Fans often like to complain that there are “too many” isekai or idol or sports anime being made each season. While a lot of shows do rely on popular tropes, I’m also happy to see a healthy number of creative and experimental anime series getting funded every season. Let’s celebrate the latest “weird anime” in today’s blog post!
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Breaking Down the Current Anime Season
The Spring 2024 anime season has a mind-blowing *60* new seasonal series airing, not counting continuing shows from last season, or eternal offerings like One Piece or Famous Detective Conan. The current anime season includes:
- Eight series that fall in the isekai genre, involving teleportation to or reincarnation in another world.
- Seven shows in the romance category, where the main characters falling in love is the primary driver of the story.
- Seven anime about sports, with everything from golf to bicycle racing to soccer represented.
- Five idol anime, or shows that contain idol elements in a significant way.
- Five series in which a harem of cute girls is a core element of the story.
- Three “slice of life” shows to relax us.
It’s clear that many anime are content to pick a successful genre and then re-create that comfortable format for us. And there’s nothing wrong with this. The reason we all love police procedural or legal dramas is that they give us exactly what we want: a somewhat predictable story structure in an episodic format each week.
But sometimes, just sometimes, an anime studio takes a risk and tries to make a really weird anime, to see if fans will enjoy it. Sometimes we get incredible experimental anime like Mawaru Penguindrum or Wonder Egg Priority. More often the result is a fresh and innovative concept that gets forgotten quickly, like Sonny Boy or Migi & Dali. But whatever the outcome, we love these anime studios for trying!
The Top Weird Anime From 2024! (So Far)
So let’s look at the top weird anime we’ve seen in 2024, so far.
Kaii to Otome to Kamikakushi Is Tons of Fun
I love it when an anime knows how to get fans’ attention right from episode one! This is the story of Sumireko, a busty bookstore clerk who won a literary award as a young girl, but can’t get her writing career started as an adult. She reads a poem in a mysterious book she received on her birthday, and it transforms her into a younger version of herself. Will this allow her to recapture the writing spark she had when she was younger?
Kaii to Otome to Kamikakushi is a fun journey into the occult, with more than a little sexy fan service.
Astro Note Is My Top Weird Anime of the Season!
When I wrote my blog post about nine anime series you’re not watching, I mentioned that Astro Note was a fun show that fans of classic anime Maison Ikkoku would appreciate. Then I gave it a proper watch and it quickly became my favorite weird anime of the season.
Astro Note is the story of a young cook named Takumi who comes to live at Astro-Sou, a boarding house similar to the one in Maison Ikkoku. But the manager, Mira, is an alien from space! She’s searching for a key her mother hid somewhere inside the boarding house many years ago. The writing is super clever, and there are some great shout-outs for Onegai☆Teacher fans, too. It’s also great as a food anime!
Jellyfish Do Not Swim in the Night
With a title like that, you know this is going to be a weird anime. It’s the charming story of four girls who help each other rediscover their dreams of creating art and music. It’s kind of a classic “band anime” but set in the modern era, with CGI and Vocaloid audio and Vtubers being part of the story. The closest thing I can compare Jellyfish to is the outstanding Carole & Tuesday, which is high praise indeed. Best of all, it’s a properly-animated series with beautiful visuals and not CGI-animated, which is getting harder to find in this genre.
Why We Love Bartender: Glass of God
I was super happy to see the return of Bartender, a show I felt hadn’t made enough of an impact with fans when it first aired back in 2006. It’s about a legendary bartender who serves drinks in a bar in Ginza. He uses his expert knowledge of making drinks to help heal each of the customers who come to him. Best of all, each episode gives you cocktail recipes you can make at home!
Read J-List’s coverage of the new Bartender anime here!
Snack Basue Is a Fun Weird Anime
The winter 2024 season was a great one for Japan’s northernmost island of Hokkaido. Not only did we get a great show about cute gyarus living in Japan’s coldest region, but we also got a fun show about a “snack” (a kind of bar) in the drinking district of Sapporo. It was basically a running stream of jokes featuring the busty bartender Akemi and the colorful customers who stopped by for a drink.
The Fable is a Hilarious Yakuza Anime
This is the story of Fable, a legendary assassin who can kill anyone within six seconds. The police have been taking notice of him lately, so he’s been asked to lay low in Osaka and somehow not kill anyone for a whole year. The show is funded by Disney for their Disney+ and Hulu streaming services.
Read more about this anime here!
Jiisan Baasan Wakagaeru
If you’ve raised kids in Japan, as I have, you’ll know that about 50% of classical Japanese children’s books seem to involve an old man and his wife who have some adventure together. In the end, they find a treasure trove that makes them fabulously rich and young again. That’s the vibe I got watching this super-relaxing anime about the cutest elderly couple ever!
Thanks for reading this blog post about seven wonderfully weird anime from 2024. What do you like about anime that refuse to fit into one category or another? Tell us in the comments below!
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Happy New Year from your Friend in Japan, J-List! We hope 2026 is a year of happiness and peace for you. To get things off right, we’re having a huge site-wide New Year’s Sale through Jan. 6, giving you 15$ off all in-stock products. Start browsing now!
