MITSUHA MEETING TAKI AND TITLE EXPLAINED

Mitsuha meeting  Taki

As we go into detail of the moments they meet, we need some background information on several scenes in the movie in order to understand how and when they meet. Not every scene has to be interpreted literally because typical the Japanse phenomena and spiritual elements that play a huge role in the movie, can be interpreted metaphorically. 

Mitsuha and Taki live three years apart in time. We can conclude this from the scene where Mitsuha sets up a date for Taki and mentions that he will see the comet after the date has ended. The note left him somewhat confused, because he already saw the comet three years in the past. During the movie it becomes clearer that their timelines got tangled somehow like musubi, in the sense of braided cords, can get tangled. 

The day Itomori was hit by the comet the body switching stopped. Taki tried to call Mitsuha many times, but he never got an answer. He decides to look for her together with his friends, only relying on the sketches he made of Itomori and the red braided cord he carries with him. When he arrives at the crater he starts to realize that Mitsuha has vanished in the comet impact of 2013. He only knows this for sure when he sees her name in a book with a list of all the victims. He goes to the Miyamizu family shrine which still remains. He drinks the kuchikamizake that was made by Mitsuha and switches bodies one more time to a point in time where the comet has not yet appeared. Taki, now in Mitsuhas body, is determined to save the villagers and Mitsuha herself. 

Taki starts to evacuate everyone in the village. When telling Yotsuha, Mitsuha's sister, to leave town, she mentions that Mitsuha was acting kind of strange after she went to Tokyo so suddenly the day before. With those words Taki remembers their first meeting when the two coincidentally meet each other on the subway in Tokyo in 2013. Taki was unable to recognize her because he had not yet experienced the body switching. When Mitsuha got off the train, she gave him the red braided cord.




Shortly after this scene they meet once again on the edge of the mountain. At the moment of kataware doki, a moment when the sun sets and it’s neither day nor night, they meet each other in their own bodies. To not forget their names they write it on the palms of their hands, but as soon Mitsuha starts to write her name, the moment of kataware doki was over. Both switch back to their own bodies and time and in a few seconds Taki already forgets her name. 

At the end of the story, because of all the phenomena and spiritual elements, their timelines get untangled because Mitsuha was able to save herself and the villagers of Itomori. The two meet one last time in the streets of Tokyo, now as adults. Even though they hardly remember anything, they do recognize each other because they were destined to meet each other once again, destined to be together and love each other. 

What is your name?

We get to hear this phrase several times during the movie, especially in the scenes where they meet each other. The first time Makoto Shinkai mentions it is at the moment Taki and Mitsuha meet on the train. When Mitsuha is about to get off the train Taki yells: 'What's your name?'. On the mountain they meet each other at the moment of kataware doki. When the moment ends, she is unable to write her name on Taki's palm. He desperately tries to remember her name, but once it has fully left his memory, he says: ' Your name...?'. At the same moment, now back in her own time and body, she too will forget his name. Whilst running around to save Itomori she screams: ' Who are you? What is your name?' to try to remember a piece of it. At the moment the comet splits in the sky, she looks at her hand, only to see that Taki did not write his name, but wrote ' I love you ' instead. The last time the sentence is mentioned, is when they meet in the same time, in the streets of Tokyo. 

These are key moments in the movie and every scene also specifically ends with this sentence. It brings across the emotion Makoto Shinkai wants to share with his audience: to love someone who might not love you back, the desire to fill up the emptiness in their hearts and the constant search for something, without knowing what it is.

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