Higehiro | Anime Review
Lately, I’ve been paying attention to forums about anime and to what other people have been saying about anime. This is been what I’ve been looking at and reading whenever I’m deciding what anime I should give a chance to. Now for the most part, I know what I want to watch and typically I won’t read up on leading up to me watching the show; however, when it’s one of those seasons where none of the anime really interest me I’ll take to the forums and read up on what anime people are talking about and Hige wo Soru. Soshite Joshikousei wo Hirou. (Higehiro) was that. When you’re presented with the following;
When regular salaryman Yoshida wakes up one Sunday morning after a long night at the bar, the last thing he expects to see is that his tiny apartment has a new resident—an unfamiliar high school girl.
The previous night, despite finally gathering the courage to confess to his boss and longtime crush, Airi Gotou, Yoshida was rejected. After drowning his sorrows at a bar with his good friend Hashimoto, Yoshida headed back to his home in a drunken stupor, only to run into Sayu Ogiwara, a runaway high schooler. She asked him to let her stay the night, and with his judgment clouded by alcohol, Yoshida complied.
Now, with his head on straight but with no memory of last night’s events, Yoshida has Sayu explain just how she ended up sleeping at his apartment. Having listened to her story, Yoshida finds himself unable to kick her out—especially after learning that she came all the way from Hokkaido! So, despite his reservations about sheltering an underage girl, Yoshida allows her to stay, and their life together begins.
Naturally, you want to find out more without spoiling too much. So I did a little digging around, reading up on people’s opinions on the anime. From what I could read, generally, there was considerable hype around the adaptation of the light novel. But like I said, as this was a ‘new’ anime, I didn’t want to spoil too much for myself, so I went off the promotional material and, of course, the synopsis provided by the beloved, MyAnimeList.net.
I will admit, the first few episodes felt different from other Drama/Romance anime. A high school student who had run away from home, who used her body for favours so that she could have a roof over her head and a bed to sleep in and a drunken officer worker who was rejected by someone he felt attracted to, meeting one day under a streetlight. A faithful encounter that would not only forge a new relationship between this office worker and high school student but change each other’s lives for the better. However, soon after that, everything about the show felt pretty typical for an anime genred as a Drama, Romance.
Obviously, some moments stood out, like when Sayu confronted one of the individuals she had sex with. As well as Sayu confronts her mother, who accused her own daughter of killing her only friend. Some others, like Sayu, finally dared to visit the school rooftop, where she watched helplessly as her friend committed suicide. But other than those critical moments, everything about the show felt very slice of life-esk and overall pretty basic for a drama, romance.
What did make Higehiro good, in my opinion, were our main characters, Sayu and Yoshida and the overall character development. We start off with two complete strangers, with different lives, both down other roads and having experienced their own shares of hardship. They coincidently meet under a light post, Yoshida being a caring person, he knew he couldn’t leave this teen alone, so he lets Sayu stay the night at his home. Sayu, not knowing any better, thought that the only reason why Yoshida allowed her to stay with him was that he wanted sex, but as we know, it was 100% the opposite. There, an agreement between the two was made. No funny business, Sayu can stay as long as she needed to until she got her life on track. From then on, we follow an unusual duo as they figure things out together while also leaning on each other for support.
Seeing them progress together is the best part of the show. Despite Sayu’s past, Yoshida continued to treat her as an ordinary person and did his best to provide an environment where she felt welcomed and safe. Whenever Sayu felt alone and felt like there was no escape, Yoshida was always there to pull her out of her thoughts. He was always there to care and to show affection towards her, something you could tell she lacked. The longer they lived together, the more they cared about each other, the more they trusted and leaned on one another. As is typical with this sort of anime, a bond developed out of nothing and eventually turned into something where the feelings they felt were mutual. However, Yoshida being the great, levelheaded person he is, was very conscious of the age difference and the different lives they were living and made sure to keep everything very PG.
Now moving onto something I disliked. Somewhere midway through the series, they decided to formulate a thing where everyone liked Yoshida and wanted to be with him. Of course, I’m speaking about Gotou and Mishima. I didn’t really like the fact that they decided to try their hand at liking him at the same time. I do not know why they chose to do that either; I didn’t feel it necessary. Not to mention, the scheme was quickly dropped, too, once they realized that Yoshida did have feelings for Sayu and vice versa.
Overall, despite there being something that differentiated Hige wo Soru. Soshite Joshikousei wo Hirou, from other Drama/Romance anime. It didn’t lean what made it stand out as heavily as I thought it should have. Since it didn’t stick to its guns, the anime itself felt pretty standard towards the end, which is a shame. I did, however, enjoy the anime, so it gets a 7 from me, but there are definitely things that could have been improved upon for sure.
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