Tamayura ~Hitotose~ – Final Review

Nearly three years ago, the makers of Aria made an original animation adaptation of another Iyasashikei Anime called Tamayura. Although it was short, it had a very light-hearted feeling as the girls focus on their hobbies and of course, making and capturing memories.

A year later, this show finally got a full season, which introduced a few more characters and developed the existing ones further. But, will this be a second coming of Aria?

For the story of Tamayura ~hitotose~, it’s basically a set of short stories, picking right off from the original animation. This time, the first episode serves as a prelude to the OVA, which introduced Fuu’s friend, Chihiro before she moved back to Takehara. This is also when Fuu’s mother gave Fuu the old camera that her father, who got her interested in photography. The rest of the episodes is mainly what you would expect from a Iyasashikei slice of life series with girls doing different things such as sleepovers, visiting an island, having a sweets competition, and creating an exhibition showing their work to name a few.

While the whole cast makes a return, there are a few new characters such as Maon’s family, Komachi (Kou’s classmate), Chimo and Chihiro. Most of these characters have reoccurring roles, especially Komachi who creates a rivalry with Norie over Kou. However, the surprising thing about her is that she becomes inspired by Fuu to take up photography as well.

On the other hand, besides Fuu, I felt that Maon changed the most throughout the whole series. From the start, she used to be quiet. However, after visiting the island with her friends and shared her dream with them, she started to change. Despite the challenges she faced at the recital because the lack of an ending to her story, with the support of her friends and family, she manages to gain confidence in her and finish it.  From her challenges, I felt that this was the special part of the show as support from people is important to gain confidence besides the amount of skill one may have. This is probably what they mean by “more aggressive,” which is the tag line for the second season. It’s not about film vs. digital, Canon vs. Nikon or mirror vs. mirrorless cameras, it’s all about gaining more confidence in what you enjoy doing and living life to the fullest.

Although Tamayura doesn’t have the same feeling of Aria, each episode gives a smoothing and cheerful feeling. Hopefully with the next season, we will see more of the same, but with more aggressiveness.

Overall Rating: 8.9/10, B+, Very Good ¶