Where Did the Light Go? Discussing The Summer Hikaru Died Volume One

4 min readJun 11, 2024

Welcome, weebs, to Animated Observations

Eventually, I’ll get back to picking up and talking about a manga series and actually finishing it, not right now though. Instead, let’s talk about a relatively new gay horror series that is doing a lot of interesting things narratively: The Summer Hikaru Died. Shout out once again to Mangkacast, whose post on the series initially got me interested.

For those unaware, The Summer Hikaru Died is a manga series about…well, Hikaru dying. Except, it is much more about what happens after. Despite appearing the same after Hikaru’s trip to the mountain where he got lost for a week, Yoshiki knows something is wrong. Soon after, “Hikaru” reveals himself to be a monster who took over the body of Yoshiki’s dead friend. They agree to keep this a secret, for now anyway.

To Love a Stranger

It is pretty obvious from the opening chapters that whatever relationship Yoshiki and Hikaru had before this revelation was a lot stronger than friendship. There are multiple flashbacks to conversations in which the two flirt pretty openly and even allude to living together in the future. Now, I’m all for a bit of consensual flirting and teasing with my close friends. However, the feelings Yoshiko laments upon learning about the death of the real Hikaru feel decidedly queer.

A good example comes from the dream sequence Yoshiki has towards the end of chapter one. The tone is decidedly light-hearted, it is a flashback to when their relationship was much simpler, when the need to rush a confession felt far away. The POV framing of it also helps to indicate this as basically every frame of his sequence has Hikaru in it minus a few. There are also multiple scenes later on where the two of them just straight up admit their feelings, but then I don’t get to do any textual analysis, so where’s the fun in that?

You Know, These Things Get Around

The story’s setting of a rural Japanese town nestled in the mountains, though not exactly new, has still been used to great effect so far. Settings like these, especially in horror/thriller environments, are often used to highlight the social and/or physical isolation of the people. This is true of both the townspeople about bigger population areas and about themselves. In Shuzo Oshimi’s The Flowers of Evil, for instance, Takao feels isolated from those around him because he views himself as more thoughtful and introspective for reading French authors, to say nothing of how true that is, anyway.

However, author Momumokuren instead highlights both the fear and paranoia of living surrounded by unexplored woods in which people can apparently disappear and then suddenly reappear with no explanation. This also bleeds the romantic elements of the story, as the town’s strange happenings could be read as an allegory for the same suffocating atmosphere that often keeps queer folk from being more open about their identity.

To He Who Bears This Curse

Despite trying to play it cool, Yoshiki’s character is profoundly affected in a way that Mokumokuren makes obvious from the get-go. The warm, friendly flashbacks peppered in throughout the opening six chapters contrast starkly with his colder, more reserved interactions with whatever has replaced Hikaru.

For a while, Yoshiki tries to convince himself that this could be normal, that the two of them could really pretend like nothing happened. However, it is in this replacement of the positive tension of love and romance with the negative tension made of fear, confusion and grief that The Summer Hikaru Died seems to be finding its niche. So far, at least, it’s a damn good one.

We did it! something timely and culturally relevant. Regardless of whether or not I deserve it, I’m patting myself on the back. Still, what are y’all’s thoughts on this series? Let me know in the comments (no spoilers plz).

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