Natsume Yuujinchou Movie: Utsusemi ni Musubu

I'm going to go against the grain and rate this move poorly compared to other people as well as compared to how I would rate the Natsume series overall. Spoilers below. This movie would have been a lot more effective if it had been reduced to one or two ~23 minute episodes. It was only about an hour into the film when the film finally decides to tell you what the film is actually about: Mukuo and Yorie. It's not super difficult to find ways to shorten this film. For instance, a putative episode could have opened up with Natsume's mom asking him to go to Gochou (sp?),Natsume and Nyanko-sensei going, Nyanko running off and visiting the tree and getting the seed, and Natsume meeting the woman who recognizes him, says he looks familiar, and him asking her if she knew Reiko. The film spent thirty minutes on the two trips to Gochou and some side material. This could have been reduced down to say ten minutes by combining the two trips into one, and cutting the other material that just waters down and distracts from what the plot is really about. And that's the problem with the film. Beyond the film taking so long to reveal what it's even about (Mukuo and Yorie), the film never actually gives Mukuo and Yorie the screen time they deserve. Instead, the film wastes its time with so much else that their importance gets pushed into the background. The film has a strong hook: a woman loses her son and a youkai mimics him and replaces him and the woman's memory of his death. And yet, never once did I cry during this film, because the film completely squanders its story. And consider the film's subtitle: Ephemeral Bonds. This theme isn't actually present in the film. This theme doesn't apply to Natsume's friends or family. You can argue the theme applies to Nyanko because Natsume misses being able to talk to Nyanko when he's split up. But that's a weak and unexplored theme in the film. At best the theme applies to Mukuo and Yorie, but again, they get so little screen time that the theme doesn't really do any work with them. It's not a shock to discover that this movie was an anime original story not written (albeit "supervised") by the original manga author.

I'm going to save you from reading the usual fuzz that you can read in every other review ever on Natsume Yuujinchou. I mean, it's Natsume. You already know what Natsume Yuujinchou is. That brings me to the good thing about this movie, it doesn't do anything wrong. It's good because it's Natsume, and if you're thinking about watching this movie, chances are you've already watched the last SIX SEASONS (!!!) that precede it. By this point, you probably like Natsume and know what to expect. What you expect is exactly what you'll find in this movie: the good old usual Natsume Yuujinchou. Describing it asan arc you'd see from the show is perfectly accurate. That’s quite literally what it is, it's an arc in the form of a movie. It’s Natsume. If you're figuring out that Natsume isn't your type of thing after six seasons, I'd be concerned about the fact that you stuck around for so long lol On the other hand, this movie isn't anything particularly special either, and other than presenting a new story, it certainly doesn't bring anything new to the table. There are some anime movies from other franchises that are utterly elevated from their parent series because of multiple aspects (ex: Haruhi), but I can’t say the same here. I’m not going to say this lack thereof is a detriment, it’s just the lack of something newer and special. Not to say that there’s anything wrong with that, though!

Basically it's a regular series episode that's a bit longer, with even better drawn environments, which is awesome. The story is pretty great, although I can't help but feel teased into thinking maybe we'd learn more about Natsume's grandfather in this - not by marketing materials, but by the plot. It's still lovely without it, but it's annoying that they keep doing that. It does the usual OVA thing where it has basically the entire cast show up and they aren't that important to the story at first, but it actually uses all of them in important story ways, which is unique. It also has theusual OVA infodumps like "here's what's going on in the plot right now", but quickly moves back to the story, which is good. I think the ending was overly drawn out, but overall, good story. Later seasons of the show are already clearly getting a budget increase, and the OVA clearly got some more. I think it was mainly used on environments, though. The characters look normal, and Nyanko sensei is almost laughably worse than usual. But at least the bushes look quite pretty! The music isn't markedly different from the series. I definitely heard familiar tunes, and they were used well. It helps better create the effect that this is just a longer regular episode. The new characters are lovely, although again, they feel built to tease us about Natsume's grandfather. That aside, there's some more great Reiko stuff, the Dog's Circle is ridiculous and lovely, Natsume's friends are great, Natori in particular has a great bit here, and the mini Nyanko senseis are cute. I was honestly expecting the same disaster of the first OVAs that starred Nyanko sensei, with the repeated footage and bad story, but I didn't see any of that. This gives me hope if they do this in the future. Great film!

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