Well folks, the spring season’s beginning to wrap up, meaning it’s time to look forward to our upcoming summer slate, and see what new anime delicacies we’ll be devouring this time. Once again, I’ll be frank – the summer is looking to be a really weak season, following up on a spring that was also an extremely weak season. This isn’t the “new normal,” and this isn’t simply a reflection of my own more exacting standards (okay, maybe it’s slightly a reflection of that) – good anime seasons come and go, and the unfortunate fact is we’ve just run into a couple seasons in a row with a relative dearth of noteworthy projects. After an incredibly strong winter that simultaneously offered Violet Evergarden, After the Rain, A Place Further than the Universe, and Laid-Back Camp, both spring and summer seem destined to struggle.
Fortunately, My Hero Academia is still running, and it’s not like summer is a total wasteland – we’ve got Banana Fish to hold down the “prestige adaptation” slot, and perhaps most importantly, Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer’s author Satoshi Mizukami is writing one show himself. Plus, there’s always backlog – why suffer through the dubious fruits of whatever happens to be arbitrarily streaming at the moment when we can always watch actually good shows from the past? I might be professionally obligated to indulge fandom’s recency bias, but you all can be free! Go! Set sail! Embrace that freedom, and watch something good!
Anyway. Moving on. As usual, I won’t run down every single upcoming show here – you can check out a site like anichart for a list of general synopses, so there won’t be any of that here. Instead, I’ll just be highlighting the shows I personally have a reason to feel excited about, along with an explanation of whatever it is that caught my interest – great staff, beloved source material, or maybe just a really great trailer. Starting with my most-anticipated properties, let’s buckle up and see what the summer has in store!
Planet With’s anime staff sadly don’t inspire confidence so far, but this show could be directed by a clod of dirt and it would still be my most-anticipated title for summer. Planet With’s vast, unassailable advantage is that it is being written by Satoshi Mizukami, the mangaka responsible for the genuinely brilliant, 10/10 Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer. Biscuit Hammer married thrilling action to brilliant character writing to arrive at a poignant and empowering story that celebrated human dignity at every turn, and if Planet With is able to capture any of that spirit, it’ll be a sight to see. All my hopes stand with Mizukami this summer season.
You can check out the show’s pretty useless PV here.
Shoujo Kageki Review Starlight
Review Starlight is the anime end of one more idol-focused media mix, like Love Live! and whatnot, where the anime production is just one segment of a larger idol franchise. That basically means the anime’s quality is an open question, but although Starlight’s director is somewhat untested, its studio Kinema Citrus have built up an extremely consistent catalogue over their decade of productions, and the show’s trailer looks absolutely phenomenal – great character acting, a natural sense of personality and humor, and that stunning, incomprehensible play at the end. Apparently Citrus’ star animator Takushi Koide’s actually taking the assistant director position here, and the results of that speak for themselves. Starlight’s a bit of an open question, but it’s nailed its first performance, which puts it ahead of most of this season.
You can check out that excellent PV here.
Story-wise, Tenrou looks like a bunch of nonsense, clearly aping the style of historical fantasy cool embodied by shows like Baccano! and poorly imitated by so many others. That style is here applied to a narrative that seems to pit gangsters against werewolves for some reason, but even if the premise is totally ridiculous, Masahiro Ando is a damn good director and animator, and so Tenrou’s ceiling is far higher than most similar shows. I have sirius doubts that Tenrou will turn out to be an impressive production in terms of its narrative, but “stylish early 20th century action anime by a great director” is still a fine thing to be, and anime-originals in general are always worth a glance, so I’m hoping Tenrou manages to be a silly good time.
You can check out the PV here.
If this season has a prestige title, it’s likely Banana Fish – based on a beloved ‘90s manga and directed by Kyoto Animation expat Hiroko Utsumi, it’s clear that MAPPA are putting a lot of care into this modern revival. That said, the trailer released so far doesn’t really thrill me; the show has a clean look, but its aesthetic feels somewhat washed-out and unappealing, meaning I’m unfortunately anticipating it in spite of its own promotion at this point. Like with Free!, it seems like Utsumi’s ideas of how colors work is… pretty suspect. I personally haven’t read Banana Fish, but its community reputation seems sturdy enough that we can at least assume there’ll be a compelling narrative here, adaptation aside. Certainly a show to watch for.
You can check out that PV here.
We’re in pretty deep speculation territory here, but weak seasons are often saved by one or two ridiculous comedies (see Hinamatsuri), and Dropkick certainly seems to be that. The original manga has maintained a relatively positive reputation as far as gag comedies go, and the show’s trailer demonstrates great confidence in its long-con of a theoretically serious summoning. The director’s relatively untested, but Dropkick seems like it at least has the potential to be a charming time, and that’s a genuine accomplishment in a season where one show’s hook is “but then the girls become the slaves!” and another was cancelled because its writer was too racist on main.
You can check out that highly misleading PV here.
After that, we’ve got… huh, I guess that covers it for me! There are other shows that could turn out well, like if Hanebado somehow maintains the animation standard set by its PV, or if Chio-chan turns out to actually have comic legs, but that’s pretty much everything I’m actively looking towards. I might also catch up on Free!’s second season, and of course there’s a fair amount continuing from the spring, but yeah, light season on the whole. I am really, desperately hoping Planet With turns out well, because if that one sinks, it’s looking like this season will miss me altogether. Either way, hopefully some of this looks relatively interesting to you folks, and let me know if there’s anything I’ve shamefully overlooked!
Shoujo Kageki Review Starlight’s Tomohiro Furukawa has worked with Ikuhara before and it kinda shows in those PVs. Might be an adequate fix while we’re waiting for Sarazanmai, I hope at least aesthetic-wise.
The highest rated source material of the season belongs to Grand Blue, which has the very respectable number 8 spot of MAL’s top manga list. It is very purely a comedy and I can vouch that the manga is indeed very funny, but it is also in style that I imagine will be challenging to adapt into anime. Bonus points for being a rare case where the characters are in collage instead of the usual high school.
Wait. Don’t tell me “Sirius doubts” was the pun you were boasting about the other day. OTL
Yeah, doesn’t seem like the busiest season, though I have enough spring leftovers to keep me happy regardless of how it turns out. If you’re looking for more stuff to follow, one thing I’d suggest is to catch up with Attack on Titan and hop aboard season 3. I enjoyed the first season, but never connected to it on a personal level. But season 2 really surprised me with its naturalistic, versatile direction (the main director was changed,) and thoughtful, passionate, humanist writing. The focus is scaled back from battlefield bombast to character emotion and a growing sense of mystery and dread- though the fight scenes are more thrilling than ever. It’s still not the deepest show around (though moreso than you’d think!) but it feels like exactly the kind of thing that you’d want to see in Attack on Titan.
The cancelled isekai LN and anime written by a racist was gonna air on fall, not summer
While I am looking forward to Chio-chan as a fun comedy, and Dropkick looks like it might have potential, the one new show that I’m looking forward to the most is High Score Girl. Given the dearth of interesting new stuff, it feels like High Score Girl will end up filling a similar niche as Hinamatsuri. Hopefully the director is as good.
I’m cringing at the very thought of Back Street Girls.
Probably a lost season for me, unless beach volleyball anime turns out to be a surprise. Otherwise, it’s time to clear the backlog.