Sara Talks Anime

Ah yes, kindergarten. The age when you’re beating up spirits just to ensure that your friends can play safely. Universal experience, right? I’m sure we all beat up a ghost or two during that time period. But it’s all good as long as your friends can still play a-okay, right?

Okay, enough of that intro paragraph that, thinking back, just feels like a whole ass nothing burger. I’m going to start this review by saying something that I usually save for the end: based on what I’ve seen in this episode, I think Kaya-chan Isn’t Scary is peak. I found myself drawn in to this universe because of the premise. A kindergartner, beating up spirits haunting her school, even if others misread her intentions? Sign me up!

I’d say the best way to describe this episode is “a series of vignettes with shared continuity”. For example, after Kaya beat up the spirit that was pushing kids until they fell off the swing (and we got the scene where Chie, Kaya’s teacher, was reacting to the aftermath of what Kaya did), we have the next story in that episode serve as a reason for Chie to be like “maybe I should trust what Kaya’s doing…” only to go into denial about the fact.

The third story in this episode is what ultimately forms Chie into someone Kaya knows she can trust. I can’t say anything more than that for that story in particular without providing too many spoilers, but the payoff is worth it, I promise.

The fourth and final story touches upon Kaya’s home life, and how she has to navigate her dad (who’s human) around the ghosts that she knows he can’t see. This also reveals a detail about Kaya’s mom that I hope gets expanded upon as the series goes on.

However, based on what’s in this episode, I am 100% sticking around. I don’t even know if my opinion will change much once the three episode mark comes up. I’ve been enjoying it that much, just based on this first episode. Now, is there the possibility that my line of thought will change based on the episodes that come out? Yes. But I have a good feeling about this show.

I just hope that it will not disappoint me. That would suck.

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Next Post: Episode 2 hasn’t aired yet. Assuming that no delays occur, it should go up on January 18th at 5:30 PM (PST).