Suzuka (涼風) is a shonen romance by Seo Kouji. The manga published in Weekly Shonen magazine between 2004 and 2007. The series was compiled into 18 tankoubon and had a 26 episode anime adaptation in 2005. this first part is a overview of the first half of the manga that was adapted into the anime. Beware, this will spoil plot points of this series...which is 20 years old at this point.
Akitsuki Yamato convinces his parents to allow him to transfer from rural Hiroshima to Tokyo for high school. They agree because he will be living in a dormitory run by his aunt and her daughter. Yamato makes this dramatic request as a way to shake up his stale and boring life, or at least that's what he tells himself. In reality, he is trying to run away from his failed relationship goals and figures going somewhere no one knows him will help. Yamato isn't going to be living as a freeloader in his aunt's dormitory, which coincidentally, is an all girls dormitory. He will be responsible for cleaning and maintaining the attached bath house.
On his first day living in Tokyo he visits his future school. While there he see's another student, a girl, earnestly practicing the high jump. Yamato is smitten by the beauty and determination of her, confident he mad the right choice. As punishment for being late arriving at his new home, his aunt forces him to start cleaning the baths. While attempting to do his work two of the dorm's college aged residents walk in on him, expecting to have a normal bathing experience. Yamato's choice to restart his life ends abruptly when the college girls put him in a compromising situation at the exact moment the girl he saw earlier walks into the bath house. The girl, Asahina Suzuka, also a transfer student, is staying at the dormitory. Suzuka's first impression of Yamato are less than encouraging and get colder when she realizes he is staying in the neighboring apartment.
Things become awkward for Yamato when he learns Suzuka is a classmate. Along with them is a guy named Hattori Yasunobu, who has known Yamato for years due to his prior visits. Yasunobu is a ladies man and secretive pervert. Another classmate, Sakurai Honoka, has also known Yamato from his childhood visits. Her family operates a small shrine that Yamato enjoyed relaxing at and they had a brief but memorable encounter in the past. As Yamato is forced to spend more time with Suzuka, between school and the dorm, he begins to develop feelings for her. Due to being unfamiliar with the area, she relies more and more on him, even though she doesn't like his lazy attitude and lack of foresight.
During a physical aptitude test in gym class, Yamato shows some latent talent in sprinting as he beats their classes top sprinted in the 50 meter dash. This perks Suzuka's interest in him but Yasunobu plays it up to mess with Yamato. Confused by the advice from his supposed friend and the ever changing signals from the girl next door he doesn't know what to do about his feelings for her. Sometimes she's nice to him and other times she berates him for making mistakes and not being serious. Suzuka herself is quiet serious and straight forward. She works hard to project an air of confidence and well thought out actions. Things become complicated for him when he witnesses what appears to be a confession aimed at Suzuka from another guy. After wallowing about it during a failed round of karaoke he returns home to find them both waiting for him. The guy is an upperclassman named Miyamoto Souichi and is part of the track team. He wanted Suzuka's help in recruiting Yamato for the team, since approaching him alone might backfire. Even with Suzuka's help, Yamato has no interest and rejects the invitation. As a parting shot at Yamato, he mentions that he seems like the type of guy Suzuka likes, playing of the history he has with her when they went to middle school together.
Yamato starts to analyze Suzuka's interactions with him. At times she is more than comfortable being around him and can act normal. Other times she acts as if he is the last person she wants to interact with. He begins to realize he doesn't know anything about her, instead he's been focusing on how she feels about him. Doing so brings back an earlier conversation with Yasunobu about love at first sight. He begins to think he fell in love with her on the first day they met. Once that realization sets in he finds it hard to interact with her normally, further complicating things. In a bid to spend more time with her they visit an amusement park on a rare day off of school and club activities. The day starts out rainy and terrible, with them squabbling over everything. In the end the rain clears and a moment of clarity seizes Yamato, he has to confess to her instead of dragging himself through this emotional hell he's been wallowing in. Her only response is to apologize to him and a growing awkwardness.
