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What makes something truly bizarre in an anime? Is it the characters doing weird things, or is it the universe they inhabit?
Making something odd, something people wouldn't necessarily think of as normal or otherwise bizarre, can be challenging when it seems like most things have been done before but better. Luckily, for those wanting to be weirded out or otherwise see truly odd things, anime scratches that itch more often than not.
Conversely, there are animes where things get all too real rather quickly. These tend to involve more realistic scenarios and situations that occur.
Note: This article contains spoilers for the various anime listed. It also includes a content warning for violence, s**ual assault, and psychological trauma. The copy reflects only the author's opinion.
Five genuinely unconventional anime universes
1) One Piece
Perhaps the most bizarre out of the Big Three anime, this entire entry could go into just the Devil Fruits themselves and their various powers. But Toei Animation's One Piece is so much more than that.
The very world itself is dominated by a Great Sea, with only a few vast landmasses to call home, and half of those are dominated by the tyrannical World Government!
Aside from the militarized portions of society, there are giant elephants carrying cities, cities in the sky, a reverse mountain connecting the two sides of the Grand Line, the Grand Line itself located around the entire equator of the world, entire islands where the seasons remain constant despite the yearly changes, and more.
2) Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo
This anime basks in its absurdism and bizarreness. The tale of Toei Animation's Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo stars the blonde afro-haired warrior Bobo-bo as he struggles against an empire dedicated to making the entire world bald.
That's the gist of what the anime is about. The plot tends to get sidetracked by whacky adventures.
The bizarreness doesn't quite stop at the main character's weapon of choice being nose hair. There are episodes about dynamite buying stocks, the pros of having big sparkly eyes, several weddings broken off mid-episode, and a rap about a roller coaster after the villain of the day is defeated.
Rest assured, none of that is made up in any way.
3) Cells at Work
The human body works in mysterious ways, and the bizarre anime Cells at Work by David Productions is no different in its depiction. The anthropomorphism of the cells in the body isn't exactly new, with Osmosis Jones and Inside Out being a couple of examples of this type of storytelling.
Cells at Work not only makes things a little bloodier than the aforementioned two but also depicts the horrifying ways in which diseases attack the body.
Influenza is portrayed as a zombie apocalypse, scrapes are sinkholes, white blood cells are practically assassins, red blood cells are hard-working men and women, platelets are cute children, Killer T Cells as sadistic nurses, cancer and COVID infections as eldritch abominations, and more.
The spin-off, Code Black, deals with what happens to a body in feeble health, and it's twice as weird and nightmarish considering how horrifying it gets as a PSA about taking proper care of the body.
4) Pop Team Epic
Pop Team Epic is as surreal and bizarre as Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo is, if not more so. The difference is that Bobo-bo is a parody of Fist of the North Star and plays up that parody and nonsense.
Studio Kamikaze Douga's Pop Team Epic is more of a general parody of almost everything in Japanese pop culture, from anime to video games, to even self-depreciation from the quick to anger Popuko and the calmer and serene Pipimi.
There is nothing like Pop Team Epic to compare to. It's not got that much of a plot going aside from some gags coming together as these two girls go on random misadventures.
In short, it's truly bizarre to see an anime switching animation styles between episodes and skits, like going full claymation one minute and then CG the next. The jokes range from going to the zoo and somehow ending up in Australia to Popuko getting mad at nearly everything.
5) Panty & Stocking With Garterbelt
Panty and Stocking With Garterbelt feature two angels named after underwear that got kicked out of Heaven for being unruly and have to repurchase their way in. The problem is that they're very easily distracted as the blonde hothead Panty loves men far too much, and the more stoic Stocking loves sweets with reckless abandon.
It's the anime that led to the founding of Studio TRIGGER, and fans have been clamoring for a Season 2 ever since its shocking ending.
This Studio Gainax production is already unusually based on the synopsis provided, but everything else concerning that universe is likewise bizarre. The heroines are crass to the point of promiscuity. The demon duo sent in to deal with them are morally upright, and the jokes cross almost every line imaginable with reportedly over 450 swear words in the 13 episodes.
Not to mention, the transformation sequences border on H material, and the songs are generally in the same regard.
Five down-to-earth anime universes
1) Haikyuu!!
If there's any inevitability throughout life, it's that sports have endured for so many years that it was inevitable anime and manga be made about them. From Prince of Tennis to Yuri on Ice to Hajime no Ippo, plenty of sports have inspired numerous stories, and Production I.G.'s Haikyuu!! is no different.
It is a sports anime revolving around the shorter-than-average Shoyo Hinata as he aspires to become Karasuno High School's volleyball team ace. He quickly learns it isn't a solo effort, as even the most skilled players can still lose if their teamwork is lacking.
Realism comes in that not only is the high school sports setting not the end of the road, but people can play a sport for more than one reason. Teamwork is also heavily emphasized, whereas it's more about the individual in others.
2) Shirobako
An anime about making anime sounds like it would be a parody or at least an affectionate joke. Studio P.A. Works' Shirobako is one of the few in a small genre of anime comedy/dramas that focus on some of the more realistic sides of working in the industry when contrasted to the idealistic dream that many anime fans have.
The series revolves around five anime club high schoolers who all share a dream of producing and making an animated series, only to be confronted with the harsh realities of working in various parts of the industry.
When the series begins, two of them are working as key animators and production assistants at a struggling company. One is a newbie voice actress who hasn't found work, another feels trapped in a well-paying but monotonous profession in a 3D graphics studio, and the last plans to be a writer but is still in college.
Realism is inherent with the long hours, lack of sleep, production delays, and staff at each other's throats. It makes people appreciate the often thankless job people in those various professions do.
3) Monster
All those content warnings at the beginning were leading to this entry. Monster is a psychological thriller revolving around a doctor's hunt for a serial killer who he operated on and saved nine years ago.
The hunt for the killer is akin to Silence of the Lambs and other horrifying looks into the human capacity for depravity and violence.
Just to name a few things that make this little number realistic? There's a torture scene with a nail clipper being used to remove someone's entire nail, and it's graphic and slow too. Then there are the various methods of killing via knife or setting fire to a library.
There's a eugenics experiment that's an aborted r**e scene, resulting in the men being killed before they can harm the child they were given. The point is, Monster is not for the faint of heart.
4) High Score Girl
Most realistic animes tend to be slice-of-life or involve romance of some sort. What better anime to demonstrate this and hopefully provide a palette cleanser after Monster than High Score Girl?
This show features a coming of age romantic story set in the beginning and middle of Japan's arcade fighting game boom in the 1990s. It revolves around kid slacker and gaming enthusiast Haruo Yaguchi and his rival, ace student Akira Ono.
Basically, the two ignite a rivalry over Street Fighter II that blossoms into something more as the series progresses. The audience sees Haruo grow, eventually realizing (thanks to the efforts of imaginary versions of Guile, Haruo's mom, and others) that Ono likes him and he likes her.
Gaming never leaves either of them, even as they grow closer.
5) Detective Conan/Case Closed
One of the longest-running shonen detective stories, Detective Conan (or Case Closed in English), revolves around the efforts of Detective Shinichi Fudo as he's poisoned and turned into a kid named Conan Edogawa. As Shinichi retains his memories, he vows to catch the organization behind his poisoning.
The series is realistic in the scenarios of all the murders Shinichi has to solve, and he's technically forced to as the detective he's living with is incompetent at the best of times. There's plenty of detail woven in, from fingerprint analysis to voice recognition to breaking through alibies and other things to find the truth of the matter.
Of course, having some gadgetry that Sherlock Holmes would envy also helps!
