Look Back (2024)
Look Back is a short animated film about two artists Fujino and Kyomoto who make manga together. I didn’t feel like this film did a particularly great job of relating the experience of creating things with the audience. The one part the film does well in this regard is at the end, in which it conveys the feeling that creators create for the earnest reactions they get from the audience. 1
There’s much more about creating things that I feel they could have explored, like in the argument they have before going their own separate ways, but the story instead focuses on the relationship between the two characters. I related more personally to Wonka (2023). 1
Summary
At first, Fujino feels jealous of the shut-in Kyomoto, who she feels is better at drawing than her. But, when her teacher asks her to deliver the graduation certificate to Kyomoto’s home, she learns that Kyomoto is actually a huge fan of her 4-koma comics and they start drawing manga together. 1
They work hard on making manga together, making seven one-shots as high schoolers, and get an offer to make a serialized manga. However, they have a disagreement as Fujino wants to accept the offer and Kyomoto wants to go to art university. They go separate ways, but as Fujino finds success as a mangaka she learns that Kyomoto has been murdered in a serial killing spree at the university she was attending. 1
Fujino imagines what it would have been like if she didn’t get Kyomoto to leave her room, but eventually remembers the time they spent together. We hear someone (Kyomoto, I think?) ask Fujino why she draws manga, which is followed by a scene of Fujino leaving Kyomoto’s home and returning to her workplace to create more manga. 1