Mitsuha Miyamizu


 * Warning: content in this article contains spoilers from the movie. Read at your own risk!

Mitsuha Miyamizu (宮水 三葉) is a 17-years old teenage girl living in a small rural town called Itomori. She is a part of her family's shrine and participates in old traditions as a shrine maiden with her younger sister. The dislike of her hometown, the issues with her family shrine and the problems with her father, makes Mitsuha want to live as a handsome boy in Tokyo. Her wish would eventually be somewhat granted, as she would start switching bodies with Taki Tachibana. She is the female protagonist of the movie.

Appearance
Mitsuha is a teenage girl with an average build and height. She is noted to be very beautiful, which is said to be inherited from her late mother.

Mitsuha has brown eyes and mid-length, straight black hair which reaches down to about her lower back, which she ties into a unique hair style; two braids on each side which she later ties into a bun with a red-colored braided cord. After going to Tokyo to find Taki, she gives away her braided cord to him and cuts her hair to chin-length with two strands framing her face. But she begins wearing the braided cord again when she got it back from Taki when they met at Kataware-doki. Seen on a promotional video, when Taki reverses time where Mitsuha survives the comet, a twenty-year old Mitsuha has her hair in a bobbed-hairstyle with the braided cord styled as a hairband, much like before. In adulthood, Mitsuha grows out her hair, almost the same length as when she was seventeen. However, she has her hair down with small pieces of hair tied into a braid at the back with the braided cord styled on.

Mitsuha was often seen wearing her school uniform, which consisted of a short-sleeved white shirt with a pocket and a red ribbon on the collar. The shirt was tucked down a gray-colored skirt she was wearing. For shoes, she wore brown loafers and black stockings. In winter time, she would wear an orange (later blue) colored sweater on top of the shirt. On the day the comet struck, Mitsuha was seen wearing a blue-colored yukata with white flowers, a red obi and light-brown sandals. In 2016 when time reverses, Mitsuha was seen wearing a white dress with stars and a yellow cardigan, along with a pair of heels. In adulthood, Mitsuha usually wears a light-orange colored shirt with a light pink cardigan on top. She wears a pair of peach-colored jeans that reaches down to about her shin bone with a brown belt and a pair of yellow-colored heels. She is seen wearing a necklace and carrying around a brown bag quite often.

Personality
Mitsuha is a kind, caring and supportive girl. She is also determined, sometimes persistent, frank and also adventurous. She is girlish and when switching bodies with Taki she wants him to be careful with skirts and not to take any shower. When Mitsuha inhabits Taki's body, he is considered 'girlish' and feminine, though he still manages to maintain his composure. She also becomes enamored with Tokyo city. Mitsuha has grown to be a bit embarrassed to perform the old traditions of her family, like making Miko in rituals for the shrine creating kuchikamizake, where her classmates often laugh and make fun of her. Her stern and strict father make her slightly insecure as well. Mitsuha is straightforward and despite being emotional like many others at times, she will not give up on something until it's done, as she was the one who ultimately saved the Itomori residents from the comet.

When it comes to love, and later with her falling in love with Taki, she becomes a bit flustered in his presence but became overjoyed nevertheless when seeing him for the first time for real. She was stated that she was single because she wanted to. She also seemed to give good advice when it came to love, as she gave some to Taki when he was on a date with Okudera in the past. However, Taki noted that she was mocking him. Mitsuha also speaks in a dialect like most Itomori residents, having the suffix -ya in her sentences. She seems to be organized and calm.

When she is in Taki's body, Mitsuha is constantly happy, energetic because Taki's life is exactly what Mitsuha had dreamt of. She treasures every moment, and when going out to cafes with Taki friends she spends a lot of money and takes a lot of pictures with Taki's phone (which makes Taki annoyed). This is because Mitsuha lives where there are no cafes. And she insists that it is his body eating. Due to leaving a peaceful and calm life in Itomori, Mitsuha claims that all Taki's part-time jobs are tiring and hard. Due to her acting feminine when as Taki, he has gained the admiration from his crush at the time, Okudera.

