Bloom Into You

Plot

First-year high school student Yuu Koito unexpectedly receives a confession from a middle school classmate. Feeling that she does not understand love, she turns him down. She later sees second-year student council member Touko Nanami turning down a confession, and becomes convinced that Touko feels similarly about romance. She approaches Touko and the two begin to bond, before Touko suddenly confesses feelings for Yuu, surprising her. Although Yuu does not feel capable of reciprocating, Touko is not bothered by this and says she would be very happy if Yuu were to not return her feelings.

Touko runs for the position of student council president and asks Yuu to be her campaign manager. To the dismay of Touko's best friend Sayaka Saeki, Yuu accepts the role. Touko expresses that she feels emotionally reliant on Yuu, as she is the only one to whom Touko can be vulnerable. Yuu decides to join the student council to support Touko, who ultimately wins the election.

As president, Touko plans to revive the student council play, which has not been performed in seven years. Yuu is against the idea, and chooses not to suggest her novelist friend Koyomi Kanou when the other members ask who could write it. Sayaka tells Yuu to solicit Koyomi's involvement and to look into the student council president of seven years ago. Yuu learns that Touko's older sister Mio was the student council president at that time and had been producing a play, but was killed in a traffic accident before its premiere. Yuu realizes that Touko is emulating her sister and wants to produce the play in her place. She tries to convince Touko that this is unnecessary, but Touko coldly refuses.

Koyomi finishes the first draft of the play. The narrative follows an amnesiac girl who must choose which person's view of her is her true self, with the original ending involving the girl choosing her lover's view. When the student council holds a study camp to practice for the play, actor Tomoyuki Ichigaya, a former classmate of Mio's, is brought in to help. From him, Touko learns that Mio was a very different person than who she is now, leaving her conflicted. Concerned, Yuu has Koyomi change the ending to have the protagonist choose to be herself instead of conforming to a specific person's view, believing that this will help Touko come to terms with herself. When the play is performed at the cultural festival, its narrative and Touko's performance are acclaimed by the audience, and the manager of a local theater troupe approaches Touko, asking her to join them and become an actress. She initially declines, but eventually reconsiders and accepts.

Characters

Yuu Koito (小糸 侑, Koito Yū)

Voiced by: Hisako Kanemoto (manga PV), Yūki Takada (anime) (Japanese); Tia Ballard (English)

Yuu is a 15-year-old high school girl at Toomi Higashi High School who has trouble experiencing feelings of love. She finds it hard to refuse any requests asked upon her.

Touko Nanami (七海 燈子, Nanami Tōko)

Voiced by: Minako Kotobuki (manga PV, anime) (Japanese); Luci Christian (English)

Touko is a 16-year-old high school girl and the student council president. She had trouble experiencing feelings of love until she met Yuu. While on the outside she seems dependable and unshakable, she has hidden her fears and desires, especially when it comes to everyone else comparing her to her deceased sister. Yuu and Sayaka have deduced this, while only Yuu has seen her vulnerable side.

Sayaka Saeki (佐伯 沙弥香, Saeki Sayaka)

Voiced by: Ai Kayano (Japanese); Shanae'a Moore (English)

Sayaka is Touko's best friend since their first year of high school, and feels she knows Touko best. She is a second-year high school girl and the student council vice president. She is secretly in love with Touko, but keeps this to herself, unwilling to jeopardize their existing relationship. She decided that she was fine simply supporting her friend however she could.

Seiji Maki (槙 聖司, Maki Seiji)

Voiced by: Taichi Ichikawa (Japanese); Clint Bickham (English)

Seiji is a first-year high school boy and a member of the student council. He grew up surrounded by two older sisters and a younger sister, so he finds it easy to talk with girls.

Production

Background

Prior to creating the series, Nio Nakatani was mainly known for her work on doujinshi, especially those based on the Touhou Project series. Because her works were primarily about relationships between girls (which Nakatani attributed to the Touhou series' almost entirely female cast), she gained a reputation as an author of yuri manga. This surprised Nakatani, as she had not intentionally set out to write yuri nor considered her works as such, and she said that she had primarily sought to depict complex human relationships that interested her. However, as she nonetheless was interested in the yuri genre, she became interested in drawing an unambiguous love story between girls.

