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Fall 2025 is a season with a bit of a disconnect for me.
For two years in a row, Fall was the biggest anime season (a title it’s traditionally tussled over with Spring). But summer’s historically unprecedented bloat (68 shows) changed that dynamic for 2025. At the time of writing I count 61 series including ONA’s. That’s a big number in the context of the medium’s history, but in present terms not so much – last fall had 67, by comparison. 60+ is still a lot so as with summer, you figure there are going to be a decent number of prospects to improve the odds of a good season.
My traditional one-third coverage rate would give me about 20 series to preview. Again, more numbers equals more prospects – that part is self-evident. And in fact 23 shows made the cut this time, so all the more so. Yet in spite of that volume, I look at the list and I just don’t see much that excites me. It’s not a group without potential, and there are plenty of sequels that are pretty much known quantities. But the total picture lacks a certain sense of anticipation, especially once you factor those sequels out of the equation. 12 out of those 23 are in the “Modestly Interested” category and any time that number is greater than half, it’s a sign of weakness.
Taking a step back and looking at the whole schedule, my vibe is pretty much “stock mid-2020’s anime season”. 60+ shows. A handful of big-money sequels, 2-3 of which interest me. Roughly 25% of the schedule LN adaptations, a number of them isekai. It feels like CGDCT is on the rebound after a slight lull and again challenging isekai for bloat, though I don’t have hard numbers to back that up. Anecdotally it also seems like romcoms built around heavyset girls are on the rise, which would be an interesting if hard to explain twist, but the numbers are small enough that it could just be coincidence.
From a historical perspective the final season of Boku no Hero Academia is certainly the headliner. That’s become one of anime’s all-time most popular franchises worldwide, and given the way things have gone with Kimetsu no Yaiba and Haikyuu! it was no given it would be allowed to properly conclude its run in series form. Another season of One Punch Man is another one to watch, although for different reasons as it’s facing an incredibly hostile fanbase after the perceived cratering in Season 2’s quality.
This is my 58th (I think) Season Preview here at LiA. Thanks to everyone who’s joined me for part of that ride. Here’s hoping efforts to make the site financially sustainable bear fruit, and these previews will continue to be free for anyone who finds them useful and entertaining. As you know my costs continue to skyrocket – hosting alone is more than doubling this year – so more than ever I’m going to be dependent on your financial support to keep LiA alive. To everyone who’s pitched in to help that cause – you have my sincere gratitude.
Let’s move on to Fall 2025. As usual, the poll is in the sidebar – please go vote!
Highest Expectations:
Boku no Hero Academia: Final Season – Bones: (PV) I’m a fan of HeroAca as a franchise, but whether you are or not it’s hard to argue that Bones and the production committee haven’t done right by it. There were a few production hiccups when the movies were competing for resources, and one of them prompted a shift in the narrative order that was debatably for the worse. But on the whole we’ve had season after season of quality, with everything adapted, and the series is paced out to finish without necessitating any major changes. Every kaijuu should be so lucky, never mind every manga.
As to the content of the final season, that it’s divisive among the fanbase is no surprise. It’s among the most negative in manga, and Jump titans set a high bar for that. And big battle shounen pretty inevitably dissatisfy a chunk of their fans with their ending arcs – exceptions are rarer than high-quality isekai. Whatever one thinks of the finale we’ve got 12-13 episodes to adapt roughly 30 chapters, so as usual it should receive the best treatment realistically possible.
Obviously I can’t talk much about the material in this venue. Manga readers will have already made up their minds, pretty much, and new viewers can decide for themselves. If you’re the former you can tune into the “almost live” podcast Samu and I broadcast at the time of the manga’s conclusion. Suffice to say on balance, I thought the ending was pretty effective and brought the story and most (not all) of the character arcs to a satisfying conclusion.
Kingdom 6th Season – Studio Pierrot, Studio Signpost: (PV) The fact that Kingdom S6 is in this category when the fifth was in Mid-table (albeit atop it) is tacit admission that yes, these previews sometimes grade on a curve. It doesn’t reflect any change in my expectations for the series – merely a difference in the quality of the schedule at the top end. Pretty much every season of Kingdom is somewhere near the tail end of the year-end Top 10 list or the top of the second 10, and this one should wind up in the same territory.
As Kingdom has progressed, on balance it’s focused more on politics and less on warfare. Season 5 reversed that trend to an extent, and I suspect we’ll see that again this year. The big variable this time is episode count. Kingdom seasons have trended shorter, starting at three cours, then two, then two split, and most recently a single cour. As I understand it however, the upcoming arc is something like 150 chapters, which would require three cours at Kingdom’s usual pacing. So will we get them, have the arc split over multiple seasons, or see it shortened to fit into a two or even one-cour season?
