The Summer is a short, yet impacting piece of youthful yuri yearning filled with the trials and tribulations that come with falling in love and managing a relationship. The tender, intimate moments of two girls falling in love emit a sense of warmth, comfort, and passion characteristic of a new relationship, but the real meat of the story rests in how the conflicting personalities of our main duos put a strain on even the mildest of interactions. The conflicts are never rooted in clichéd misunderstandings or feel mean-spirited, but rather stem from Yi-gyeong and Suyi being very different people with different perspectives on the worldand themselves. The lack of acceptance toward LGBT relationships in the time period the story depicts is also a notable stressor early on, feeding into Yi-gyeong’s tendency to put a heavy emphasis on her personal appearance and leading to conflicts over Suyi’s directly opposite demeanor.
The raw emotions of each moment are brought out wonderfully by the softness of the artwork, with incredibly solid color design leaning into moodier sunset lighting matching the sense of intimacy rather well. There is a bit of animation jank that pops up every once in a while, but rarely enough to wholly disrupt the overall experience, with solid character design work and excellent framing of the more intimate moments of their relationship making this a nice little piece of eye candy. Much like youth itself, the story is brief and fleeting, yet burns brightly enough to leave an impact; certainly a hidden gem worth checking out.