Apologies for this comment being so long, but after finishing the anime, and being heart-broken over Candy and Terry, I had some thoughts on Terry, Albert, and 'ano hito', and how the series ultimately fails on the romantic aspect of the story. I will add them here in case others would like to read them, and maybe find something of interest, and perhaps hope.

First of all, what I mind about Albert as a potential love interest and eventual life partner, is that the show gave him opposing character cues. He was always considered as a kind of mentor and support figure in Candy's life, Candy herself regarded him as a brother on many occasions, and his secret identity of 'Grandfather William', was indeed a father figure to Candy. However, Albert was also the 'Prince on the hill', who was Candy's first love, and also the mysterious character that was foreshadowed to be the show's romantic end game. Therefore, Albert has two different character cues, which are incongruent with each other: romantic hero, and father figure. If later in Candy's life they developed feelings that led to eventually him being 'ano hito', technically it could be justified, as people can be friends for a long time before falling in love, etc., and also the author had no qualms about people marrying family members if they're not actually blood-related (presumably due to the time period and the status of the Ardley's, for eg., there was never a comment about the familial component in instances when the show explored the marrying of Anthony/Candy, Neil/Candy, and Anthony/Eliza). This doesn't mean it's not problematic; Albert as the 'Prince on the hill' was written as Candy's first love from the start, he wasn't given that identity as a retcon, the author always intended him to be the 'Prince on the hill', however, the author also intending him to be a father figure to Candy, as he legally and knowingly adopted her. And in the end of the show, the author murks the waters even further by showing amnesiac Albert as increasingly attached to Candy ('I want to us always live together') in ways that can easily be misconstrued as romantic. Could a romance like that develop? Sure. But it is deeply problematic from an ethical and psychological stand point, and the fact that the story is vague on that front, shouldn't be overlooked.

On the other hand, Terry always had one and only character cue, that of the romantic hero, and more importantly, that of the 'one true love'. However, while Albert's credibility as a love interest rises during the last part of the show, Terry's declines, and it's a parallel in opposite directions that I think was done on purpose. When Albert was regaining his memory and deciding to finally reveal himself as 'William Ardley' and put many wrongs to rights, Terry was at his lowest point, desolately drinking his days away. And this latter part is also revealing: the scene when Albert saw Terry drunk in a bar, and then took him to watch Candy from afar, was so short, and felt so out of place in the story (Terry out of the blue being in Chicago for presumably a long time without anyone ever noticing, despite the story having a very long incident streak of people meeting each other in the most unlikely places and against many odds) that it almost seemed like a plot device to a) appease the viewer regarding Terry's future (and indeed, Candy later reads of his theatrical comeback in a magazine, and thinks how it's good that he's back together with Suzanna), and b) to make Albert look better by comparison, but it's such a short sequence, that whatever the actual intentions of the scene may have been, they don't read as convincing. It's almost like a footnote.

Moreover, by the end of the show, Candy would group Terry in her thoughts with Anthony, as if for all intents and purposes, Terry was dead to her. It was certainly a way of coping with the separation, but it was also a way for the show to imply that this chapter of Candy's life is closed, and there's other things starting. And from a story-building standpoint, again it's very odd. We get introduced to Terry in episode 30, and for the next 85 episodes when the story ends, we are bombarded by the constancy, intensity and pureness of their love for one another. Yet, it fizzes out (I use 'fizz' intentionally, because the events that led to their separation didn't have nearly the same gravitas, or given the same screen time, as other tragic events in Candy's life) without ever becoming realized. Could something like this happen in real life? Again, sure. But from a story building point of view it makes no sense. When creating a character's life story, there's a finite amount of events and information to be explored until the end of the story, so why put such a huge and extremely drawn-out spotlight on something that was never intended to be the main element? I don't mind that they were never able to be together due to the events that happened as much, I mind that the show gave them such a huge significance for such a big chunk of the story, and then erased it very quickly, and comparatively, not as painfully as well. In contrast, Anthony's story was handled much better: their relationship wasn't drawn out, the time the audience had with Anthony was appropriate to become invested enough, so as to be devastated by his demise and empathize with Candy, but not long enough, so as to consider him the romantic hero of the show.

A final thought of the how the writing fails, is that although the show very early on establishes that Candy dreams of a pure love, as symbolized by the 'Prince on the hill', tries to achieve it with Antony and later Terry, and finally achieves it with 'ano hito', we are never told who 'ano hito' is, as if the actual person, their identity, life story, their relationship with Candy and how it came to be, isn't actually important. Both Anthony and Terry had substance and agency: they were battling their own issues, dealing with painful past traumas, had dreams of the future, and trying to become better people, and Candy was inspired by their circumstances to do the same, and grow as a person. She embarked on her own self-discovery journey inspired by Terry's dream of becoming an actor, and the show made a point of presenting both Anthony and Terry as active forces in her life and not as passive figures, only serving as background romantic fodder. Yet, 'ano hito' is not given the same treatment, it's as if it doesn't matter 'who' he is as a person, only 'what' he is, ie., the eventual life partner, which not only makes it seem cheap, but it's inconsistent with how both Anthony and Terry were dealt with in the past. Candy was always thinking to herself of the qualities and actions that she valued in Terry and Anthony, she wasn't just thinking of them in romantic terms, and only as love interests, but as people she came to respect and love because she got to know the qualities that made them worthy of respect and love. They also grew as characters (Anthony wanting to break free of the Ardley's and live a more genuine life, Terry following his passion for acting, and carving out a name for himself) alongside Candy, and we, the audience, were invested in them for that reason. However, 'ano hito' is barely mentioned, so we are suddenly supposed not to care about how this person came to be, what was their past, if they had struggles they overcame, what it is about him that Candy came to love and presumably respect?

The whole theme of the show is how Candy grows due to different events, and how she learns things from different people, and discovers that every kind of encounter in her life had been valuable in some way. Therefore, to present 'ano hito', one of the most important people in her life, as a mere mention is odd thematically, and I don't agree with the author's justification of 'he can be whoever the fans dream them to be'. I don't want Candy to end up with the kind of character whom *I* want, but with whom *she* wants. Why suddenly the audience has to dream up something for Candy and shape the character for themselves, when the whole show was about Candy, a very headstrong person, slowly, concretely and arduously shaping her own future and making her own decisions. This kind of vague, 'build your own' character and situation, doesn't work with how how any of the elements of the story were laid out beforehand. 'Ano hito' is significant to Candy, therefore significant to the audience, so robbing him of an identity feels inconsistent and incomplete, especially compared to previous developments, and there's no logical reason why he shouldn't have been fleshed out.

One element that gives me hope is that Candy and 'ano hito' were said to live near Avon river, which also runs by the town of Stafford-upon-Avon, the birthplace of Shakespeare. It's a reach, but if Candy and Terry moved together to the UK, then a place close to Shakespear's hometown might have been their choice, due to Terry's love of the theatre and Shakespear.

Thanks for reading if you made it to the end, and to the creators of the site: thank you for making such a great resource for fans of the show to find a measure of closure regarding the ending. The story is so compelling and makes the audience so invested, that an open-kind of element in the ending understandably leaves questions and disappointment, therefore it's ameliorating having a place to discuss it with others 🙂