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EP. REVIEW: IRODUKU: The World in Colors

Where do you fall on the debate of whether it is better to have loved and lost or never to have loved at all?

the major one being Hitomi's ability to see the colors of the magical fireworks at the end. The question is why she could see them. The easiest answer, and the one the show has been guiding us towards, is that she feels happiness, but then what brought that very specific happiness about? It is the friend-love of her clubmates? The familial love of Kohaku? The romantic love of Yuito? Probably the answer is all three, but then we have to wonder how that's going to work when she goes back to her own time and only really has one of those. It doesn't feel like she's learned to love in the past, although perhaps she has learned to trust, which may eventually make all the difference.

In my experience, time travel stories of this nature tend to take one of three paths. The first is that the two romantic interests end up in one of the two time periods together based on a miracle of some sort. The second is that they separate and take with them the memories and lessons of their time together to live better lives. And the third is that they end up with the reincarnation or child of the person they loved in the other time period. All of them could technically work here, although I've never really been a fan of the third one, and these are only the most common paths. What happens next week at the moment this episode just cut off may be the deciding factor, but whatever the answer is, I think it will have been a journey worth taking.

I think the finale was disappointing. I kinda wanted to see her meet her friends but seeing them as old people. Plus she was at a grave and they didn't want to clarify who it was? They show Hitomi together with the librarian but won't show us who Yuito ended up with? (probably the Senpai lets be honest though)

I think they spent too long on the farewell for dramatic purposes

I think the finale was disappointing. I kinda wanted to see her meet her friends but seeing them as old people. Plus she was at a grave and they didn't want to clarify who it was? They show Hitomi together with the librarian but won't show us who Yuito ended up with? (probably the Senpai lets be honest though)

I think they spent too long on the farewell for dramatic purposes

Kohaku and the bookstore guy who I suspected would become Hitomi's grandfather. (Wasn't that shot of them at the end cute?)

That almost makes me wonder if we truly needed the romance subplot at all. Yes, it added some tension between Yuito and Sho and Hitomi and Asagi, but strictly speaking, Yuito and Hitomi just needed to come to care about each other. In that respect, their romance was almost a cruel tease

All Hitomi strictly needed to realize and understand was the power of love, romantic or otherwise, and how it makes up part of the colorful spectrum of emotions. In fact, I would argue that it would have made more sense for Hitomi to learn the importance of non-romantic love, since it was her mother's lack thereof (in her perspective) that caused Hitomi to lose her ability to see colors in the first place. Perhaps that is what she and Yuito felt for each other, but the need to frame it as a romantic narrative undercuts that potential message.

It doesn't make the fact that we see Hitomi crying at a grave at the very end any less of a stab to the heart, however. While it could be her mother's grave and I wrongly assumed that she had simply wandered off and was alive somewhere, the easier supposition is that Yuito has died in the last sixty years and it is his grave she's visiting. It's awful either way, but if it is his gravestone, it returns us to the symbolism earlier implied by the continued use of Alison Uttley's 1939 novel A Traveler in Time - in that book, the heroine goes back in time and befriends Mary Queen of Scots, who, despite having her life changed for the better, still dies in the end, as history decrees. With so many references to Uttley's novel within the series, I'm inclined to believe that this scene is simply another piece of someone's homage to a favorite childhood novel. (And sad or not, I'd still recommend Uttley's book over modern elementary school death books. Looking at you, Bridge to Terabithia.)

So whether you cried this week or not (and I definitely teared up), there's a feeling of completion to this show's journey. It wasn't perfect and certainly dragged its pacing at times, but issues with the romance plot aside, it really has been a beautiful journey – and as the saying goes, sometimes the object is not to get to the top, but rather to enjoy the climb along the way.

I think my only quibble with the ending was the scene showing Yuito giving Hitomi his book. He looks like he's 25, 35 tops, when he'd have had to have been at least 64-5 (I don't think Hitomi could be younger than 4 there).

That took place in the hallucination world, and I think was just metaphoric. Yuito wrote it for the little girl he met in the dark room, and symbolically gave it to her.

Soulwarfare wrote:

I think the finale was disappointing. I kinda wanted to see her meet her friends but seeing them as old people. Plus she was at a grave and they didn't want to clarify who it was? They show Hitomi together with the librarian but won't show us who Yuito ended up with? (probably the Senpai lets be honest though) I think they spent too long on the farewell for dramatic purposes

I am in pretty much at the same boat as you. I knew that she will back to her period of time but I expected that everyone, who she leave in the past, will meet her or at least later at Kohaku house. It was lazy move from studio side. But overall I quite enjoy this show it wasn't that kind of show where you thinking " What is going to happen next" but more relaxing after long day at University.

EiMs wrote:

Soulwarfare wrote: I think the finale was disappointing. I kinda wanted to see her meet her friends but seeing them as old people. Plus she was at a grave and they didn't want to clarify who it was? They show Hitomi together with the librarian but won't show us who Yuito ended up with? (probably the Senpai lets be honest though) I think they spent too long on the farewell for dramatic purposes I am in pretty much at the same boat as you. I knew that she will back to her period of time but I expected that everyone, who she leave in the past, will meet her or at least later at Kohaku house. It was lazy move from studio side. But overall I quite enjoy this show it wasn't that kind of show where you thinking " What is going to happen next" but more relaxing after long day at University.

I think you're underestimating how long 60 years is. All of her old friends have long moved on, moved away, had families, careers, died, ect. Heck I'm only thirty and my high school years are already a very distant memory. I doubt I could name half the people I once hung out with on a daily basis. So it doesn't shock me at all that they're not all waiting on a girl they once knew for maybe three months six decades ago.