Hello folks, and welcome back to Wrong Every Time. Today we’re checking out a brand-spanking-new property that just started airing in October, an adaptation of the shonen manga Sanda. I had not previously known about this title, and its synopsis feels almost incomprehensible to me. It’s apparently to some degree a commentary on Japan’s declining birthrates, projecting a future Japan where children are closely monitored and controlled to ensure fertile futures. That much makes sense to me, but then we hit “Santa Claus has been sealed away because of the curse,” and the introduction of a lead who can apparently transform into Santa Claus whenever he wears red clothes.
I know Christmas is more of a date night event than anything even tangentially religion-related in Japan, but I guess I’ll have to find out how Santa Claus and birthrate commentary more fully align from the show itself. And frankly, I have every reason to suspect the show will provide a genuine answer – after all, we’re adapting a fully complete work by Beastars creator Paru Itagaki, who’s already renowned for weaving incisive social commentary into her fantastical dramas. Meanwhile, our director Tomohiso Shimoyama is a mainstay at Science Saru, with a sturdy key animation background and direction credits working alongside both Masaaki Yuasa and Naoko Yamada. I am exceedingly curious to see how these ideas coalesce into a coherent shonen adventure, so let’s get right to the action with the first episode of Sanda!
Episode 1
“You know, a girl’s butt is colder than I imagined.” Well, that’s certainly not the opening line I expected!
Opening in the heat of the action, with our presumed lead pinned and nearly stabbed by a girl wielding a pair of scissors
Oh, I really like these character designs. They’re definitely leaning into the distinct quirks of Itagaki’s style, with uniquely lanky bodies and a focus on the precise boniness and musculature of their limbs. Itagaki’s characters always look stressed and like they’re practically stretching through their skin, an aesthetic choice that emphasizes their mental disarray. Beastars’ Legoshi always looks uncomfortable in his own body, which works well for that manga’s concerns, but seems to be a more general truth of Itagaki’s approach to character design
I also like the lineart itself, very sharp and distinctive – loose, variable linework combined with minimal line weight really makes the characters pop on screen, and gives a similar “barely hanging in there” visual effect to Itagaki’s base designs
Of course, this girl also looks fraying and exhausted because her eyes are sunken dots surrounded by heavy dark circles. The classic tricks always work!
A profile shot really lets us appreciate how stringy and playfully exaggerated these characters are. Loose, evocative expressions, lovingly animated hand gestures, and a presumed female lead who’s pretty much twice the size of our protagonist – lots of distinctive personality in every choice here
The character animation for their dance here is quite fluid, though it is a bit of a shame the layouts are limited by these CG backgrounds
Also just efficient, dynamic storytelling, opening with the knife attack before gracefully sprinkling in context on what they were doing here
“I’ve had dreams where I’d been straddled by a girl, or chased around by one, but not like this!” Immediately framing our lead as a horny adolescent with perhaps somewhat masochistic fantasies, which seems unsurprising both for this narrative’s subjects and Itagaki at large
Oh man, these flailing smears and expressions are so good! I hope the show can keep up this level of character acting, it’s really delightful
Our lead is saved by the arrival of another student
Fairly distinctive OP as well, embracing a white-black-red color scheme that emphasizes both Santa’s coat and the clear promise of violence
Some clever visual transitions here too, though the imagery for the most part follows a classic shonen template – posing character intros, brief action cuts, looming antagonists, etcetera
“Could this mean that Fuyumura likes me?” Our lead seems kinda dumb in an extremely realistic adolescent boy sort of way
“Being awkward and surly has to be the same for both guys and girls going through puberty.” Yeah, we’re definitely digging into the precise anxieties of this developmental moment, with a lead that’s just self-aware enough to realize they’re all flailing. Itagaki seems to look back on adolescence with a rueful fondness that doesn’t preclude absolutely roasting her characters for their misconceptions
Oh my god, his face of stunned realization is so good. Love these big saucer eyes, and the simplified way they’ve contorted his mouth into a drooping crescent moon
Our lead Sanda is fourteen years old. One of his friends swiftly sets him straight regarding Fuyumura’s intentions
I feel like Sanda’s features are intentionally reminiscent of a frog, particularly his eyes and the long, down-sloping line of his mouth
Apparently Fuyumura’s been a mess ever since her friend Ose died. Sanda says Ose was “declared dead a week ago,” an oddly precise way to phrase that
More charged details about this world, as we see banners declaring their academy “Trauma-Free Curriculum Daikoku Welfare Academy.” An excellent way to convey incidental worldbuilding in any visual medium, making sure the banners and advertisements of your world tell the audience something specific about its culture and inhabitants. These banners in particular imply an invasively paternal attitude towards public education, with an overbearing emphasis on mental health implying a fear of its absence in society at large
Sanda and his friend comment that cold weather in December is actually abnormal now. And Sanda has never heard of Christmas
“Cold doesn’t bother me at all!” Then the first fall of snow seems to prompt some violent reaction in his body
Sanda of course assumes this pain in his heart is the Trill of Destined Love
Ooh, I like how the show’s actually leaning into the OP color scheme for this sequence of Sanda and Fuyumura alone. The falling snow facilitates a general desaturation of the show’s color scheme, while the red notes in the scenery are made even more bright and menacing. If you’re going to make a Santa-themed werewolf narrative, this is how you do it!
