Yofukashi no Uta

Title:Yofukashi no Uta
Call of the Night
よふかしのうた
Overall:Buy
Keywords: , , , , , ,
Notables: AMAMIYA Sora
Animation - LIDEN FILMS
SATO Gen
Ko Yamori is a 14 year old insomniac who sometimes wanders the streets at night when he cannot sleep. One night he encounters a strange girl named Nazuna Nanakusa who seems to revel in the freedom of the nightime city. It turns out that she has every reason to prefer darkness: she's a vampire. But a surprisingly unthreatening vampire, who corrects Ko's misperceptions about just how vampires come to be.

13 episodes
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Buy 8 8 8 7 8 9 Ggultra2764 [series:4523#1552]
Call of the Night explores the chemistry between middle schooler Kou Yamori and vampire girl Nazuna Nanakusa, with the former desiring to fall in love with Nazuna and become a vampire to add excitement to his otherwise dull life. Early episodes explore the development of their relationship with Nazuna being a rather lively character with her carefree, impulsive, and childish personality and adding some fun to the chemistry in her bond with Kou. However, the series later shows some more depth to things than what the first half would have you assume with Kou's presence shown to offer something fresh to her otherwise dull and mundane life as a vampire. It also explores how one could perceive a relationship between humans and vampires in different angles such as with Kou wanting a genuine relationship with Nazuna outside of lust and other vampires using their attractive looks or supernatural abilities to attract people they can turn into vampires without developing a genuine relationship, one of whom is focused on to explore her frustration with this element of being a vampire. The only major gripe I have with this series is, as usual, being the lack of a conclusive ending as Nazuna and Kou's relationship developments remain unresolved and the beginnings of a developing conflict with the introduction of a major character who is seemingly antagonistic toward vampires. Otherwise, this was a surprisingly enjoyable rom-com offering its own unique take on exploring a developing relationship between a human and vampire.

Last updated Wednesday, December 06 2023. Created Wednesday, December 06 2023.
Rent Stretch [series:4523#628]
(Rent+ or Buy)

(All episodes watched):

Well, the notion of a boy running into an odd vampire, and possibly winding up as her boyfriend, was sort of interesting. But as I watched episode one I felt that something seemed to be missing here. It was kind of hard to believe that this guy (or anyone) would accept the existence of vampires so readily. And Nazuna's explanation of how vampires are created was pretty contrary to everything we have been told in the past, but it might be necessary for this premise. I got the feeling that we needed a true surprise, one that nevertheless made some sense and was intriguing, but didn't get one. And the two main characters weren't initially all that interesting either. Ko seems to fall for Nazuna almost at first sight, which was hard to believe. Is it because he hopes for a relief from his insomnia by becoming a vampire himself? So, I wasn't all that excited by this show, but decided to watch episode two to see if it got any better. There seems to be an extensive cast which has yet to be introduced.

Episode two seemed to be trying to make the supposed unconventional method of vampire reproduction (if you fall in love with one who has bitten you, you become a vampire yourself) into something kinky, but I didn't see how that would ever succeed. Maybe I was imagining things. Fortunately, the show didn't rely too heavily on it. If a female vampire gets impregnated by a male one, their child will be a vampire, won't it? Still, I detected a higher level of sophistication to the thoughts and dialogue of the characters of this show than is present in most. Whereas they hadn't lept out at me in episode one, they grew fairly rapidly afterwards. Nazuna may be less experienced at creating new vampires than she lets on. In episode three we meet Akira, an old classmate of Ko and a qualified friend. Nazuna gets somewhat jealous at the prospect of Ko having another female friend (not a girlfriend as of yet). I liked this romantic triangle twist and was curious about where it would go. Episode four left me feeling that this show is actually quite funny. Akira spends some time with Ko and Nazuna and you get the idea of just how weird their behavior would seem to a newcomer. I thought I detected something familiar about the character designs and the technique of joke telling, but the 'original creator' ('Kotoyama') seems to be a relative newcomer; the only other series by that name which I have watched even some of seems to be Dagashi Kashi. In episode five we learn how Nazuna makes a living (just barely); this was amusing. The humor in this show is definitely above average.

Nazuna seems to be something of an outcast among vampires, as we learn in episode seven. Other (female) vampires are suspicious of what's going on between her and Ko. But we learn that Ko needs to hurry up the become-a-vampire process, which won't be easy given Nazuna's lackadaisical attitude. Episode ten was fun as Nazuna has taken on a part-time job at a vampire maid cafe(!) and Ko is tasked with solving the mystery behind a peeping tom scandal there. Episode 11 was good, too, as we see that becoming a vampire isn't entirely a matter of fun and games. This show in general seems to put more effort into storytelling than most. The climactic scene in episode 13 almost brought a tear to my eye as Nazuna and Ko finally sort things out. Even if it was about vampires, the plot of this show made more sense and was more plausible than most. Or maybe that's just another way of saying that it was better than most.

Last updated Friday, October 21 2022. Created Tuesday, July 26 2022.

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