Wandance – Madhouse: (PV) Truth be told I’m stretching a bit to include Wandance in “Highest Expectations”. But again, in a season without a lot of weight at the top I’m a little more liberal than I would be otherwise. And overall it is a series I’m quite looking forward to. I’ve heard very good though perhaps not great things about the manga, and I know a couple of folks who consider it really excellent. It comes from Madhouse, who still more than most have the ability to turn out a truly elite production (though if I’m honest the dancing in the preview looks pretty unimpressive). On the other hand while director Katou Michiya has worked on some great stuff, his track record at the helm is not exactly stellar.
Wandance (sometimes Romanized as Wondance) is the story of a first-year high schooler named Kaboku with a stutter who’s trying to lay low and not attract attention. One day he sees a girl hip-hop dancing with no concern for being seen, and is so swept up in the moment he joins the dance club. I really don’t have much interest in dance to be honest, or hip hop dance specifically. But that’s rarely an issue if the story is well-told. and there’s good reason to suspect this one is. Uchiyama Kouki – who as far as I’m aware does not and never has had a stutter – is playing Kaboku, and I’ll be interested to see how he approaches the role.
Mid-table:
One Punch Man 3 – J.C. Staff: (PV) It’s easier to slide those two series into the top tier because the gap to “Mid-table” is pretty yawning this season. I’ll start with One Punch Man 3, not so much because I have huge expectations for it but because of the curiosity factor I referenced in the intro. Whatever happens with the series itself, the shitshow surrounding it is certain to be a spectacle.
As for my take on it, I certainly agree S2 was a big step down from S1. But at least as much of that was the narrative content as the animation. That tanked too, but I found the story was pretty much adrift and the pacing was all over the place. Mostly the visuals I found sort of average, rather than the horror show fans claim. But the fact that Madhouse delivered some of the best shock and awe sakuga in anime history in the first season make the second look much worse. More than anything I feel bad for the staff working on the series now – they’re in a total no-win situation.
Ganglion – studio maf: Ganglion is in mid-table and frankly in the preview for one reason and one reason only – it’s directed by Watanabe Ayumu. He’s arguably the finest director in TV anime and one sort of assumes he wouldn’t take a project unless he felt it was worth his time. But Ganglion is a weird one – it was a very late announcement, and studio maf has literally never produced another series as far as I can see. It’s a one-volume, eight-chapter manga from 2007 that almost no one I know has ever heard of. And what’s more, Watanabe was originally slated to have Witch Hat Atelier premiere this season, before it was delayed. There’s some weird stuff going on here.
Ganglion is the story of a “salaryman soldier” who works for an evil corporation trying to take over the world, and regularly gets his ass kicked by the heroes on the opposing side. Beyond that I don’t know a hell of a lot, but again I’m assuming there’s some reason somebody decided to adapt an incredibly obscure manga from two decades ago under a brand new studio, and got the top director in TV anime to direct it. Curiosity is the draw here to be sure.
Ranma ½ (2024) 2nd Season – MAPPA: (PV) It’s fair to say this remake has comfortably exceeded my expectations. It had been a long, long time since I had any exposure to the franchise, and the Urusei Yatsura remake left me cold. I did remember liking Ranma ½ better, but not to the extent I did this time around. Ranma is a better series, but I also think the adaptation is superior.
It’s worth noting that the best part of Ranma is probably the part that’s already been adapted. There are problematic characters still to arrive, and things begin to stagnate and repeat themselves a bit. That said, there’s always a comic charm to this series and its main cast, and I fully expect this second season to be solidly entertaining.
Kimi to Koete Koi ni Naru – Millipensee: (PV) This is not a manga I have personal experience with, but I’m getting some sleeper vibes from this shoujo adaptation. The story follows a high school girl who gets a beastman for a classmate, a rarity in this setting. Mainly a romance, I suspect it’s also going to focus on issues of prejudice and discrimination (always a volatile topic in Japan).
The manga has a pretty good reputation, the premise seems solid, and while Millipensee’s track record is nothing special we have an outstanding director in Itagaki Shin. There’s just enough circumstantial evidence here to convince me to keep a close eye on Kimi to Koete ni Naru – I sense it has the potential to surprise on the upside.
Sanda – Science SARU: (PV) Sanda is mangaka Itagaki Paru’s followup to the international hit that is Beastars. My initial take is somewhat mixed as the manga seems to generate tepid reviews, but I got fooled by that with Dekin no Mogura so that only goes so far. Hoozuki no Reitetsu is certainly a better series than Beastars but the latter is nonetheless very good, so a certain deference must be paid to bloodlines here.
