Iroduku: The World in Colors

 

• genre: drama, ensemble cast, romance, urban fantasy
• number of seasons: 1 season with 13 episodes
• myanimelist / anilist

my family got a temporary amazon prime video subscription for 2 months as they wanted to watch 1 certain show that's only available on there, then i decided to check out if there are anime available on there as well. the subscription has now been terminated, and i ended up completing grandblue and iroduku which i love both shows in totally different ways. (btw i didn't write up a blog post on grandblue was because i was kinda too busy to type up a whole post on why i absolutely loved that shitpost of a show, so anyways just know that i LOVE it)

iroduku is one of the many original anime made by the legendary p.a. works, however its reputation, from what i've seen within anime communities, isn't as good as their previous work with a similar theme, nagiasu (aka a lull in the sea, 2013), or just other p.a. works original anime in general. some even described how p.a. works' quality has declined until they changed things up by adapting mangas in 2022 with paripi koumei. therefore, i kinda expected myself to hop into iroduku as a "bad" show, but i still don't understand people's criticism towards p.a. works at that time, as i pretty much enjoyed iroduku.

iroduku features our main character hitomi (cv ishihara kaori), a high school student in the year 2078, got sent back to the year of 2018 by her grandma, kohaku (cv hondo kaede (younger)), for no apparent reason. hitomi suffers from complete colorblindness that everything she sees is just black and white, but found herself being able to see colors in aoi yuito (cv chiba shouya)'s drawings. she meets the people in the magical-photography-art club, and as she became a part of it, she slowly found out the reason behind her colorblindness.

iroduku feels very gentle, no matter it's the character dynamics, or the music (the op & ed are just beautiful), or the character and background designs, or the colors, i.e. the main theme of the show, they all just blend in together very well and overall it felt very soft and comfortable to watch, or easy on the eyes. at the first few episodes i wondered why didn't they put more focus into how hitomi is someone from the future by showing how she isn't used to technology at that time, but later i realized that the worldview isn't the main focus of the show, rather the the character conflicts instead.

there is not a single character that i don't like in this show, every single person of the main cast (i.e. the members of the magical-photograhy-art club) has their own struggles and iroduku managed to go into them with appropriate length, while not losing the focus on the main characters, hitomi and yuito. i especially feel attached to these 2 as both of them are really sensitive people that care so much about other's feelings, and this added a lot of the gentleness i mentioned earlier.

the other characters all have their points that stand out so that the audience remembers them, for example younger kohaku's extrovert personality that likes to pull little tricks on people, shou (cv maeda seiji) being a reliable leader of the group, chigusa (cv murase ayumu) being the funny guy in the group, etc. the thing about having an ensemble cast is that you have to make the audience remember every single one of them, which especially i easily forget characters in a show, iroduku did a good job making me remember the group.

the background is very detailed, and that i would like to visit nagasaki one day to relive the absolutely stunning cityline they saw at night. the magic system is also the cherry on top too, as it approaches the show in a very kind way while managed to keep it not being the main focus of the show. also i really love how hitomi's perspective of things is sometimes shown with a black and white filter, so we get to understand even if something looks really good to our eyes, a world without colors is what hitomi is suffering from.

spoilers of the plot below

regarding the whole "colors" theme, it's not like it doesn't make sense when hitomi realized that she could see colors when she feels truly happy, but the whole "only able to see colors from yuito's drawings" feels like merely a plot device. maybe you can say that hitomi found yuito's drawings familiar to the only book that she could see colors as a kid - which was then revealed that it's also drawn by yuito - then why was baby hitomi able to see colors from that book? but the way they delivered how hitomi slowly being able to see colors feels really immersive, and i love myself an immersive watching experience.

yuito is also my kind of anime boys that i would fall in love with - having his own insecurities and may seem reluctant to socializing and making friends, but then slowly opens up his heart in front of the person he likes. i nearly cried at the scene where yuito and hitomi went outside to find each other just for a "i want to see you" (which is basically the same as a confession in japanese dating cultures).

iroduku's ending may not be the most completed ending, but at the same time i feel like, since the whole story surrounds hitomi's struggles with seeing colors, there is no need to mention so much on how did the characters do 60 years later. for the grave that hitomi visited at the end - i feel like it's more of her mom (i assumed she died, but it makes the most sense to me if i assume it that way)'s grave than anyone else's, as she told her grandma kohaku that she wanted to visit her mother when she came back from the past.

overall speaking, iroduku feels really comfortable to watch with an immersive experience, and it captures school life really well in my opinion (or just, you know, like any other p.a. works show that focuses on school life). it may not be as impactful as p.a. works' past works like angel beats! or nagiasu, but at least iroduku stands out in its own way.