Instead of wallowing in misery he decides to keep pursuing her, joining the track team to spend more time with her. She see's through his plan and gets upset with him for being reckless and potentially causing problems for the team. He relents and tells Souichi he wants to join, focused on getting back on Suzuka's good side. In the punishing first day of practice Yamato learns just how hard the team pushes its members. Suzuka criticizes him for his lack of focus, but a fellow first year, Hashiba Miki, offers some moral support for the new guy. He continues to attend, persevering, not wanting to let Suzuka be right but also inspired by the extraordinary effort she puts into her training.
Honoka decides to join the track team as well, to be with Yamato more. After learning that he has feelings for Suzuka, she can't let go of the feelings she has for him. While not physically gifted, she is allowed to join the team as its manager. No matter how hard Yamato works and how well he does, he can't get Suzuka to change her opinion. At one point she directly tells him that she hates him, leaving him lost for words. As they prepare for a track meet, Yamato overhears Suzuka and Souichi talking. Suzuka is going to take advantage of a rest day before the meet to return to her hometown, Yokohama. While there she is going to see a boy named Kazuki. Souichi seems to know him too. Yamato suspects that this Kazuki may either be a guy shes dating or someone she has a crush on.
Driven out of desperation, Yamato secretly follows Suzuka to Yokohama. He is desperate to learn about this Kazuki guy and what he means to her. He finds himself in front of her families home with no clue what to do next. Before he can figure that out her older sister confront him. At first suspicious, her sister, Suzune, decides to help Yamato find Suzuka. On their way to meet Kazuki she hears the sad tale of Yamato being rejected and ignored by her younger sister. To his surprise, Suzune leads him to a cemetery, where they come across Suzuka, deep in prayer in front of Kazuki's family grave. Yamato is competing with a dead man for Suzuka's heart.
Suzune tells Yamato about Kazuki and Suzuka being on the same track team in middle school. The older boy was a highly talented sprinter who had become eligible to compete in the nationals tournament. Unfortunately he was killed in a car accident the evening before the event began, leaving a great void in the track team and in Suzuka. As Suzune recounts what type of person Kazuki was things begin to make sense to Yamato. He shares many similar personality traits with the dead boy as well as a similar sprinting style. He understands why Souichi said the things he did about what type of guy Suzuka likes in their first meeting. In more way than one, he reminds her of the painful loss she experienced and continues to dwell on. Yamato, understanding the gravity of the situation, leaves before Suzuka notices him. He returns to Tokyo to dwell on the pain that he appears to be causing her and what that could mean for his chances of courting her.
Suzuka struggles with Kazuki's death because it left unfinished business between them. Through their career together they never saw eye to eye, constantly at odds with each other on how things should be handled. The day before he left for nationals he confessed his feelings for her and apologized for not being nicer to her. She replied that she had to think about it, given the unexpected confession. He told her to wait until he returns as a winner, to let him know her feelings. Suzuka struggles with those emotions more than two years later.
The realization about the dead guy Suzuka likes crushes Yamato's will. After skipping multiple practice days and signaling skipping out on an upcoming meet, Suzuka confronts him. In a moment of lost control he explodes telling her to stop comparing him to a dead person. The sudden revelation that he knows a personal secret draws her rage and fury. Yamato may well have put the final nail in his coffin with his explosion but the mental anguish hes been putting on himself over it reached its breaking point.
On the day of the track meet, Yamato is doing everything he can to avoid being there, choosing to wander the empty streets with Yasunobu instead. With nothing open and no where to go, Yasunobu drags Yamato to the field the competition is being held at. He overhears Suzuka being bullied by the star sprinter of another team, Emerson Arima, who in turn had heard her bad mouthing him in relation to the abilities of her dead senpai. Letting his emotions get the better of him, Yamato steps in and tells the guy that he's faster than the other boy. Arima doesn't believe his bluster and tells him to prove it during the meet. Against his earlier desires, Yamato is competing in the event he was selected for, to try and save face for Suzuka and himself. Yamato ends up loosing the heat against Arima, but showed the arrogant top sprinter that he can't be discounted. Angered at Yamato, Arima brushes him off as nothing but a annoyance and not a real threat.
