The most popular anime of the year is on Netflix

According to Jonathan Klotz
| Published 30 seconds ago

As 2024 rolled around, I thought Solo levelingreverse isekai shonen, would be the biggest new show of the year, but as the year went on, I realized that no matter how popular the show was, it didn’t capture the hearts of legions of anime fans on social media the way I expected. Instead it was Tastea very different type of shonen that combined romantic comedy with aliens and the supernatural that has set anime fandom on fire in recent months. It turns out that throwing every anime trope into a blender doesn’t result in an unwatchable mess; instead, it’s one of the best new shows in years.

Aliens AND Yokai AND Superpowers

Taste followed by the cheerful Momo Ayase who as Fox Mulderdecides to believe in aliens, and the grieving Ken Takakura, nicknamed Okarun for his interest in the occult, when they inadvertently gain superpowers that allow them to fight malevolent spirits, alien invaders, and evil humans. This sounds like the main focus of the series, and in a way it is, but the pair’s motivation is to retrieve a part of Okarun’s body that he lost after he became possessed and gained the ability to change into a demonic form. It’s absurd, comedic, and wildly over-the-top, but the show somehow manages to balance it out with moments of raw emotion.

The seventh episode “To a Kinder World” is one of the highest rated anime episodes in history on IMDb, with a 9.7 rating, ditched the crude humor and fan service found in most of the series for a story centered around one of the yokai (ghosts), the acrobatic Silky. The yokai’s story is so tragic and heartbreaking that after the episode aired, social media was full of fans posting videos of themselves crying. It’s both Dandadan the best episode and show of the power of anime.

While episode 7 is the clear standout because it ditches most of the humor and fanservice, the rest Taste still worth a bite. Momo and Okarun’s developing friendship and budding romance provide heartwarming moments in almost every episode, even when they have to outrun yokai or deal with dinosaur-shaped aliens. It’s a delicate balancing act of maintaining absurdity and emotion in every episode, and most anime fail at this amazing feat, but with one pretty notable exception, the team at Science Saru pulls it off.

Dandadan is not for everyone

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the one exception that might be Taste it’s hard for some, and it’s not the crude humor or finding the missing parts of Okarun, it’s how Momo gets into the wringer. There are foreshadowed attack scenes, including the Season 1 cliffhanger in the hot springs, that stick out compared to most other shonen. Blatant fanservice moments have also fallen out of favor in recent years, but the show embraces them, especially when it comes to Momo, so in everything the show does to move anime storytelling forward, it still has one foot in the 90s.

Taste it may get universal praise but it’s not for everyone, and while I found it to be a refreshing roller coaster ride, I also watch a lot of anime, including paying myself Solo leveling recap filmand anything that dares to be this different and risky immediately catches my attention. Season 2 won’t be out until the summer of 2025, giving you plenty of time to binge on the first season’s 12 episodes. You’ll want to consume it all at once, so sit back, relax, and let the bizarre combination of classic shonen with aliens, occult, vengeful spirits, and crude humor wash over you in beautifully animated waves.

Taste is streaming Netflix, Hulu, Disney+and Crunchyroll.