When Tatsuya Kusunoki, an editor of the manga magazine Dengeki Daioh (in which Nakatani had professionally debuted with her previously self-published short story Farewell to My Alter) approached Nakatani at a doujinshi convention, asking if she wanted to draw a yuri series for the magazine, Nakatani accepted the offer. Kusunoki stated that he had always enjoyed yuri manga and had wanted to produce one. He said that as Dengeki Daioh had not previously featured a similar girls' love story, it was uncertain whether such a proposal would be accepted. The editor-in-chief ultimately approved of the idea, which Kusunoki attributed to the publication's "open-minded" culture and the magazine's financial resources.

Regarding her approach to the yuri genre, Nakatani stated that while she liked romance stories, she was disappointed with narratives that painted a relationship as necessary to complete oneself emotionally, as it made her feel as if "something was wrong with me." Nakatani felt that same-sex romances often avoided this dichotomy, and that as she struggled to write a convincing heterosexual romance, she was more drawn towards creating manga about same-sex couples. While Nakatani had also drawn boys' love manga previously, she found yuri more interesting, since she wanted to draw cute girls. In one interview, she said that yuri was difficult to define, but that "once the reader thinks it is yuri, then at that moment it becomes yuri." In a conversation with Riddle Story of Devil creators Yun Kōga and Sunao Minakata, she concurred with Kōga's statement that yuri is about "girls getting involved with other girls," adding the qualification that it is "feelings between girls." She also cited the anime adaptation of Sound! Euphonium as an influence, saying it showed "everything I want to do in yuri."

Early development

Besides the work being in the yuri genre, Nakatani had not decided on any story details before accepting Kusunoki's offer. She developed many ideas for different plots and characters, almost all of which were ultimately scrapped, except for Touko's character design. The editor-in-chief suggested a "secret love", which Nakatani noticed was common to the yuri genre in stories where the characters had to keep their same-sex relationship secret due to both being girls. Nakatani did not want to focus the narrative on the social challenges of girl-girl relationships, as she felt it would be too simple, and was more interested in exploring the characters' personal flaws. Thus, she thought of a twist on the idea, where rather than keeping their love secret from others, drama would come from two girls keeping their love secret from each other. This became the impetus for what would become Yuu and Touko's romance story.

Kusunoki proposed a "light and dark" yuri story to Nakatani, where a "dark" lead character would be in some way redeemed by the "light" character, as this was a dynamic seen in other yuri manga he had previously enjoyed. Touko was created first as the "dark" half of the pairing while Yuu was made to fill the "light" role. Nakatani wanted Touko to be attractive but "troublesome," and designed her to appear superficially perfect, while in reality being a difficult person with deep emotional insecurities and self-hatred, who would confess her love but not wish to be reciprocated. From there, Nakatani developed Yuu as the type of girl who she imagined would be able to help and eventually come to love Touko.

Yuu was intended to visually and temperamentally contrast with Touko, as a deliberately cute girl with a deeper "cool" aspect. Her personality was written to be someone who would not feel happy about Touko's love but also not reject her, which led to her being created as a girl who desired romantic feelings but did not understand them. As they were planning the characters, Kusunoki and Nakatani asked others around them for stories about their experiences with romance. One woman said that she did not understand romantic feelings, and Nakatani based the manga's depiction of Yuu's emotions on her story. Once Touko's role as the student council president was decided, Nakatani conceived Sayaka, Touko's friend in the student council, who would have an unrequited crush on Touko. Nakatani wanted Sayaka to come off as "extremely cool", and designed her to contrast with Touko's "lovable" image when standing beside her as her student council vice president and academic rival.

Serialization

Nakatani and Kusunoki wanted to make the characters' emotions understandable even to readers who may not be able to relate to them. It was particularly important for the story's female characters to be enjoyable to Dengeki Daioh's shōnen demographic. They tried to not shy away from emotionally complex characters, believing that if they were depicted successfully, it would lead to a more fulfilling story. Kusunoki said that this was a challenge, but felt that Nakatani was capable of accomplishing it.

In planning Bloom Into You's story, Nakatani paced the series such that there was always a dramatic plot twist at the end of each volume. For instance, she deliberately avoided showing Touko's perspective until chapter 10 of the manga, which was placed at the end of the second tankōbon volume. She felt it served as an ideal climax for the end of that volume, being a critical point where the nature of her relationship with Yuu was solidified. In response to Happy Sugar Life editor Katsuyuki Sasaki saying that this had "turned the story upside down", Kusunoki commented that it enabled readers to reread the previous chapters in a new light, and said that the series "really starts" from that point. As Nakatani felt that it was important to not let the characters change too quickly, she tried to keep in mind what she felt that they were likely to do at the point to which she had developed them.

