5 Centimeters per Second(2007): Characters, Voice Actors, Character Analysis and Character Map
Released in 2007, 5 Centimeters per Second (Official Website) is a staggering, emotional animated feature by visionary director Makoto Shinkai.
In this article, we are going to look back at the primary cast and voice actors of 5 Centimeters per Second. We will explore their individual charms, their tragic flaws, and their profound roles within the narrative. Who exactly were these broken, beautiful characters that populated Shinkai’s melancholic world?
Please be warned: the following deep-dive character analysis contains major plot spoilers.
*This is a translated version. The original (Japanese) is available here.
Short on time? Let our AI walk you through the core highlights of this character breakdown in a quick, conversational overview.
- 5 Centimeters per Second (2007) Character Map
- 5 Centimeters per Second (2007) Character Profiles, Voice Actors, and Deep Analysis
5 Centimeters per Second (2007) Character Map
Although Takaki Tono and Akari Shinohara desperately kept in touch through handwritten letters, they only physically reconnect one last time when Takaki learns he is transferring to the distant island of Kagoshima. Following that snowy night, their correspondence tragically ceases, and the two slowly drift apart into adulthood.
In the character map above, Takaki’s lingering feelings for Akari in the third episode are labeled as a “symbol of the days when he was earnest about something.” This is a crucial, personal interpretation. While a surface-level viewing might suggest he is pathetically hung up on his ex-girlfriend, reading the psychological subtext makes it clear that she acts as a “symbol of uncorrupted passion.” For an adult Takaki, suffocating under corporate burnout and a hollow life, Akari represents the beautiful, lost innocence of his youth. This is why I have framed their relationship this way.
5 Centimeters per Second (2007) Character Profiles, Voice Actors, and Deep Analysis
Takaki Tono | Voice Actor: Kenji Mizuhashi
About Takaki Tono
The central protagonist of the narrative. We follow Takaki’s agonizing emotional journey from his innocent days as a third-grader in Tokyo, through his isolating high school years, and finally into his suffocating adulthood as a corporate employee before he breaks free to become a freelancer.
The primary focus of the first two acts revolves heavily around Takaki’s messy, unfulfilled romantic life.
- Episode 1, “Cherry Blossom,” depicts the desperate, snowy reunion and the inevitable, heartbreaking parting with his childhood soulmate, Akari Shinohara.
- Episode 2, “Cosmonaut,” chronicles the painful, unrequited love his high school classmate, Kanae Sumida, harbors for him.
Both acts are textbook definitions of “tragic romance,” ending in profound emotional separation. Furthermore, in the third act, “5 Centimeters per Second,” Takaki is brutally dumped via text message by a live-in girlfriend with whom he shared a hollow, lukewarm relationship.
Looking at the raw data, Takaki’s romantic life is an absolute disaster, which casts a heavy, gloomy shadow over the entire film.
However… if you strip away the romantic melodrama, 5 Centimeters per Second actually culminates in a triumphant ending where Takaki takes a terrifying, necessary step forward by quitting his soul-crushing job to become a freelancer.
“Five centimeters per second” is famously introduced as “the speed at which a cherry blossom petal falls.” But on a deeper thematic level, it is also the speed of “the agonizingly slow, invisible steps taken by people desperately trying to move their lives forward.”
The first and second episodes beautifully showcase young people earnestly taking these microscopic, painful steps toward their futures.
The journey to make those tiny steps bear fruit is brutal and isolating, which is precisely why the film maintains such a consistently melancholic tone. But we must never forget the breathtaking cherry blossoms that frame both the beginning and the end of the film. Only those “who refuse to stop walking” get to witness those blossoms bloom again.
Read our full psychological breakdown of Takaki’s ending:
Why 5 Centimeters per Second is Actually a Story of Triumph
About the Voice Actor: Kenji Mizuhashi
Takaki is voiced by live-action actor Kenji Mizuhashi. While he has an extensive resume appearing in numerous Japanese films and television dramas, his hauntingly subdued performance as Takaki Tono remains his only credited role as an animation voice actor to date.
Akari Shinohara | Voice Actors: Yoshimi Kondō / Ayaka Onoe
About Akari Shinohara
The heroine of the first episode, “Cherry Blossom,” and the undisputed phantom of Takaki’s first love.
She meets Takaki when she transfers into his elementary school class in Tokyo (Takaki himself being a frequent transfer student). Bonding over their shared status as outsiders and their delicate health, they forge an unbreakable soulmate connection. However, fate intervenes, and they are tragically separated when Akari’s family moves to rural Tochigi right after graduation.
Though they valiantly attempt to bridge the gap with handwritten letters, the cruel passage of time and physical distance eventually erode their correspondence, forcing the two to walk entirely separate lives.
