History Manga / SingYesterdayForMe

''Sing "Yesterday" for Me'' is a manga series by Kei Toume that began in 1997 and finished in 2015, originally published as ''Yesterday wo Utatte''. It received a TwelveEpisodeAnime adaptation in 2020 as part of the Spring season, directed by Fujiwara Yoshiyuki and produced by Creator/{{Dogakobo}}.

* HeIsAllGrownup: Zig-zagged with Rou and Shinako. Rou desperately wants Shinako to see him as a man worthy of romantic love, and despairs that she still sees him as a child. Halfway through, Shinako realizes that she wants to watch him grow up and pledges to pay more attention to this. There's a moment where she suddenly realizes how tall he is and how his arms are more muscular, but is instead reminded of his dead brother rather than being attracted to him for himself.

* SliceofLife

Uozomi Rikuo has been spinning his wheels ever since he graduated college. Rejecting the pressures of social conformity, he took a job at a convenience store and lost touch with his friends. All that changed one night, when a girl shows up at his store with a crow on her shoulder. The girl, a high-school dropout named Nonoka Haru, takes an instant shine to him, and starts dropping in on him at work. Around the same time, he has a chance reunion with Morinome Shinako, an old flame from college with a DarkAndTroubledPast who is now a school teacher -- at Haru's old high school. The two women meet, and Haru declares romantic war on Shinako. But Shinako has other obstacles keeping her from Rikuo-- she's still not over the death of her high school crush, and she's also being pursued by his younger brother Rou, an artistic teen in his last year at her school. Will our characters be able to let go their feelings of yesterday and move on to a new future?

* HeyYou: Rikuo seems to deliberately avoid referring to Rou by name when speaking with Shinako, refering to him as "the kid" or other terms, and only calls him by name in the final episode.

* VitriolicBestBuds: Rikuo and his old friend Fukuda. Fukuda often snarks at Rikuo, and doesn't hesitate to criticize his aimlessness in life, but is one of the few friends still in touch with Rikuo, and encourages him to get his life on track.

* BookEnds: Haru first met Rikuo when he was running for the bus. At the end of the series, [[spoiler: they get together after Rikuo runs up to her while she's waiting for the bus.]]

* MaybeEverAfter: [[spoiler:The manga ends with Rou leaving Europe (and Rio) to pursue Shinako again. The manga makes it unclear if his latest attempt will be successful, but the chapter ends on Shinako looking up to the sky as if she's waiting for someone to return to her.]]

* SlapSlapKiss: In the last episode of the anime, [[spoiler: Haru punches Rikuo on sight because she things he's a ghost or hallucination, and out of anger for how he dropped her. After he confesses his love to her, she kisses him forcefully on the mouth.]]

* BrutalHonesty: Fukuda doesn't hesitate to say what's on his mind around Rikuo, or to shut Rikuo down when he makes excuses. When Rikuo says he'd feel awkward coming to the reunion after he failed to get a job, Fukuda says Rikuo didn't even ''try'' to get one.

** Rikuo's younger photography partner Minato, a pretentious and hot-headed go-getter who serves as a rival for Haru's affections for one arc before disappearing to travel to the world. Rikuo dislikes him for his self-important snobbiness, but his confidence and clarity of goals contrasts with Rikuo and spurs him to improve himself on that front.

* PerpeturalFrowner: Rikuo almost always has a slight frown on his face.

* CompressedAdaptation: The anime adaptation is 12 episodes, based on a manga of 110 chapters. This has caused some controversy.

* ObliviousToHisOwnDescription: This happens when Minato talks with Haru in Episode 5.

* MaidCafe: Haru works at what mostly seems like a normal cafe, but for some reason she, and not any of the employees, wears a {{Meido}} outfit at work.

* MaybeEverAfter: [[spoiler:The manga ends with Rou leaving Europe (and Rio) to pursue Shinako again. The manga makes it unclear if his latest attempt will be successful, but his scene ends on a hopeful note.]]

* OutOfFocus: In the second half of the anime, Haru gets much less screen time as the narrative focuses more on the Rikuo-Shinako-Rou dynamic. Once Rikuo completely leaves his convenience store job, Haru has less of an excuse for seeing him and her visits with him become more contrived and less frequent. Eventually, she moves to a different neighborhood.

''Sing "Yesterday" for Me'' is a manga series by Kei Toume that began in 1997 and finished in 2015, originally published as ''Yesterday no Utatte''. It received a TwelveEpisodeAnime adaptation in 2020 as part of the Spring season, directed by Fujiwara Yoshiyuki and produced by Creator/{{Dogakobo}}.

