Fune wo Amu | The Great Passage, Review: Who Said Dictionaries Aren’t Interesting?

Hi everyone and welcome to our place! 😀

I don’t know if you remember, but I was doing a series called the Random Anime series? Yeah? Well, let’s continue with that yes? Don’t worry, next week I’ll start the Horrible Anime quest and then will proceed to come and fort between those two! 😀

Now, if you don’t remember (probably you don’t), the last random Anime series post was the Kiss Him, Not Me and at the end of the post you can see that the one I got was:

– Fune wo Amu –

Synopsis | Story

If you are looking for a fast paced Anime, with a lot of action, this The Great Passage is not for you!

The synopsis of Fune wo Amo is centered in Majime Mitsuya a guy who works as a sellersman. However, due to his lack of talk skills he is just horrible doing it. Araki, the director of a dictionary department is looking for someone to replace him since he is starting to get near his retirement. When he hears one of his subdits, Masashi Nishioka, talking with Majime he decides to hire him.

The story is then around the process of creating one of the best dictionaries out there and let me tell you, I never thought it could become so interesting.

The story has a slow pace, but in a relaxing kind of away. The story goes through all the steps (and missteps) it takes to construct a dictionary in Japan which is way more interesting than the Western approach. Alongside this you will be able to follow the evolution of Majime from a terrible talkative person, to a normal functioning human being. Most of this is because of the great relationship he develops with Masashi which is just a delight to watch growing.

I loved the story! I was needing a more relaxed environment and The Great Passage was great for it! Although the pace is a little slow you can feel all the emotion that was put into it! It’s that kind of emotion that evolves you and just makes you to also feel emotions towards the story and its characters. Moreover, you get some nice skits where cute dictionaries explain you the process of building a dictionary in Japan, how sweet is that?

Characters

There are not many characters in Fume wo Amu, but I’ll just be focusing the mains ones, Masashi and Majime since they are, by far, the center of this Anime. It was refreshing to see an Anime where they didn’t focus in the love relationship of the main character (yes, there is one) but in a friendship and companionship relationship.

Majime and Masashi do not start in the best accords, specially because Masashi does not understand Majime. To be honest, I think it is just normal since Majime is just a strange guy. How he got a salesperson job just completely blows my mind. Nevertheless, they end up getting together and from strangers they grow to coworkers and from there, they grow to a life friendship. The evolution is done in such a natural way that is just a delight to see that bonding growing and growing.

Majime Mitsuya

Majime is the main character and, as you could imagine the one who gets to have the most evolution throughout the Anime. As I said, in the beginning he is a terrible talker which has the job of a salesperson. Of course, his job is not going that good. Due to this, he is not the guy with most confidence as you could imagine.

The main thing that makes him such a terrible talker is that he overthinks every word spoken by him or others. He overthinks so much because words can mean a lot of different things and he basically doesn’t have the tact (or the lack of it) to understand the context around it.

Everything changes when he meets Masashi and starts working as an editor of the dictionary, The Great Passage. For a guy as Majime, this is the perfect job and, from a terrible salesperson he passes to be a great editor which made me think that everyone is great at something, just needs to find what it is.

This job will change his life! He just got a life goal and finish something that will leave his mark in the world, so he puts his head into his work 100%. Due to missteps and natural problems that occur, the dictionary takes years to finish. During these years you will be able to see Majime growing up as a person.

Masashi Nishioka

Masashi does not get such an evolution throughout the Anime. In fact, he stays the same, more or less. The thing that you get to see is more about him and not as much an evolution. The only thing you can really see changing in him is his understanding towards Majime as also his love for the dictionary department.

Nevertheless, he is a great (and complex) character which ends up making you falling in love for him!

Animation | Audio

The animation is great! It’s true that there is not much happening in the screen, but that’s because of the story and the Anime itself. The backgrounds are just gorgeous and relaxing, while the animation itself is as smooth as you could ask for! I was completely blown away by it since I wasn’t expecting so much out of it.

The intro for example is one of the best things I ever seen in Anime. Completely different, really simple, but gorgeous!  Look at it:

When it comes to audio, there is also no problems whatsoever. Dubbing, sound effects and background music are just done right and it just makes the trip in this big ship of words even more pleasant.

– Conclusion –

Basically, Fume wo Amu is great! I never thought I would enjoy so much an Anime which is about creating a dictionary. Well, to be honest, The Great Passage is way much more than that! So yeah, a great Anime for you to relax and you even learn some things about dictionaries, how cool is that?

If you are looking for a more relaxed show and just enjoy a trip of gorgeous design and full of emotion, then this one is for you!

I give to Fune wo Amu

What about you? Have you watched Fune wo Amu? Did you liked or was it too slow-paced for you? Comment down below! 😀

See You Soon! 😀