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| Wow such a bittersweet ending. Hoping for s2. |
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| I didn’t completely like the last episode. It felt a little bit too much rushed. Ono died, once more, definitely. It was a miracle that she was able to move at that point, and Fuyumura’s words made her heart skip a beat, literally, it was too much for her and she ended up dying. Mixed feelings with this one. The last scene was good. |
| Oshibu might have won the battle but Sanda still lives to fight another day. Ono passing away is too tragic. Poor Fuyumura, she just realized that she didn't want to lose her. Yet, I think that confession was the thing Ono needed to be at peace. This was an enjoyable season. I'm glad it got dubbed! |
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| The show ultimately lacked something fundamental, I just can't put my finger on what exactly that was.. maybe the story just wasn't that interesting or the world building fell short. I also found it difficult to like any of the cast. Could have been more Christmas-y too, especially considering the season we're in - missed opportunity if you ask me. Animation was always great tho |
Reply to Azizku
trampler8324 said:
Sanda is by no means bad. But it’s just not my cup of tea and I really don’t like it. Science SARU did a great job though.
Ending was also bad. 4/10
Sanda is by no means bad. But it’s just not my cup of tea and I really don’t like it. Science SARU did a great job though.
Ending was also bad. 4/10
Was it the annoying side characters?
| More like all characters lol I didn't like the base concept behind the show, nor I like the portrayed world. The story is fresh and there is some originality to it, which is nice, plus good visuals. But the plot itself felt like a convoluted mess that couldn't bring me to care about any characters. |
| Unless this gets S2 it's pretty forgettable I guess. Ono drama was so stupidly done. Previous episode Ono is in massive pain and we're left with strong impression she died alone there. This episode Ono seemed FINE. Like previous episode didn't happen. If she was in pain and enduring/not showing it, they did awful job showing that. What's even more corny, she looks fine up until the last moment when she dies immediately after confession! Dunno. This show had some interesting ideas but I'm still left with sour taste in my mouth. |
Sigmar-UnberogenDec 20, 2025 12:41 PM
Sigmar-Unberogen said: Unless this gets S2 it's pretty forgettable I guess. +1 But how popular is it in Japan to be financially viable...? |
| That's how it is going to end? Meh, some of this was really good but it couldn't stay consistent and seemed like it wanted to make some kinda commentary on growing up but couldn't figure out what it was. Ono's death was pretty dumb IMO as was Fuyumura going from psychotic to not caring to being completely broken by her death. A "terminal case of growing pains" 9_9, whatever. Also the principal as a bad guy just seemed pretty arbitrary, same with him hating Santa. I don't know it just all fell apart there the last few episodes and ended up being pretty dumb. 6/10 |
| Such a good episode and series! I loved it! Round two between Santa and Oshibu! That was such a cool fight, and it seems Sanda can use the wind to his advantage, so that's how Santa made his sleigh fly? I wonder if there's a representation of the reindeer further in the story. Ono... rest in peace. I'm glad that at least the last words she heard was Fuyumura telling her that she loved her. It's kind of crazy to imagine. The amount of time it takes for a body to grow, condensed into a night of sleep. She got all of that when her body wasn't old enough to handle it and she died from those growing pains. Such a tragic fate. At least Fuyu still has Sanda, he will keep his promise to Ono. (Also idk what happens in the manga but I really hope after this Fuyu and Sanda became more than friends, cause I like them too much as just friends and it be screwing Ono over more than the story already did lol) I NEED SEASON 2 ASAP! |
| Poor closed!!! kekeke |
| Didn't expect Ono to actually die but it's not surprising considering how this show has been, that's not a proper ending but then I believe we can expect a S2 at some point, it was awesome overall for how original the story is and its universe, I had high expectation because I love Beastars writing and even though it's completely different for the story basis I think both shine for their originalities and the personnality of their characters, I want to see more so if they don't announce a S2 soon I'll probably read the manga |
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| Fuyumura confesses and then Ono passes away... Quite an emotional final episode, overshadowing the fight between Sanda and the principal at the start of the episode. While not in his Santa Claus form Sanda can at least be there for Fuyumura and comfort her. Such a loss will take quite some time to process. The talk about blue in that scene reminds me a bit of the opening scene of Blue Period. In a way quite a beautiful scene but still weird to end the season on this note. Overall it was an interesting and enjoyable anime to watch, with a lot of excentric characters and a lot of randomness. The anime covers an interesting perspective on a societal problem in Japan and offers quite a few good messages. Still, it was quite inconsistent at times and the ending really feels like a 13th episode could air next week. Let's see whether this will get a season 2. |
DtDaniDec 21, 2025 5:15 AM
| I have so many questions... I hope this series gets a S2. Such a gem and very unique. |
| Simply the best anime of this season ! I love watching it from start to end, the animation was super great and the story captivated me. The ending was a song that I listened to a lot of times. I really hope for a season 2 as soon as possible! |