Sanda follows the titular 2nd-year middle schooler, who’s attacked with a kitchen knife by a classmate and struggles to understand the reason, eventually attributing it to chuunibyou. But there’s some sort of deeper cause behind it. It’s a pretty hard premise to get a handle on, frankly. Science SARU has done a lot to bolster their credibility with the Dandadan adaptation, so that’s not a concern. The manga is complete, which is nominally a positive, but at 16 volumes it’s certainly too long to adapt properly in a single cour, and an episode count has not been announced. Lots of questions here, but potential as well.
Fumetsu no Anata e Season 3 – Brain’s Base: (PV) What the hell can one say about To Your Eternity at this point? It’s an unholy mess of a series any way you slice the apple, capable of (increasingly rare) Himalayan highs and shocking lows. I don’t think it’s ever come close to equalling the first arc and the Gugu arc, but even the wildly uneven second season had some nice moments.
That said, Fumetsu no Anata e barely clings on to the mid-table classification at this point. Honestly I’m not expecting a lot – the series as a whole seems to get worse over time. At least this third season ought to finish the story if my understanding is correct, and this series does have the habit of sticking landings even when you’re expecting a crash.
Kikaijikake no Marie – Liber, Zero-G: (PV) Mechanical Marie is another series I’m getting a bit of a sleeper vibe from. It’s an adaptation of a completed 6-volume (thus a good fit for a cour) shoujo manga about a wealthy misanthrope whose butler hires a deadpan girl to play the part of the robot maid his master asked him to procure, and he was unable to. It’s an amusing pretext for a romcon, I think.
Nishimura Junji is certainly possessed of a wealth of experience – he was the main director of the first Ranma ½ adaptation for crying out loud. There’s some good stuff on that resume, and he seems like a good fit for the material with Kikaijikake no Marie. The staff/studio byline is otherwise unremarkable but with a finished product that can be properly adapted in the time allowed, I think the floor for this show is fairly high.
Modestly Interested:
Spy x Family Season 3 – ColverWorks, Wit: (PV): I guess there’s a bit of a “how the mighty have fallen” quality to Spy x Family being listed here. But truth be told, it’s not like I was ever a huge fan of it. By the standard of my checkered relationships with kaijuu series, SxF is one of my favorites but again, the bar is pretty low. It’s also fair to say I got a loss less out of the second season than the first, which was already starting to sputter by the time it finished.
I just don’t think this is a series with any real idea of where it wants to go or what it wants to accomplish – frankly at times it seems as if Endo Tatsuya doesn’t know what to do with it. When the better plot threads get attention it will continue to be very good, but I expect that to be pretty rarely.
Shabake – Bandai Namco Pictures: (PV) Shabake is an odd sock in the anime drawer in many ways. It’s the story of a sickly young rich boy during the Edo Period who’s protected by a pair of youkai. One night he sneaks out and witnesses a murder, and thereafter he and his demon helpers turn into amateur detectives tying to catch a serial killer. I don’t know anything about the novel Shabake is based on but the fact that it’s a novel in itself makes it a series of interest. Nothing jumps out to me in looking at the staff list.
Star Wars: Visions Volume 3 – Various: (PV) This is a 9-episode ONA but we’ll call it a series for preview purposes. The prior editions of Visions have been a mixed bag, with some good individual episodes (one of them, The Ninth Jedi, was picked up for a full season in 2026). The nature of the series makes that inconsistency pretty much inevitable but there are always some elite studios and directors involved in a Visions project, so we’re likely to get a couple of keepers this round too.
Fujimoto Tatsuki 17-26 – Various: (PV) See above – another ONA, eight eps this time. I’ve read a couple of the one-shots that make up the source material for this adaptation, and they’re fine. That’s how I feel about most of Fujimoto Tatsuki’s work – I think his reputation exceeds the reality (though his assistant game is pretty unparalleled). The one Fujimoto work which I actually do think it pretty special is Sayonara Eri, which naturally is the one thing he’s written which remains unadapted (though I have to think that will eventually be rectified).
Chitose-kun wa Ramune Bin no Naka – feel.: (PV) Total shot in the dark here with this romcom, a LN adaptation to boot. The story finds a super-popular high schooler assigned by the school to convince a hikikomori to come to school. No idea really why this might not suck, but feel. can be an interesting studio and the staff is quietly quite accomplished.
Ao no Orchestra Season 2 – Nippon Animation: It feels like forever since this sequel was announced at the end of the season, but in truth it’s just two years. Ao no Orchestra was very much an on-the-cheap production and the writing could be hit-and-miss, but it had its moments and I’m kind of a sucker for the “classical music sports anime” subgenre.
Yano-kun no Futsuu no Hibi – Ajia-do: (PV) An adaptation of a well-regarded seinen manga about a boy who’s always showing up at school covered in injuries, and the nervous girl who worries about him. Nothing super exciting on the staff list but Ajia-do tends to do well with this sort of material more often than not.
