This series was incredible. It was one of the first series that I watched and it actually depicted a real relationship, and how they can sometimes be. The concept of the show was beautiful, and all acting was amazing as well. This served as my very first Japanese series, and they absolutely killed it, I'm so excited to dive in and see more of what Japan has to offer.

Let's dive in.

This is one of the first series that I’ve seen where the couple actually grows with each other and gets older. Seeing them go through high school and college and then adulthood really added some needed flavor to this series. I think that aspect of the story was the best, and it made me fall more in love with this couple as they progressed.

This was a really beautiful story that was told. Ito Akira had me feeling so bad for him, but at the same time, I was so upset with him and society. He saw all of his other coworkers getting married and having kids, and he felt like he couldn’t do that with a man, no matter how in love he was. Raiku did an amazing job at paying Nishi. My favorite characters are always the ones that are the happiest and the bubbliest and I fell in love with him as soon as I saw his childlike ways.

My favorite part was definitely the end when they meet back up at the northern lights. It was also nice to see the little cameo of Wayne and Huang from MODC, it was definitely not expected.

The only thing I would argue about is the fact that Nishi had the exact same hairstyle for 20 years. Even though he is childlike and always bubbly, he still had a maturity growth somewhere in there, and even though this is a bit nit-picky, I just really wanted to see more of his growth throughout his adulthood, and some of that starts in his hair.

The show was real and raw, but cinematically perfect. This is definitely now one of my all-time favorite series.