Ano Hi Mita Hana no Namae o Bokutachi wa Mada Shiranai

It was inevitable, keeping with my namesake I had to go through a few anime series before summer ended.

The main characters of Ano Hi.

This series came out in April and finished airing in June by A-1 Studios. During the last few months of high school, a lot of my friends were talking about this one and given my free time over the summer, I gave it a try.

So why didn't I jump onto this series earlier? Well, I essentially stopped watching anime for 1 or 2 years just due to the quality of material that was coming out. Most animes were either just full of fan service (w/o a good plot) or had poor animation.

Luckily, a few episodes into Ano Hi, I was amazed by the animation quality and the tight story line. The plot is fairly simple. A group of 6 childhood friends drift apart over the years after Menma, who used to be in the group dies from an accident. Jintan (in the red t-shirt in the above picture) is a shut in (essentially a NEET as he hasn't been in school for a semester) when one day, Menma (the girl in the one piece white dress in the picture) appears to Jintan. Menma supposedly appears because she has a wish that needs to be fulfilled before she can rest in peace.

As Jintan tries to find out what her wish is, the 5 childhood friends get back together. As we witness the 5 friends interact with each other and deal with the re-appearance of Menma (although only Jintan can see and hear Menma) the true emotions and characteristics of the 5 other friends are revealed.

This is an 11 episode series and has a satisfying conclusion. This anime is filled with drama and deals with multiple love triangles. All I can say is get some tissues ready because it gets emotional at times.

One of my favourite tracks from the anime

I do not own or take credit for all of the above images or videos, if you would like them to be taken down, please message me.

Have you watched this series yet? If you have, what's your opinion of Yukiatsu? (I personally hate his guts")
Any of the upcoming anime series of Fall 2011 look interesting?