounded like they belong in this anime from the beginning.

Ah, it’s about damn time. I’ve been indifferent about shoujo-ai shows for a good while but after seeing Yagate Kimi ni Naru, I may change my mind. This show managed to capture the expression of love in ways that exceed my expectations. It seized opportunities to recreate a sensational drama without stepping over the line. Keep your pants on because you’re not going to get sexual shock content all over your face. What you get is a drama done right in the most entrancing way possible. It's almost perfect.

Reviewer’s Rating: 9

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Dec 29, 2018

ineedyuri

Mixed Feelings

As a fan of Yuri and all things girls love. Bloom Into You left me in a dark state of depression.

I dropped the manga a while ago trying to figure out why I never really got into it. But after finishing the anime, I finally figured it out. It's Boring!

Starting out with the positive.
The presentation is Second to none when it comes to Yuri anime adaptions. Animation is fluid and the attention to detail great. And the Opening has many undertones. But this is where my appreciation ends.

The rest of the show is just so boring to watch.

The characters are just not very likeable. So ... Yuu is your typical shoujo manga protagonist. Has never experienced love and wants to know what it is. Unfortunately that's where her development ends. She's still the same person with no romantic feelings at the end of the show.

And Touko really started to annoy me half way through the show. and it's mostly because of their romance together.

I don't buy it. Their whole relationship together is built around one conversation they had with each other. And it's not a healthy one.
I see people praising it for these same reasons, but the idea is that they should develop past that.

They could have even fixed this if something ever happened in the show. The show is too slow, and what's worse is that the Play the show has been building up to never happens.
I feel like they could have cut a lot of moments out to make it happen.

I wanted to like Bloom Into You, I really did. But Bad pacing, a dull romance that goes nowhere, and an incomplete ending left me unsatisfied.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Dec 28, 2018

fallserso

Not Recommended

This show is average. Not bad, not good. Just average. That being said, I wasn’t entertained watching this, not even from laughing at how bad it was, because it wasn’t bad. It was just average. Despite what most people think, being average isn’t a terrible thing, so as a little disclaimer, I am not saying everything about this show sucks for everyone who might take this review badly.

The show is very clearly, a romance genre. The key to any good romance media is the relationship: nothing else matters that much. My problem with the show is that it doesn’t try to make the relationships between ... our main characters all that interesting. An issue with many yuri or yaoi animes are that they use the idea that they are in a gay relationship to hide the fact that there is no real substance or development; they are too lazy to create anything interesting about the relationship besides the fact that they’re lesbians. The setting isn’t the issue either as there are a ton of romance anime that do well in mundane settings (and even if a romance media is set in a more unconventional and/or radical setting- the relationships itself isn’t taken over by the setting) because romance genres aren’t really supposed to be about exterior factors that govern the story's universe per say, rather a device to tell a love story. My point being, the environment or exterior factors shouldn’t be the most important part overshadowing the characters, but should be used as an effective agent in portraying a relationship. However, Bloom Into You makes this mistake repeatedly throughout its course as boring subplots distract us from the main focus of the anime, the relationship.

So why was the relationship so uninteresting? Or, at least why did I subjectively find it bland? Well, it has to do with the romance development/buildup and characterization. A great romance anime that does this very well is Kimi Ni Todoke. There are certainly a lot of cute romance scenes in Bloom Into You, but it isn’t memorable or as effective as they could be. This is because there is no real buildup to the romance scenes or context, (for God’s sake one of the main characters doesn’t even reciprocate the same feelings) which makes the scenes unsatisfying and coming out of nowhere. There is no longing, no real angst that make the romance scenes worth while in this anime. Kimi Ni Todoke, my aforementioned example, takes the time to show longing, reciprocation of feelings as well as showing who each of the characters are: this is what makes trivial scenes of even the characters smiling at each other enjoyable and satisfying- overall making it an effective romance medium. Bloom Into You doesn’t do this very well either. Even in supposed-to-be emotional scenes, I fail to sympathize with any of the characters, and I’m a really emotional person, so it says a lot! There is no real character in dialogue, visuals or voice acting. It feels completely bland and lifeless, a very frustrating issue because the anime is centered around our characters and their relationship with each-other. There is just genuinely no substance in dialogue either which makes it very hard to emotionally relate with the last-minute backstory. Just overall making the characters less likable and therefore the romance/ their relationships less interesting and engaging.

A very important note I’d like to mention is the trend in a lot of animes that I’d like to call The Aesthetic Effect. The Aesthetic Effect is used in animes with “pretty” visuals, stories, music and concepts to be used as a facade to it’s mediocre nature. How vague the show is and the inoffensive factors of this anime make it desirable and appealing to a lot of the general audience. I think not only is this anime extremely bland, but also quite offensive at times by using lesbians as a token to justify dislikable behaviour to say the least of the main character Nanami forcefully putting herself upon the clearly uninterested Yuu. Not to be THAT person, but if a male character did things Nanami did to Yuu, it would be seen as extremely creepy. I found these scenes very unsightly and uncomfortable, which is the least thing you want for a romantic scene in a cute anime. To wrap things up, it is very clear this anime was made by people who see lesbians as an easy token key to attract audiences without adding real substance. Bloom Into You is just vague, pretty, attractive concepts jumbled into an unprofessional mess with the name of aesthetically pleasing romance. I will never understand why this anime is so overrated and put on a pedestal for being some sort of groundbreaking anime as it is just plain out boring with not really anything new to offer. Do yourself a favor and don’t watch this anime, it’s just a waste of time and it will leave you with nothing.

TL;DR - boring and mediocre, uses gay tokenism to hide behind it’s flaws.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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