* AmicableExes: When [[spoiler: Rikuo and Shinako]] break up, it's the most honest and open they ever are with each other, and they agree to stay friends afterward.

* IncestSubtext: Shinako sees Rou and his father as family, and treats Rou like a little brother that she feeds and cares for. She is still emotionally committed to Rou's brother, which would make Rou her brother-in-law. However, Rou has romantic feelings for her that he demands she reciprocate, and while she doesn't feel the same way, she refuses to give him space or sharply reject him, [[spoiler: and even breaks up with Rikuo because she's afraid of hurting Rou's feelings]], which emboldens Rou to keep pursuing her. The result is a weird quasi-romance between the two with strong BrotherSisterIncest undertones, even though they're not actually related.

* RomanticFalseLead: Rikuo's younger photography partner, a pretentious and hot-headed go-getter who serves as a rival for Haru's affections for one episode before disappearing to travel to the world. Rikuo dislikes him for his self-important snobbiness, but his confidence and clarity of goals contrasts with Rikuo and spurs him to improve himself on that front.

** Similarly, Haru shows her love for Rikuo by spontaneously bringing him food from her workplace. She finally becomes convinced that he's not into her first when he is underwhelmed by the breakfast she makes him, and then when she finds him with Shinako after rushing to bring him a cake she made at work

* HeIsAllGrownup: Zig-zagged with Rou and Shinako. Rou desperately wants Shinako to see him as a man worthy of romantic love, and despairs that she still sees him as a child. Halfway through, Shinako realizes that she wants to watch him grow up and pledges to pay more attention to this. There's a moment where she suddenly realizes how tall he is and how his arms are more muscular, but is instead reminded of his dead brother rather than being attracted to him for himself.

* ManicPixieDreamGirl: The young quirky, determined Haru is a breath of fresh air in Rikuo's life, and once he meets her Rikuo gets out of his funk and decides to do more with this life. Despite livening up Rikuo's life, she has little development of her own, and it's unclear what her goals and motivations are besides getting together with Rikuo.

Uozomi Rikuo has been spinning his wheels ever since he graduated college. Rejecting the pressures of social conformity, he took a job at a convenience store and lost touch with his friends. All that changed one night, when a girl shows up at his store with a crow on her shoulder. The girl, a high-school dropout named Nonoka Haru, takes an instant shine to him, and starts dropping in on him at work. Around the same time, he has a chance reunion with Morinome Shinako, an old flame from college with a DarkAndTroubledPast who is now a school teacher -- at Haru's old high school. The two women meet, and Haru declares romantic war on Shinako. But Shinako has other obstacles keeping her from Rikuo-- she's still not over the death of her high school crush, and she's also being pursued by his younger brother Ryou, an artistic teen in his last year at her school. Will our characters be able to let go their feelings of yesterday and move on to a new future?

* ChristmasEpisode: Episode 9 and part of 10 of the anime takes place on Christmas. This being [[UsefulNotes/ChristmasInJapan Japan]], the event is an opportunity to advance the romantic plot. Haru spends the evening at work in a special Christmas cosplay outfit. Rikuo spends the evening third-wheeling at a "party" with his college friend and his wife, and invited Shinako, though she declines to spend it with Ryou. Shinako couches her Christmas gathering as continuing the tradition of spending the day with family (Ryou), but he clearly understands the romantic subtext and passes over a party with his friends to try to make a move on Shinako. Shinako leaves early after rejecting Ryou yet again and patronizingly telling him to study, and shows up unexpectedly at Rikuo's party. [[spoiler: Rikuo uses this opportunity to re-gift her a necklace, a romantic gesture that pushes them closer towards being a couple.]]
* CoolLoser: Ryou is an attractive and artistic teen who should have lots of friends, and seemingly does off screen. However, he invokes the trope by avoiding them and looking down on people at school because he feels he's more mature than them due to his relationship with Shinako, and prioritizes her over his social life.
* DoggedNiceGuy: Almost everyone. Early on, Rikuo tells Haru he's not interested in her, but she decides to pursue him anyway, and spends a lot of time bringing him leftovers, showing up at his work, and arranging "accidental" run-ins with him in the hopes that he will change his mind. Meanwhile Rikuo loves Shinako despite her rejecting him both in college and at the beginning of the story, and hangs around her maintaining an uneasy friendship while he hopes for more, periodically taking tentative steps to advance the relationship. And Ryou, even though Shinako has made it clear she sees him like a brother, eagerly spends as much time with her as possible and periodically makes grand, angry displays where he demands that she return his feelings.

