Honey and Clover I+ II

Type: TV

Episodes: 24

Status: Finished Airing

Aired: Apr 15, 2005 to Sep 27, 2005

Yūta Takemoto, Takumi Mayama and Shinobu Morita are three young men who live in the same apartment complex and are students at an art college in Tokyo.

An art major with a passive view of life, Yuuta Takemoto spends his college days aimlessly looking for his true calling. Together with a mature Senior, Takumi Mayama, and a greedy, hyper ball of energy, Shinobu Morita, they go through the toils and small pleasures of their impoverished student lives. Yet, nothing truly manages to break through Takemoto’s barrier until he meets a talented 18 year old girl. Upon seeing Hagumi Hanamoto, the young Yuuta begins to see the world in the lonely but bright colors of love.

Very few producers can turn a generic college romance anime into a lovable series full of quirky and unforgettable characters. One thing is for certain: the casting for the project is definitely a major factor. From scriptwriters to the voice actors, Honey and Clover is a titanic marriage of skills. Everything from the direction to the voice acting is finely tuned, and the final product is nothing short of a genuine labor of love.

One day, they are introduced to Hagumi Hanamoto, the daughter of a cousin of Shūji Hanamoto, an art professor, who has come to live with Hanamoto and has become a first year art student at the art school that everyone attends. Takemoto and Morita both fall in love with Hagu, but Takemoto hides his feelings and tries to be a friend to Hagu while Morita expresses his love in ways that seem only to scare Hagu, such as calling her "Mousey" and constantly photographing her. Hagu herself, though initially timid and afraid of company, gradually warms up to the three.

The group comes to include Ayumi Yamada, a master of pottery who is well-known by her nickname "Tetsujin" (Iron Lady), who becomes very close to Hagu. When not at school, she helps run the family liquor store. While Ayumi is popular with many young men, she falls in love with Mayama, who does not recipocrate her feelings and considers her a very dear friend. Instead, Mayama pursues an older woman, Rika Harada, a widowed friend of Professor Hanamoto who runs an architecture studio she founded with her husband.

The story follows these five characters in their love triangles, unrequited love, graduating from college, finding jobs, and learning more about themselves.

Characters

Hagumi Hanamoto

Usually called "Hagu" by her friends, she is an 18-year-old first-year art student at the start of the series. She is depicted as appearing and acting several years younger than her true age. Despite her appearance, she is a gifted artist and her work is highly praised by art professionals. She is shy and very nervous when interacting with people, to the point of becoming physically ill from stress, with the result that other art students think she is strange. She was raised by her grandmother in a sheltered environment, where she learned to draw sketching the ever-changing view from her porch. When Morita and Takemoto first meet Hagu, they both immediately fall in love with her, although they express it in different ways. Hagu spends most of the series unaware of their feelings for her, seeing them as friends. After Takemoto confesses his feelings for her, she begins avoiding him, and at the end of the series she admits she loves Morita. However, she returns to Shūji because she cannot imagine a life without

Hagu is undoubtedly the most unusual character of the cast, and probably the one that most viewers find difficult to deal with. I was among the many who found that it was hard to take her seriously due to her character design, and her child-like actions would force anyone to raise an eyebrow. It’s almost as if she’s permanently chibi.

However, Hagu’s character begins to make a bit more sense when you factor in her upbringing, and, more importantly, her attraction to art. Raised in a quiet, reclusive environment with none of the social pressures that city dwellers are forced to deal with, she was always a distant child who lived in her dreams. The scenes from her life in middle school illustrate this well: she’s shown looking out the window in class more than the average harem lead, except I’m sure her mind was filled with something more important. It’s as if she lived in a completely different world, and didn’t bother learning the basics of society. As a result of that, she looks like a child when compared to her classmates, and she needs someone like Shuu to take care of her like a father.

Yuta Takemoto

A second-year art student, age 19 at the start of the series, living in the same apartment complex as Mayama and Morita. Takemoto is the primary point-of-view of the series, and often acts as narrator of episodes. He is depicted as the most mellow of the main characters. He falls in love with Hagu immediately after being introduced by his professor but keeps his feelings to himself through most of the series. Because of his inability to act upon his feelings as freely as Morita, Takemoto decides to act as a brother-figure to Hagu, giving her friendly support when needed, for example, building her sophisticated dollhouses at her request. Later in the series, as a result of his conflicted emotions, Takemoto develops a stomach ulcer, forcing him to repeat a year of school. Early in the series, he questions his vocation as an artist, but over the series he becomes comfortable with himself. After a bicycle trip to Cape Sōya, the northernmost point in Japan, Takemoto gains the confidence to tell Hagu how he really feels. Although Hagu does not accept him, Takemoto admits that just meeting her and the time they spend together has influenced him.

