The Darwin Incident
Short Synopsis: A human-chimpanzee student goes about his daily life while eco-terrorists plot in the background.
Mario: I suppose the reason for Darwin Jihen’s appeal is that we still don’t know where it wants to go with this premise. On the one hand, I do like Charlie as the main character and the way he navigates the world. He has a different point of view than a typical human protagonist, and he isn’t afraid to be who he is. On the other hand, the way the show blatantly delivers that message by having a lot of humans who say terrible or racist comments to him just for the sake of it is just… too in-your-face. I feel the plot is going to evolve much more than what we see here, but if the show can keep Charlie as the main protagonist, I am fairly confident that he can carry the show. Just maybe… ease up on the humans.
Potential: 30%
Lenlo: So like… When I first saw the key vis for this, I thought Darwin was about like, a monkey playing chess or something? But instead it’s about a human-chimpanzee hybrid going to high school with his best friend/love interest, and the animal-rights people who rescued him are now back as terrorists? I’m so confused. Why does this exist? Who made this? Why? Everything about it is kind of just weird, from his offputting design to this basically just being a loner story but there’s actually a damn good reason for this kid to be a loner this time. It’s kind of just an odd show. There’s nothing especially bad about it, but there’s nothing particularly good or noteworthy either. It sort of just… exists.
Potential: 15%
Osananajimi to wa Love Comedy
ni Naranai
Short Synopsis: A high schooler is torn between romancing either of his childhood friends, both of whom are head over heels for him.
Mario: This is the first of the harem shows I mentioned several posts ago, and to be brutally honest it’s even worse than the title makes it sound. This dude has two childhood friends who want to eat him alive, and we see things from both his perspective (acting cool despite being aware of their attraction), and the girls’ perspective. The MC having no personality is pretty much a given, but what’s worse is the blatant ways they try to seduce him in front of their class via the “childhood friend” wildcard. Looking at the OP, there will be a few other girls joining this harem as well. This is the first show I watched in 2026, and it wasn’t a good way to start the new year at all.
Potential: 0%
High School Kimengumi
Short Synopsis: Numerous five-person clubs full of oddballs vie for influence in a school where no one is expected to learn anything.
Wooper: I expected to rely on fansubs for this show (a remake of a comedy manga adaptation from the 1980s), but one streaming service or another actually picked it up despite its lack of western appeal. That’s unmistakably a good thing, but as for this premiere itself, it was unmistakably bad – more than that, it was one of the most obnoxious anime episodes I’ve seen so far this decade. It started innocuously enough, with a transfer student making a minor fool of herself during her introduction, then expressing her amusement at a Mad Max-parodying quintet who busted into the classroom afterwards. Coming into this episode, I knew their superdeformed antics would power Kimengumi’s comedy, so her interest in their club of dumbasses didn’t throw me. What did surprise me, though, was just how little breathing room the show left itself once these five pranksters got going. Trampling rival clubs, emerging from desks like Jack-in-the-boxes, stuffing bread down people’s throats while sprinting around campus, biking downhill fast enough to warp the space-time continuum – there was no rhyme or reason to anything that happened in this episode beyond the first few scenes. Even a comet bearing the label “GRADUATION” crashing to Earth and aging the characters up to high school wasn’t weird enough to serve as a conclusion, since the show went on for five painful minutes after that point. Even by gag manga standards, this was total trash.
Potential: 0%
The post Winter 2026 Impressions: The Darwin Incident, Osananajimi to wa Love Comedy ni Naranai, High School Kimengumi appeared first on Star Crossed Anime.
