In a near-future Japan, Christmas has faded into myth, and the birth rate has dropped so dramatically that children are now the most precious commodity. Society has artificially extended adolescence to preserve its youth, and traditional holidays, like Christmas, are a mere legend of the past. Sanda Kazushige is a middle school student who unexpectedly becomes entangled in a strange and dangerous mystery. When his classmate, Fuyumura Shiori, accuses him of carrying a curse that could help find her missing friend, Ono Ichie, Sanda's life takes a dramatic turn. Together, they embark on an incredible adventure to unravel the truth behind Ichie's disappearance and uncover the hidden magic of Christmas itself.

SANDA is based on the manga series byParu Itagaki. The anime series is streaming onAmazon Prime Video on Fridays.

I am the absolute wrong person to comment on anything Christmasy. Case in point: when I was in preschool (and again in kindergarten and first grade), I told all of my classmates that Santa isn't real because I thought they should know their parents were lying to them. This did not endear me to anyone, nor did my sharp rebuttal of someone who attempted to sell me on the “Chanuka elf.” So I have a hard time connecting with the central premise ofSANDA, which I realize is weird because I routinely walked into closets looking for Narnia. Oh well.

Still, I do applaudParu Itagaki's idea here. In her story's world, Santa isn't a person so much as a curse that befalls a certain family, in this case, the Sandas. Before climate change was a thing, Santa Claus came every Christmas, but with the demise of the four seasons and people no longer observing that holiday, Santa has become a myth…one that fourteen-year-old Fuyumuradesperately wants to believe is real. That's because her friend Ono vanished months ago and has recently been officially declared dead, and she believes that the only person who can grant her wish to see her again is Santa Claus. Better than the Tooth Fairy, I suppose.

How she figured out that her friendSANDA is, in fact, the bearer of the Santa Curse is a mystery. She's not sure what exactly Santa can do, but she's pretty sure that he's the answer, and she also thinks she can activate the curse if she follows certain steps. How she got from “he needs to put on something red” to “if I stab him in the heart, his bloodwill dye his shirt” just illustrates how utterly desperate this poor kid is. Or that she's gone mad from lack of sleep, which, judging by the circles under her eyes, seems as good a guess as any. Fortunately forSANDA, she's right, but I don't know that she'd care that much if she wasn't, meltdown notwithstanding. This is, after all, a girl who is willing to blow herself up if Santa won't help her.

The art is my favorite part of this. Itagaki's fluid, almost sketchy artwork sings here, from everyone's insanely wide eyes to the jagged muscles on Jacked Santa's abdomen. (Also, she's no coward; Santa has nipples.) Movement is dynamic, and the final scene involving fire is striking to watch, like a stained-glass window shattering in front of your eyes. Thedub is also shockingly good for Amazon, and I appreciate how the English voice actors take care to annunciate the difference between “Santa” and “SANDA.” I'm not keen on watching more of this because I really dislike Christmas media, but this is still more palatable than I thought it would be.

I'm not sure what vision of Santa Claus everyone in the world ofSANDA has, but it sure doesn't sound like any version I've ever heard of.Is there a Santa who has sleigh runners on his feet and carves his first initial like a jolly Zorro? That sounds at least as normal as Terry Pratchett'sHogfather, famously the only Christmas-adjacent book I care for.

ButParu Itagaki's Santa and Pratchett's do share one critical element: they are powered by belief. That's the strongest element of this second episode – the idea thatSANDA can unleash his Santa powers when children need him to. He's more like a superhero than a jolly old elf, and that makes a certain amount of sense. Childrenneed someone to believe in, whether it's Santa or a Fairy Godmother; it makes they feel like they have some hope and someone who's on their side. That seems to be something in short supply for the dwindling child population in this series. Kids arerespected, yes, but not for themselves. Instead, they're honored because they represent the future.Who they are doesn't seem to matter at all.