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| No season 2 announcement. I WANT IT NOW!!! |
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| I didn´t like the final!!! Second season? It was announced!!! kekeke |
| I think She will be back again after her cell has adjusted with her body. |
| - Mal-Badge - Level 25 Ranked 1135 Last update : 27.02.2022 at 05:50 My Candies :   |
on 
| Ono passing away just after Fuyumura tells her she loved her made me tear up ( T_T ) |
| so i see now. their ideas and science about aging and beauty and preserving the supposed perfection of youth killed her. without all that obsession and tampering with the natural processes of the human body, she would have lived several more years as a child and then even more years as an adult. such a peculiar story using science fiction and the supernatural to examine the most basic and primal issues of humanity. what our very genes and carbon-based, water dependent, omnivorous lives as social animals requires. it looked bizarre in many places and ways... but the story was thought provoking and entertaining. definitely different than my initial as well as uninformed, vague, and amorphous impressions of what it was going to be like. i'm glad i finished this one off. but one glaring idiocy by Sanda did worry me... he never considered the biological imperative of anybody who was 'Santa'... procreation. heh. ;> he wouldn't have been born this way unless some OTHER Santa carriers had no kids. |
| just an ol school American otaku enjoyin the life. don't sass me kiddies, i've been otaku probably since before you were born. leave me in peace and i won't bother you either. |
| Sanda had all the elements to be a great anime. The most faithful possible adaptation of Paru's design, excellent thematic music, insanely devoted voice performance and overall very well executed but unfortunately, no one can ignore the excruciatingly confusing worldbuilding the show subject yourself to. Absolutely none of this makes sense whatsoever and it feels like new rules are being created each episode if not each scene, it is so jarring all possible stake are lost past the 3rd episode. It starts as a story of a kid who can transform into Santa Claus when in contact to red color, he has the powers of what we imagine what Santa would have as a shonen hero and can turn back into human form by eating jelly beans. Sanda can also feel when somebody is lying by having nearby items drop the grond (idea abandonned after 2 eps) Sanda will also die if he falls in love with a child (resolved with 0 explanation) Also his acolyte is a girl who has free access to explosives and can create infinite amount of C4 at will (?) In this universe kids are allowed to kill adults and it's not considered a crime (??) There is a Santa claus killing squad despite santa claus being clause to a myth in this world and he hasn't appeared in 20 years (???) The school director is some 90 years old biocyborg who looks 20 because of facial surgery (????) Also the headmaster of the school is a 30cm granny who can do kungfu and jumps like yoda (?????) In this universe, kids do not have to sleep due to special diet and medication which somehow keeps them from feeling exhaustion (?????) The reason is because in this world sleep is the cause of puberty (the fuck is hormone lmao??) and therefore they prevent kids from sleeping to not have them age (?????) You can go from the start to the end of puberty in a single night (what in the fuck????) Also it causes you to die from "pains" (?????????????) A 14 years old girl that is already responsible for murdering her own mom has free access to weapons and ammo (?????) Seurotonin can fully conceal surgery scars (O my wikipedia trivia turned plot device) Every kid in the country have been given governement affiliated marriage partner due to population decrease (okay why not makes sense) But actually every sexual depiction have been forbidden inside the school making even artbooks about classical sculptures have censored genitals due to fear of kids reaching puberty (then what the fuck is even the point????) I could go on but if you add the way the story completely falls apart once Ono just comes back from nowhere solving what was clearly supposed to be a central arc for a wide strech of the plot which leads to almost every consequent events following Ono's return to feel weirdly filler-ish with characters not doing anything like Sanda going into a shonen training arc just for the sake of it. Paru tries to tackle so many themes at the same time, this story really has the effect of Beastar's third arc conclusion when Paru suddenly tried to change an effective story about defining your own nature into all the societal themes she could fit in 20 chapters. Sanda is a shonen about a kid becoming Santa Claus, it's also about Japan's population decrease, Asia's cult of youth and beauty, teenage lesbian romance, eugenism, children overprotection laws, fascistic school system, a coming of age story on top of making an allegory between Santa Claus and God. It is so much things at the same time, it only ends up a mess in the end, an memorable but disappointing mess nonetheless. |
| This is a series that reminds me of how much I love anime, the unabashedly absurd played straight with passionate productions to make it all work. I'm really surprised they actually committed to killing off ono which gives credence to the school's rules it seems despite everything, I really hope we get a 2nd season I want to see where this goes from here after such a major status quo change. |
Immahnoob said: Jizzy, I know you have no idea how to argue for shit, tokiyashiro said: Jizzy as you would call yourself because youre a dick The most butthurt award goes to you And clearly you havent watched that many shows thats why you cant determine if a show is unique or not Or maybe you're just a child who likes common stuffs where hero saves the day and guys gets all the girls. Sad taste you have there kid you came up to me in the first place making you look more like a kid who got slapped without me even knowing it and start crying about it to me |
