Synopsis
Mitsuyoshi Tada is a high school boy who aspires to be a photographer and has never fallen in love. One day while taking photos of blooming sakura trees he encounters a transfer student from Luxembourg named Teresa Wagner. Upon learning that the girl had gotten lost after ending up separated from her traveling companion when they arrived, he decides to help her. And when the two ends up getting caught in the rain, he further aids her by bringing her to shelter at his grandfather’s cafe. This marks the start of their story.
General Impression
The beginning of the series gives off a light-hearted feeling to it, and then the show takes a surprising bittersweet turn. Usually, a story involving two characters learning what it’s like to fall in love, there’s a whole lot of sweetness and a touch of drama. To have a series that takes on the themes of unrequited love is quite the surprise. Especially when it brings out the deeper side of different characters.
Another thing that makes the series stand out is how it moves from the usual shoujo cliches. The problem, however, is that after the characters have their emotional moments, they don’t really have a resolution given to their small arcs. We get this interesting build-up and revelations, and yet it doesn’t seem to go anywhere. Rather it just seems like it was meant to incite the viewer into looking more into the series.
Ending Thoughts
It was pretty much expected and yet it was still disappointing. The whole series it was building this interesting subtle romance between Tada and Teresa. With the way things were being built-up, you would expect a bittersweet but open-ended ending. And yet it goes for the typical happy ending with the main pair getting together right after their confession. It’s not bad but a more wistful ending would have been nice. And again, we don’t get proper resolution for the side characters though there are some solid open endings for them.
Going back to the happy ending. As sweet as it may be, it pretty much opened a number of holes in the series. Given how Teresa’s basically run away for love, there’s a whole lot of questions left given how she is the princess of the country. And then there are her companions to also question about as well. Basically, we get this sweet happy ending but it left behind more than a few questions.
Conclusion
The series is interesting in how it moves away from the norm of shoujo stories and takes on a more bittersweet theme. It sets up a subtle chemistry between the main characters which as a nice change of pace and given the theme of unrequited love for the side characters, a deeper side was shown to each of them. The problem with the series though is that it doesn’t give a solid resolution for a lot of things, even towards the ending. It builds up many interesting points for different characters but it seemed to only settle on the main two.
Rating: 7/10