All of this feels like it's uneasily shoehorned into the episode, which is otherwise concerned withSANDA's roommate, Amaya, revealing that he knowsSANDA's Santa secret. Like Fuyumura, he wants something from Santa, and, like Fuyumura, he's willing to go to unhinged lengths to make it happen. Seriously, the best thingSANDA may get out of all of this is the fact that he's going to school with lunatics.

In some ways, this feels like a rehash of episode one: someone discoversSANDA's secret, tries to hurt him, he uses his Santa skills, and reaffirms his dedication to helping kids. Thrown in for kicks are an old man dangerously obsessed with maintaining his youth (I'm just relieved he's relying on cosmetic procedures, not the blood of virgins or something) and the fact that Santa can grow sharp skis from his feet. It's still full of vim and dynamically animated, but it just didn't hold my interest as much as the first episode.

There's still oodles of potential here. Itagaki's an expert at weaving subtext into her works, so it may be worth watching for her commentary on intergenerational politics alone. After all, the most important thing is to believe.

God Bless you,Paru Itagaki, you dang-ass weirdo. I was sold onSANDA from the minute I learned thatScience SARU was involved with this production—and believe me, they deliver the goods. Before we even talk about the incredibly stylish and lively animation, though, I want to giveSANDA kudos for somehow managing to make its absolutely bugnuts premise actually work. It's one thing to have a main character who discovers some strange, magical contrivances that will turn him into a Buff Daddy Santa Claus. I've lived on the internet for decades now. I've seen the stuff that people do to our venerated symbols and mythological figures. It was only a matter of time before some talented pervert licked the felt tip of her pen and asked herself, “What if Tim Allen's The Santa Clause, except Tim Allen was a tiny anime boy with squishable cheeks, and Santa was caked out for days?”

Naturally, this person was always destined to beParu Itagaki—so there's no surprise thatSANDA is one-hundred percent committed to the bit. What I found the most pleasantly surprising about this premiere, though, is how well all of the other individual pieces of the setting and story work. The near-future setting with its altered weather patterns and suspiciously vanished schoolchildren has this odd aura of menace oozing out from under the surface. This giddy yet dark atmosphere can also be pinned on our co-lead, Shiori Fuyumura, who is a certified Itagaki Freak if ever I saw one. Don't think I didn't catch the way she noshed on that popsicle in her daydreams, Ms. Itagaki—I know that this chick is basically just a gender-swapped LegoshiBEASTARS with his furry bits filed off. Then again, I can't think of a better companion to ourSANDA Claus than a gangly psycho with obsessive tendencies and an unquenchable thirst for solving crimes and inspiring people with their irrational commitment to their youthful ideals.

In all seriousness, though, I knewSANDA would be fun, and funny, and deliriously gorgeous to look at, but its heart is what I ended up loving the most about it. WhenSANDA is finally consumed by his curse and becomes the manically laughing Kris Kringle of legend, Shiori lets her stony facade drop as she declares her undying faith in the Santa Claus that can help her find her missing friend and reignite the belief in Christmas Miracles all over the world. It is such a ludicrous sequence of events that the only rational response is to smack your head in disbelief, and yet, I found myself brushing a couple of earnest little teardrops from my eyes instead. The world sucks, right now. Everything is on fire. People hate and fear each other. We need Santa back this Christmas, gosh darn it. Tim Allen's brains got mangled by cocaine-worms years ago, and we all know what happened to poor Phoebe Cates' dad when he tried to take up the mantle in Gremlins. There's only one hero left to do the job. He's a tiny little guy who likes to call himself Happy Cheeks while he munches on Gummy Worms. His name isSANDA, and he's the jolly Father Christmas that we'd all do well to address our wish lists to this season.

