The Fall Anime 2025 Preview Guide - Shabake

During the Edo period lives Ichitarō, the young owner of Nagasakiya, one of the largest stores in Nihonbashi. He has been physically weak since birth and is unable to go outside. However, Ichitarō is always surrounded by spirits such as Hakutaku and Inugami, who serve and protect him. One night, Ichitarō sneaks out and witnesses a murder. From that day on, a series of bizarre murders began to occur in Edo. With the help of the spirits, Ichitarō's search for the culprit begins.

Shabake is based on the novel series by writer Megumi Hatakenaka and illustrator Yū Shibata. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Fridays.

The highlight here is the yokai. There are certain ayakashi that pop up repeatedly across many series, like kappa or kitsune, but Shabake's first episode takes care to give us some less familiar faces, and I love that. Sickly Ichitarō can see yokai – possibly because his birth was the result of his mother's prayers to Inari – and otherworldly beings surround him. Two are relatively standard anime features: an inugami and a tsukumogami born from a bell. But the others are much more unique: a hakutaku, a byobu nozomi, and a cluster of tiny yanari. At least those last two are probably rarely seen because of their lore – byobu nozomi are “folding screen peepers,” best known for spying on people over folding screens, and yanari are “house squeakers,” meaning they just make a lot of noise in poorly built wooden houses. (A hakutaku is a particularly brilliant chimera.) Not exactly romantic yokai, or even particularly friendly ones in their lore.

But all bets are off when it comes to Ichitarō. Since his older brother died young, everyone has kept a firm eye on him, and now, in his young adulthood, that's really beginning to grate on him. Two of his yokai friends, Nikichi (hakutaku) and Sasuke (inugami), also serve as his guardians, meant to prevent him from overexerting himself. Still, the byobu nozomi takes his place when he just can't stand it anymore and needs to get out. (The yanari are easily bribed with dango.) And of course, none of them can keep Ichitarō from sneaking out and running headlong into a murderer and then practically tripping over his victim.

This, quite frankly, feels more like an “episode zero” than the first episode of Dusk Beyond the End of the World. It's primarily focused on setting up the characters and their dynamic, establishing Ichitarō's chafing at the restrictions placed upon him and the way he interacts with the yokai around him. It's not really doing much to set up the mystery that this is purported to be, at least not until the very end of the episode. While I still enjoyed it, I did find it dragged a bit, especially in the middle, when Ichitarō was walking around with the bell spirit. The all-brown color scheme doesn't help, especially since the past, Edo period or otherwise, wasn't uniformly sepia and dull green. It's an attempt to create a sense of a long-ago event that really isn't necessary, especially since the scenes of bustling Edo and the work in Ichitarō's family apothecary do the job more than adequately.

Still, I'm curious to see where this goes. I'm a sucker for mysteries, historical fiction, and folklore, so this is very squarely aimed at me. That I didn't love this first episode isn't a great sign, but I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt, if only because I really love the way faces are drawn.

In time for October comes a show that has at least a little bit of spooky spirit stuff going on. Shabake is a period piece starring Ichitarō, who has instigated interactions with a host of classical Japanese spirits and…well, that's basically it so far. This premiere is really not in a rush to do anything apart from introductions of the supernatural cast of critters and barest whiffs of a plot conflict for Ichitarō to involve them in. That doesn't necessarily have to be a bad thing. Better shows have been predicated on less, and a story like this can absolutely get by on vibes if it has them. Shabake doesn't really have that vibe, though it's not critically failing at this moment either. It's a perfectly cromulent ghost story, and might even blossom into something cool if it can find its verve.

Ichitarō is solidly sympathetic, if nothing else. His grappling with his chronic condition isn't what gets him down so much as the fact that so many of his attendants don't really let him do anything because of it. Even after treatment that seems to have mitigated most of his issues and having been raised by a couple of cute spirit guys, he's still handled delicately, not allowed to do anything for himself. It's an ironic parallel to the gods and spirits watching over him to help him grow up healthy, that now he's so closely monitored that he can't do anything but sit around and keep his health. That's a functional character point, if anything, and seeing Ichitarō willingly pushing against it gives the plot its most basic vestiges of momentum.

I am kind of curious about what's here—the details of how Ichitarō became acquainted with all the different spirits in his orbit, who the mysterious guy he's sneaking off to see is, and what exactly's going on with the apparent murder mystery that this episode cuts off. These are functional hooks for a mystery/drama/whatever this show is going to be. And not for nothing, but plenty of the spirits themselves are pretty cute. I'd stick around for another episode or two to learn more about what's going on with that Byoubu Nozoki fella. But therein lies the issue of presenting all these characters and critters to the viewer at once without providing too much detail. I feel like I hardly know anything about, say, Suzuhikohime apart from her kind of cute design and propensity for exposition.

The direction and overall look of Shabake are similarly functional without being overbearing, hence the lack of vibes. The sequence of Ichitarō fleeing the stabby vagrant has a solid amount of tension to it that almost fits the style of the spooky season. More of that would drive up the appeal of a series like this. As-is, it's extremely fine, which is too bad given that this is the sort of project that would thrive if it had more of its own flavor coming through. Much like Ichitarō wishes he could do, the Shabake will be better if it's allowed to cut loose, to stretch its wings, to do more of its own thing.