A Place Further Than The Universe is an anime that is gonna remain in a warm spot in my heart, I feel. Having said that, what is it saying? What is it about? Perseverance, grief, loneliness, bravery? These are all themes present in the story in quite notorious ways, but if I had to bet on it, I would say the story is about friendship, because friendship supports all the other themes.
All the struggles that each of the girls go through during the story are made easier, are made more manageable, are faced more decisively, and sometimes even resolved, due to the support that the friend group has afforded them. Yuzuki literally only wants to create real human connections, and gets them through friendship. Mari learns to proactively work for the adventure she wants, to take the risk of disappointment after making an effort, to step out of her comfort zone, in the drive to help and accompany Shirase. Hinata learns how to be vulnerable, how to be helped, and where she has the right to take distance due to Shirase's support. Shirase is helped in very practical and direct ways, wherein she would never have reached Antarctica without her friends' help, but additionally, she is emotionally supported as she finally reaches the point where she can process her grief and mourn. Friendship is the common thread in the story.
What I truly find fascinating is what this series says about friendship beside it being an incredibly helpful, motivating, and healing force in one's life, because a lot of the choices made in the story are quite interesting and unusual.
The character with whom we are introduced to the story, Mari, has a best friend at the beginning, Megumi. As Mari begins her character arc, Megumi falls into a spiral of jealousy that makes her harm Mari in subtle ways, until she confesses her actions in regret. Another story would have set up this plot-line for a redemption arc, but in this one, Megumi recognizes that it would not be healthy for Mari to keep interacting with someone who has been harming her behind her back, and that she herself needs to take distance from the relationship. She "breaks-up" their friendship. (There is an implication later on that Mari and her keep texting, but its also clear that something has indeed been disconnected.)
The story makes a very strong emphasis that the girls, the main 4 of the cast, have known each other for a very short period of time, but they very quickly get along, sometimes without any sort of transition period of them being at odds. In other stories, the strong friendship would have been given the force of time behind it, or otherwise, more emphasis would have been given to a transition where the characters would have learnt to respect and hold affection for each other. Instead, they are friends the moment they chose to help each other, and the disagreements they have from then on never feel like a threat to that.
One of them, Yukuzi, barely understands the concept of friendship, and in an effort to not lose her current friendships, she wants the other girls to sign a contract. Rather than promise to be best friends forever (though they do tell her that they are best friends), they tell her that the contract would not mean anything. That sometimes people drift apart, and that it is nobody's fault. The friendship happens naturally and that one just knows, without having to sign anything or commit in perpetuity. (Though the girls do make clear to each other the intention to keep seeking each other out.)
In this way, this story presents an interesting and invaluable set of messages. That friendship is not supposed to deliberately hurt you. That friendship can simply be something you choose to do, to help a person, to prioritize their needs, and to be there. That you do not need the weight of time or expectation to make friendship happen. That you do not need someone to profess their friendship to you in order to acknowledge it internally. That you are not beholden to friendship beyond the point where you're willing to participate in it.
For over a decade now, it has been theorized we've been in a Loneliness Epidemic, globally. A lot of outlets have described it being especially intense in Japan and the United States. Some describe it as beginning in the 2000s, others in the 2010s, but whichever the variables are, people are having a harder time connecting with each other, with visualizing the possibility of building connections that are not neatly fixed within the romantic, familial, or even the professional. This series presents us with an imaginative framework that we could use to help us visualize possibilities in our own lives, to feel the joys of friendship with none of the usual apprehensions. Everyone needs to know that if you seek it, you can find people whom you can understand, and who can understand you.
I know that some friendships have turned out to be invaluable in my life, and that points of great hopelessness might have never resolved if I had not mentioned it to friends, if they had not encouraged me to make the effort for my aspirations, and helped me find a path forward.
