Makoto Shinkai tried not to make Suzume a romance — and failed

2016 your name was not director Makoto Shinkai’s first project, but it was his first major success, becoming the third highest grossing anime film internationally and establishing him as a global name. It also confirmed certain expectations for Shinkai’s future work: Since your name was such an evocative romance, fans expected more of the same from him.

His post from 2019 Weathering with you gave them exactly what they expected: another charged relationship drama between young people with a supernatural element. So of course, then the first trailers for Suzume came out, many fans expected another magically tinted romance. The titular heroine finally meets a mysterious, beautiful stranger and they are thrown together by an intense magical conflict. Never mind that her rambunctious new companion turns into a chair early in the film; the pieces all seem to be there.

However, this time Shinkai was less interested in writing a love story. Instead, he wanted to focus on a variety of different relationships.

But by shifting the focus away from romance, he made Suzume‘s romance absolutely incredible. Unlike in Weathering with you And your name, SuzumeThe film’s romantic arc is more subdued and less of the film’s driving force. And yet, as the romance takes a back seat in favor of the main character’s growth, with the primary climax turned inward, Suzume ends with a particularly unique and beautiful romantic arc.

[Ed. note: This post contains setup spoilers for Suzume.]

Like it Weathering with you And your name, Suzume is about two young people who are involved in a supernatural adventure. (And again, one of them is from a small town, while the other is an urban slicker.) In this case, Suzume, the protagonist, meets the enigmatic Sōta after asking her if there are any abandoned places around. She learns that Sōta is on a mission to close doors between worlds, to contain a giant supernatural worm (a staple in Japanese mythology) that threatens to cause natural disasters. But when she follows Sōta to a dilapidated hot spring, she accidentally sabotages his mission and he becomes a chair. Suzume and chair-Sōta travel Japan together, closing doors and containing the worm all the way to Tokyo.

While Suzume’s journey begins when she meets Sōta, the movie isn’t just about the sparks between them: it’s more about how Suzume connects with everyone around her, and how that ties into her growth as a person.

Early on in the movie, it becomes clear that while Suzume seems like a typical high school student, there’s something more to her, something that seems slightly out of place. It could be her willingness to put everything aside to follow Sōta’s mission, or the fact that she seems to have trouble connecting with those around her. It’s subtle at first, but it comes to a head when she helps Sōta close one of the mysterious doors and they face the powerful worm creature together. Sōta, who has trained all his life for this task, wonders why Suzume risks her life for his cause.

Image: CoMix Wave Films/Crunchyroll

Her reaction explains a lot about her character – why she’s so willing to put herself in danger, why she’s independent from a fault, why she’s so disconnected from those around her. The reasoning behind that reaction is rooted in the traumatic events she experienced as a young girl during the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. Once we realize that, the story of Suzume risking her life for a mission she just got to know (and a cool dude she just met) changes to Suzume working through her trauma and trying to exert some semblance of control about these catastrophic natural disasters.

In another film, Suzume’s dedication to her mission would easily lend itself to single-minded obsession and self-destruction. Instead, her cross-country journey slowly but surely pushes her to open up to people. Her relationship with Sōta is vital to this change, but more importantly, she meets and accepts help from a wide variety of people on her journey.

Suzume is about processing trauma and eventually learning to live. Even after the movie’s turning point, Suzume still recklessly endangers herself to save others. Like it your name And Weathering with you, sees Shinkai’s newest young heroes race against time to stop an impending disaster. But some key differences in Suzume make sure the last act coincides in a way that transcends the previous two films. Suzume has a personal connection to the impending catastrophe, one that snugly envelops her entire character journey. The event itself feels huge and all-encompassing, but because the movie focuses on her rather than the action, it gives the payoff more emotional impact. And when Suzume stands up to fight her battle, it’s not about making a dramatic choice or defying all odds. She’s just reframing what she’s trying to do in a way that feels more personal than most action heroes’ journeys. She doesn’t want to give her life to save the world; she just wants to stay in it.

Image: CoMix Wave Films/Crunchyroll

Sōta inspires Suzume to live, but doesn’t for him, and not out of love. He inspires her to live because He wants to live, which makes her realize that she is also worth living. He changes her for the better by inspiring her, without actually being the only reason she changes. Because the movie focuses so heavily on Suzume as a character, we get a sense of who she is, what she wants, and how she’s changing. Sōta is just a smaller part of her larger journey, which makes their relationship richer and more fulfilling.

After all, romantic relationships aren’t the only driving force in life, and knowing that Suzume’s relationship with Sōta isn’t the only important facet of her life makes a future for them more likely. The film leaves them both with their own meaningful stories, which does not detract from their deep connection. If anything, their relationship resonates more because it’s not the center of their lives or their story.

That’s far from the bittersweet end of it your namewhere the supernatural bond between the young lovers fades, or the powerful choice sets in Weathering with youwhere the protagonists choose each other over a dying world. Suzume‘s romantic threads are more subtle and leave more to the audience’s interpretation. But Shinkai’s refusal to describe every step of their connection gives the feeling of a more mature relationship, one where the two parties have more of an idea about who they are as people and what they’ve done for each other. Without the traditional movie-sounding kiss or love confession to give viewers their big, obvious cathartic love story moment, the relationship feels more natural — what grounds Suzume‘s more fantastic bits too.

Suzume debuts in theaters April 14.