“The first 1,225 Steps”
What They Say:
When aspiring manga artist Chika’s storyboards get rejected, she ditches her desk for an adventure! Armed with a quirky social media poll, she sets off on a spontaneous journey of random crowdsourced destinations. From hilarious mishaps to heartwarming encounters, Chika discovers inspiration, friendship, and herself, one unpredictable stop at a time.
The Review:
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
Based on the manga of the same name from Kenta Ishizaka, this spring 2025 series has an interesting idea behind it that should draw a number of fans. The manga is the debut work from the creator and is not licensed in English, however. The anime adaptation brought on Masaharu Watanabe to direct it from the scripts overseen by Yoshiko Nakamura. Watanabe has a lot of directors credits but also topline Ganbelm and Wakaba Girl and a lot of Re: Zero works. Nakamura worked on Re: Zero as well but also things like Hiiro no Kakera and the Super Lovers project. Makaria handled the animation production and also has The Brilliant Healer’s anime this season, and lots of production assistance jobs.
The show introduces us to Chika, a young woman who only thinks about manga and has no other real interests beyond that. She’s gone to pitch a manga at a publisher but it comes after a few rejections and now this new one as well. She’s told she has potential, basically, but that her work needs more of a hook and interest to it with the plot. That has left her feeling fairly dejected and just trying to figure out what’s next. To her surprise, it’s a dice journey thing she sees on TV that ends up giving her motivation to go on a journey herself but does it through social media to get others to suggest where to go. The percolating hope is that it could inspire her in some way to move forward and she doesn’t expect much when she crashes for the night, not expecting any kind of response. It’s both the encouragement she needs to do it but also the kind of stress of having to follow through on something she kind of put out as a half-joke.
She has to get a bit creative in it when it comes to what’s voted on, but she ends up going “up” to the Higashiya Hot Springs for a trip, taking her a good distance from home in Tokyo. It’s a decent travelogue as we see her finally arrive and wander around the town a bit, learning some of its local history and the like. But it’s also fun to see her hustle to get to the hotel on her way back to it when she sees signs with bear warnings. It’s a good experience for her overall, especially something like trying to get a hotel room last minute, and enjoying the experience that’s different than her daily life. It’s the kind of thing that can inspire even in small ways. But the rea joy is the public bath itself with its fantastic views, great room design, and that incredible water itself. It’s one of those moments where she does manage to really relax, which is a sea change after where she was the day before.
In Summary:
As someone who watches hours and hours of Japanese walking tour videos, admittedly more the midnight ones, there’s an appeal in this with how it brings the photorealism into the series so Chika gets to see places. It’s a good blending overall and her curious personality is coming into focus well now that she’s on this journey. It’s a bit of an awkward setup at first but one that makes sense when you have someone who may be good at illustration but hasn’t found what it is they want to say yet. Chika’s got the skills but the lack of life experience and something truly motivating her is what’s missing from her work. So this journey, taking an indoorsy eighteen-year-old, is putting her on the path to becoming both a better person and a better storyteller. Not a better artist, a better storyteller. It’s not going to be easy but these first steps, all 1,225 of them, are worth it for her and it’s an enjoyable journey to go on her with.
Grade: B
Streamed By: Crunchyroll
