This Week in Anime

The Best OPs and EDs This Season

Chris
Nicky, sometimes I feel left out not getting to fully participate in the seasonal Preview Guides with Nick and the others. So why don't we take this opportunity to preview all this season's new shows ourselves? How many could there be?

Oooookay, yeah, that is a little daunting. Maybe we could just preview all the theme songs instead? Never mind, that would still be too many. Plan C: Let's only talk about the theme songs from this season we really like!

That's only fair, as the productions often assign directors specifically to showcase the songs with some uniquely stylized animation. It feels like every season there are at least one or two standout openers. And one fitting that bill for this season definitely seems to be Magical Destroyers.

I don't know that I'd say Magical Destroyers is bad, but I've bounced off of it myself, from the two episodes I've seen of it. But there's still an absolute allure to the way this OP presents the material. It makes me wonder what other shifts might await in the show's already subversive anarchic magical girl setup, the way the theme song itself just breaks down halfway through, alongside its imagery.


This is a series I probably wouldn't be willing to give the Three Episode Test to if it didn't catch my attention this way, which is saying something.

A lot of times the premiere doesn't open with the OP; instead, it's slotted in at the end like some extra-long cold open. That's what Magical Destroyers there did with its first episode. Gor a more extreme example, we have the other big viral hit for this season, Oshi no Ko, which sports a feature-length first episode that keeps audiences waiting over an hour and a half to hear the full OP! And they didn't even have the sequence itself to accompany the song!

Thankfully, Yoasobi had us covered with a whole-ass animated music video, which released at the same time.

It's the sort of song that's a perfect fit for something like Oshi no Ko. It collects a multitude of moods into its sub-four-minute runtime, mixing rap and ominous choir elements alongside the idol bopping. The visuals, though ostensibly derived from the short story, still fit the multifaceted aspects that define Oshi no Ko as an overall work.


It definitely makes me curious as to what the opening sequence for the anime proper is going to look like.

You're not kidding. It's a slick animated music video on its own, but having the full context for the premiere means some parts absolutely huuuuurt!

It doesn't have to be all emotional damage. Sometimes the attacks are simple, perfectly-honed earworms. This is the case for one of my most pleasant surprises among this season's openers, the one for Otaku Elf.

I'm not kidding by the way. Since catching the first episode of this show a few days ago and pulling the song up again for this column, it has not left my mind!

It's just got a lot of little details I enjoy, like the scene of Koito chasing Elda around the kotatsu only for both of them to wind up dizzily bobbing to the beat. Look at 'em go!

It makes for kind of an amusing opposite to something like the Magical Destroyers OP. Rather than drawing you in with hyper-stylized, cryptic imagery, Skip and Loafer's opening here tells you pretty much everything you need to know about its characters, their dynamics, and their vibes just by showing them goofing around together.

This is a case where the series director, Kotomi Deai, handled the direction of the OP as well, which is probably what ensured the pitch-perfect tone. Deai is also handling the writing for this adaptation, giving one the sense that she's very hands-on in maintaining the consistency of Skip and Loafer as an anime.

Along those lines, we have the opening for this season's new Shonen Jump adaptation, Hell's Paradise. This is one where they've got the OP up-front in the premiere, which makes sense, given that this is another high-gloss MAPPA production trying its damnedest to show off.

This is definitely a case where you watch it and go "Yup, that sure is a MAPPA Shonen Jump anime!". But I'm still very into the esoteric stylized elements alongside these Ringo Sheena/Millennium Parade tunes.

Oh yeah, it's definitely a cut above what I came to expect from stuff like Bleach's OPs back in the day, which seemed to eventually devolve into slideshows of the ballooning cast. Hell's Paradise here still has character shots, but they're intercut with other wild stuff that compels me to find out these characters' deals.


Also, Gabimaru's wife is there. That's extremely important.

Out of hell and into heaven, it is. Tengoku Daimakyo's OP is an interesting example of the kinds of distinguishing choices in styles we've talked about. The actual series sports a densely detailed look at its apocalyptic world, which you'd expect from Production I.G. The OP then eschews that for a significantly more stylized approach courtesy of independent animator Weilin Zhang.


Comparing the looks can make for an arresting, and impressing, exercise in contrast!

I feel like I'd be remiss if I didn't also bring up the ED for Tengoku Daimakyo. It trades in that sweeping, epic feel of the OP for a more down-to-earth depiction of the daily lives of the characters.

Though it's not above its own esoteric indulgences. Love me some space whales.

Now you are speaking my language! G-Witch of course experienced no shortage of hype during its first season, but the OP and ED were hardly the most talked-about parts of it. They were fine. Pretty good in places, even! But that made it even more surprising when Takeshi Ohashi returned from the first ED to direct the second one and just...went harder than anyone rightly expected him to.


I almost don't know where to start with this one, given it feels like every lovingly styled frame merits mention. One of my favorite details is probably the multiple Sulettas, who not only tie into several ongoing theories fans have about the show, but have also spawned plenty of amusing take-offs from G-Witch's legions of online fan artists.

It's not apparent in screenshot form, but there is some powerful animation of Miorine and Suletta's hands shaking as they clasp them together in that shot.

Also, I dare not post any version of it for spoilers' sake, but as of last week, G-Witch did the thing where the opening part of the ED song plays over the last few seconds of the episode itself. City Hunter is credited with popularizing that trick, and it is great every time.

I don't know if "Red:birthmark" will be going memetic in the same way, but it's not like G-Witch is exactly lacking for meme fuel through the rest of it.

This is one that does kinda fall into that whole "Character Showcase" school of OPs, but it's fitting in the context of a second season. It's also the only place we've glimpsed Guel Bob thus far in the first two episodes, as I become increasingly concerned about my boy.

And there are some other neat flourishes in showing off those characters, like the knowing way Elan is always framed using reflections.

Even amusing in context, it's still appropriate to the overall tone of this anime. That's definitely the recurring theme of this particular playlist we've run down here: songs and sequences that are quite cool and entertaining on their own, but also encapsulate their series in ways that engage the audience.

It is a match made in heaven and I can hear Nick jamming out to it from here. My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv999 is just a strongly directed anime overall, thanks to Morio Asaka, and that's reflected in the OP as well. Here, we see the characters in their daily lives next to the video game embellishments.


Also, points to consistently portraying Akane as a hopeless doofus.

Look, a series like My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv999 is nothing if not a sequence of callouts.

You are right, though, about anime theme songs not needing to be overly reverent approaches to their material to still properly represent it. And what series knows more about irreverence than Mashle: Magic and Muscles and its ED? This is probably my last standout fave of the season: an upbeat funky dance number celebrating the wonder of...cream puffs.

This is our other Shonen Jump adaptation on the list here, and wow could this not be further from the approach of Hell's Paradise if it tried.

Aha, the most important metric by which a sequence may be judged: The quantity of shots you want to make into your new desktop background.

It really feels like an embarrassment of riches. That Magical Destroyers OP might have been the first one to come out swinging, but stuff like the Mashle and Ancient Magus Bride EDs proves that there's room for sequences of all kinds to resonate with people and these cartoons we enjoy watching.


And as these convenient YouTube links we've included have further proved, it's nice of the powers that be behind these shows to make it easier for us to experience these bite-sized musical encapsulations of our favorite new anime.

Take note, Netflix. If I wanted quick-time events, I'd be gaming, not watching anime.