Genre: Drama, Comedy
Length: 12 episodes + 2 OVA
"Yukito is a travelling performer. He moves through this world with only the clothes on his back, driven onward by stories of "The Girl in the Sky." Not knowing when or if he will find her. Yukito wanders, clinging to fleeting hope.
Destitute and near starvation, Yukito's life changes after the eccentric Misuzu offers him food and shelter. This fragile beauty shares her dreams of a life lived amongst the clouds, and Yukito listens closely out of a gratitude which quickly gives way to curiosity.
The unlikely pair grows close, but Yukito cannot escape his destiny, or his past. His need to find "her" is much too strong. Who is the girl in the sky? Does she even exist? The answers twist in the breeze, and the questions float aimlessly through the air."
Friggin' Key, I swear! If someone knows how to push out a tear-jerker, it's them. Keep telling yourself that you don't feel your chest constricting and the moisture rolling down your cheeks is just sweat... Clannad had a lot of emotion behind it, but it also had nearly 50 episodes in total to work with. Don't think I've felt the strings to my heart being plucked as much by an anime series as Air has done. The final two episodes were something else...it might be as emotional if it just happened out of the blue, but the writers made sure that you knew what was going to happen in the near future. That feeling of *No, no, no...don't let it happen like I think it's about to* is used to maximum effect.
Air starts with Yukito and Misuzu, but for the first half of the series, there's more of an emphasis on a supporting cast that is pretty vacant from the finale. Yukito manages to befriend several girls in the town and helps them to find some closure to issues in their lives. Of course they're all filled with drama. At points, you can be crying out of sadness and then out of happiness. A couple episodes focus on the origin of the *Girl in the Sky* and how such a legend came to be. The 2 episode OVA also helps to explore the past even more.
I felt that Air was an amazing series that has a huge focus on the emotions. The plot is definitely not all together, but it comes together in the end and I enjoyed it. Don't expect a happy ending and be ready to wipe a few tears away. Enjoy!
