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The theme song for The Apothecary Diaries the Movie: Treasure of the Departed Consort is a new track written for the film by Kenshi Yonezu, titled Haru ga Tomori. The film opens Friday, December 11, 2026, and a new trailer, a key visual, and a character relationship chart have all been released alongside the announcement.
Haru ga Tomori. Yonezu has put out a comment on the song, and in it he reveals what he drew on: nursery rhymes. Tulip and Antagata Dokosa. Those two songs became the bedrock for the theme of a movie built on rear-palace mystery entertainment.
It may look like an unlikely combination. But read the relationship chart and the story outline side by side and you start to see why nursery rhymes. What this film deals with is the story of things handed from one person to the next.
Let’s start by sorting out where the song sits.
Who sings the theme song for The Apothecary Diaries movie?
Kenshi Yonezu. It is a new song written for the film, titled Haru ga Tomori, and it plays in the trailer released this week.
Season 2 of the TV anime aired in January 2025, and in ABEMA’s rankings for the first half of 2025 it took the top spot in both the overall anime views category and the new anime views category. It was also number one in the teens, twenties, and thirties-and-up age brackets. It won the grand prize at the TikTok Trend Awards for the first half of 2025, and it topped Crunchyroll’s ranking for the April 2025 quarter as well. A show that squeezed every last number out of both streaming and social media now gets Kenshi Yonezu for its movie. You cannot reinforce a lineup any harder than that.
Yonezu kicks off the largest tour of his career, Kenshi Yonezu 2026 TOUR / GHOST, in November. That tour period overlaps with the film’s release, so his December exposure is going to be considerable.
Why nursery rhymes? Kenshi Yonezu’s comment
Yonezu says that while writing Haru ga Tomori he read deeply into the script he had been given and, at the same time, drew on nursery rhymes. His comment reads as follows.
In writing this song, alongside reading deeply into the script I was given, what I drew on were nursery rhymes. I was especially influenced by “Tulip” and “Antagata Dokosa.” I believe that the inheritance that arises between one person and another, and where it ends up, does not necessarily require anyone’s approval or any formal procedure. Each of us settles it on our own and chooses it on our own. The song is called Haru ga Tomori. I hope you enjoy it.
Source: Anime!Anime!
Inheritance requires no approval and no paperwork; each of us settles it on our own and picks it up on our own. That is exactly where the song meshes with the film. In the movie, Maomao and Jinshi set out on a journey to return the body of a middle consort who died five years ago to her homeland. Who receives what, out beyond the reach of the official system, is the theme itself.
Once you look at it that way, the choice of nursery rhymes falls into place too. Nursery rhymes are music that has survived by passing from mouth to mouth, with nobody paying attention to the author’s name or the formal rights involved. Yonezu backs his line about inheritance happening of its own accord with the very origin of the music he borrowed from. It is very Kenshi Yonezu that this is more than verbal decoration.
Who appears in the movie’s story?
It is a story in which Maomao and Jinshi head for Minan Province, territory under the direct control of the Mi clan, to return the body of Jakusei, a middle consort who died five years ago, to her homeland.
Once there, the two meet Ginzan, a former head lady-in-waiting, and Mokusei, the youngest son of the Mi clan. Then Suija appears, the chief of a band of water bandits hunting for a treasure hidden by the previous clan head. And an incident occurs in which the head is taken from Jakusei’s body. The bandit group is known as the Kada.
The tagline on the key visual reads “A hidden truth, a final wish.” An opening in which a corpse loses its head is a decidedly grim way in, even by this series’ standards. But The Apothecary Diaries has always also been a show about Maomao unpicking the human circumstances behind an inexplicable case. How the motifs of a treasure and a severed head land on those words, a final wish, is where this movie will be won or lost.
Who is on the staff and cast, and when does it open?
It opens on Friday, December 11, 2026. Norihiro Naganuma directs, Yuko Kakihara writes the script, TOHO animation STUDIO handles animation production, and Toho distributes.
| Role | Credit |
|---|---|
| Director | Norihiro Naganuma |
| Script | Yuko Kakihara |
| Character design / chief animation director | Yukiko Nakatani |
| Color design | Misato Aida |
| Art director | Masakazu Miyake |
| Art boards | Takumi Tanji, TJ |
| CG producer | Masaya Machida |
| Director of photography | Atsushi Takeyama |
| Editing | Daisuke Imai |
| Sound director | Shoji Hata |
| Music | Satoru Kousaki, Kevin Penkin, Arisa Okehazama |
| Animation production | TOHO animation STUDIO |
| Distribution | Toho |
On the cast side, Aoi Yuki voices Maomao and Takeo Otsuka voices Jinshi. Mariya Ise plays Mokusei, a character new to the movie. It is a lineup that carries the core of the TV series over intact, and the three-person music team of Satoru Kousaki, Kevin Penkin, and Arisa Okehazama continues as well.
The source material is a rear-palace mystery entertainment series by Natsu Hyuuga, illustrated by Touko Shino and published under the Hero Bunko imprint. Cumulative series circulation has passed 57 million copies worldwide. The third TV anime season has been airing since October 2, 2026.
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The Apothecary Diaries the Movie: Treasure of the Departed Consort theme song, in summary
The theme song for The Apothecary Diaries the Movie: Treasure of the Departed Consort is Haru ga Tomori, a new track written for the film by Kenshi Yonezu. It opens on Friday, December 11, 2026, and the newest trailer, the key visual, and the character relationship chart are all out already.
Yonezu has commented that he was heavily influenced by the nursery rhymes Tulip and Antagata Dokosa, and he places the inheritance that arises between people at the center of the song. Norihiro Naganuma directs, Yuko Kakihara writes the script, TOHO animation STUDIO handles animation production, and Toho distributes. Aoi Yuki voices Maomao, Takeo Otsuka voices Jinshi, and Mariya Ise plays the new character Mokusei.
It is rare for a theme song announcement to double as a reading of the film itself, but the way this song was made does exactly that. Yonezu’s line about inheritance being something handed over of its own accord, with no approval and no procedure required, maps directly onto the movie’s plot about a journey to return a body to its homeland. And he pulled that idea out of nursery rhymes, the kind of music from which the author vanishes most easily of all. Before a single note of the song has played, this announcement already tells you what the film is about.
December 11 cannot come fast enough. I never expected to see the day when Antagata Dokosa echoes through the rear palace.
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