The passage of time is something that we all have to reckon with, and can be tricky to deal with in fiction. Some creators choose to have their characters age more slowly, or not at all. In “Wandering Son”, Takako Shimura chooses to follow Shuichi, Yoshino, and all the rest through a tumultuous period in their life, which means that they will necessarily age. This was particularly well-done in Volumes 11 and 12. Shimura shows the change in time subtly, through everything from character design changes, references to events in the calendar or school year, and sometimes even just several peaceful panels. Seeing how the characters and world around them grows and changes with time is captivating, and adds to the realism within and the readers’ emotional connection to “Wandering Son”.
In Volumes 11 and 12, our main cast of characters move through their final year in middle school and on to high school. They are separated, and explore more about themselves. Shuichi becomes far more confident in himself, denouncing those who would decry him, more regularly wearing women’s clothing, and even changing his hair color. He also introduces long-term girlfriend Anna to Yuki. Saori and Yoshino become closer friends, as Saori no longer has any romantic interest in Shuichi. Makoto’s affections flit between several male characters across these volumes. Even the ever-confident Doi is changed by the move to high school, as he is brought down to size by older students and forced to cut his hair.
Changing a character’s look is one of the main ways that Shimura deftly shows the passage of time. Short periods between scenes or chapters are denoted by minor changes in the characters’ clothes or a hairstyle. Longer time jumps are more clearly delineated. This could be by saying how much taller a character has grown, a more noticeable hairstyle change (for example, the one that Shuichi gets in Volume 11), or, most clearly, changing their school uniforms or clothes to reflect a change in year or season. Using changes like these help the aging of characters to feel more natural, because we can relate them to how we notice time passing in our everyday relationships with those around us. If we don’t see a friend or loved one for several months, they might very well have grown (if they are a child), has a major hairstyle change, or be wearing clothes for a different season. Thus, changing the designs of characters helps to progress the clock without resorting to blunt techniques like a caption that exclaims ‘TWO MONTHS LATER’. This fits the more restrained, subtle style of “Wandering Son” neatly.
Another diegetic method of showing time that Shimura uses remarkably is the use of calendar events. The most notable of these is the yearly school cultural festival, which seems to attract significant events almost as surely as the end of the school year does in the “Harry Potter” books. As readers, we know that the characters are a year older than they were at the previous festival, even if it is not something directly on our minds at the time. Beyond this, Shimura incorporates seasonal changes such as cherry blossoms representing spring and snow representing winter, the characters celebrating events like Christmas, New Year, and even Valentine’s Day on a regular basis to give us a frame of reference for when in the year the events we are seeing are taking place. This regular signposting of the time of year effectively delineates the flow of time as we pass each one. When we take all of these markers together, it adds up to the several years of their lives that we have been following Shuichi, Yoshino, and everyone else for at this point.
The final method of showing time is one that I haven’t noticed as often but struck me powerfully once during these two volumes, and that is Shimura simply showing us a few peaceful panels of the world, devoid of all characters, as a cutaway. The particular sequence that I marveled at is this one, from page 7 of Chapter 94:
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These four panels help to create a breather that spans weeks from New Year to Valentine’s Day. They didn’t do so alone, as these events were referenced as well, but I found myself captivated by how effortlessly simply having uneventful shots of the sky, a map, a bridge, and an alley are in showing that time has passed. It felt like a short sequence from a Studio Ghibli film, and was one of my highlights of this week’s volumes. I have not actively spotted other instances of this technique, but I’m sure that they’re there, and I will be more vigilant for them in the future. However, the ease with which such sequences work is a mark of Shimura’s skill – something that has probably gone unnoticed by me countless times already is nevertheless effective in its aims.
Seeing the characters of “Wandering Son” grow up and age an emotional experience amplified Shimura’s use of diegetic events and subtle techniques to show the months and years going by. Whether it is the characters’ appearances changing, references to yearly or seasonal events, or even a small sequence of panels, Shimura never shoves a timeline in our faces and says ‘WE ARE HERE!’. This adds to our immersion in the story, and the feeling that we are walking alongside Shuichi, Yoshino, and the others as they walk through some of the most important years of their lives.
Next week, we will discuss Volume 13, covering Chapters 100 to 107. It’s only a small passage of time from now to then, and I hope that it is a happy one for all of you. See you next week!