I loveSANDA. That much should be obvious based on my reaction to the premiere. To be fair,Science SARU could animate anything, and I would consider it must-see television for the season. The fact that the studio is specifically taking onParu Itagaki's bizarre and deranged buff-boy Santa Claus manga is just a plus.SANDA and Shiori's Uncontrollable Christmas Chronicles won me over after just one episode. The real question, now, is how well the show can keep this momentum going.

One way to make sureSANDA doesn't lose steam is to introduce a proper antagonist, and that's exactly what we get in “Candies, Canes, Kisses, and Blades.” Unfortunately, during Shiori's little bomb stunt last week, their classmate Hitoshi Amaya stuck around and learned everything aboutSANDA's secret new identity. Naturally, Hitoshi's first instinct was to kidnap our heroes and blackmail them with this dirt he's dug up. He's a Naughty List kid, all the way, and he clearly relishes the role of the villain. He also might be a little freak, since his condition for setting the two free is to force Santa and Shiori to make out.

What's funny about this whole scenario is that Shiori doesn't give a damn and aggressively tries to suck on Santa's whiskers, since nothing will stop her from rescuing Ichie. She knows that it's still just regular ol'SANDA underneath all of that muscle and beard stubble. Santa, however, is horrified at the notion of breaking the most sacred trust between Father Christmas and the children he loves, because he'd never love them in that way. Not only does this wacky scenario give the show the chance to demonstrate a situation in which Santa Claus is not afraid of bending a little tyrant over his knee and delivering a deserved ass paddling, it also gives our hero the chance to discover his terrifying new ability to sprout razor-sharp sleigh runners from the bottoms of his feet. You know, because that's definitely a classic Santa Claus feature that everyone would expect to see show up in this story. I remember when Kris Kringle used that very same ability in the old Rankin/Bass stop-motion specials to slice the head off of the Winter Warlock and deliver it to Miss Jessica on a platter. Classic stuff.

Hitoshi isn't the only strange dude thatSANDA and Shiori encounter this week. Hifumi Oshibu is a 92-year-old man whose wrinkled, withering flesh contrasts with his collagen-infused, youthful face. His obsession with youth is another glimpse at the social commentary about society's treatment of childhood and development that Itagaki seems to be infusing into this story. Later on, Hitoshi reveals that his motivation for using naughtiness to bring Santa Claus back is tied directly to the lack of children in this futuristic Japan. It's too early yet to tell ifSANDA's themes will be especially coherent or well-developed, but it's a good sign that the show isn't just relying on the Santa Claus shtick to keep its story going.

While this episode isn't quite as bombastic and thrilling as the first,SANDA's second outing has given me no reason to doubt that this series will be able to make its kooky premise work as a long-form story. I know we haven't even gotten to Halloween yet, butSANDA is coming to town, and it's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas to me.

Well, I can't deny thatSANDA looks kinda cool, but an entirely Christmas-themed show inOctober? I would never be able to bring myself to indulge in that. The season has to be right,otherwise it just weirds me the heck out and—what the hell, is that a DeLorean?

"Chris, it's me: you, from the future! December 2025, specifically! And as someone whowatchedSANDA during the proper season, I'm here to tell you this anime absolutely has the hollyjolly juice! I mean, you and I both know you digParu Itagaki's artistic excess.Studio Orange'streatment ofBEASTARS was an effective translation of her sensibilities, butScience SARU, with thisproject, is showing that they were made to animate her art. The exaggerated character designsdefined by their weighted, inky outlines make the jump to screen effortlessly. Co-lead girlFuyumura has one of my favorite designs we've seen in ages, for one, but then there's Santahimself. There's something so audaciously anime about a shredded Santa Claus whoengages in comically overblown set-piece action that just repeatedly destroys crampedclassrooms.

