Why couldn't Mitsuha and Taki remember each other's names?

Question

In the second half of Your Name (after the body switching stops happening), Mitsuha and Taki can't remember each other's names. They can even end up forgetting the names within 10 seconds of seeing each other. Why does this happen? One theory I have is:

Before Taki intervenes, Mitsuha would have died when the comet hit. Taki couldn't remember her name because her future was hanging in the balance.

But this answer doesn't entirely work. For one,

He still fails to remember her name after they rescue Itomori, and Mitsuha is no longer at risk of dying

And second off

Taki was never in risk of dying in the comet, but Mitsuha still can't remember his name either.

So why did this happen? I know this is somewhat the main theme of the whole movie, but it never made sense to me how they could forget so quickly. It's almost like something was actively causing them to forget.

Answer 1

Losing the associated memories is one of the effects of this mysterious phenomenon that the entire movie is based around, it happened in the scene you are asking about, but it also happened in reference to Mitsu's grandmother. All the supernatural occurrences in the movie are supposed to be caused by the shrine god, comet, the shrine maiden (Mitsu) or some combination of those three. Losing the memories associated with the body-swap/time-travel was quite simply just one of the effects of the supernatural phenomenon surrounding "Kimi no Na wa".

Going into specifics as to why it was that moment, exactly what memories they lost and why it happened so suddenly starts to enter the territory of artistic interpretation, this reddit post explains a few useful plot moments for understanding this and comes up with quite a good interpretation for why it happened at that moment because it had just reached twilight and they had just left the shrine which holds the symbolic meaning of leaving behind your most precious thing (their memories of each other).

The issue that I think you noticed with your theory is that it limits the forgotten memories to be specifically about death when really it was about much more. The reddit post is just one interpretation, exactly why is really up to the viewer.

Answer 2

Since they mostly switched bodies after going to sleep, one could think of it like forgetting a dream. Sometimes when you wake up from a dream you don't remember what happened soon after, even while you are currently thinking about it; details can quickly fade away.

This also goes hand in hand with Mistuha and Taki not remembering anything while they were "awake". They were living as the other person, so large swatches of their days were unknown unless the other chronicled it for them while they were there. Taki would have no idea what happened that day if Mitsuha hadn't written in his e-dairy and Mitsuha wouldn't have know what had happened if Taki didn't leave her notes (or if her friends hadn't told her what happened).

When Mitsuha disappears, so does all of her data entries in Taki's e-diary, making it seem like she was only a dream and that all of Taki's memories of her and living as her were also a dream.

This is idea of dreaming is especially prominent when Grandma (Who knows that Mitsuha actually Taki) asks him, "Are you dreaming?".

Answer 3

I had to read this elsewhere - but when Taki and Mitsuha respectively go into the shrine (the Underworld) they have to leave something behind in exchange for being allowed to return alive. That something is their memory of each other. In the twilight, Taki gives Mitsuho the thread she gave him [3 years later / earlier] so he loses his reminder of her.

Answer 4

Maybe the producer brought in this idea to slowly bring the movie to an intense, beautiful end and to link the idea of that specific scene to the title (Your Name). You see, the fact that Taki and Mitsuha couldn't remember each other's name wasn't important-it was for us to realise that despite the confusion Taki and Mitsuha were both in, the fact they knew not a thing about each other but indeed, knew each other better than they know themselves was important to acknowledge. Because that was...love. This was love. Without thinking twice, they continued their quest in finding whoever it was within them during those times they thought they were "dreaming". When people thought the 2 of them were mad, little did they know they were just determined to find each other(or in more beautiful words, the person's life they were living).

Or, maybe it was the idea of understanding how love can blind you and make you do the unbelievable; how it drives you mad, doing things you'd never do before. And that's what I love the most. We've all been attached to this movie after watching it. The music, the scenes, the script, it all constructed not just a movie, but a story of love and life within itself.

And whether or not this was done intentionally by the cast and writers, it gave the movie a beautiful effect and made it so much more aesthetic. You're left with so many questions, everyone interpreting things so differently, but still, we're all coming to the most wonderful conclusions. I love this. <3

Answer 5

I think that they forgot each other's names because in the movie Mitsuha's grandmother says "you need to leave here the most important thing for you, which is the Sake" But then, the most important thing for Taki and Mitsuha was remembering each other's name.

I hope this is clear, if you have any doubt you can ask me :)

Answer 6

At the moment they forgot their names, in the past mitsuha had already died, and that's why the memories were changing to fit what happened. In the story, when they change the past, taki could still remember who mitsuha was, but all documents said she died. That's why he started forgetting to fit the previous events that were changed.

PS: I don't know if it was clear...

Answer 7

Honestly just seems like a plot hole to me. It seems to central to the movie to have something like this left unexplained and "up to the viewers interpretation". It almost seems like this was added so that they could name the movie "Your Name".