The spinoff novels, which focus on Sayaka as a central protagonist, were written by Hitoma Iruma, whom Nakatani had previously collaborated with on Iruma's earlier novel Shoujo Mousouchuu. Although she was initially apprehensive about someone else writing her characters, she agreed when it was decided that Iruma would be the writer. Nakatani provided Iruma with details about her planned ending for the series. Among these details, Nakatani wrote dialogue for a conversation where Yuu and Touko learn that Sayaka has a girlfriend, which would be included in the final chapter of the manga. Iruma chose to begin the novel with Sayaka in elementary school, as he did not feel confident that her middle school experience would be enough to support a full novel, and thus imagined a history for her based on the few details given about her past in the manga. He said that as Nakatani was the original creator, he felt that his role in the novels' creation was "the one who contributed the text".

Following the release of the novels, Nakatani said that Iruma's writing had influenced how she wrote Sayaka, particularly her confession to Touko in the 37th chapter. Rather than discarding her understanding of the character due to Iruma's influence, his characterization instead aligned with her own view. Although it was planned early that Sayaka would eventually confess and be rejected, her character grew to be more detailed as the series went on, and she became much more involved in the narrative than Nakatani had initially planned. In writing the conclusion of her subplot, Nakatani wanted to avoid implying that her rejection meant she had "failed", saying that Touko could have never accepted her confession even if she had confessed earlier in the story. She rewrote the dialogue of Sayaka's confession scene several times.

Anime adaptation

Before the anime adaptation was greenlit, Kadokawa sent director Makoto Kato several titles that it was publishing, asking if he would be interested in directing an anime version of any of them. Among these was Bloom Into You, which caught Kato's interest more than any of the others and resulted in him asking that an anime adaptation be considered. While Kato did not typically read manga except when required to in the course of his work, he was attracted to Nakatani's panel layouts, which he said were "very similar to how things are done in film". Kato felt that an adaptation would fit his style as a director. He admitted that he did not have any previous knowledge of the yuri genre, but nonetheless was intrigued by the story and saw potential in it for broad appeal, even to those who were not already fans of yuri. Kato believed that bringing his perspective as an outsider made the anime more interesting, as he imagined that someone more familiar with the genre would produce something with more limited appeal.

Kato had previously worked as an assistant director for Re:Creators, and debuted in the lead directorial role on the anime adaptation of Beautiful Bones: Sakurako's Investigation, which Nakatani had seen prior. As Beautiful Bones' source material was a novel series, Kato had not had to adhere to pre-existing visuals, and he described working on a manga adaptation as a challenge for this reason. While Nakatani was confident in Kato's skill as a director, she was nervous about letting others handle her story, as she was uncertain if she would be involved. Kato assured Nakatani that he cared about the original manga and wanted to create a faithful adaptation, assuaging her concerns. Nakatani was consulted extensively during the production of the anime, attending the recording sessions and script meetings as well as supervising the visuals, character design, and storyboards. Kato considered her opinion important due to the story's complexity. Nakatani explained her intentions with several scenes and characters to ensure that they were accurate, and provided her envisioned chronology of the story's events. She also contributed new details not directly shown in the manga, such as the earlier draft of the Student Council play prior to Yuu's request that Koyomi revise it. Nakatani felt that her input helped the anime more closely reflect her original work, a feat which she regarded as remarkable.

Series composition writer Jukki Hanada joined the project after being asked by a producer if he would be interested. In reading the manga, Hanada felt it would be difficult to adapt, but decided to accept the offer as he felt an anime would be worthwhile. Nakatani was already a fan of Hanada's work, and quickly placed her trust in him. Prior to writing the scripts, he discussed his interpretation of the story with Nakatani, saying he read it as "a simple love story" between women with a minimized focus on homoeroticism, and that it was not concerned with avoiding the "associations with 'immorality'" often found in other yuri works. Hanada said that his reading "wasn't far off" from Nakatani's own opinion. Hanada felt most connected to Touko, as he related to her feelings of self-hatred, while Kato identified with Yuu. Hanada opined that this contributed to the success of their collaboration, as they did not clash with one another over how to portray either character.