Also a terrific layout here, peering up from below them as the snow’s shadow crawls up the ceiling
Fuyumura accuses him of being a descendent of Santa Claus, and then receives a “gift” from him in the form of an eraser, apparently one of his sleeper agent activation conditions
Nice effect of this exaggerated character acting including wildly foreshortened hands as Sanda expresses his disbelief
Oh damn, our boy actually confesses he has a thing for Fuyumura! Delighted they’re not dragging that out; if this and Dandadan signal a trend where shonen protagonists are actually allowed to be active couples, I am emphatically for it. The emotional negotiations of an active relationship are far more interesting than static “will they-won’t they” stalling, and presenting heroines as genuine partners rather than longed-for idols means they also get to be more fully realized as emotional actors in their own right
Now a neat trick of transitioning, using the red jacket to facilitate screen wipes and further emphasize the scrambling disorder of this interaction
“You’re going to wear something red, Sanda,” she says as she stabs him. An intimate moment as he is “penetrated,” violence and sexuality intertwined, as in Beastars’ reflections on what it is to be a “carnivore”
“Ono didn’t die. She just up and vanished one day.”
Apparently there are no longer seasons, and weather remains relatively stable throughout the year
“Hanging out with you lets me enjoy all the seasons!” What a romantic sentiment
It seems Ono’s continuing celebration of Christmas may have been what led to her disappearance
“If you die on me, I’m screwed! I never wanted you to die!” So Fuyumura is both pretty darn stupid and also perfectly willing to embrace lethal violence in pursuit of her goals. We’re cooking up an interesting pair of idiots here
“If I give up, Ono really is dead.” The power of faith, transposed from Christmas’ religious origins to Fuyumura’s faith in her friend
Wonderfully demented transformation sequence for Sanda becoming Santa, using the swooping wind and snow to obscure the background in order to facilitate a full three hundred sixty degree pan around him
“The bond between Santa and a child who believes in Santa is unbreakable.” Faith again, clearly a theme here
Fuyumura’s expression softens for the first time as it sinks in that Santa is really here
“Is this Santa’s instincts right now, or simply ethics?” We seem to be immediately diving into one of the particular peculiarities of these “kid who transforms into an adult hero” narratives – how much that transformed identity is the original kid, and how much is a secondary personality being grafted over their own feelings. That always struck me as an odd quirk of this brand of magical girl and sentai drama
“And with that, a snow-white curse fell over my youth.” Sanda already sees this as more werewolf curse than awesome secret identity
He immediately begins lamenting the loss of his adorable, youthful face. It seems he’s still mostly Sanda, except when he’s compelled by the natural instincts of the Santa persona
His mood-stabilizing jelly beans ultimately return him to normal. Some nicely character-rich writing so far, giving both our leads distinct behavioral quirks and emotional hangups
The next day Fuyumura declares she has planted a bomb in the science lab “to discover what Santa is capable of.” Like with the initial stabbing, she demonstrates zero hesitation in taking potentially calamitous actions, so strong is her faith that Santa Claus will make it right. Quite the fanatical take on the Christmas spirit!
Fucking love Fuyumura’s insane googly eyes reflected in Sanda’s pupils. These character designs are so charming
Sanda already lamenting the distance between himself and his middle school peers, that they have the privilege to wish for whatever they might dream of, while he is condemned to be the dreamless wish-granter
I didn’t expect us to arrive at questions like “how would the real Santa Claus defuse this bomb” within the first episode, but I am all for it
Thus he transforms and threatens to snap Fuyumura’s neck, just like Santa would do
“I can’t write out what I want. Because I know that the fear of losing someone far outweighs the joy you feel when you’re with them.” Whew, what a beaten-down, defensive philosophy
More excellent color design work as Sanda eats this explosion, reducing the scene to greyscale plus the bright orange of the flames
Their shenanigans are observed by a lurking classmate, who the charming, loosely painted ED clarifies is our third party member
And Done
That was delightful! This show’s premise seemed absurd from the start, and this first episode has done nothing to dissuade me of that impression, instead embracing the lunacy of framing Santa Claus as a mighty transforming superweapon who brings joy to all the children (even those who stab him or blow him up). We’re already receiving inklings of greater social commentary beyond this episode’s rapid-fire introductions, and the show’s visual aesthetic is just utterly entrancing, combining inherently distinct and compelling character designs, fluid and expressive character acting, and purposeful color design flourishes to arrive at a distinct balance of Itagaki’s style and Shimoyama’s motion-focused direction. Always nice to find a show that feels so original and so confident!
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