After having to deal with the hustle and bustle of the week, it’s nice to sit down and turn on a show to relax. For me, Grandpa and Grandma Turn Young Again is that show, due to how chill and wholesome it has been so far. I’m not going to say it’s “the wholesome anime of the season” quite yet, however. After one show that I watched that I thought was going to stay on the wholesome route, I’m waiting until the conclusion of a show/season before I make that judgment. But enough blabbering from me for right now. Time to get into the review!
The episode begins with two boys walking through the orchard that Grandpa and Grandma tend to, with the boys making comments that boil down to farming being something that only old people do, and how they want to get out of the country and go into the big city. They notice the (now young) Grandma, having yet to make the connection that she is the same Grandma they’ve seen working here previously. They don’t appear to make the connection until Grandpa drives up and goes back home with Grandma…and the boys begin considering becoming farmers. This was a nice little segment to have before we get into the real meat of the episode, and I think it begins the episode on a good note.
The next segment begins on the day before Grandpa and Grandma woke up young again, with Grandma asking Grandpa about some flyers that could be thrown out, with Grandpa saying that it’s fine, though Grandma seems to have her attention on a specific flyer. The next day, we see that there is a package on the table, which Grandma opens…and it’s a white dress, presumably bought by Grandpa from the store that was being advertised on the flyer that Grandma was looking at! This was another super sweet segment, and it was nice to see this wholesome interaction between the two!
We then see Grandpa and Grandma watching a show that Mino had told them about, with Grandpa struggling to find what was good about it. When Grandma asks to replicate what was being done, it has no effect because they’ve been together for 50+ years. Later that day, Mino is over and the fishmonger comes over to the house. Their speech has a heavy accent (though a note of what they’re saying is provided for the viewers), and Mino struggles to understand what’s being said. Grandma comes out and deals with this, however, to get past the communication barrier. This was another fun little segment, and I could really feel for Mino during the segment where she was talking with the fishmonger.
Afterward, we meet a new character: Shiori. Like Mino, she’s a granddaughter of Grandpa and Grandma, and she’s staying with them after getting in a fight with her father. After Grandma gets off the phone with Shiori’s father, she talks to Shiori, with Shiori saying that she has nothing and that she’s been running away from everything, crying. And what Grandma says to comfort Shiori is super sweet, and also my favorite line from this episode. “Shiori, the fact that you’re crying is proof that you haven’t run. You’re still fighting.” We see a flashback where Shiori reveals to Grandma that she wants to be a doctor, that way she can fight her grandmother’s illnesses, and we see another shot of Shiori’s tears. This is just such a sweet segment of the episode, and I really hope we get to see more of Shiori during the show (which we should, because she’s in the key visual I’m using!), because she seems like such a good character!
A flashback then plays where Grandpa and Grandma have a conversation where they’re talking about their plans to head out seemingly getting canceled because Grandma got sick. She insists that Grandpa should take Yoshiaki to the beach, but Grandpa chooses not to. Grandma is then looking at swimsuits, wondering what one she should wear. While she’s contemplating this, Shiori sits over with Grandma, the former being on her phone. After a conversation, Grandma decides to begin getting dinner ready. Shiori then looks over at Grandpa and calls him “the worst”, which leads to one of the best integrations of those manga-bonus feeling scenes I’ve seen in this series so far. Hopefully, these can continue feeling more natural like this.
The next segment has “Yoshiaki” calling Grandma, asking for money, which Grandma presses record for the call. When Grandma was listing out what “Yoshiaki” wanted, my entire mind was screaming “scam”. Grandma seems to play along, but when she reveals to “Yoshiaki” that she was not their mother, “Yoshiaki” hangs up. Later, we see that a member of an “It’s me” scam ring turned themselves in, and based on scenes in the episode, this was the one that called Grandma, and when she thought he was Yoshiaki, played along with that. I hadn’t heard of this kind of scam before watching this episode (I’m more familiar with those Nigerian princes and those fake Microsoft support things), though I’m guessing this is a common scam in Japan.
Grandma then realizes that she doesn’t need her glasses to read anymore, being able to read the text on the calendar from far away, which even Mino can’t read. After realizing that Grandma can read the newspaper, Mino then decides to trick Grandma into flirting with Grandpa by having her read words that she points to. After that, Grandma pulls that same reading trick (though with different intentions) on Mino. This was a silly little segment, and after what could’ve been seen as two more serious segments, it was a nice change of pace.
Mino is then watching her show, asking if Grandpa and Grandma had held hands and gone on a date before. Grandma declines it, and points out that when they were still old, holding hands was more like helping each other walk. Later that day, Grandpa and Grandma went out shopping and are walking back home, with both not wearing gloves on one of their hands. After some hesitation, they hold hands. This was a super cute segment, and it seems to get us back on the usual status quo.
They then go to visit Takahiro, a doctor who is also Shiori’s father, who is surprised to see them so young again. He does a basic check-up and does some tests on them, and promises to provide the details later. We then see him flashback to when he was younger, aspiring to be a doctor so that he can fight his mom’s illnesses, and how it doesn’t seem like he was able to do that. This flashback also reveals one of the illnesses she has: cancer in Grandma’s liver.
The final segment of the episode begins by showing Grandpa and Grandma planting the apple tree, and even shows them pulling it back up during a storm, and showing how it still grew apples after that. After another shot of the two finding the golden apple, the two chose to cut it into slices and each eat a slice. We also see a scene of the tree seemingly dying, which…ouch, I hope that doesn’t foreshadow anything. That night, both of them had a dream involving an hourglass flipping over, which would lead to them waking up younger. During their conversation, they both hid treats they made to celebrate their 58th wedding anniversary, but it seems like there were no hard feelings in the end. While this was a fun segment to end the episode on, it feels like this should’ve been the second segment of the first episode, at least logically. I’ve never read the source material, so I don’t know if the crew of the anime switched up the order or not.
Despite my one timeline placement irk, this was still a solid episode! I loved seeing the interactions in this episode, but due to something I didn’t bring up in this review, my rating is staying at 9.5/10 golden apples so far. Maybe the third episode will change it. Either way, I can’t wait to see where this story goes!
Additional posts about Grandpa and Grandma Turn Young Again:
Sara Talks Anime 
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