The romance genre in anime has long been going through a period of drought with a noticeable lack of truly interesting stories. Despite some of the old hit romance series like, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya and Kaichou wa Maid-sama, the rest are mostly run-of-the-mill shows.
However, out of nowhere, Horimiya appeared to be an exception to this trend, bringing hope for a revival of quality romance anime. Although it was still a manga created as far back as 2011, its fresh take on the genre felt refreshing for a lot of viewers. But alas! The subsequent anime adaptation, released in January 2021, didn’t really offer much as it never showed a lot of elements that made the manga so lovable. But why did it happen?
Horimiya’s Author Was Hardly Involved in The Production of The Anime
In an intriguing interview, the Director of Horimiya, Ishihama spoke about various details behind the production of this anime adaptation, and some really interesting facts came to light. The most striking revelation was that the original manga author, Hero was rarely involved in this process. Ishihama said that Hero hardly gave any guidance on anything, pointing out that it gave the whole production team great creative freedom.
The authors didn’t provide many specific instructions.
According to Director Ishihama, his lack of involvement did not affect the production much, but as fans, it is difficult to say it didn’t prevent the anime from reaching its full potential. The original manga had more depth to it that made the series popular, which was clearly missing in Season 1 of Horimiya. It’s natural that fans would be sad, knowing what could have been if Hero had played a more creative role in the anime adaptation.
Horimiya Season 1 Could Have Been Way Better, Had The Mangaka Been a Part of Its Production
The Horimiya anime was meant to be a self-containing single-season adaptation, but its poor execution and creation have left the narrative all messy and hurried. Only if Hero had more hands-on with the production process of this series, its pacing issues in both seasons may have been eradicated.
With Hero’s proper guidance, the anime could have remained true to the original story’s emotional depth and character development, preventing any chaotic pacing within the storyline. Furthermore, just a faithful adaptation of the first season would have made the second season absolutely unnecessary.
The overuse of certain characters without proper development and resolution added further chaos to the adaptation. Now if one attempts to view the anime, in order, it will actually result in a disjointed journey through the series due to the haphazard pacing of the first season alone. So, it wouldn’t be too far off to say that the anime’s potential was kind of thrown to waste, which could have been avoided if the creators had stayed closer to the original idea.
Horimiya season 1 & 2 are available to watch on Crunchyroll.
This post belongs to FandomWire and first appeared on FandomWire
