Life.
Okay, I think I just summed up this entire show! Go watch it. Bye!
Oh right, Sing “Yesterday” for Me probably needs a little bit more of an elaboration, huh?
Let’s Go!
First Episode Synopsis
Sing “Yesterday” for Me (or Yesterday wo Utatte for you lovely weebs out there), centers around a guy named Rikuo Uozumi who works part-time at a convenience store but doesn’t actually consider it a job. He doesn’t know, or more or less, isn’t really interested in doing anything in life but all of that changes one night when he goes out back to feed the crows some boxed lunches.
A girl by the name of Haru Nonaka shows up and wants to know if she can have a boxed lunch as well. She’s sporty, perky, a bit overbearing, but damn I’d be lying if I didn’t say she was lovable! Rikuo ends up feeing her a lunch and the lesson we all learn here is that you never feed stray Harus because they will just keep coming back for more… and Haru does… every. Single. Day.
But she doesn’t come back for a free lunch, though. She comes back to try and get closer to Rikuo as she has a romantic interest in him. The only problem is that Rikuo’s friend wants to know if he’s going to the class reunion, despite graduating only 6 months ago. He makes mention that Shinako Morinome is going to be there and that catches his attention. As you could have guessed, Shinako is a former crush of Rikuo’s.
I think that you can see where this is going. You have Haru who likes Rikuo but Rikuo doesn’t really care for Haru. Rikuo likes Shinako but Shinako has something that’s holding her back from accepting his feelings.
Throughout all of the romantic entanglement going on in this show, you get some pretty hard-hitting lines just about life and how some people just don’t have any drive for it whatsoever. You get a sense that the characters aren’t accomplishing the goals that they thought once had. It’s like ending up at a place in life that you didn’t want to be in but were forced there either by outliers beyond your control or a change of mindset coupled with choices that you, yourself, made.
Worth Watching?
YES – Okay… with Sword Art Online and the third season of My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU delayed due to COVID-19 (which is still #1 on the Top 10 anime betrayal list), I felt empty just watching Tower of God. I came across a Gigguk video where he ran down the Spring 2020 shows and I picked three of them out of the ones he highlighted. This was one of them and let me say this…
I was two weeks behind on Tower of God and three weeks behind on Boruto. I watched the first episode of Sing “Yesterday” for Me and finished the available episodes before catching up on Tower of God and Boruto. It hooked me THAT much!
While ID:INVADED was a sleeper hit of the Winter season and one of my personal Anime of the Year contenders, if Sing “Yesterday” for Me plays its cards right, it will send up as my second selection as a candidate! The story itself in here is almost non-existent from a meta standpoint. As I opened this First Reaction up with, it’s about life. That’s it. An anime about life… nothing more… nothing less.
What drives this show is the characters. In fact, it is completely dependent on the characters and each one has its own storied pasts, their own personalities, their own little quirks. Character-driven shows are often hit or miss but this one is knocking it out of the park! You feel these intangible connections to each of the characters introduced so far and while I could go on and react to episodes two and three, I’ll be sure to do that at the end of the season when I review this show.
Speaking of… this show has 18 episodes. Not 12, Not 13, Not 24, Not 25 like you would find in any 1-2 cours series. This has 18… a really odd number which means that this will end halfway through next season. While it is an odd number, I’m happy that we’re getting that much more out of this show. I’m definitely hooked and I want it to be the weekend already so I can continue to watch more of it!
If you’re looking for a good slice-of-life drama to sink your teeth into, this is going to be the show to do it with! Don’t sleep on this one!