Media

Manga

The manga is written and illustrated by Nio Nakatani. It began serialization in ASCII Media Works' monthly magazine Dengeki Daioh on April 27, 2015 and ended on September 27, 2019. The eighth and final tankōbon volume of the manga was released in November 2019. Describing the series as having "adorable artwork and [a] charming love story", Seven Seas Entertainment announced its licensing of the manga for English release in North America on February 14, 2016. The manga is currently published in Japanese, English, Korean, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, Thai, French, Italian, German, Spanish and Vietnamese.

The manga was relaunched as a full-color webtoon by Kadokawa Future Publishing's Tatesuku Comic imprint. It began serialization on BookWalker on August 11, 2021.

Two volumes of an official manga anthology were published by Kadokawa and released between December 2018 and March 2020. Seven Seas announced its licensing of the manga anthology for English release in North America on December 4, 2020.

Novel

A spinoff novel, Bloom Into You: Regarding Saeki Sayaka (やがて君になる 佐伯沙弥香について, Yagate Kimi ni Naru: Saeki Sayaka ni Tsuite), is written by Hitoma Iruma and was published through Kadokawa's Dengeki Bunko imprint beginning November 10, 2018. The second volume was released on May 10, 2019, and the third volume was released on March 10, 2020. Seven Seas Entertainment announced in July 2019 that they had licensed the series for release in English in North America.

Anime

A 13-episode anime television series adaptation was announced in the June issue of the Dengeki Daioh magazine on April 27, 2018. It was animated by Troyca, produced by Kadokawa, Docomo Anime Store, AT-X, Sony Music Solutions and Kadokawa Media House and directed by Makoto Katō, with Jukki Hanada handling series composition, Hiroaki Gōda designing the characters and Michiru Ōshima composing the music. The opening theme is "Kimi ni Furete" (君にふれて, Touched By You) by Riko Azuna, while the ending theme is "hectopascal" by Yuu Koito (Yūki Takada) and Touko Nanami (Minako Kotobuki). The series aired in Japan from October 5 to December 28, 2018. Sentai Filmworks licensed the series outside of Asia and streamed it on Hidive in both subtitled and English dubbed formats. Sentai also released the series on DVD and Blu-ray in September 2019, while MVM Films published the series on home video in the UK. KSM Anime released the series on DVD and Blu-ray with a German dub.

Stage play

A stage play adaptation of the manga ran in Japan in May 2019. A second stage play, adapting events in the Regarding Saeki Sayaka light novels, ran from October to November 2020. An encore performance of the stage play, with a script revised to include the events of the manga's conclusion, was announced in October 2019 as part of the "Curtain Call" project following the end of the manga's serialization. It was planned for the fall of 2020, but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In July 2022, the encore was rescheduled to be performed between November 25 and December 4, 2022, with the previous main cast slated to reprise their roles.

Reception

By 2019, there were 1,000,000 copies in print in Japan alone. It placed fourth in the 2017 Next Manga Awards from Niconico and Da Vinci. The manga also ranked on Oricon's weekly manga rankings chart, with Volume 4 reaching 30th place and Volume 5 reaching 21st place. The manga placed third in AnimeJapan's 2018 "Manga Most Wanted as Anime by Fans" poll. Sword Art Online creator Reki Kawahara stated in a conversation with Nakatani and Ai Kayano (the voice of Sayaka in the anime) that he was a fan of the series.

In a poll conducted by the Japanese site Anime Anime in April 2022, Bloom Into You came in third place amongst the anime that readers said they most wanted a continuation of.

Critical response

Erica Friedman, reviewing Bloom Into You on a per-volume basis, was initially critical of the series. Friedman praised its artwork, gender diversity in the cast, and lack of reliance on fanservice, but expressed discomfort with Touko's forward expression of her feelings and the perceived dubious consensuality of the kissing scenes. Friedman also disliked the straightforward romance plot, feeling that the possibility of Yuu being asexual or aromantic was not considered. However, Friedman praised Sayaka's character and her subplot within the manga, as well as the inclusion of Riko and Miyako as positive role models of a functioning relationship. She described the story as "intriguing, rather than entertaining" and hoped for later plot turns to address her criticisms. Friedman later praised a scene in the fifth volume for seeing Yuu become "an active participant in the narrative" when she urges Touko to not depend on her for fulfillment. Despite remaining disappointed that Yuu was not "a rare aromantic manga protagonist", she ultimately praised the series's character development and ending.

