The passage of time is a theme that has always resonated with me. Magnetic rose, Frieren, Hoshi no Koe, and 5 cm per second. Yesterday and today I read through all of the 5 cm per second manga. I’m not going to go super in depth bc I simply don’t have time to say everything I want to say right now, but there’s a few things I really want to point out.
Time
I’ve seen the film twice years ago, so I already knew about everything in it, but experiencing 5cm/sec again for a 3rd time actually felt more impactful to me than the other 2 times I experienced it. Frieren is similar in how it becomes more meaningful the more you watch it, but that was because you develop a deeper connection with the characters each time. In the case of 5cm/sec, it’s more impactful the more times you see it is for 2 reasons: 1. There’s so much depth to it that it’s hard to unpack everything in just a single watch/read, and 2. this is a story about how time doesn’t stop moving, and the more time moves on in the real life, the more you can relate to 5cm/sec.
On the back cover of the manga, it’s described as “a love story that is as timeless as it is fleeting.” This quote perfectly summarizes 5cm/sec. 5cm/sec shows a story where relationships form, but as time goes on and people follow their individual paths, those relationships slowly decay to the point of being simply memories.
As I said a minute ago, this story becomes more relatable with each reread/rewatch since irl time goes by too. The first time I watched 5cm/sec was about 5 years ago. Back then, there was someone that I was great friends with. We were always on the same wavelength and understood each other really well. The last 4 years however we went down our separate pathways, similar to Takaki and Akari, my friend and I tried to keep contact with each other, but eventually we just stopped talking since we stopped having things in common with each other that we could actually talk about. My friendship with him is still a vivid memory and the years I spent with him throughout my school years are memories that I’ll never forget, I even still remember the layout of our old minecraft world from nearly a decade ago lmao, but since I don’t interact with him as much anymore, my memories of him will stay as memories. I’m ok with that though because we had a good time back then, and that’s what’s important.
To expand upon that a little bit too, some people also make the argument that 5cm/sec represents a time before the widespread use of the internet and cellphones, a time when letters was the main way that 2 people could communicate with each other, and that led to Takaki and Akari losing contact with each other. I personally disagree with that idea, because while the internet makes long distance communication easier, as seen with my friend and myself, the core of losing touch with someone isn’t always about a lack of accessibility to communication, but about a lack of things to communicate to them.
Accepting Change and That What’s Past is Past
Another major theme that coincides with the passage of time is change and accepting the past. As times marches forward, things will change and there’s nothing you can do about it. Keeping up with the changing world is something that I personally have a little bit of difficulty with. I’m someone who naturally prefers consistency, so it takes me a bit to really adapt to change. Especially in these years following covid, time has felt like it’s been going by so much faster and the world is changing at a crazy pace, and I can’t keep up with it. AI is a good example of what I’m talking about. I, and you too, grew up in a world where the type of AI we have now seemed like some type of futuristic sci-fi concept. In these past years, AI has evolved to the point where it’s quickly becoming indistinguishable from humans on the internet. I look at things like chat GPT and feel like I’m looking at some type of fictional sci-fi story, not real life. The idea that AI has gotta as advanced as it has while I looked away for 2 seconds is hard for my mind to wrap itself around.
Takaki has similar troubles when it comes to accepting that his relationship with Akari is something that exists in the past. In the 3rd section of 5cm/sec, Takagi explains to Risa that he was never able to get over the fact that he was never able to express his feelings to Akari and that his lack of acceptance that that is something in the past that he can’t back has led to him hurting many people over the years. Everyone has regrets and what ifs about their actions in the past. I have so many that I can’t even count them all. Sometimes when laying in bed at 1am, when standing in the shower, or when mindlessly thinking while playing piano I’ll just return to the past and think about what would happen if I just made a different choice about something in the past. I’d like to be able to say that I’ve accept that I can’t change what’s in the past, but I’d be lying. I wish I was able to go back in time and change my actions in the past.
I’m going to give a quick mention to Sayonara Memories by Supercell. I’m not going to go into depth about this song in this post, but this is one of my favorite songs of all time. It’s about a girl who had a crunch on a boy in high school, but never built up the confidence to confess her feelings. Eventually they graduated and she never got the chance to meet him again. At the end of the song, the girl finally manages to say “suki deshita”, “I love you”, but there’s no response, and in the music video, the camera turns to an empty desk. She finally managed to confess her feelings, but since you can’t change the past, he didn’t magically reappear. She came to terms with the fact that what’s in the past is in the past and that she has to move on.
Like I already said, all people have regrets about actions and choices they’ve made in the past. Plenty of optimistic people will just say to leave the past behind and focus on the future, and I agree, that’s how you should look at things, but deep down, everyone has regrets that will forever linger within them.
One More Time, One More Chance
One more Time, One more chance is a song from the 90s Yamazaki Masayoshi. This song was written well before 5cm/sec was written, but this song fits with 5cm/sec so perfectly, and Shinkai really made a great decision to feature the song in his film. One more time, One more chance essentially has the same story of 5cm/sec, I even questioned if Shinkai was influenced by the song when making this film, but it turns out that’s not the case. That actually makes its inclusion even better imo though. The fact that One more time, One more chance and 5cm/sec such similar messages and themes is a testament to just how everyone experiences similar pains when dealing with the passage of time. Also just in general this song is just so well written. It conveys its intended emotions perfectly, so perfectly in fact that I always start tearing up when I listen to it lmao. On that note, I also have cried 3/3 times when watching/reading 5cm/sec lmao, the romance aspect truly is so bittersweet, and my feelings of bettersweetness connects back to what I previously said about having trouble accepting change. I wanted Takaki and Akari to end up together bc of how perfect they were together, but I also understood that time has passed and things have changed, they’ve met different people and have gone down their own paths.
Conclusion
Alright, so that’s all I’m gonna talk about for today. Idk if I’ll ever make a post giving an in depth analysis of 5cm/sec like I did with ongaku, I want to, but I don’t think I have the time for that unfortunately. The biggest reason I wanted to make this post is that I just finished reading the manga and wanted to just let my feelings about it flow out. 5cm/sec is my 2nd favorite shinkai work after kimi no na wa, and it truly is a timeless masterpiece. I believe everyone should watch or read it, and continue rewatching/rereading every few years because as I’ve pointed out a couple times, the more time that goes by irl, the more you relate to and understand 5cm/sec. I know I yapped a bit more than I was planning on doing (about 1500 words lmao), but if you read all of this, thanks for reading, and I’ll encourage you to just look back on your past for a minute and just think about it. Appreciate the good parts of it, feel some regret about things that you wish you did differently, maybe feel some nostalgia for your childhood. In the crazy, fasting moving world we live in right now, it’s important to just escape our current reality for a minute and enjoy what the gift of life as done for us. Once again, thanks for reading, see ya later