Background
Mitsuha is the first child born to Toshiki and Futaba Miyamizu. The early years of her life were filled with joy and love as she peacefully lived her life with her parents and later, younger sister. Her mother and father were both active in the Miyamizu traditions and Mitsuha was also taught about it. However, everything changed when her mother became very sick and eventually died when Mitsuha was a child. Her father was devastated because he couldn't do anything to save his wife. When Mitsuha's grandmother Hitoha told him to pull himself together, he confessed that he only loved his wife Futaba and not the Miyamizu shrine. After this, he was ordered by Hitoha to leave. As so, Mitsuha and Yotsuha began living with their grandmother.

Plot
Mitsuha grew up happily with her grandmother and younger sister, though she continued to have a strained relationship with her father and had to stand out with her his strict actions sometimes, which she disliked. She also disliked the fact that she got attention just because her father was the mayor of the town, as well as the criticisms she got when performing the Miyamizu traditions.

Itomori Incident (2013)
In high school, she would often hang out with her best friends, Sayaka and Tessie. One day when Mitsuha came to school, everyone was looking at her and was being cautious of her. In class she was looking through her notes in her book, where it was written; who are you? When the teacher called her, Mitsuha replied with a fast reaction, everyone laughed and commented if she knew her name today, both things making Mitsuha surprised and clueless. Later on, her friends commented that Mitsuha was normal today since they claimed she was like another person the day before. Mitsuha commented that she had felt like she was dreaming of someone else's dream. Sayaka theorized that it might be from stress and the upcoming ritual Mitsuha and Yotsuha would do.

Several days later, Mitsuha and Yotsuha performed the ritual for the residents to see where they made kuchikamizake, an ancient traditional way of creating sake involving chewing rice to intake yeast for fermentation, which became "half of Mitsuha". But because of her classmates making fun of her because of this and other problems such as her small hometown, Mitsuha exclaimed she disliked her life and wished to be a handsome Tokyo boy in her next life. Her wish was somewhat granted, as she started switching bodies in her dreams with a teenage boy in Tokyo called Taki. However, Mitsuha was unaware that she was switching with Taki three years in the future, and the Taki in her timeline didn't experience the switching and therefore didn't know who she was. Mitsuha began loving her life as Taki, where she treasured every moment and enamored Tokyo. Though she stated it was stressful at times due to Taki's part-time jobs, she enjoyed it. They laid up rules to protect each other lifestyles and though they were grateful towards each other at times, they also experienced annoyment and bickering, often leaving messages like fool, idiot at each other bodies.

One day, Mitsuha arranged Taki's date with his crush at the time, Okudera. She was happy for him and thought that they would end up together. However, she later cried as she had supposedly forgotten Taki's name or fallen in love with him. She then decided to go to Tokyo to find Taki and meet him in person. On the way there, she was having thoughts about how he would react when he would see her. When trying to call him, it was to no avail which made Mitsuha hopeless and she mentioned that they could never meet. However, Mitsuha was certain that if they really saw each other, they would know right away, and continued the whole day searching for him. In the evening, a tired Mitsuha was waiting for the train, when something caught her attention. She tried to run up and when the train eventually stopped, she hopped up and went through the crowd, where she found Taki. She nervously looked up at him waiting for a reaction, only to be shocked that he didn't notice her at all. Mitsuha called out to him, but Taki bluntly asked her who she was, which made Mitsuha a bit upset and sad. She let it be but she knew that it really was Taki whom she switched bodies with. When arriving at her station, Mitsuha went away without saying anything, only to be stopped by Taki asking for her name. She gave him her name as well as she braided cord she was wearing, which Taki would later wear as a good-luck charm.

Later, Mitsuha asked her grandmother to cut her hair due to her meeting with Taki. She then got ready to attend the festival where the comet would also be visible. Mitsuha and her friends Sayaka and Tessie went to an area to watch the comet clearly. Slowly, however, Mitsuha saw how the comet was splitting into pieces, and in seconds, the comet hit the whole town, killing Mitsuha and most of the other Itomori residents in the process. Three years later, Taki would experience the body switching, though it would be with the Mitsuha before the incident.

