To say that it’s been a long wait for the anime continuation of Kimi ni Todoke – From Me to You might be an understatement. To put it in perspective, last spring, Viz started publishing the soft sequel to the original manga, Kimi ni Todoke: From Me to You: Soulmate, which features Sawako and Ume in college. This third season doesn’t go that far, or even to the end of the original manga, but it still offers a lovely journey back into the story’s world, complete with an ending that, while not final, gives us hope for the characters’ futures while letting us know that things are far from over.

Rather than being a ten- or twelve-episode series, the ONA comprises five long episodes, plus a puzzlingly numbered “episode six,” which should be watched first. Episode six is a fifteen-minute recap of the major points from the first thirty-eight episodes, so if you’re feeling like you need a refresher, that’s where you ought to start. (Although I should mention that both seasons one and two are streaming on Netflix as of this writing.) Episodes one through five are the actual third season and, somewhat bafflingly, are all about one hour and six minutes long, with one clocking in at an hour and twelve minutes. If you’re a binge-watcher, this is tailor-made for you, but if you prefer watching an episode here and an episode there, the longer runtime can feel onerous, forcing you to take breaks at awkward times in the story’s runtime. On the plus side, each episode’s ending theme imagery is unique, and it’s clear that a lot of resources were devoted to making this as good as possible.

The story is striking, not just for its sweetness but for the way it doesn’t make any attempt to update things. It’s still 2011, and the plot unfolds in a style of shoujo romance that feels a little old-fashioned today. That’s a good thing since series fans are unlikely to react favorably to any attempts to modernize only a third season, but it’s also pleasantly nostalgic in genre terms, especially since the original manga was, I suspect, many readers’ first introduction to this brand of shoujo romance. It allows the innocence of the story to be preserved, with little details like kisses and unbuttoned top buttons taking on outsize importance, and a scene of Kazehaya and Sawako agreeing to use each other’s first names achieving dangerous levels of cuteness. There’s an adorable innocence that we don’t see as often now, and even viewers without warm and fuzzy feelings about the first two series may find themselves feeling those things with this one.

The plot is roughly divided between three couples: Kazehaya and Sawako, Chizu and Ryu, and Ayane and Kento. Since the first couple is established, their storyline follows their romantic progress. Along with the aforementioned elements, one of their major hurdles is Sawako’s father, who comes across as overprotective but is, by the final episode, really revealed to be more afraid of losing his daughter as she grows up. Kazehaya does his best to prove that he’s honestly in love with Sawako, but this runs up against his issues, namely that he feels trapped by his image as a wholesome guy. He feels like he has to continue to be earnest and largely asexual where Sawako is concerned, and he becomes actively afraid of his feelings. He wants to kiss and touch his girlfriend, but a piece of him thinks that’s not what he’s supposed to do – he’s not supposed to be that kind of guy. He’s as trapped by this thought cycle as Sawako was by the Sadako nickname, and it dovetails with Ayane’s storyline in a very organic way.

As you’ll remember, Ayane has a reputation as a girl who gets around. She’s had multiple boyfriends, and in this season, she confesses that she’s never actually been romantically attracted to any of them. She doesn’t know what it’s like to be in love, and that bothers her, especially as she watches Sawako’s relationship blossom. At one point, she begins dating a boy in another class who has a lot of assumptions about her and what she’ll do with a boyfriend, physically speaking. Ayane is beginning to realize that she doesn’t want to be that person anymore, but she’s partly stuck because she doesn’t see herself as someone who can have what Sawako does. She’s trapped in people’s image of her, and while I wouldn’t say that she’s ashamed, she’s growing uncomfortable. Like Kazehaya and Sawako, she has to realize that she’s more than what other people perceive her to be, and that that’s not only okay, but it’s also her choice.

The most textbook storyline is Chizu and Ryu’s romance, which hews closely to childhood friend tropes. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t good, and their extended flashback in episode three is one of the strongest sequences in the series, serving as both background to their feelings and an exploration of the grieving process. Their relationship ends the series the least settled, but that makes sense with Chizu as a character. She has romantic feelings, but she’s not romantic and not quite ready to be comfortable with a relationship. It fits in with the overall series themes of social versus personal expectations, which we see in various ways throughout the season, with one of the nicest surprises being that the so-called Kento Girls (his self-proclaimed fan club) aren’t mean girls or bullies at all. No one can be judged by their appearance or assumed reputation because no one, not even side characters, is only one thing. (Except maybe Joe. He’s a disaster of a human being.)

Kimi ni Todoke – From Me to You‘s third season is everything you could hope for, especially episode five. It may not resolve everything left hanging, but it shows us that these characters are still alive and moving through the world, giving us hope that things will work out for them in the end. Life doesn’t stop when the characters get together, and this does a good job of reminding us of that without stepping all over the happy “ending” we had before. With excellent performances from both English and Japanese returning casts, cleaner character designs and animation, and unique ending images for all five episodes, this is a worthy follow-up and one that was worth waiting for.