In the final act, “5 Centimeters per Second,” we see a mature Akari happily engaged to be married. While Takaki is taking a terrifying new step by quitting his corporate job, she is taking her own monumental step forward through marriage.
Though the film focuses squarely on Takaki’s suffering, there is no doubt that Akari Shinohara endured her own years of agonizing struggle, heartbreak, and conflict that simply weren’t depicted onscreen.
About the Voice Actors: Yoshimi Kondō and Ayaka Onoe
Akari’s younger voice in the first episode was provided by Yoshimi Kondō, while her adult voice in the third episode was provided by Ayaka Onoe. It appears Ms. Kondō is no longer active in the entertainment industry, though she did provide voice work for a commercial produced by Makoto Shinkai for the Shinano Mainichi Shimbun. Ayaka Onoe had a successful career as a fashion model but also appears to have quietly retired from the spotlight.
Kanae Sumida | Voice Actor: Satomi Hanamura
About Kanae Sumida
A third-year high school student living on the remote, space-faring island of Tanegashima. She fell madly in love with Takaki the second he transferred to her middle school and has harbored a desperate, secret crush on him ever since.
By her senior year, she successfully engineers a routine of walking home with him after his archery practice, but their relationship agonizingly refuses to progress beyond polite friendship.
At the emotional climax of the second episode, Kanae finally musters the courage to confess her feelings, but upon seeing the distant, melancholic look in his eyes, she breaks down and abandons the confession.
Kanae’s devotion was absolute, and realistically, Takaki must have noticed her intense feelings. And yet… he handled the situation with a maddening level of passive detachment.
We know he was suffocating under his own existential dread and the ghost of Akari, but if he had enough free time to type endless emails to an empty inbox, he could have afforded to show Kanae an ounce of genuine emotional attention.
You really have to wonder: what did a vibrant girl like Kanae even see in a brooding guy like him? Perhaps his mysterious, isolated aura was the main draw. From an outside perspective, he just seems paralyzingly shy, but Kanae unfortunately fell for a highly complicated, broken boy. But then again… I suppose that is exactly what teenage heartbreak looks like.
About the Voice Actor: Satomi Hanamura
Kanae is brought to life by the talented voice actress Satomi Hanamura. Beyond this heartbreaking performance, she is best known for playing the protagonist Mirai Onosawa in the acclaimed disaster anime Tokyo Magnitude 8.0, and Aya Okamura in Makoto Shinkai’s poignant short film Someone’s Gaze.
Risa Mizuno | Voice Actor: Risa Mizuno
About Risa Mizuno
Takaki’s adult girlfriend, who briefly appears in the grim third act, “5 Centimeters per Second.”
From the moment she is introduced, their dynamic radiates a heavy, unsettling aura of emotional disconnect. Unsurprisingly, she delivers the final blow, dumping Takaki via text message with the devastating line: “Even after exchanging 1,000 emails, I feel like our hearts only moved 1 centimeter closer.”
As an audience member, you desperately want to believe that the two of them shared at least a few happy, genuine days, but the film paints their relationship as entirely sterile.
The specific phrase “exchanging 1,000 emails” heavily implies that they were both so entirely consumed by their grueling corporate careers that they were reduced to communicating exclusively through digital text. Because they had lost the physical and emotional habit of “meeting face-to-face,” their relationship withered, and it was only fitting that their final goodbye was also delivered through a cold screen.
When you view it from that angle, perhaps the tragedy wasn’t that they “weren’t a good match,” but simply that they “met at the absolute wrong time in their lives.”
If they had met after Takaki quit his soul-crushing job to become a freelancer, they might have built a beautiful life together. We can only hope that, just like Takaki, much brighter days awaited Risa after they parted ways.
About the Voice Actor: Risa Mizuno
In a fun bit of trivia, the character is voiced by an actress sharing her exact name: Risa Mizuno. She is a trusted regular in Makoto Shinkai’s stable of actors, having previously voiced Maki Kasahara in The Place Promised in Our Early Days, the kind teacher in Children Who Chase Lost Voices, and a news announcer in The Garden of Words.
About the Author
Recent Posts
- 2026-04-14
Detective Conan: One-eyed Flashback (2025): The Fatal Phone Call and Hayashi’s True Motive - 2026-04-14
Case Closed: The Scarlet Bullet (2021): Unmasking the True Motives and the Dark Mystery of Makoto Ishihara - 2026-03-29
Detective Conan: The Private Eyes’ Requiem (2006): The Tragic Delusion and True Motive of Suehiko Ito - 2026-03-23
The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2013): Characters & Voice Cast Info, Character Analysis, and Character Map - 2026-03-22
The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2013): Full Synopsis and Differences from The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter (Full Spoilers)