Even though he made a fool out of himself at the competition, things seem to be thawing between Suzuka and Yamato. Unfortunately for him, Suzuka isn't sending clear signals about her feelings. He perceives her attitude with him as being borderline hostile, but she's still talking with him. Meanwhile Honoka is trying to figure out if Suzuka has feelings for Yamato as well. She attempts to get the upper hand and asks Yamato if he wants to join her for a day off at the pool. Before they can finalize the plans Miki invites herself along, bringing Suzuka into the plan as well as another team mate, Kenji. Honoka's plans to spend some quality alone time with Yamato fail to materialize. Yamato is determined to try again with Suzuka while the group enjoys the pool.. Honoka is determined to seduce Yamato. Kenji is interested in Honoka. Miki and Suzuka just want to blow off steam and have fun!
A short time later, as the track team is about to head off to the nationals, Honoka confronts Suzuka about her feelings for Yamato. She tells her about her intent to ask him to go out with her. Surprised by the news, Suzuka tells Honoka that she has no interest in him. Yamato approaches the two girls at the moment Suzuka states her disinterest in him, leaving him to misinterpret the conversation.. Instead of being crushed by the misunderstood statement, he decides to push thought of her out of his mind and focus completely on his training.
The entire team heads to Hiroshima for nationals, Honoka comforts Yamato during special training he's being made to do by the team captain. Even though he tried to push his thoughts about Suzuka from his mind he still becomes depressed due to the failure of his relationship with her and the way he embarrassed himself at the track meet against Arima. As he dwells on his situation Honoka finds him alone and decides to chat with him. Honoka, desperate and seeing an opening kisses him and tells him that she wants to be with him forever. As quickly as her confidence appeared it went away and before he can respond she runs away from him. As if on cue, Suzuka shows up to see why he's sulking only to find him flustered. Yamato doesn't know what to make of the kiss and round about confession from Honoka. The next day, and more awkward interactions lead to them being alone and talking. Something over comes the both, Honoka goes in for another kiss and Yamato, temporarily forgetting about his feelings for Suzuka, asks her to go out with him. Yamato tries to hide his new relationship status from everyone. Unknown to either of them, Miki had come across them in the act of beginning their relationship. The next day while shopping with Suzuka, she breaks the news to her. Suzuka brushes it off and continues on her tasks acting normally.
On the final day of the trip, Yamato falls behind buying drinks for everyone. Suzuka comes across him on her way to the bathroom when he trips and drops the drinks. She rushes onto the platform to help him only to have the doors close and the train take off without either of them, Miki watches helplessness as the platform slips away with them chasing after, Yamato and Suzuka are stuck in Hiroshima while everyone else returns to Tokyo. After failing to find alternative ways to return that day, they accept that they will have to stay in Hiroshima one more night. Yamato calls his parents to pick him up, given his severe lack of money. Suzuka was planning on staying overnight at a hotel but Yamato's father insists she comes with back to their home instead. The tension is think between the two over his sudden relationship with Honoka.
Suzuka isn't receptive to Yamato's attempts at entertaining his unwilling guest. After server rounds of pestering she finally asks him why he's thinking about her more than his girlfriend back in Tokyo. Yamato thinks this clears things up, but Suzuka is still in a difficult mood due to many things. While she tries not to let it show, she does seem to be bothered by him suddenly getting a girlfriend after all the attempts he's made to be with her. To try and cheer her up, he suggests they stay another night so he can show her a display of fireflies in the field near his family house. Surprisingly she agrees' to extend their unintended trip.
