Love gained, love lost, love redeemed - Lost in Starlight 2025
Lost in Starlight is very sweet. Like love, it works out in the end.
Lost in Starlight (LIS) is an over-sweetened love story and a mushy first act to bear. It’s quirky but falling in love and lapsing in a partial loss of logic also is. A sugary series of events, more or less predictable, where people dance around each other to navigate fiery emotions.
Wholesome level: Sugar and spice in a bumpy romantic tale which includes a bit of stalking, clinginess and wholesome redemption.
There’s a space-time for excessively-sweet romance, but sometimes the sugar content is high enough that it makes you unwell. Romance is often made out of exaggeration, but if feelings are not peppered with maturity they turn out hurtful.
Jay, one half of the romance, may be annoying on purpose to underline the clingy aspects of people adamant about a relationship. But when a character is annoying by intent he remains so for as long as the writers need him to, which may be too much.
When one Mars astronaut complains about Jay’s song being played endlessly, that’s how the pulpy musings between lovers feel - the high highs and mushy lows of a couple you know and who you hope would evolve past the drama, at east occasionally.
If 5 Centimeters per Second was a realist buildup to the anxiety of romance - whether to complete or lose it - LIS moves fast and sweet to unite its lovers. 5CPM dealt with love lost in a factual manner, but more elegantly by not over-bearing the mood with endless arguments between the protagonists. It exaggerated their feelings through metaphor and reaction, with less appeal to explicit exposition. LIS goes the opposite way - it’s excessive and explicit but intentional.
Fans of Interstellar will recognize this approach to the question of enduring love through physical distance. A similar materialist attitude toward love phased into the realm of speculative sci-fantasy and romance, where the connection endures as if transformed into universal law.
It’s a shifty endeavor to look for moral teachings in stories like LIS, because you might end up thinking following your dreams is nonsensical. Nan-young, the other half of the romance, becomes an astronaut to follow her mother and her passion, an event negated by a pointless accident. While the trauma happens, she seems to argue in favor of safety contrary to initiative, though at the same time she wants Jay to persist singing with his beautiful voice.
The romance is a roller-coaster of emotions and events, mostly because of Jay. Both the story and clingy lover find redemption by the end: Jay matures through his obsessions to become a caring partner; the story bumps a few cliches to reach an elusive happy-end.
As with romantic literature and Anime, there is a public waiting exactly for this - raw feelings released without filter, though not always for the betterment of the people involved. The pleasure of a sugary experience is the same regardless of medium - once in a while, we desire the simple release of a romantic story while joining the lovers for the ride, bumps and all.
With so much drama, it’s easy to forget that Lost in Starlight has merits beyond its raw feelings.
It’s visually beautiful, oozing urban idealism with a city half-modern half-visionary, rainbow hues and colorful gradients to reflect the ideal state of an ever-renewed love. It’s encouraging to see an Anime where the city of the future is a pleasant living space and not a decrepit soul-pestering simulacrum.
In 5CPM it was mostly nature supplying the backdrop for metaphor and romantic anxiety; LIS draws up a near-future city, not utopia but close enough to be relatable and desirable.
To build its romantic spirit, LIS connects plot with musical sections. Stylized musical beats - the kind which could be trailers in themselves - move the lovers through their relationship or reveal moments from their past. Music beats in a pseudo-musical may be a cheat to advance the plot or soften the viewer, but they’re effective and fit romantic stories.
Another kicker is how LIS uses the in-world tech of its future to connect the lovers. Augmented reality - the creation of a digital or real space around a person - has uses beyond getting people closer. LIS understands the emotional kick when it makes Jay and Nan-young speak face to face, take a walk through the space garden, brush their teeth together through the growing physical distance. A minor detail nested inside a music beat to keep the lovers in touch, digital but effective.