Kao ni Denai Kashiwada-san to Kao ni Deru Oota-kun – Studio Polon: (PV) Maybe the tiniest of sleeper vibes with this romcom about a stone-faced girl and a boy who wears every emotion on his sleeve. My gut feeling is this one could be kind of cute.
Towa no Yuugure – P.A. Works: (PV) I just can’t quit PAW, even if little they do these days is of any consequence. With Towa no Yuugure we find them back in their historical comfort zone – a sci-fi adjacent original series. This one is the story of a boy who wakes up from cryogenic sleep to find a vastly changed world where marriage no longer exists, and meets a girl who looks exactly like his old girlfriend. Strong staff led by uber-experienced director Tsuda Naokatsu.
Nohara Hiroshi: Hiru Meshi no Ryuugi – Shin-Ei Animation: (PV) Nominally Nohara Hiroshi: Hiru Meshi no Ryuugi is a story of a foodie salaryman and his adventures in lunch breaking on limited time and budget. But it seems it’s more a comprehensive examination of being a foodie, with lots of cooking minutiae and real-life detail. If you asked an AI to come up with a quintessentially seinen premise, I doubt you could come much closer.
Taiyou yori mo Mabushii Hoshi – Studio KAI: (PV) Shoujo adaptation from prominent mangaka Kawahara Kazune (Ore Monogatari!!). This time around it’s a pair of osananajimi just starting high school. The girl notices the boy is now an ikemen and realizes she’s fallen for him, but whether he returns the feeling in any way is an open question. I don’t have a great batting average with shoujo romance but this author has done stuff I’ve liked before.
Ninja to Gokudou – Studio DEEN: (PV) Some sort of modern-day ninja vs. yakuza action comedy. The manga actually seems to have a few fans, so I’ll check it out for curiosity’s sake.
Toujima Tanzaburou wa Kamen Rider ni Naritai – LIDENFILMS: (PV) Manga adaptation about a 40 year-old who’s always dreamed of being a Kamen Rider who finally gets his chance, only to find it’s not at all what he expected. I know nothing about the source material but the staff and cast are quite strong. so this has a chance to be decent.
Will definitely blog: Boku no Hero Academia Final Season, Kingdom Season 6, Ranma ½, Fumetsu no Anata e Season 3. Only four series, all sequels, and two of them are hardly tentpoles. That speaks of a pretty indifferent season right there.
Sleepers: Kimi to Koete Koi ni Naru, Kikaijikake no Marie, at a stretch Shabake or even Yano-kun no Futsuu no Hibi or Kao ni Denai Kashiwada-san to Kao ni Deru Oota-ku.
OVA:
OVAs get back on the scoreboard with a single entry this season.
Golden Kamuy: Inazuma Goutou to Mamushi no Ogin/Shimaenaga – 10/17/2025: (PV) Even with no new TV entry it’s a big season for Golden Kamuy, starting with this OVA. It depicts the titular chapters, about which I frankly know absolutely nothing. But it’s Golden Kamuy, so it’s probably good.
Theatrical:
More GK and the return of one of theatrical anime’s titans headline the movie schedule this season.
Golden Kamuy: Sapporo Beer Koujou-hen – 10/10/2025, 10/31/2025: (PV) What is the “Sapporo Beer Factory Arc”? It seems to involve Sugimoto and Hijikata teaming up to take down one of the tattooed prisoners, now on a killing spree in Sapporo and planning his next murder at the beer factory. The arc will be covered in two films premiering three weeks apart.
Hateshinaki Scarlet – 11/21/2025: (PV) There was certainly a time when a premiere from Hosoda Mamoru would have been one of the biggest events on the anime calendar. But since his split with screenwriting partner Okudera Satoko after Ookami Kodomo no Ame to Yuki, the magic has pretty much been missing. Nothing Hosoda has done since has approached the fruits of their combined talents, and I honestly don’t see much reason to expect that to change with Scarlet.
The plot this time centers around a princess whose father was murdered and finds herself in the land of the dead, driven by the urge to avenge him. I’ve heard this film referred to as a Hamlet homage but I’ll wait until I see it myself to make a call on that.
Peleliu: Rakuen no Guernica – 12/05/2025: (PV) Peleliu: Rakuen no Guernica is a manga adaptation about a young aspiring mangaka who’s sent by the army to the titular island in 1944. Peleliu was regarded as e veritable Eden, but because the site of a horrifying bloodbath on both the American and Japanese sides. While there’s no direct connection to Mitsuki Shigeru, one can’t help but think of his experience when reading that description. At a time when historical revisionism is a crusade of Japan’s right wing, stories such as this are tremendously important.
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