That evening they head to a nearby creek, unfortunately the fireflies are no where to be seen, meaning there was no point delaying their return to Tokyo. He brings up an embarrassing incident from middle school when he brought the girl he liked to this same spot to ask her out. he had a plan using the beauty of the night evening and illuminated bugs to enhance the mood. The plan didn't go so well given it was raining. He decided to go for it anyways and was understandably rejected by the girl, who was soaking wet at this point. As the sky gets darker and their vision adjusts they begin to notice an abundance of the bugs floating aimlessly around them. Suzuka asks him to recreate what he was going to do in middle school. With little better to do, he reenacts the planned moment, using Suzuka as a stand in. To his astonishment she accepts his advances but quickly smiles and tells him is was a joke. He once again returns to a very conflicted mental state about her true feelings.
The following day they make it back to Tokyo without any further incidents. Honoka meets them at the train station and reaffirms her feelings for Yamato. The next day she shows up at Yamato's apartment intending too cook dinner for him. He enjoys the feelings, pretending like they are newlyweds and lets his emotions start to take control. In order to push thoughts of Suzuka from his mind he begins to get aggressive with Honoka, trying to instigate a higher level of intimacy. Instead of responding like he thought, she responds to his changed attitude with fear and concern, fleeing from his apartment. He quickly realizes that his actions were less then noble and didn't take her feelings into consideration. He goes to apologize to her the following day. She accepts his apology, but part of her tries to blame his actions on herself.
A few days later, after more mixed signals from Suzuka, Honoka and Yamato go out to eat at a family restaurant. Honoka surprises him by inviting her best friend. While caught off guard by the unannounced visitor, he is stunned when the girl arrives, an up and coming singer named Shirakawa Nana. Yamato is astonished that the quiet and diligent Honoka would be best friends with someone famous enough to be in magazines and on TV. They change venues to a karaoke booth for more privacy. Quickly Nana shifts the conversation to scold Yamato for being so aggressive with Honoka the other day, wanting him to understand that behavior won't be tolerated. Honoka excuses herself to use the bathroom, to overcome her discomfort in the conversation. Before she can return, Miki and Suzuka, who are also there for karaoke, come across them. Before understanding the situation, Suzuka attacks Yamato, believing he is cheating on Honoka with Nana. The misunderstanding clears up quickly when Honoka arrives and the two girls join the party.
After karaoke, Nana confront Yamato again. She observed his behavior, particularly in relation to Suzuka and how he presented himself to Honoka. While hes doing a good job of acting like the ideal boyfriend, she believes hes only reacting to her assumed emotions instead of having honest thoughts on his behavior. She stresses that he needs to really be a good boyfriend and think about her in more meaningful ways. She questions whether he has any real feelings for her or is even aware of who she is and what she wants. He considers her words and comes to the realization that he has not been taking her side of the relationship into consideration, choosing to go along with the idea but lacking any deeper intent. Wanting to see her friend be happy, she offers him a life preserver and lets him know when Honoka's birthday is, so he can truly start off on the right foot. Her birthday is close and he scrambled to get her a present. When she asks him to spend the day with her, he lies, saying he had plans with Yasunobu, in order to hide his plan to go shopping for her. Instead he asks Suzuka to help him pick out a gift for her. At the end, Honoka secretly spots them shopping, realizing that he lied to her about being with Yasunobu.
When he surprises her with the gift the next day, she confronts him about being with Suzuka instead of Yasunobu. Shocked by her guess, not wanting to lie to her, he admits to it. She's happy that he chose not to hide it from her but when he starts to ramble about how Suzuka behaved, Honoka becomes angry. She tells him that she doesn't want the present and runs to the safety of her home, leaving Yamato alone and bewildered. As he tries to apologize to her at school she does everything she can to shut him down, choosing not to interact with him while she works through her feelings. Yamato is lost, he doesn't know why his actions are having such a profound effect on her. He struggles to understand why she is particularly sensitive about things related to Suzuka, not understanding how much she perceives his feelings for her.
