Enjoy long-running favourites, reinventions of classics, and the newest sensations, all from the world of Japanese animation.
Blue Lock
Imagine the battle royale of Squid Game but for football strikers. That is the premise of Blue Lock, based on the manga written by Muneyuki Kaneshiro and illustrated by Yusuke Nomura.
After Japan is eliminated from the 2018 FIFA World Cup, coach Ego Jinpachi is tasked with creating a programme to “destroy Japanese loser football”. The man has a bold plan: Gather 300 of the most elite under-18 forwards to live, train, and play in a state-of-the-art sports complex, and separate the wheat from the chaff through elimination rounds. For the 299 losers, their careers are over. For the last guy standing, his future as the world’s best striker begins.
The series follows Yoichi Isagi and other hopefuls as they engage in a battle of wits and wills. Unlike other sports anime, where the underdogs prevail through the power of teamwork and friendship, Blue Lock can be brutal and unflinching. This is a game of survival, with each player pitting their special skill, referred to in the show as a “weapon”, against their rivals’. Fans of over-the-top shonen (male-oriented, action-adventure) anime are sure to get a kick out of Blue Lock.
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Japanese Football Association launches a rigorous training program to find the national team’s next striker.
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A Condition Called Love
Hananoi is tall, handsome, and sick — lovesick, that is. Meanwhile, Hotaru is short, shy, and sick … of love. He’s co-dependent; she’s aromantic. Together, they are the most unlikely student couple. It might not sound like much of a love story, but their opposing approaches to the most human of conditions make this adaptation of writer-illustrator Megumi Morino’s manga so intriguing.
After Hotaru takes pity on Hananoi in the wake of his latest break-up and shares her umbrella with him in the snow, the boy begins a romantic pursuit that, to put it lightly, borders on obsessive. He confesses his love for her in public, changes his looks, buys her favourite food for her, and spends a night out in the cold looking for her lost hairpin.
It’s all a bit much for Hotaru, who has sworn off any love beyond the platonic after a hurtful incident in her childhood. Unbeknownst to her, Hananoi has a painful past, too. Despite Hotaru’s apprehension, she is curious to experience dating her schoolmate, but on her own terms. As the duo partake in a ‘trial’ courtship till Christmas, they begin to discover that, as the Climie Fisher song goes, love changes everything.
A first love love story between a girl who doesn't understand love and a boy whose love is too intense.
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Black Butler
School’s in, and 13-year-old Victorian-era detective Ciel Phantomhive (Maaya Sakamoto) and his demon butler Sebastian Michaelis (Daisuke Ono) have an assignment, one which they can’t afford to fail. As the Queen’s Watchdog, Ciel is tasked with solving cases that Queen Victoria herself deems threatening to England. His latest case sees him investigating the disappearance of several students at the prestigious Weston College. Ciel goes undercover as a student and tries to get close to the four house captains, known as the ‘Prefect Four’, while Sebastian disguises himself as Ciel’s housemaster.
Black Butler is made by some of the most respected people in the anime industry. Based on the manga written and illustrated by Yana Toboso, this fourth season of the series is directed by Kenjirô Okada (March Comes in Like a Lion, RWBY: Ice Queendom) and produced by CloverWorks, the animation studio behind The Promised Neverland and Spy x Family.
Ciel receives a letter from Queen Victoria telling him several students at Weston College have disappeared.
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Suicide Squad Isekai
The Suicide Squad are on their most death-defying mission yet — and it’s in another world! Harley Quinn, Clayface, Deadshot, King Shark, and Peacemaker are sent through a portal to a fantasy world to recover other villains that were sent there before them. But the clock is ticking — if they fail to complete their mission in time or attempt to run away, bombs implanted in their necks will blow up.
Produced by Wit Studio — the makers of Attack on Titan and Spy x Family — and written by Re:Zero scribe Tappei Nagatsuki, the ten-episode series follows the team of misfits as they encounter other characters, good and bad, such as Katana, Rick Flag, and Ratcatcher. Along the way, they get into all sorts of adventures, fighting elves, orcs, knights, and even one big dragon.
Fans of DC Comics’ earlier forays into the anime space, such as Batman Ninja and DC Super Heroes Vs. Eagle Talon, will want to check this series out, which features zany fight setpieces, blink-and-you’ll-miss-them easter eggs, and even a magical-girl transformation sequence involving the entire squad.
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Amanda Waller, the head of A.R.G.U.S., has assembled a group of criminals known as the “Suicide Squad”.
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Sword Art Online Alternative: Gun Gale Online
Karen Kohiruimaki may be tall for a Japanese woman, but she’s short on self-esteem. Standing at 183 cm, she’s always the butt of jokes. But in the serious virtual reality online shooter Gun Gale Online, she can finally be both diminutive and larger than life as her pint-sized avatar LLENN, dubbed the Pink Devil due to the colour of her attire and weapons.
As she racks up her kill count and grows in notoriety, it’s not long before she makes her first friend (or enemy?) in Pitohui: a fellow female player with a disturbing lust for violence and suicidal moves. Pitohui is a danger not just to herself but also to her stoic and subservient sidekick, the mysterious M. Soon after Karen joins a new tournament with M, she learns that there lies a dark secret about her new online pals, one which may affect their real-world lives.
Long-time fans of Reki Kawahara’s Sword Art Online, the franchise this series is spun off from, will appreciate references to the mainline series, while newcomers and battle-royale enthusiasts will enjoy the character-based storytelling and worldbuilding. With the second season set to premiere this month, now’s a great time to join the battle with LLENN and her P90 submachine gun P-chan and catch up on Season 1.
LLENN meets Pitohui, and doing as she is told by Pitohui, she enters the Squad Jam group battle.
View DetailsImages: © Muneyuki Kaneshiro,Yusuke Nomura, KODANSHA/BLUE LOCK Production Committee, © Megumi Morino, KODANSHA/ “A Condition Called Love” Production Committee, © Square Enix, Suicide Squad © & TM DC. © 2024 Warner Bros. Entertainment. All rights reserved, © 2017 KEIICHI SIGSAWA/KADOKAWA CORPORATION AMW/GGO Project © KS/K/G