Main Story (2016)
Three years later after Mitsuha's death, Taki experienced the body switching with Mitsuha but had absolutely no idea that she had passed away. Once when Taki realized a picture of Itomori at an exhibition and looked at it in awe, he was noted by Okudera that he was now in love with another person (Mitsuha), instead of her whom he had a crush on before. Taki embarrassed denied this, indicating that these statements were indeed true. But after that day, Taki stopped switching bodies with Mitsuha that left him clueless and in shock, he also couldn't contact her by phone. Because of this, he decided to meet her in person, but because of not knowing the town's name, Taki relied on his memory of the town solely and drew a picture of Itomori. After completing his drawing, he found about Itomori's current state and Mitsuha's status after going on a journey to find her; he was absolutely devastated.

Taki tried to prevent Mitsuha's and the other Itomori residents' deaths by going the Miyamizu shrine and drinking Mitsuha's kuchikamizake; "half of their souls", where he wished to travel back in time to prevent everyone's death. Taki then went through a dream sequence with Mitsuha's braided cord as a connection. He saw most of her life in the dream until her death, where Taki desperately told Mitsuha to get away from the area before the comet struck, and before seeing the comet struck in the dream, Taki woke up in Mitsuha's body, making him overjoyed.

He then went out and try to prevent everyone getting killed by the comet by preparing as they would do so no one would get killed with Sayaka and Tessie. Taki then realized that since he had fallen asleep in the Miyzmizu shrine in the "underworld", Mitsuha should be in his body since they are switching places, and started to make his way there. Meanwhile, Mitsuha woke up in Taki's body in the Miyamizu shrine. She was surprised and wondered what Taki was doing in the shrine, and went up to the mountains, where she saw half of Itomori gone. She realized at that moment three years ago, she had also died when the comet struck, making her horrified. Much later, Mitsuha now at the mountains, felt a sensation that Taki was there. Taki called out to her, with Mitsuha doing the same. They heard each other and knew they were there, but they couldn't see each other, because of their different timelines. However, they started searching for each other and when they felt like they had passed by each other, they tried to reach out to each other, but failing. Hopelessly, as they saw how the sun went down, both Mitsuha and Taki, now in their original bodies and the same timeline, commented on how it was Twilight - "Kataware-doki", surprising them both deeply upon seeing one another. Mitsuha became absolutely overjoyed and emotional, as she started crying with Taki being just as happy. He explained the lengths he had to go through to save her, for example, drinking her kuchikamizake, to which Mitsuha commented on Taki being a pervert, also because of him touching her chest, and he apologized. Mitsuha then realized that Taki had her braided cord as an armband. Taki explained that he had kept it for three years and gave it back to Mitsuha to wear. After conversing and enjoying each others company, Taki explained to Mitsuha that she had things to do, since the comet was already visible, with Kataware-doki almost coming to an end. Taki suggested that they should write their name on each other's hand so they wouldn't forget each other's name, to which Mitsuha happily agreed to. At first, Taki wrote his name, but before Mitsuha could do the same, Mitsuha and Taki were separated by their timelines once again, with Mitsuha being sent back to 2013 to prevent the comet, while Taki was in 2016 trying to not forget Mitsuha's name.

In sadness, Mitsuha went to Tessie for preparing their plan so they could prevent the death of the citizens of the incident that would occur while trying to not forget Taki's name. They set up explosives in an area so people would think that there was an accident, so they could get the citizens to evacuate to their high school for safety. The plan was successful, as Sayaka, in the broadcasting room in the high school, got some of the citizen to evacuate to the high school. Meanwhile, Mitsuha and Tessie went to the festival and told the remaining citizens to evacuate to the high school because of the "fire". Because of their lack of time, Tessie called out to Mitsuha, only to see her crying because she couldn't remember "his" name. Tessie, in distress, told her to go persuade her father since they couldn't evacuate all the citizens by themselves. Mitsuha agreed and started to make her way to her father's office. However, at the same time, their plan slowly started to fail as Sayaka got caught leading the broadcast and because the citizens were ordered by the mayors to stay put. While Mitsuha tried to remember the precious person's name she had forgotten, she saw how the comet was broken and tripped. She then remembered that this person told her that they should write their names on each other so they wouldn't forget each other's name. Mitsuha slowly opened her palm, and though she expected his name being written on her, it was written "I love you" instead. Tears started to flow from Mitsuha's eyes and commented that she couldn't remember his name with only that. Though, this gave her the motivation to prevent the accident and continued to her father's office. When she arrived there, her father was clearly not very happy seeing her. But Mitsuha came up to him, with a very determined look on her face. Just moments later, the comet struck the town with most of it disappearing.