“As time passes, the day will come when everything will fade to memories. But, those miraculous days, when you and I, along with everyone else, searched together for just that one thing, will continue revolving forever somewhere deep in my heart as my bittersweet memory.”

The main character. Takemoto, the epitome of “ordinary poor college student who has no clue as to what he wants to do after he graduates.” Takemoto, an oddly sentimental but hesitant sophomore who fell in love but didn’t do a thing about it. Takemoto, who found the will to build a massive tower, break it down, and then ride half way across Japan and back, even though he has no distinctive traits or abilities to drive him forward. Takemoto was an interesting guy because he was normal, but it was his ordinary, relatable personality that let his story culminate everything that Honey and Clover stands for.

Shinobu Morita

24 years old and a 6th year student in the beginning of the series, Morita occupies room 203, his floormates being Takemoto and Hasegawa. Morita is unable to graduate, as he can never wake up on time to go to classes. This is mainly due to the work that he does, which forces him to go missing for periods of time. What he does for work though remains a mystery. When Morita comes back from his mysterious job, he immediately falls asleep for at least 48 hours, due to the amount of work he does. He also returns with a large sum of money in his back-pocket and brings a food item to share with his flat mates. Although the flat mates believe he does it to mock them, such as when he brings a bag of croquettes instead of meat, Morita does care deeply for his friends such as Takemoto.

Morita is a very mysterious person. He does many random, crazy things for his personal enjoyment, such as creating a twister game with too many colors, which resulted in horrific pain for him and Takemoto. Morita is a perceptive individual, but tactless and often states the truth, such as how Mayama secretly stalks Rika outside her apartment, when nobody wants to hear it. He also expresses his love for Hagu in weird and quirky ways, such as forcing Hagu to dress up as a mouse. Morita's obsession with Hagu stems from a fondness of cute things during his childhood, such as causing a cat to become neurotic after cuddling it too much. As a result of Morita's obsession Hagu becomes afraid of him and tries to avoid him but eventually falls in love with him later on. Despite the way Morita treats Hagu he sincerely cares for Hagu, getting her a pair of expensive mules and creating a broach with a dove on it, both of which was in her scrapbook of things she wanted.

Morita is highly talented and also highly mobile – despite the fact that he is much more of a “soulmate” for her, he can’t be the the dependable support that she needs. Neither can Takemoto. Like most other Honey and Clovers, I do think that Morita is one of the most well-conceived characters in manga/anime. In the beginning, the viewer may be led to believe that he is not much more than comic relief, yet throughout the series we get a glimpse of a truly interesting and complex character. What adds to this is the fact that we aren’t allowed into Morita’s mind with the same frequency that we are with Takemoto or Yamada. Morita remains a mystery to the viewers a lot of the time because we, like the on-screen characters, can’t truly understand what he’s thinking. In the beginning he seems like a shallow character, throwing away his education and schooling to earn money, yet we discover later that he did those things only to help Kaoru. It’s the fact that Morita so often hides behind his comedic exterior that makes his serious scenes all the more dramatic. I’m sure we can all think of people we’ve known who so consistently have an air of humor to them that it’s hard to imagine them acting serious. Observe the scenes between Morita and Yamada, for example, which many people say are highlights to them because you get to see a completely different side of Morita. The climactic scene between him and Hagu near the finale of the second season is another example – both the viewers and Hagu have never seen Morita in a state as he is now, completely devoid of any humor, his comedic wall completely shattered. That is why it was so obvious to Hagu that something was deeply wrong.

His first (and probably main) story is the one that centers around his family, which is largely disconnected from the rest of the characters. It’s also largely self-explanatory. However, I found it to be a moving little side-arc because it dealt with something that, once more, I’ve always wondered about but have never seen portrayed in fiction: the danger of talents. It must be excruciatingly painful to have something that you’re passionate about but to be unable to excel in it because you weren’t born with the right abilities, but the situation becomes even more awkward when the one with the talents has no desire to use them. Morita looked like he enjoyed his father’s work, but he was never passionate, never ambitious. It was his brother who wanted to succeed, and just like their father’s friend, Kaoru was unable to grasp the goal that Shinobu was born with his hand clasped onto. It’s a bittersweet story with no winner or loser, keeping with the tone of the rest of the show, and it explores the dark side of talent and ability that most would fear to examine too closely.