| The reason Fuyumura knew Sanda is Santa is still not explained.. Just found out the author is Beastars author, it's no wonder the story is weird lol. Niko is funny and likeable, I hope she get more screentime. Overall decent, I hope they make another season. |
| Man, twelve episodes have passed and I still don't get why they are preventing the kids from growing up when the government's goal is to repopulate the country... Like, why do these kids even have designated partners for marriage when the school is doing their hardest to prevent boys and girls from developing sexual desires that can trigger puberty? I just don't get it. OK finale, I guess. I never really liked Ono so her death means nothing to me. Now that said and in case of a potential sequel, I do hope this event gives Sanda a good push in terms of character development because so far, he has talked a lot but has accomplished barely anything. Anyways, not a good first season in my opinion. Story progression was a mess, the way some topics were addressed felt pretentious and most of the characters left me with a very awful first impression. Not to mention Sanda as MC lacks presence and can act quite lame at times. And I mean, animation and characters like Yagiuda and Niko were certainly nice but yeah... not enough to make me care more about this show at the end of the day. Though I can see why others may like it for its unique premise and unpredictable development. 4/10 |
| Well...that show as a a bit disappointing. Needed more humor, much more XMAS related stuff, but its an anime, so...I dunno. I liked hte characters in their own way for the most part, but that tall chick...She looked WAY too much like a Tim Burton character. In fact most of their eyes reminded me of somehting "burton-esque" :P. That ending sucked, but oh well. Tis the season...6/10. I WANTED MORE EXPLANATIONS for the state of the world in that future ffs. I know much of the low brithrates was predicted in the mid 20th century, but I needed more looks at what Japan ended up like by 2080 in this anime ffs...*sighs All I want for Xmas was closure lmao Also Goku's voice actress played the old lady headmistress in this. THat was so PERFECT lol! |
AnchientProphet2Dec 27, 2025 12:53 AM
| Anyone complaining about this missed the point. Maybe it’s because I am also old comparatively, but it captured the conflict between childhood and transitioning into adulthood perfectly. |
| Well that’s a depressing way to end the anime 😭 Rip Ono |
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| I really liked the art style and animation in this series, and especially Fuyumura's character design, yes she looks like a Tim Burton character and I love it, I couldn't stop staring at her at first. But the story kinda lost me after a while, maybe it was just too weird for me, and it started to be more action-focused and some of the fights kinda bored me, especially since Santa is invincible. I lost a lot of interest in the show as it went on, but it was still good I guess... |
| These last 2 episodes were a massive pain to watch. Tons of flashbacks (specially the ones that reuse animation). The headmaster who was supposedly the main antagonist took a break in order to let a lesser henchmen (Fumi) kill Santa. The biggest problem with most of Santa's fights is that he's immortal, there's nothing that meks us the audience feel that he's in a real peril. Fumi shooting bullets at Santa felt like playing a dull videogame where the boss has a ridiculous amount of HP. The whole flashback of Fumi was completely idiotic, specially when her mother told her that there would be someone she would share the pain and it would be okay even if she would wreak havok in some festival (how the fuck would she know this before hand?). Ono's storyline is also quite dumb in it's execution. They kept claiming that if you sleep a whole night as a teen you'd mature all the way taking a massive taxation in your body. Fuyumura slept a big part of the night a lot of times but she wasn't affected by it. In the same sense the author managed to make Sanda being unable to transform because of bogus reasons a lot of the times. Convenient writting was all over the place (like that part where the a fire starts exactly where Fumi lies on the floor). Meh, the only reason I'm giving this one a 5 is because Science Saru's animation was top notch (when they weren't reusing animation due flashbacks). |
| I really hope there is a season 2 for this. It was a fine episode but didn't feel like a conclusion to me... |
| My friend made my forum pic. |
| I liked the characters, and the show tackles the themes of puberty and aging in an interesting way, but the 12th episode didn't feel like a final episode. I need a sequel. |
| Soo the Headmaster didn't just jump down to go finish Santa off, he walks off the other end of the roof and just completely forgets about Santa whom he just said he was going to kill? And Sanda's fiancée not scolding the hell out of Sanda after he missed twilight with her seems very out-of-character from what we've seen of her in previous episodes. To go from being stood up and left hanging on the last twilight of their youth, to later being invited to join Sanda and his buddies for a party at night, just feels so off. She would normally be furious, maybe even suspect that this same group of friends were the reason Sanda was gone for so long and get angry with them as well. It felt like things wrapped up too nicely by the end when some of the narrative choices made contradicted what the characters would be likely to do. Not the strongest finish re: the characters above. Though Ono's and the murder-girl's stories wrapped up in poetic ways. |
SpirelordJan 9, 11:22 PM
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