Since it was revealed that every resident survived the comet, it is presumed that Mitsuha did successfully convince her father to evacuate all the citizens in the end. After preventing all the deaths and continuing with their lives in the original timelines, Mitsuha should be about 20 years old in 2016, 3 years after the comet struck in 2013.

Epilogue (2021)
8 years after the comet struck, Mitsuha now lives in Tokyo. She moved there along with her high school friends Sayaka and Tessie, and younger sister after the incident. It is thought that Mitsuha moved to Tokyo right after the incident to take shelter, but it is also stated by the creator of the movie that Mitsuha moved to Tokyo to search for a job in the fashion industry, probably due to her childhood traditions. It is presumed that Mitsuha finished her education in Tokyo, as she is 25 years old by the time of 2021.

Mitsuha lives alone in a small apartment which is decorated with 'a bit of Itomori' that she bought with. She says that once in a while when she wakes up, she finds herself crying, though she doesn't know why. The feeling that she lost something precious and important to her lingers her for a long time after she wakes up. She looks at her palm at times and remembers that someone had written: "I love you". She has had these feelings since the day the comet struck Itomori 8 years ago. On a winter night, Mitsuha was out with an umbrella as it was snowing and happened to pass by Taki. Mitsuha's ribbon caught Taki's attention and he looked back at her, only to see her continue walking. Thinking that he was misunderstood, he continued walking as well. Mitsuha then looked back at Taki, but didn't think much about it as she didn't realize that the young man was indeed Taki, and walked away.

In summer, Mitsuha went out and got on a train. She was standing right by the doors, and when she looked out, she saw Taki, but at a different train in front of her. This made Mitsuha very shocked and lost for words, and as she stared at Taki in awe, he saw her as well, making a similar reaction as Mitsuha. At this moment, both knew that they had been searching for each other. When they got off the trains they tried to find each other, and after a while of hasty searching, they found each other at a staircase; Taki at the bottom and Mitsuha at the top. However, and none of them said anything despite being so shocked upon seeing each other, so Taki went up while Mitsuha made her way down. This made them both regretful and sad, but when Taki reached the top, he called out to Mitsuha, and noted that they had met before. Mitsuha began crying out of joy and shock and replied that she also thought so. The movie ends with them asking for each other names.

Trivia

 * Her name, Mitsuha (三葉) means "three leaves". This also applies with her grandmother, her name meaning "one leaf", her mother, "two leaves", and her younger sister, "four leaves".
 * Her family name, Miyamizu (宮水) means "shrine water".
 * Since she was switching bodies with Taki from the future in 2013, Mitsuha is 3 years older than Taki.
 * When Taki inhabits her body, he wears Mitsuha's hair in a ponytail since he doesn't know how she does her hairstyle.
 * It was mentioned by Sayaka that on the first day of switching bodies, Mitsuha went to school with bed hair.
 * The red braided cord that Mitsuha gave to Taki is a reference to the Japanese myth: "The red string of fate". The two people connected by the red thread are destined lovers, regardless of time, place or circumstances. This magical cord may stretch or tangle, but never break.
 * This is also associated with the concept of the movie: "Musubi"; knotting, which has a similar description. Mitsuha and Taki were separated by time, circumstances and memory, but they still found each other at the end with their hearts connected.
 * When they met each other at Kataware-doki, it was the only time both Mitsuha and Taki were the same age, as you experience something "not human" at Twilight (Kataware-doki).