Chris, me, homie, I need you to understand, it's the audacity, the absurdity, that makesSANDAthe show that this is. It simply wouldn't work the same way if it were about some regular,year-round mythological figure being represented bySANDA's cursed changing heritage. It's thefact that he turns into Santa Claus and busts out with the Power of the Christmas Spirit that makeseverything about this so uproarious. He bellows "HO HO HO" the first time he transforms.There's a dramatic invocation of "Silent Night" when a knife wound dyes his shirt red to fuel thetransformation. He survives an explosion because Santa is impervious to fire on account ofhaving to travel through fireplaces. It's just a bonkers idea of a show that it becomes self-sustaining. I know you think Christmas material outside of December is skin-crawling; I'm you,after all. But take it from me, me, that kind of dissonance is what makes it work, specifically inthis case.

This is a show that wouldn't work if its concept and accompanying presentation weren't asutterly insane as they are—and they reflect the creative insanity ofParu Itagaki herself. I don'tknow why that chicken-headed genius keeps opening her stories with high school murdermysteries, but who am I to doubt her? And I'm amazed at how her story is already consistentlybringing everything—aboutSANDA's powers, how he uses them, and Fuyumura's need for hishelp—back to the Christmassy spirit of granting wishes to children (ridiculous stabbings andschool bombings notwithstanding). Within all that insanity, it really reflects the reason for theseason. Which is when I watched it. In December. In the future. So I'll see you then, butremember,SANDA's worth watching now for anybody who doesn't instinctively start itching alltheir skin off if they hear the sound of sleigh bells outside in the last month of the year! Ho, ho,ho…"

…huh. Well, I guess I can look forward to a pretty crazy Christmas in a couple of months.

Self-inflicted framing devices aside, I can absolutely keep talking aboutSANDA. The sheer absurd quality of it earns it an exception to my regular Christmastime conundrum, and hey, it's going to finish up its season at the end of December anyway, so it's scheduling itself as effectively as I could've reasonably hoped for. Maybe I would've preferred just to binge it all during that month, but this is the game we play with the Preview Guide.

SANDA continues to impress with its second episode. It's significantly heavier in terms of setting, backstory, and resultant theming than the first episode. As nuts as this anime is, it couldn't get by on pure spectacle through its whole run. The spectacle is still there, though. Santa's powers keep popping out ofSANDA, like offensively capable sleigh runners sliding out of his feet in this episode. He slides around and cuts his initials into the ground like a ring-ting-tingling Zorro. I think seeing all the story's interpretations andSANDA's resulting mastery of his yuletide weapons is going to be a key feature of this bonkers narrative.Science SARU has calmed down a little in their rendering of the action around this, partially because there's more exposition happening to supplement it, and also because they're continuing to complement it with other indulgences like a lush, dynamic color palette. I can't believe that the rich oranges and shaking-down shadows alongside all the movement have me using "explosive" to describe aChristmas special that isn'tDie Hard.

Thing is, with a full-length anime series to work with,SANDA's able to dig into the thematics of the holiday season and societal effects in ways most tie-ins to tidings of comfort and joy don't really do. It helps that it's sociologically relevant, directly addressing concerns about Japan's birth rate and economy, with the gonzo Christmas framing that actually makes sense. The writing regards worries about "coddling" children through the lens of necessity rather than societal weakness, balancing out Santa's natural wish to protect children against the creepy resource management of the school's headmaster. And that bizarre introduction is placed against the reveal thatSANDA's roommate, Amaya, is his own brand of weirdo. He takesSANDA captive by tasing him; that poor boy is constantly getting attacked.

That unlike-anything-else aspect ofSANDA makes its merry framing work. Other series might chafe at the zigzagged tension betweenSANDA and Fuyumura. This story clarifies the point thatSANDA's Clausian instincts mean he can't even think of her as a peer anymore. She's willing to do anything, including planting one on his old-man form as a purely pragmatic way to deal with being kidnapped. It makes the relationships in Itagaki's previousBEASTARS look downright normal by comparison, and if I have to celebrate Christmas in October, the least I can ask for is that the show revel in how weird that feels for me. This is an anime that feels fake in the best way, and regardless of the month, I'm so glad something like this actually got made.