The Summer 2026 Anime Preview Guide

BLACK TORCH

Jiro Azuma is descended from a long line of shinobi, and he can also talk to animals. Although he may appear rough and tumble, his compassionate side emerges when it comes to furry critters. But Jiro's soft spot for animals gets him in major trouble when a suspicious stray cat fuses with him, granting him exceptional power but also dragging him into humanity's hidden battle against powerful, menacing spirits.

BLACK TORCH is based on the manga series by Tsuyoshi Takaki. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Saturdays.

I certainly can't fault the protagonist of this story – not only can Jiro talk to animals, he also is very keen on protecting them. It's not every Shonen Jump show that has the requisite “beat up thugs under a bridge” scene be because the hero is trying to save a cat and a crow. Of course, you could argue that Jiro's animal-saving is also what gets him into the predicament he finds himself in at the end of the episode, because when the crow comes back to bring him to a severely injured black cat, things get strange fast.

Although, impending issues with the Ministry of Espionage notwithstanding, Rago's decision to bond/meld with Jiro isn't a terrible idea. Rago, a mononoke in the form of a black cat with a white sun on his back, understands Jiro in a way that his grandfather clearly does not. He knows that Jiro's not going to stop putting himself in danger to help animals. He also appreciates that Jiro nearly lost his life defending him. Healing his wound and living in his body means that Rago can both save Jiro's life and enable him to live the sort of life he's clearly set on. It's also a very feline solution to the problem; never mind being a supernatural being, Rago is also very much a cat, and that means that he's going to take the path that suits him, human wishes occasionally be damned.

I remember liking the manga upon which Black Torch is based, largely for the cat-centric approach to ninjutsu, but also because Jiro's goal felt more relatable than many another shounen protagonist's. He's earnest without being stupid and stupid in the way many teens are. The anime mostly captures that, and it generally makes it look good when Jiro's out using his ninja skills, although there's a strange sort of pause that always happens mid-fight, presumably so we can admire his fighting form. I don't love that the lone woman in this episode is nearly always shown from a low angle nor that Jiro's grandfather is an apparently unrepentant asshole, but this definitely has potential.

It also premiered as a simuldub in many languages. Both English and Japanese are good, and I found that I preferred Yūji Ueda's Rago to Keith Silverstein's but A.J. Beckles' Jiro to Ryōta Suzuki. Other voices didn't make much impression one way or another, but I think it's safe to say that watching this in your preferred language won't impact the quality of the show. I don't think this will break boundaries, but fans of shounen action should be entertained.

I loved The Wild Thornberries when I was a kid, but even back then, I knew that it was missing some key ingredients to truly take it to the next level. Namely, the story of the young animal whisperer was missing some hearty doses of nü-metal and good old fashioned ultraviolence. It may have taken a couple of decades, but Black Torch has finally arrived to rectify this tragic missed opportunity. Jiro may be a cliche shonen manga protagonist in basically every other way, but the fact that he can befriend and talk to animals gives him just enough of that Eliza Thornberry edge to make me interested in seeing what his story is all about.

The cool thing about being a tough-guy Japanese punk who can talk to animals is that, in addition to chilling with the local alleycats and corvidae, Jiro can also talk to the spooky animal-shaped spirits and demons that have haunted the land for millennia (which are very real in this universe, naturally). The inciting incident of Jiro's journey is an encounter with a sickly black cat who reveals himself to an immortal mononoke named Rago, which honestly doesn't faze Jiro too much until he gets caught in a battle between Rago and another demon that ends with Jiro being fatally impaled. Naturally, our protagonist can't actually kick the bucket in the very first episode of his own show, so Rago lends his rescuer a hand by fuzing with the dying boys spirit and giving him badass shadow-ninja powers with which many nasty demons can be properly pulverized.

As a premiere, Black Torch is an exercise in extremely effective efficiency. There are no bones being made about complex characterization or subversive storytelling, here. Jiro is given just enough of a personality to go along with his animal-talking shtick that we understand what he's about as a hero, and then he is summarily executed by a big, bad monster so Rago can infuse him him Adorable Demon Kitty Magic. The English dub helps to solidify this mercenary take on the shonen action formula, with A.J. Beckles' Jiro and Keith Silverstein's Rago both invoking the steely edge that you would expect from this odd couple the moment you caught sight of the key art.

I was torn on what score to give this premiere, but I ultimately threw in an extra star on top of the three I would normally award such a series for demonstrating this degree of cold, calculating adherence to genre expectations. I wasn't being entirely silly when I said up at the top that I like the idea of The Wild Thornberries, Except With More Cheesy Butt-Rock and Exploitative Gore.” If all Jiro could do was jump around and punch monsters with the usual ninja mudras and psychic blasts, that would be one thing. But Jiro is in this to protect the furry friends that make everyone's lives better, and his partner is a sick, quasi-evil cat that can transform into a satanic shadow horror straight from Lovecraft's nightmares. If that isn't worth a whole extra star in the Preview Guide, then I don't know what is.

Yes, I will take a generic shonen for $500 please. I've already complained a lot about the generic fantasy shows that have come out this season, so of course I have to do the same about the generic shonen of the season. Honestly, I have seen this exact premiere probably a dozen times over the course of my life, and while I can't say I was necessarily bored for reasons I'll get into in a minute, I also can't say that I was particularly interested in any attempt at emotional investment that this first episode tried to give me. I think I was more caught up in just how bizarre some of the buildups and explanations were. The main character was trained in how to use ninjitsu in the modern day and his grandfather happens to have this incredible sword? Sure, why the hell not?

I didn't care about Jiro's relationship with this demonic cat. His ability to talk to animals, while initially kind of interesting, feels like it was just an excuse for the two to be able to talk to each other and I could call pretty much every plot point that took place during the course of this premiere within the first five minutes. The main thing that this premiere had going for it was that it was dripping with style and definitely trying to follow that “rule of cool” mentality. The dub has this really fun attitude to it, the animation is stellar (even if the choreography is a little bit messy) and my God this soundtrack is probably gonna be the most memorable thing about this show. Also, I will always enjoy Keith Silverstein playing some kind of jaded creature because that man could read the phone book to me and I will be ready, listening with bated breath.

Outside of those admittedly superficial things, there's not really a lot here to talk about. I'm already making predictions for what episode two is going to be about like how Jiro is probably gonna join this mysterious organization as a part of some deal, he's going to be at odds with a lot of his teammates, one of which is undoubtedly going to be some kind of hard ass on him and there's going to be some kind of generic secret war that's going on that Jiro is going to need to participate in. I guess if you've never seen a shonen before then this could be interesting, but I'm gonna need a little bit more before I just throw this into the “no different than anything else I've seen” pile.