Special: August Debuts

Date: August 7, 2024

Two late-starting anime series are debuting today, so let’s take a Preview Guide-style look at both of them.

Delico’s Nursery

Streams: Crunchyroll on Wednesdays at 1 p.m.

Rating: 3 (of 5)

This one has the unusual pedigree of being based on a stage play by Kenichi Suemitsu, who also wrote the screenplay for Welcome to the Ballroom and directed one of the Touken Ranbu stage plays. Its origins date back to 2009, so naming a major background character TRUMP (an amalgamation of “True of Vampire”) probably has nothing whatsoever to do with the real-life U.S. presidential candidate. Still, that this is being released in anime form now, just three months before a major election featuring a candidate with that name, is either a truly weird coincidence or else indicates that someone in Japan has a perverse sense of humor.

In any case, this is a Victorian England-styled setting where nearly everyone – including all of the main cast – seems to be a vampire. Exactly why they all need to be vampires is hard to say; that detail seems largely irrelevant to what plays out in this episode, and all of the characters act within the parameters of completely normal humans; they don’t even show fangs or sunlight vulnerability. Regardless, noble Dali Delico is being tasked with leading an investigation into serial murders which may be connected to TRUMP (a mythical entity that is essentially the vampire progenitor), but he’s refusing to do it because he made a promise to his dying wife to give his young children “all his love” and he takes that promise very seriously. The other dashing bishonen who are supposed to be under his command insist that he should be capable of balancing both tasks, so he eventually agrees, but with one catch: all of them have to find a way to balance their duties and child-rearing (which each of them has always been hands-off about), too. Hence the HQ for investigating the serial murders is now both a figurative and literal “nursery,” with the children of all the top officials present.

Honestly, this is a great story concept, one rife with all sorts of potential complications as young men who know nothing about child-rearing now suddenly have to be “hands-on.” Just, again, I’m not sure why vampires need to be part of it. I’m less completely sold on the very stylized character designs and the Victorian architecture and clothing styles, but that’s more of a personal preference, and the setting does have some somewhat intriguing world-building potential. While I’m grading it neutrally for now, I can see this one catching on, especially in the cosplay arena.

True Beauty

Streams: Crunchyroll on Wednesdays at 1 p.m.

Rating: 2.5 (of 5)

Though this one streams on Crunchyroll and has an anime-like aesthetic, it is actually a Korean production, down to being based on a Korean webtoon, using Korean on-screen text and credits, and being originally dubbed in Korean (I think). Though its visual style falls somewhere in between U.S. animation and anime, its story structure, elements, and approach are similar enough to shoujo anime for there to be a lot of potential carry-over appeal. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good, though.

To be sure, it does look quite pretty in its character designs; in fact, that’s the series’ strong point by far. The story derives somewhat from the classic tale of The Ugly Duckling, where a high school girl derided as being ugly at her former school is able to transform herself into a beauty at her new school by simply learning how to take advantage of make-up. While she appreciates the new friend and vastly improved social standing this earns her, she also feels fake, and isn’t entirely uncomfortable with all this new attention. Things get complicated when she starts having encounters in both normal and made-up forms with a drop-dead-gorgeous boy who’s quite standoffish but also seems to be very much in sync with her true self on reading and musical tastes (she’s into heavy metal).

At just a bit under 20 minutes, this is a little shorter than a typical anime episode, but its problems lie more in execution. The episode pushes the pace too much, parts that are supposed to be funny mostly aren’t, and the male lead has all of the personality of cardboard. The concept is also lacking in originality, and I couldn’t help but feel that this is, to a degree, a poor man’s version of Kare Kano. The messaging seems to be heading towards a “beauty may get you what you want short-term, but not what truly matters” direction, but it’s also still being idealized in its approach. I can maybe see this one flying if it can navigate past this bumpy start, but I’m not holding my breath.