Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
It should be a crime to end season one of any show on such a cliffhanger! It almost makes me want to drop my rating for Dan Da Dan. That said, the abrupt climax didn’t erase the memory of its wickedly wild, unhinged, and thoroughly entertaining early episodes. But ugh, those last two episodes—what a drag. Slow and patience-testing (yes, that should definitely be a phrase), with episode 11 standing out as especially random, uneventful, and downright annoying. We really didn’t need a creepy dude running through the streets to meet his lover to trigger Okarun into realizing his true feelings for Momo.
Phew. Sorry, that first para was a bit of a rant and totally assumed that you already know all about the plot and main characters of the 2024 anime series “Dan Da Dan”. So, if you don’t know anything about it, I’ll repeat what I wrote in my “Dan Da Dan: First Encounter Review” – If you’re looking to fill the Jujutsu Kaisen-sized hole in your heart, this show is a great answer – it is a lot sillier, lighter, with a dash of romance and fewer characters, so you don’t scratch your head over who is who. Spanning 12 episodes, season one of Dan Da Dan follows high school student Momo Ayase who rescues a nerdy classmate from bullies, only to start a crazy new friendship which entails fighting monstrous aliens and grotesque ghosts. The genre-bending anime mixes humor, horror, fantasy, and the horrifying embarrassment of teen love.
Momo Ayase is the popular girl at school who might look like a teen delinquent on the outside but is a dreamy romantic at heart. She nicknames her new nerdy friend Okarun because his real name is the same as her longtime celebrity crush (Ken Takakura), a fact she finds way too embarrassing, so she gives him a different name altogether. L-O-L. Ken AKA Okarun, on the other hand, is a shy, introverted boy obsessed with aliens and looks like a Japanese version of Harry Potter.
The first half of the season hilariously contrasts their clashing personalities as they get tangled up with monstrous aliens and a dangerously powerful spirit called Turbo Granny. Okarun ends up cursed by Turbo Granny, gaining the ability to transform into a powerful being who can channel the spirit’s unique abilities. Meanwhile, Momo discovers she has psychokinesis powers of her own that activate when she fights aliens. Momo’s grandmother Seiko helps the teens understand their newfound abilities and trains them into becoming the newest ghost-hunters in town. Sort of. From aliens who want to operate on private parts to deadly spirits with aspirations of motherhood, Dan Da Dan is packed with bizarre antics that will leave you in splits.
The animation style in ‘Dan Da Dan: First Encounter’ is colorful, dynamic, and two-dimensional in nature, and the creators often play with color, depending on the mood of a given scene. For instance, when Momo first encounters creepy aliens, the color palette shifts to become bright, neon, and is trippy in tone, as if you’re watching a cyber-punk show. Or there’s a significant chunk where Momo and Okarun face-off a demonic, sumo-like alien entity, and those scenes are animated in black-and-white shades, adding a lot of theatrical effect to the violence, to convey the hopelessness and bleakness of their situation. Basically, the anime style is fun, and fittingly complemented by a spunky soundtrack, some sections of which are like remixed versions of retro arcade games music.
Two of the major supporting characters introduced in Dan Da Dan season one include the beautiful but vain Aira Shiratori, who initially mistakes Momo for a demon and hilariously tries to exorcise her. Aira makes her debut in episode 5, but her importance becomes clearer in the following episodes. She serves as both a romantic rival and a professional ally to Momo, if you count all the alien and ghost-fighting as a serious side hustle! At the end of episode 10, viewers get to meet Jin Enjoji, Momo’s childhood friend and also her ‘first love’, so Okarun immediately gets jealous of this new character. Jin is a little like Aira on acid, he is extremely energetic, flirtatious, and annoying! I didn’t find his bits funny at all.
In the second half of Dan Da Dan, the romantic love triangles and the characters’ complicated feelings take center stage, making all the teen crushes and confusion pretty fun to watch. However, some of the alien battles and a bizarre new love story between two ghostly mannequins was very lackluster. The show begins to lose its groove in the last mile, even though, on second thoughts, it’s really a case of the plot not being able to match its own initial craziness.
Oh well, even though episode 11 was a drag, episode 12, the season finale, opens on a very promising note. It shows Momo, Okarun, and Jin Enjoji traveling to Jin’s hometown to help him deal with the evil spirits haunting his house. But just when Momo finds herself in a dangerously deadly situation, the show abruptly ends! Instead of wrapping up the chapter and teasing a new problem, the creators leave Dan Da Dan hanging in the middle of a new town mystery.
Anyway, from its quirky characters, creepy aliens, colorful animation, and a fantastic intro song, ‘Dan Da Dan’ is a very entertaining anime if you’re looking for an offbeat teen horror comedy.
You can stream Dan Da Dan on Netflix and CrunchyRoll.