Hanasaku Iroha and the Spring Season

"A pretty girl reached out her hand to me and..."
"Die."
"...Told me to die!"

The Spring season of anime has begun, and what an impressive start to the season it is. P.A.Works, the studio who gave us True Tears, Angel Beats! and Canaan, aired their new anime Hanasaku Iroha, and it gracefully leads what will hopefully be a season full of surprises.

Hanasaku Iroha is a slice-of-life and drama series with a hint of comedy following 16-year old Ohana Matsumae whom lives with her mother in Tokyo. Under a series of circumstances, she has to move away from Tokyo and begin working with her Grandmother at a hot spring hotel. Ohana herself seems interested to find drama in her life, suggesting that she may have led quite a boring life up until moving away. Ohana's best friend from Tokyo, Kouichi Tanemura, is upset when Ohana tells him about the situation, confessing his feelings for her on the spot and telling Ohana how blind she has been to his feelings all along, ending in Ohana leaving for the hotel without Kouichi to see her off. I imagine there will be a reunion in a future episode as it was quite heartbreaking to see their interaction stop at that.

Upon meeting her rather strict and old-fashioned Grandmother, it is quite apparent that the drama Ohana is seeking will become a reality in no time. Although not obvious to the oblivious Ohana herself, she has found herself in a strange new place, forced to work at the hot spring hotel by her Grandmother in return for putting a roof over her head and feeding her, surrounded by strange new people whom don't seem quite right in the head. The socially inept Minko Tsurugi is our second major character, who seems quite intent on hating Ohana for picking her precious weeds. The other girls at the hot spring hotel haven't been explored very well yet but I expect all of them to have a large part in the overall story. I don't particularly want to spoil the first episode so I'll leave it there and say give this one a taste, it's definitely a keeper for me.

Onto the art and animation, the art is phenomenal as standard for P.A. Works. They are easily one of the masters of animation at this point, the quality was that of a movie more than a series. The visuals are gorgeous. Not much more to say.

The character design is of course high quality too, although character design in anime is somewhat of a problem due to the amount of characters there actually are and how similar characters from one series may look to another, I didn't have too much of a problem with this in Hanasaku Iroha. Ohana's design is definitely made unique by her warm complexion, wavy hair and flower decorations, and you could definitely recognize her character in an instant. Kouichi suffered from being the bog standard cliche anime guy, though this is quite usual in series of this sort nowadays. The other girls also seem to fall on very overused designs and I personally believe Minko's design could have been better. The voice acting is exceptional and supports the characters incredibly well, Kanae Itou does an amazing job of portraying Ohana's character.

The soundtrack is beautiful, which seems to be a recurring thing with anime nowadays. If theres ever anything that all anime have in common, it is usually a killer soundtrack. Hanasaku Iroha is no different. The opening song (Assuming they played the opening at the end of the first episode) is really nice and supported by lovely animation.

I have very high hopes for this series after viewing the first episode and hope that it delivers. It could go in quite a few different directions at this point, I imagine we'll get plenty of heart-wrenching drama and some hilarious comedy moments as is standard for P.A. Works. Highly Recommended.

There are many other shows I wish to watch this season and some that I have already begun watching. These include Gintama, Nichijou and Steins;Gate. All will receive comments in the coming days.