Sakura Quest is a 25 episode original anime. It has a normal but yet also weird premise. Yoshino is fresh out of college but is struggling to find work in Tokyo, this seems like a common problem. She doesn’t want to go back to the rural town that she grew up in, since getting out of there was the reason she went to Tokyo in the first place. Unfortunately for her, she ended up landing a job as the “queen” of a rural town anyway. Basically, she’s part of the PR effort as the spokesperson for the town in order to attract more tourists into Manoyama, and help revitalise the town.
In addition to her colleagues at the Tourism department, she’s joined by several other young townspeople: Shiro, Maki, Ririko and Sanae. Each has their own skills but there’s nothing too strange of spectacular about any of those characters. They eventually form the “ministers” that advise the queen and settle to think up of ways to revitalise Manoyama.
As an outsider, initially Yoshino goes out to learn what makes the town special and worth coming to. In the process, she finds out that there are people who are resistive or at least, happy with the way things are now and doesn’t need the town to change. Manoyama is a town steeped with traditions and other things that might seem boring to others, such as a locally grown vegetable that is a speciality, but these are also the people’s livelihoods.
To be honest, the setting and content is a bit boring. It’s realistic, without any ounce of fantasy but the writing also lacks drama or any sort of hook. It starts plot threads but then drops them and coupled with many of the events being bland and uninspired, it can be boring to watch. It slowly gets better halfway into the season, where a big event happens and initially, seeing the positive effects was heartwarming as you feel the same joy and satisfaction as the characters. However, for every plan that the characters hatch, no matter how farfetched, or even how good of an idea it is, there will be disadvantages. We see the negative consequences as this is not an idealistic world, and the characters much deal with it.
So in the end, the anime is a slow burn, especially with how Yoshino spends a lot of time uncovering more and more about the town. All of Manoyama’s rich history is tucked away with its popular and isn’t easy to discover. Learning about how a tradition came to be, even a mundane one, like the reason a certain of noodle is a staple of the local cuisine, is much more interesting than it sounds.
While all the characters mature, Yoshino is naturally the one that matures the most. She changes from an unemployed graduate that doesn’t think too far ahead to a responsible person. She cares for Manoyama and ends up even appreciating her own rural hometown. She now thinks about the consequences of her actions and is genuine in her efforts to revitalise the town.
The ending trends towards trying to make the view nostalgic for the past. The revival of Manoyama is a big long-term project, so you know it cannot be feasibly done by the end of the season, so you wonder how it is going to end. There’s some reconciliation and some drama. The ending is one of those bittersweet goodbyes and it’s done well when it basically summarises all of the bonds that Yoshino had created in her year in Manoyama. It also doesn’t try to wrap everything up, rather opting for just enough to give hope, even though things will continue to change.
Overall, Sakura Quest is an average anime. It’s different and unique in that it tackles a subject that isn’t done much in anime but unfortunately there’s a reason for that. The anime is filled with events that are too normal and bland to truly keep your interest. It gets better in the second half of the season, especially once Yoshino builds up her reputation and more of the population are supportive of her. As per usual for all PA Works anime, the art style looks great and clean looking, so there’s always a plus. It’s an anime that’s hard to recommend since it is quite niche.
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