Again Yamato tries to talk things over with Honoka, going to her house in the evening. She's bothered by this and they begin arguing. She expresses her persistent concern with him and his thoughts about Suzuka. She is convinced that deep down there will be a part of his heart that will be for her, regardless of how much time he spends dating Honoka or someone else. In order to protect her self, given their relationships brief length she suggest break up. Yamato, unsure what to feel or think, uncertain as to why he decided to begin dating her in the first place meekly agrees with her suggestion. Both parties find themselves back at the beginning, but now that Honoka had a chance to make her long help desire for him a reality, she may be able to grow into the next phase of herself, free of Yamato. He on the other hand, finds himself residing in a state of static ennui. He lacks any motivation beyond obligations and struggles with anything hes tried to accomplish since starting high school.
He returns home to sulk, only to find the two alcoholic college student that enjoy harassing him partying in his room. He tells them that he broke up with Honoka, lying about it being he who suggested it. After they leave Suzuka confronts him about what she overheard and he continues to claim he broke up with her. He doesn't want to hurt Suzuka, since she's the reason the break up happened. He convinces her of his harshness towards Honoka and she leaves in disgust, considering him even more foolish then before. If only she knew the truth that he was foolishly trying to hide from her. Now both girls hate him.
Yamato and Kenji are selected to be part of the relay team in the next track meet. After a heart to heart with Miki, he decides to let things go between both girls and just concentrate on running. During relay training his mind continues to dwell on the problems he's facing with Suzuka and Honoka, causing him to loose focus on the baton pass. Miki see's this and sticks around until afterwards to offer him some help with training, away from the other team mates who have lost their patience with him. During the after hours practicing she grills him about why he's so distracted, forcing out his concerns about his personal relationships. Knowing that he lied to Suzuka, which caused her to start hating him, she implores him to tell her the truth, in hopes it will lead to a smoothing of tensions. He agrees to the idea and tells Suzuka about the real reason Honoka broke up with him. She gets upset at him for lying to her as well as her being the catalyst for the break up. Even though shes angry, she still encourages him to do well in the upcoming meet, hoping to help him focus. She doesn't want to be blamed if he loses again. Yamato starts to dwell on feelings he has for Suzuka, determined that he should try again, even though she shot him down months earlier and still seems to dislike him. The biggest obstacle though is her continued obsession with her dead senpai. He convinces himself that if he can become the top sprinter in the nation he should be able to have the confidence to ask Suzuka out again. Until then, hes just a runner up to a dead man.
After doing well in another meet and qualifying for the city tournament, Yamato works with the team captain to improve his running style, frustrated that he can't beat Arima. He works hard to change his running style to improve the loss of power he experiences in the second half of the sprint, hoping it will help him gain an edge over the more proficient opponent. Unfortunately the change in style causes him to fail out in the preliminary round of the next meet, crushing his sense of purpose and his will to confess to Suzuka. While sulking in his apartment the day afterwards, Suzuka decides to try and cheer him up by cooking....the only thing she can....boiled eggs. In heat of the moment he tells her about how he planned to confess to her again Unknown to him, his plan is similar to the way her dead senpai confessed to her two years earlier, causing barely healed wounds to reopen. Upset by the memories and Yamato's persistence, she flees his room, leaving the dorms all together.
Yamato decides to go look for her after hours have passed since she ran out of his apartment. Honoka comes across Suzuka at her family shrine, in a depressed state. She decides to confront her rival in love over the way she conceals her feelings for Yamato. Honoka lets all of her frustration out at the other girl, blaming her for a variety of problems due to her mixed signals. Suzuka lashes back, expressing the regret she feels for not being able to tell her long dead senpai her feelings for him and runs off again. Before Honoka can think about chasing after her, Yamato shows up, distraught. He tells her he is looking for Suzuka. She replies that he just missed, seeing his face and his concern, realizing that there really is no place in his heart for her. She points him in the direction of his hearts desire and starts to console herself in her lost love.
