Overview:
The fifth season of Natsume Yuujinchou, Natsume Yuujinchou Go picks up following Natsume as he interacts with his human and yokai friends. Season 5 does seem to be focussing a lot on the minor character backstories. I reviewed this week to week here if you want to check out my thoughts on individual episodes.
Review:
I’m keeping this one super short because I’ve already reviewed the first four seasons of this and revisited it and to be honest season 5 doesn’t really break away from what the other 4 seasons have done. Pretty much don’t start with this season. Watch the first four. While the show does take an episodic approach, it is the small changes in Natsume over the five seasons that help this show to really soar so you kind of need to watch it in order.
As I said in the overview, this season spends a lot of time with some of the other characters and fills in their back stories which was a nice diversion from the yokai of the week episodes (though we still had these as it is Natsume after all). Probably my biggest issue with season 5 is the limited focus Natsume himself gets, though after 4 seasons I guess it would be hard to continue to focus exclusively on him. And then Nyanko-Sensei has pretty much been sidelined for the entire season this time and given he’s my favourite character I just kept wanting him to be more involved. He does get a few good moments and we can clearly see how far he’s grown as a character but I just wanted more.
Natsume is still Natsume however and visually is cute but fairly washed out and none of the characters are particularly striking in their appearance (by the way, the picture above is a young Natori and not Natsume but it is hard to tell). The music is still really relaxing and just kind of fun to listen to and the episodes still resolve nicely and mostly happily without falling into the realm of overly sickly sweet.
Seriously, check out my review of the first four seasons and then if you like fantasy or slice of life at all go watch the show. It is amazing and there is a reason I’ve watched 5 seasons of it despite it being incredibly slow moving which is usually enough for me to give a show the flick.
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 1
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 2
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 3
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 4
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 5
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 6
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 7
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 8
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 9
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 10
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 11
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 12
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 13
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 14
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 15
- Natsume’s Book of Friends Volume 16
I bawl through the whole season. But anyway great job and thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Natsume’s only made me cry once and that was when he lost his ability to see yokai and Nyanko-Sensei was right beside him and Natsume couldn’t see him. I love this show and the emotional journey it takes us on but its a fairly even journey with slow climbs and drops rather than lurching from one tone to the next. I really just enjoy how good it makes me feel.
I feel you on that part of the story.
Honestly there’s something about Natsume that makes me love it so much that I can’t even tell you what that reason is. It’s too hard for words!
You pretty much covered everything I thought so great job!
Agreed
This season seem that lack a a central plot that ties the episodes together. Natsume is usually episodic in nature, but there is usually a underlying plot.i think this season served to reintroduce the series after such a long break and set the stage for season 6
I just finished season 3 and am about to begin season 4. I ended up really liking how Natsume evokes a myriad of feelings of reasonable intensity. If s5 is more of the same, I’m fine with that though knowing that there’s less focus on Natsume and Madara is a little disappointing.
And seriously, that’s Natori?
…is he related to Natsume because the resemblance is uncanny.
That resemblance is uncanny but as far as I know he isn’t related to Natsume. That would be a terrible plot twist to find out he was. I enjoyed the episode that focussed on young Natori but I spent the whole time mixing him up with Natsume in my head.
I loved the first four seasons of Natsume Yuujinchou, in fact it’s the anime I end up recommending to anyone who commits the mistake of asking me. The fifth one was nice but it wasn’t the anime that made me cry my eyes out even over seemingly happy ending. Natsume Yuujinchou used to always leave me with such a bittersweet feeling, and I really missed that on this season. Some of the episodes were really good though. I don’t know but I think it might be because of the change in studio.
I’m beginning to wonder if my assessment of the seasons past were really reflective of what I’ve come to view the show as capable of achieving. Season five seemed to depart from my idea of the franchise being a more endearing introspection of Natsume’s lived experience as mirrored through his experiences living with the occult. This season felt more like it had trappings of the occult without any clear thematic cohesion to solidify its point.
But that was the first half of the season. The second half pretty much felt like the Natsume I’m familiar with. Which makes me wonder (going back to my point) if I’m not just being mistaken. Because I might be mixing up my views on shows that use the occult to drive a dramatic narrative with shows like Mushishi.
I might have to revisit the first four seasons. :-/ Anyhoo, thanks for sharing your thoughts! After all is said and done, I think I still love this franchise regardless. 🙂
I felt like season 5 was a nice continuation on the story, but you are right that the season itself didn’t seem to have thematic cohesion (which the other four seasons did seem to have). Still, very much looking forward to this continuing.