Officially the most watched OP of all time in two months

Yoasobi don't miss

Unironically my favourite battle shounen.

the anime is really over, its time to read their manga

I'm more of a fan of the manga d*** fight island

Thanks bro

We! Are!
STAR T RAIN
Check! Now!
Come on!
Come on!
Come on!
Come on!

what did this dethrone

Tokyo Ghoul

My only issue with the last HD episode was the characters afterwards. This should’ve broken them, but it comes off like such a non issue afterwards.

Like I feel the source material could have been improved off that because it’s like that in the manga also

Never even heard of Oshi no Ko but yall just made me download the whole szn

Animator Spotlight: Shinji Otsuka

All gifs in order
Castle in the Sky (1986)
Neo Tokyo (Running Man Section) (1987)
Akira (1988)
Porco Rosso (1992) background characters animated by Katsuya Kondo
On Your Mark (1995)
Princess Mononoke (1997)
Jin-Roh (1999)
FLCL (2000)
Blood: The Last Vampire (2000)
Millennium Actress (2001)
The Cat Returns (2002)
Tokyo Godfathers (2003)
Ponyo (2008)
The Wind Rises (2013)
The Tale of the Princess Kaguya (2013)

Happy 68th Birthday to Shinji Otsuka One of the best animators of Studio Ghibli, and a master of action, character acting, and idealistic timing. Otsuka was an animator originally on Studio Annaparu until he joined Ghibli in the late 80s where he did some of the best cut on Miyazaki’s and Takahata’s films. He would leave the company after Princess Mononoke where he would go freelance for around six years working on the biggest projects of the era, with several Production I.G. titles like Jin-Roh and FLCL, and also Madhouse projects particularly Satoshi Kon on Millennium Actress, and Tokyo Godfathers. He would rejoin Ghibli back in 2004, and has remained there primarily, and only doing minor freelance shortly after 2014. Known to do an absolutely staggering amount of key animation when brought on to a project, he is a complete speed demon, and is adaptable as hell.

Otsuka had a pretty early start as an animator in the industry at 23 in the late 70s doing in-betweens on shows like Ore wa Teppei and Doraemon. He’d break out successfully as an animator on Tomorrow’s Joe in 1980 where he animated on 18 episodes. After success of Joe, he came on to Space Cobra where he quickly worked his way up fast enough to become an AD an animator. For an early 1980s pilot this is incredibly expressive animation sakugabooru.com/post/show/199162\. And on the movie it got even more expressive sakugabooru.com/post/show/135787.

From there he became very successful getting offers on Urusei Yatsura, Golgo 13, and then he’d make a splash on The Dagger of Kamui directed by Rintaro. Now at this point Otsuka was no amateur. This man was a full on powerhouse of versatility, and while most if it isn’t well documented cuts on Golgo beforehand evidenced this sakugabooru.com/post/show/147896\. Otsuka flexes very dynamic ninja like action under direction of Takuo Noda to a fantastic degree, despite not having insane camerawork its made up for by the insurmountable character acting made in-between the action sakugabooru.com/post/show/217809\. I love the detailed debris at 50 seconds in, and the added detail of the reflexion in the balls at the end is so good.

On Angel’s Egg, Otsuka joins several animators he’d become colleagues with at Ghibli, Makiko Futaki, Masaaki Endo, Toshio Kawaguchi, and others, along with future Mamoru Oshii staff. His scenes are pretty tame compared to Futaki and Kawaguchi’s, but there is very nice character acting with this hand cut being a highlight sakugabooru.com/post/show/171489.

The next year Otsuka splashed onto Miyazaki’s Castle in the Sky one of the first Ghibli films. As one of the more regarded action animators next to Masaaki Endo and several others. Otsuka comes in early during the robot attack on the government fortress. A recycled robot design from a Lupin III episode, the shots of it firing lasers are by Otsuka. sakugabooru.com/post/show/18271 while not insanely recognizable as Katsuya Kondo or Kawaguchi’s cuts, the explosions feel of the era and feels more like Endo’s supervisions of the scene. His later scenes feature sakugabooru.com/post/show/18278

1987, we see Otsuka working on tone of animes like Twilight Q, Wings of Honneamise among others. His most exciting work that year is on Neo Tokyo produced by Madhouse founders Masao Murayama and Rintaro. The film is comprised of three segments, one directed by Rintaro, one by Yoshiaki Kawajiri, and then Katsuhiro Otomo. Otsuka is on Running Man directed by Kawajiri, also joined by Kawaguchi.

music video by Lorn
Kawajiri animations work with painfully detailed designs, from his future works on Wicked City, Ninja Scroll Vampire D: Bloodlust there is a high level of drawings that every frame becomes screen grab worthy. Otsuka being no stranger to detailed designs like on Golgo 13 barges in and takes on the task. Thankfully there isn’t too many movements on the segment, being carried by Kawajiri’s art style. Otsuka handles a majority of the animation in the first half sakugabooru.com/post/show/211336, with Kawajiri doing a total 3 minutes of KA afterwards sakugabooru.com/post/show/211344

The next year Otsuka begins to start committing full-time onto Ghibli working on My Neighbor Totoro where he mostly just does character acting. One pivotal scene he’s placed on is the seed dance, with Otsuka in the first half sakugabooru.com/post/show/28112 then Makiko Futaki for the effects of the tree growing, and of course Yoshinori Kanada at the end. Otsuka also presumedly worked on the first cut of the film, the "Stroll" opening.

That same year Otsuka was brought on to Akira. Many of the animators from Totoro were also on Akira, due to a majority being TMS freelancers like Kawaguchi, Endo, Futaki, and Otsuka himself. Otsuka, Futaki, and Kanada were left in charge of Tetsuo’s monstrous transformation, of course Otsuka starting off with a legendary cut of animation that any animator would love on their resume, this is also his only cut on the film.

Otsuka 0:00-0:45
The consistency of volume and control in these cuts is inhuman, and only going off of Otomo’s storyboards I imagine was arduous as hell. Thanks to help from ADs like Takashi Nakamura and Koji Morimoto and the godlike staff could this scene only be made possible.

Otsuka rightfully took a break from effects heavy animation, and instead moved on to do a loving story about a young witch on Kiki’s Delivery Service. For the first time Otsuka was elected as a AD alongside Katsuya Kondo, and Yoshiyuki Momose. There is a lot really amazing concept art, storyboards, and layouts all throughout the movie all brought to life by the three ADs, and of course Miyazaki himself


With Otsuka on AD duty he does little animation throughout, with the standout of one scene where Kiki overlooks the city sakugabooru.com/post/show/44932.

Otsuka would then hop on to several Ghibli movies for the next few years. On Only Yesterday he handles a lot of the subtle character scenes not doing too much, but on Porco Rosso we begin to see him being known for his insane output. I believe he does about 5-6 minutes of KA at least, showing off just how fast he is. sakugabooru.com/post/show/28424 he handles a dogfight sequence early on as well as some great character acting sakugabooru.com/post/show/28400\. Though the true highlight of his powers is on Porco and Curtis’s fist fight sakugabooru.com/post/show/28433 one of the greatest cuts in Otsuka’s career, with crowd assistance by Yoshifumi Kondo. Miyazaki’s boards are rife with intentional Popeye-esque heroics although overtime the fight becomes much more brutish as the two by the end are bloodstained and broken sakugabooru.com/post/show/28435.