Michelle Smith of Manga Bookshelf wrote that she initially considered Touko's early confession to be "unearned" but that later developments in the remainder of the first volume captured her intrigue. Sean Gaffney felt that Yuu's portrayal was a "nice reversal" and credited her character with the manga's popularity, but also praised the narrative and cast in general, saying he "was surprised several times throughout."

Rebecca Silverman of Anime News Network gave a generally positive review to the manga's first volume, saying that the potential of Yuu being aromantic made the story more interesting for offering representation to an underrepresented group. Silverman speculated that Yuu's sexual experimentation with Touko throughout the story was reflective of Nakatani writing her first yuri series as well as her debut work after her history of primarily authoring doujinshi, saying, "What we could be seeing is an author experimenting with a genre she's not entirely comfortable with yet". She also complimented the choice to set the story in a co-ed school as a "nice change" from other yuri stories, and said that it had "no 'forceful' tropes" (such as in Citrus or NTR: Netsuzou Trap). However, Silverman called Nakatani's art and character designs simple and "slightly generic", though she praised the expressions for being "easy to read".

In a feature for Neo, Alex Jones praised the anime adaptation as a "far broader" exploration of its subject matter in contrast with the fan service-focused approach of Citrus (whose anime adaptation had aired the same year as Bloom Into You's). Jones further commended Sayaka's inclusion and how the series explored her backstory, saying that it elevated her character beyond the common trope of the "unrequited best friend crush", and also praised the role of Riko and Miyako in helping her be confident in her identity. Reviewing the anime in the same issue, Jones felt that the topic of aromanticism was never "fetishized," and praised the story's themes of self-introspection as well as the quality of the production and character expressions, saying the anime "never relies on trying to be 'cute' in the conventional sense". Jones' singular note of criticism was the anime only offering an "incomplete story" due to it not adapting the remainder of the manga.

Themes and analysis

Numerous English-language critics reviewing both the manga and the anime interpreted the character of Yuu Koito, and her expressed lack of attraction to Touko early in the story as suggesting that she was asexual or aromantic (or some variation thereof). Reviews either praised the series for perceived representation of aroace identities, or criticized it as an inadequate or disappointing depiction. Natasha H., in a piece for Crunchyroll, said that the story avoided depicting Yuu as "broken" and showed her as an aromantic individual who was nonetheless capable of a fulfilling relationship with Touko. In Neo, Alex Jones wrote that while Yuu's feelings may at first appear aromantic, further developments in the narrative rather suggested that she was demisexual. Jones acknowledged that this could be "disheartening" to aromantic readers, but said that with Maki's inclusion, the series avoided implying aromantic individuals to be "late bloomers".

Bauman attributed the spread of this reading to the anime adaptation, which did not cover later plot developments in which Yuu develops explicit sexual attractions towards Touko. While Bauman said it was "a valid and understandable argument" if based only off of the anime, she nonetheless denied this reading, citing the advertising of the work as a conventional love story and the explicit depiction of romantic and sexual attraction on both sides. Bauman felt that Yuu's early failure to reciprocate Touko's attraction was attributed to a "character fault" rather than an expression of any non-standard romantic orientation. Additionally, she criticized the character of Maki as a poor example of aromantic representation, saying that the series did not acknowledge the reality of aromantic and asexual individuals who "can have meaningful lives and stories of their own that do not necessarily involve courtship."

Writing for Anime News Network, Nicki "YuriMother" Bauman called Bloom Into You "one of the most successful yuri works," noting its commercial success and popularity with readers, of which she said it "deserves every bit". In spite of this acknowledgement, Bauman was nonetheless critical of the series. While she said it broke away from many tropes commonly associated with yuri, she said it still featured numerous genre conventions, describing it as "a near-textbook example of the 'girl-meets-girl' structure". Bauman pointed to many narrative elements, such as the school play plotline and Sayaka's attraction to Touko, as imitative of other series such as Maria-sama ga Miteru and Strawberry Panic!. Another point of criticism was Touko's forceful expression of her affection for Yuu, described as an example of the "predatory lesbian" trope that Bauman called "one of yuri's most harmful".