Dan Da Dan‘s Debut Is One of the Slickest Shows of the Year

It’s been a bumper twelvemonth for unthinkable anime adaptations, with the likes of Frieren and Delicious successful Dungeon faithfully bringing their root worldly to beingness connected the tiny screen. But Dan Da Dan‘s anime adaptation mightiness already beryllium a acheronian equine contender for the champion looking amusement of the year.

Dropping today, October 3, connected Netflix, Hulu, and Crunchyroll, the archetypal occurrence of Science Saru’s Dan Da Dan carries the tone of its root worldly fantastically. A chaotic premiere thrusting its 2 protagonists together—Momo Ayase (SSSS. Dynazenon‘s Shion Wakayama), a young miss who comes from a household with ties to the occult and paranormal, and Ken “Okarun” Takakura (Demon Slayer‘s Natsuki Hanae), a lonely otaku who is obsessed with UFOs—like Tatsu’s manga earlier it, the bid gleefully plays with signifier and stylization to rapidly creation betwixt its mish-mash of genre underpinnings to make 1 of the astir energetic anime I’ve seen successful a while.

From its electrical opening (directed by Abel Góngora, and acceptable to hip-hop duo Creepy Nuts’ thrumming, bass-heavy caller way “Otonoke,” already destined to go arsenic ear-wormable arsenic their different large anime OP of the year, Mashle‘s “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born”) done to its climax, Dan Da Dan‘s archetypal occurrence jukes wherever you’d expect it to jive successful its loving attack to the supernatural and sci-fi genres its playing in. One of the contiguous strengths of Tatsu’s manga was conscionable however fluid and kinetic it could be, defying your expectations from leafage to page. One crook could bring you to an action-packed splash bursting with momentum, the adjacent detailed, visceral assemblage horror, the 1 aft that, stylized, cartoonishly exaggerated wit arsenic Momo and Okarun riff connected each different and contort their faces and bodies into progressively absurd proportions.

The anime plays with this fluidity brilliantly, with virtually each country bending styles arsenic overmuch arsenic the communicative itself leaps betwixt genres with a consciousness of joy. This is close successful Saru’s oeuvre, 1 of the astir awesome animation studios astir close present with a assemblage of enactment that covers everything from Star Wars Visions shorts, to the gross horrors of Devilman Crybaby, the East-meets-West blends of Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, and of course, overmuch of the filmography of beloved manager Masaaki Yuasa. Dan Da Dan is oozing with the assurance of a workplace that has specified an eclectic scope to its name, not conscionable successful its consciousness of question and its exaggeration, but successful however it tin rapidly flick betwixt a grounded, cinematic attack to its play and this over-the-top exploration of the form. When Dan Da Dan needs to beryllium tense, oregon intimate, it tin be, with clever tricks of framing that tin marque moments of fearfulness oregon moments of transportation betwixt its 2 protagonists spark, but erstwhile it allows itself to radiance with a small weirdness—a zany look here, a stark splash of psychedelic colour present (or successful immoderate cases, a deficiency thereof) there—its inventive ocular benignant matches its chaotically energetic communicative successful a lucifer made successful heaven.

Almost each country successful the opening occurrence has a fantastic small twist that keeps you successful awe of how Dan Dan Dan looks—as erstwhile a dejected Momo, caller disconnected being dumped by her dirtbag boyfriend, slinks down a precocious schoolhouse corridor successful a mode that’s practically slithering towards the camera, noodle-limbed and quivering with each step, lone for everything to drawback backmost to a stark, inactive world erstwhile she comes crossed Okarun for the archetypal clip arsenic he’s being bullied successful his classroom. In the episode’s climax, successful which Momo awakens to spiritual psychic powers aft a invasive brushwood with a radical of aliens, the country bursts with a kaleidoscopic array of bold, agleam colors arsenic Momo comes into her own, an unthinkable opposition to the tense, restrained fearfulness that came moments earlier arsenic the amusement dances astir the borderline of portraying a horrific infinitesimal of assault. It’s a testament to the premiere that I could spell connected astir small ocular details successful practically each scene, but Dan Da Dan doesn’t conscionable deed the crushed running, it does truthful with a remarkably assured consciousness of itself, successful an adaptation that could’ve precise easy struggled to seizure the akin assurance of Yukinobu Tatsu’s manga and its ain communicative and ocular flexes.

In a twelvemonth of immoderate genuinely fantastic looking shows—animated oregon otherwise—Dan Da Dan instantly stands out, a caller burst of kinetic vigor connected our screens arsenic the nights gully successful for the autumn TV season. Anyone who’s work Tatsu’s manga astatine this constituent knows things are lone going to escalate from wherever the anime’s premiere leaves off, but if it tin support that vigor passim its 12-episode play (and hopefully good beyond), we’re successful for what mightiness beryllium 1 of the year’s finest bits of television.

Want much io9 news? Check retired erstwhile to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s adjacent for the DC Universe connected movie and TV, and everything you request to cognize astir the aboriginal of Doctor Who.