Takumi Mayama

A fourth-year art student, age 22 at the start of the series, in the same apartment complex as Takemoto and Morita. He acts as a senpai (senior) to Takemoto and tries to help Morita get up for early morning classes. Early in the series, Mayama helps Rika Harada out with various errands at her design firm, Harada Design, during which time he develops feelings for Rika. The series initially leaves unclear whether Mayama takes advantage of Rika's disability to fulfill his desires, but it is later shown that Rika reciprocates his feelings. At her urging, Mayama begins working for a different design firm, but after it breaks up, near the end of the series, he returns to work for Rika. Despite Yamada's throwing herself at him, Mayama considers her only as his close friend, but he becomes protective of her when a colleague with a reputation for playing girls develops an interest in her.

Mayama is easily one of the most interesting members of the cast, playing the role of the cool, intelligent type that seems to enjoy stealing all of the dramatic quotes. He noticed Takemoto’s infatuation for Hagu right off the bat, and he’s always shown smoking and looking off into the distance, like some sort of modern city-dwelling monk; it doesn’t take long for the viewer to build up some respect for him. His one weakness, of course, is Rika, and jokes are made throughout the series about his stalker-like means of pursuing her affection. He’s effectively a bit of both: on one hand, a calm and collected upperclassman, but on the other hand, obsessive, overprotective, and unable to make a move.

Mayama balances his life out quite well, so much so that it’s easy to incorrectly think of him as a side character. He gives advice to his friends, particularly Takemoto, he presumably has a comfortable career awaiting him – we learn later that this is more or less true – and he has, on the outside, a casual love/hate relationship with Ayumi. A quick glance at his character, within the universe of the show or out of it, would make him seem quite ordinary.

Ayumi Yamada

A third-year art student, age 21 at the start of the series, specializing in ceramic arts. She is well-known by other students for her pottery and her nickname Tetsujin "Iron-lady" for running 6 km to school every morning to help her dog lose weight. She is depicted as a beautiful young woman, who catches the attention of her male friends and coworkers. Yamada is deeply in love with Mayama, but he does not return her feelings and repeatedly encourages her to find someone else. Later in the series, she is angered by Mayama's sudden protectiveness when he tries to shield her from his former boss, Nomiya. Yamada is close friends with Hagu, who addresses her by first name. At the end of the series, Yamada continues as a graduate student in art, while making pottery for Harada Design.

Simple, and painfully true. Ayu’s arc tells the story of unrequited love right up to the end, complete with all of the self-reflections and angsty monologues and tears that come bundled with the package. She cries, a lot, and it’s perfectly fitting because that’s the only thing she can do. In a sense, she has an advantage over Mayama – as he said, girls become more beautiful when they’re in love, but what can a guy do it that situation? However, her tears earn her sympathy, not affection, and despite all of her efforts to look good for him during the summer festival, nothing could avert his faraway gaze. It’s like watching the second part of 5 Centimeters Per Second all over again: an utterly hopeless, yet completely unavoidable one-sided love.

Hands down, the greatest attribute of Honey and Clover is its intricate character chemistry. While there is no distinct plot, the cast carries the full weight of the series and runs with it. Unlike many other anime, not a single major character is wasted as an obtrusive cliché. Everyone is intelligent, calculating and fettered by their emotions. The dark loneliness, the irrational fears, the heart-wrenching longing, they all are vividly painted through the character’s silent screams towards their unrequited loves.

Honey and Clover isn’t as much about romance as it is about dealing with rejection, and the fear of rejection. The cast have real personalities, affected and often hindered by real emotions. To keep this show from being an angst-filled melodrama, the series keeps the raging emotions suppressed and maintains a cheerful atmosphere lightly layered with melancholic brooding. Despite strenuous circumstances, the characters maintain their sense of humor and refuse to relinquish their bright smiles. The memories created from the small interactions with true friends and the flickering ray of hope that accompanies each new day are what drives these characters to chase after their seemingly hopeless love.

Honey and Clover does a brilliant job depicting daily life without making it boring. However, since the series is essentially just a prolonged stay with a group of friends, the audience does not get to see the fruition of all of the conflicts. Much like real life, very few things are cast in stone. With a relatively open ending, the audience is left insatiably wanting more. By the end of the series, it is hard not to relate with at least one character. It wouldn’t be surprising if you relate with all of them; they are just that human.

Reviewed by: Shadowmage