First Look: The Ghost in the Shell

In the near future, nanomachine and cybernetic technology have advanced to the point of becoming commonplace. Almost all humans have integrated technology into themselves. However, the world keeps turning, and governments and corporations alike jockey for control over the populace. Technology has merely allowed for new avenues of oppression and terrorism. Major Motoko Kusanagi and Public Security Section 9 are at the forefront of this new battlefield, fighting both technologically enhanced criminals as well as cyberspace hackers who lurk on the net. 

First Look: Jaadugar: A Witch in Mongolia

In the 13th century of the Khwarazmian Empire, Sitara is sold to an affluent family of scholars and begins her service and tutelage as a slave. However the Mongol Empire, at the height of its power, invades Central Asia and destroy Sitara’s homeland. Pressed into servitude to her new masters, Sitara resolves to take vengeance upon her captors.

First Look: Black Torch

Jiro is a mean-faced delinquent with a heart of gold and the ability to talk to animals. He nurses a mysterious black cat back to health, but it turns out to not be a cat at all: it’s the ancient mononoke Rago the Black Star of Doom. When other mononoke arrive in pursuit and Jiro is killed in the crossfire, Rago fuses their spirits together, and a new shonen battle anime begins.

First Look: Sparks of Tomorrow

In an alternate history Kyoto where electricity still fails to outpace steam power by the start of the 20th century, tinkerer Kihachi Sakamoto crosses paths with the gullible Inako Momokawa, whose family has come into the possession of Kichachi’s missing brother’s journal. Within the pages of this catalog, secrets are contained that could spark a scientific revolution — but our heroes are not the only ones who have realized its significance…

First Look: You and I are Polar Opposites

Outgoing, fashionable Suzuki and bookish, taciturn Tani are nothing alike. Nevertheless, mutual admiration for how they lead their lives without care for what others might think about them bring them closer together, starting a romance that proves opposites attract.

First Look: The Darwin Incident

Charlie is a normal 15 year old starting high school except for one detail – he’s the world’s first Human-Chimpanzee hybrid, a ‘Humanzee’. As he forges a friendship with loner girl Lucy, the eco-terrorists who attempted to free his mother are re-emerging with a new agenda.

First Look: Journal with Witch

When her parents die in a car accident, fifteen-year old Asa Takumi has nowhere to go — that is, until her estranged aunt Makio shows up. Despite a strained relationship with her family, in particular with Asa’s mother, Makio is determined to give Asa a new home and takes her in. This takes some getting used to for Asa, who decides to start chronicling her experiences in a journal.

First Look: Fate/Strange Fake

As ever, multiple factions of wizards and mages vie for supremacy in the Holy Grail War, summoning figures from myth and legend as Servants to battle it out until only one remains. But this time it’s happening in Snowfield, Nevada, United States of America; and all kinds of unexpected events are occurring in this strange, fake imitation of the original Grail War.

First Look: Gnosia

A collection of wacky characters must determine which one of them is infected by the Gnosia virus, lest their spaceship self-destruct to contain the infection. The amnesiac Yuri is one of them, and repeatedly wakes up to a shifting set of crew members and possible infected each time they die.

First Look: Digimon Beatbreak

In a world where humanity’s thoughts and emotions – their ‘e-pulse’ – powers advanced AI technology, Tomoro Tenma is a weird glitch in the system. When digital monsters emerge attempting to devour his e-pulse, he’s forced to team up with violent gremlin Gekkomon to defeat them.

God is Dead, Long Live Takopi

Forget everything I said about Takopi’s Original Sin being “tough to recommend” and watch one of the most uncompromisingly and stunningly realised works of animated art this wretched decade has brought forth so far.

First Look: Gachiakuta

In a world strictly divided into the affluent and the poor, Rudo is a scavenger who takes pride in fixing and refurnishing old objects deemed “trash” by the privileged. After being framed for murder, he’s thrown into The Pit, a gaping abyss the inhabitants cast both their garbage and undesirables into. Rather than dying, Rudo finds himself in an unfamiliar world; an endless hellscape of garbage. 

First Look: The Summer Hikaru Died

Stuck in a boring countryside town with parents who do nothing but argue, Yoshiki Tsujinaka has no one but his best friend Hikaru to rely on. Their friendship is put at risk, however, when Yoshiki discovers that Hikaru has been dead for months, and his entire being has been taken over by a mysterious eldritch creature.

First Look: Takopi’s Original Sin

Takopi, an alien from planet Happy, crash-lands on Earth to fulfil his lifelong goal of spreading joy across the universe, and meets 9-year-old Shizuka Kuze, who is subjected to relentless bullying from her classmates. Determined to save Shizuka from her miserable predicament, Takopi quickly finds out that happiness is a lot harder to find than it might seem…

First Look: Mobile Suit Gundam GQuuuuuuX

UC0079. Zeon wins the One Year War, defeating the Federation and emancipating spacenoids from the rule of Earth. UC0085. Under Zeon rule, spacenoids still are not free. Amate Yuzuriha is a high schooler living on the ostensibly neutral space colony Side 6. Having lived in space all her life, she yearns for the world beyond the confines of the colony. A chance meeting with Nyaan, a refugee and smuggler, dramatically alters the trajectory of her life as she gets drawn into Clan Battle, the underground mobile suit duels that are held on Side 6. Elsewhere Challia Bull, a veteran of the One Year War, chases after sightings of the mysterious Red Gundam, once piloted by Char Aznable.