He finds Suzuka at a nearby park and they begin arguing. She yells at him for concerning himself over her whereabouts and emotions. She breaks down, telling him that she can't like him because she doesn't want to risk the pain she felt from losing her senpai. She wants to push him away, afraid that her feelings for him will grow, leading to incredible pain. In the spur of the moment, assuming it might change her mind or at least keep her quite he kisses her. In shock and horror she reels back and slaps him, telling him to get away from her. This leaves him stunned, he has truly ended any chance he might of had in reconciliation with the girl he likes. Taking his time returning to the dorms, dwelling on his mistakes, he see's the lights to apartment still on. He tries to apologize for kissing her like that, realizing the sooner he apologizes the better the outcome, but she refuses to acknowledge his presence.
The following morning he learns Suzuka has plans to return home, to visit her dead senpai's grave again. He confronts her before she leaves, trying to convince her to stop dwelling in the past. Instead of arguing with him, she tells him to join her. He agrees to join her and while waiting at the grave, watching her in silent prayer, he wonders why he's doing. He begins to consider this as some twisted punishment she ha concocted. Before he can dwell on it any further she begins to speak. She is speaking to the memory of her dead first love, trying to find the resolution she has been denied since he died. She tells him that she can't go out with him, that she has someone else she likes. She doesn't come right out and say the person she likes is Yamato, but he takes that as a chance to win her over. All he has to do know is become a better person for himself and for her.
This is the point that the anime adaptation chooses to end, with the possibility of a relationship between the two main characters at the wrap of the story, 72 issues out of 166. I have said it plenty of times before, but Suzuka is the story that really turned me into a fanatic for romances. It has its major flaws but at the same time has always been quite enjoyable for me. I always enjoyed the romantic aspects of other earlier anime I consumed, like the central love story between Ranma and Akane in Ranma 1/2. The soliloquy of Tenchi Muyo's mother in the Tenchi Universe cannon, Achika, moved me so much I got a tattoo of her in remembrance. But, it was Suzuka and REC that really unlocked the path for romance anime and manga for me, being the first truly romance centered anime consumed.
Yamato isn't exactly the empty shell of a main character either, so there is some substance to the characters and the plot. He is pretty flawed and careless, a trait that leads to most of his problems. It also doesn't help that Suzuka is a severe tsundere type character, always wanting to be perfect and serious, never willing to show anything like weakness. The entire drama of the series revolves around Yamato being careless and Suzuka being a bitch about it. He keeps coming back through the abuse because hes so infatuated with her. Suzuka on the other hand sends all sorts of mixed signals with everything she does. Her mood flips on a dime and confuses anyone paying attention to her. The only saving grace are the secondary characters that position themselves are active observers. From time to time they swoop in and tell both of the lead characters whats what, trying to resolve unnecessary drama. Most of the secondary cast supports a relationship between Yamato and Suzuka but try not to interfere too much, only butting in when the resistance becomes too much to bear.
The author likes to tie a lot of his works into the same world, Suzuka has some quick cameo's from characters that appeared in other stories her wrote, but it really sets the beginning of semi connected story that spans three long running manga by him. The events of Suzuka directly lead the the events of Fuuka, with a 15 or 16 year break between the end of the first and the beginning of the second. In between them is the long series Kimi no Iru Machi that tells a separate story which runs in a the time between Suzuka and Fuuka. Kimi no Iru Machi ties into those at its conclusion in an interesting way. The Suzuka project was envisioned before the pandemic when I was going through older posts and was not satisfied with how little I talked bout the plot in my original anime review. as well as not having done a review of the manga its self. I wanted to do this series, which has been so pivotal in my fandom, a better job. Now, its turning into a consecutive read through of all three related titles. So after the second part of Suzuka, I will dive back into Kimi no iru Machi and break it down in a similar manner. After that I will move to Fuuka, a series I never finished.
Part two covers the rest of the manga that was not animated in the adaptation. We get to see if Yamato can win over Suzuka's frozen heart and what the future may hold for the both of them.
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