* IncestSubtext: Shinako sees Ryou and his father as family, and treats Ryou like a little brother that she feeds and cares for. She is still emotionally committed to Ryou's brother, which would make Ryou her brother-in-law. However, Ryou has romantic feelings for her that he demands she reciprocate, and while she doesn't feel the same way, she refuses to give him space or sharply reject him, [[spoiler: and even breaks up with Rikuo because she's afraid of hurting Ryou's feelings]], which emboldens Ryou to keep pursuing her. The result is a weird quasi-romance between the two with strong BrotherSisterIncest undertones, even though they're not actually related.
* LikeBrotherAndSister: Shinako sees Ryou, the younger brother of her dead crush, as a little brother figure, and treats him in a motherly fashion, cooking his meals and nagging him about his schoolwork. This is not at all mutual, however, as Ryou harbors romantic feelings for her.

* ReplacementGoldfish: Shinako was devastated by the experience of caring for her high school crush as he slowly died of a terminal illness. She fills the emotional void he left by caring for and nurturing his brother Ryou and their father. She shows hints of possible attraction to Ryou, but only because he reminds her of his brother, and is incapable of seeing Ryou as his own individual man rather than a clone of his brother or a child to be cared for.

* HeIsAllGrownup: Zig-zagged with Ryou and Shinako. Ryou desperately wants Shinako to see him as a man worthy of romantic love, and despairs that she still sees him as a child. Halfway through, Shinako realizes that she wants to watch him grow up and pledges to pay more attention to this. There's a moment where she suddenly realizes how tall he is and how his arms are more muscular, but is instead reminded of his dead brother rather than being attracted to him for himself.
* SecretRelationship: Towards the end of the story, [[spoiler: Shinako and Rikuo]] get together, but are too afraid to tell their other romantic rivals and directly reject them. [[spoiler: Haru finds out when she sees them together, but when Ryou catches them together, Shinako and Rikuo's relationship is dead in the water when Shinako refuses to offer an explanation and then apologizes to Ryou instead of admitting she's dating Rikuo.]]

* StaticCharacter: Shinako's character is defined by her obsession with her dead crush and her sense of obligation towards his family. Her character arc focuses on moving on from the past and trying to develop her own life, but she keeps spinning her wheels and remaining in the same emotional place. The end of the anime has her [[spoiler: doing the same thing she has done throughout the whole show-- rejecting Rikuo so she can continue to visit Ryou, without any resolution of their strange relationship, even though it's hinted that even Ryou might have moved on.]]

** Shinako spends all her time making food for Ryou and his father. Ryou takes this as a sign of her interest in him, and proudly shows off her homemade bentos to his friends at school, only to be chastened when a friend also has a homemade bento, made by his mom. In one scene, Ryou demands she keeps cooking for him after he goes to college, drawing parallels with how he demands her love. This contrasts him with Rikuo, who is grateful and determined to repay Shinako for her food (and love).

* TriangRelations: Haru likes Rikuo, who sort of likes her but is more in love with Shinako. Shinako is friends with Rikuo and enjoys his company, but is still fixated on her dead high school crush. Meanwhile, Ryou is also in love with Shinako and is far more assertive about pursuing her than Rikuo is.
* UnequalPairing: Shinako and Rikuo both have a love interest that is about five years younger than them, a notable difference when the oldest is in their early 20's. Shinako and Ryou are particularly unequal because Shinako is a teacher at Ryou's high school and sees herself as an older sister/mother figure to him.

* WillTheyOrWontThey: The whole point of the series is to resolve what combination of the Haru-Rikuo-Shinako-Ryou love quadrangle will get together.
* YamatoNadeshiko: Shinako is a demure, reserved and conservatively dressed woman. She spends nearly all her free time serving and cooking for her adopted family, the father and brother of her dead high school crush, seeing it as an extension of her nursing of the crush on his deathbed. She does this out of a self-centered sense of obligation, as the family neither asks for nor particularly appreciates this motherly role. This deference to the family and sense of obligation keeps her from becoming the lover that Ryou wants, but also keeps her from her own happiness or personal growth. Her sense of obligation to the family and Ryou keeps her from getting together with Rikuo, and keeps her constantly sad and obsessed with the memory of her dead crush. While she shows some signs of a backbone, being willing to lecture Ryou in a motherly way if she thinks it's best for him, she's overall something of an ExtremeDoormat, [[spoiler: finding herself completely unable to stand up for him or clearly explain her own feelings, which ultimately ends her relationship with Rikuo.]]