Grandpa & Grandma Turn Young Again episode 3 once again manages to bury a mystery right beneath the surface of the show. With time skips, a little bit of history, and some heartwarming moments, we further glimpse into the lives of our protagonists and yet know less about their current predicament.
As the show begins, we’re given a little insight into Ine and Shouzou. Originally from Tokyo, Ine moved to Shouzou’s village after what looked to be the devastation of World War II. Her newfound life left much to be desired. She didn’t fit into the community, the work was more than she was accustomed to and the food sucked. But, it’s that relocation that gave her the life she now loves.
After a dream involving the giant hourglass that seems to directly control their age, Grandpa wakes up looking like a leather sac left out in the sun for too long, and that’s problematic for a few reasons. Shouzou worries that with his youthful looks gone and Ine still being a GILF, she might lose interest. Not to mention how people will react when they see them together now. Ine shoots this down quickly, but that’s an interesting thought experiment.
Say the concept of soul mates actually exists, and you find your perfect partner. Then, through magical botany powers, that person’s appearance changes drastically. So much so that now there’s a visual age gap of a few decades between you. How would you react to it?
Say the average age of a reader of this article is 25, and your partner is about that age. Then, one day, you open your eyes, and that person is suddenly 50. Or that person looks like they just crossed the age of consent. Technically, they’re still the same person. They have all the emotional and mental traits you adore. Does your love for them change?
Grandpa’s age isn’t quite all it seems to be. While his face shows his age, his body is still somewhat of a puzzle. His muscular arms and physique are still in line with the days of his youth. But, his internal organs show the wear of age. This suggests that when they revert to old age, their health issues come back, and this bodes especially badly for Ine, who suffers from cancer. That’s not the most pressing issue on her mind though. She has other things to worry about.
Want to know a grim fact? The older you get, the more prone you are to loneliness. The more lonely you become, the more your health spirals. And once you pass a certain threshold, that cycle perpetuates itself. Loneliness in old age increases the risk of everything from heart disease to dementia and Alzheimer’s. And with the luck of old age, comes the pain of goodbyes.
Outliving the people you care for is something you really don’t ever get over. And, it’s something you are never prepared for. And the momentary panic that Ine feels when realizing this is a 10/10 scene. There was no big show of emotion, just crushing dread.
As Grandpa & Grandma Turn Young Again episode 3 continues Grandpa heads to bed and in his sleep, he’s once more visited by the hourglass of youth in his dream. And he concludes that if he were only to flip it, he’d return to his youth. His deduction proved to be correct, as come the morning of the next day, he’d be a chipper man once more. But as the conversation gives way to the inevitability of what’s to come, they both realize that the hourglasses leak sand, and once all the sand is gone, their time will go along with it. Based on what’s left in the hourglasses, they have a few more years at best.
Critiquing creative work is never an easy thing to do. What one person may find to be peak entertainment may fall flat for others. Is this show winning any awards for artwork and its world-building? Nope. Does that make it something to overlook? No way.
The show is a great little mirror into the thoughts that fill one’s mind late in life. And it gives some solid insight into what can plague you later on as opposed to what you think will. It’s still tinkering as a slow-burn slice of life with more of a romance subplot, but after 50+ years with someone, it’s less excitement and more the lovely comforts of life.
Screenshots via Crunchyroll
©Kagiri Araido, KADOKAWA/ Grandma and Grandpa Rejuvenate Production Committee