With the spring anime season rapidly coming to an end and many of summer’s most anticipated new and returning releases not dropping until July, many anime fans have been forced into an unfortunate limbo while they wait for the new seasonal lineup, but, thankfully, anime streaming services like HIDIVE have massive catalogs of hidden gems and binge-worthy series worth diving into during the early summer months.
Housing everything from JRPG-inspired isekai franchises to laid-back slice-of-life romance series, HIDIVE offers anime fans a mix of unique underground anime trying to break into the mainstream and seasonal blockbusters with massive fanbases around the globe.
1) 2.5 Dimensional Seduction
For anime fans looking to fill the hole left in their hearts while waiting for Season 2 of My Dress Up Darling, 2.5 Dimensional Seduction is another cosplay-focused romance series. Instead of focusing on just developing the relationship between the two leads, though, 2.5 Dimensional Seduction leans far more into harem territory. This, surprisingly, works in the series’ favor: 2.5 Dimensional Seduction follows Masamune Okumura, a loner in his second year of high school who runs the school’s manga club on his own.
In a twist of fate, a first-year student named Lilysa Amano, a passionate cosplayer and manga fan joins the club and pushes Masamune into being her photographer. This eventually leads to more cosplayers joining the club and opening up Masamune’s world to not only get himself out there socially, but, maybe, to fall in love, too. Relatively laid-back but still filled with plenty of fun moments, 2.5 Dimensional Seduction is a quick 24-episode series that’s perfect to add to a summer watchlist.
2) From Bureaucrat to Villainess: Dad’s Been Reincarnated!
One of the funniest and most inventive isekai of the decade, From Bureaucrat to Villainess: Dad’s Been Reincarnated! is a perfect spin on isekai and its extremely popular subgenre, “villainess reincarnation” that follows a salaryman in his 50s after valiantly giving his life to protect a young boy from getting hit by a truck. To his shock, he awakens as the villainess from his daughter’s favorite otome game, Magical Academy: Love & Beast. While he’s familiar with the concept of being dubbed a villainess, the newly reborn Grace Auvergne is unfamiliar with the otome genre and doesn’t seem concerned at all with what his fate may have been in the original game’s story, nor what his natural demeanor as a fatherly salaryman may do in social interactions with other characters in the game’s world.
In a very fun twist, back in the real world, Kenzaburo – the salaryman-turned-villainess – is in a coma. His wife and daughter, back at home, can see everything that he’s doing in the game and try to help him advance with hopes of bringing him home once the game’s story comes to an end. For those looking for the perfect subversion to a popular subgenre of one of the most oversaturated anime genres to date, From Bureaucrat to Villainess: Dad’s Been Reincarnated! is a funny, earnest pick with lots of passion behind it.
3) Flower and Asura
From the same studio behind Mushoku Tensei and Flower and Asura is a gorgeously animated seinen slice-of-life series that desperately deserves a larger fanbase. The series introduces its audience to Hana Haruyama, who, after seeing a recital of An Asura in Spring, develops a passionate adoration for the art of storytelling. Once she makes it to high school, she’s scouted by a fellow student named Mizuki Usurai to join her school’s broadcasting club. While Hana is a bit socially awkward and reluctant, Mizuki supports her as a friend and is constantly find ways to encourage her to continue to develop her performance skills.
With only twelve episodes, Flower and Asura is a powerful exploration of creative passion, and the most powerful way to get your voice out there is to just jump into creating and doing exactly what it is that you love. Handling all this through the art of poetry recital, while niche, gives the audience the opportunity to see themselves in Hana and resonate with her self-doubt and growth as a character throughout the show.
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The Eminence of Shadow
A parody of edgy anime tropes that pushes its isekai premise to hilarious extremes, The Eminence in Shadow very much feels like a love letter to self-aware anime fans who grew up creating insanely over-powered self-inserts, only to realize later in life that they were absolutely ridiculous in the best of ways. The anime follows Minoru Kageno, a young man with ambitions to become an evil mastermind capable of controlling society from the shadows. In true isekai fashion, he’s never able to realize this dream as he’s unceremoniously struck by a truck and wakes up in a fantasy world.
Reborn as Cid Kagenou, the protagonist decides to wear a constant facade of mediocrity and slowly build a shadowy organization of evil-doers and manipulators to gain political power from under the table and seize control over the people of his new world. But, as Cid begins to gain notoriety among other underbelly dwellers, he begins to become increasingly embroiled in greater threats that turn him on the path of almost being a reluctant hero. Silly, edgy, and ridiculous – The Eminence In Shadow’s 32 episodes make a great series to binge casually.
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5) Call of the Night
Based on the smash hit manga by Kotoyama, Call of the Night puts a unique spin on the concept of vampires with some almost shockingly poignant social commentary on today’s youth. The show follows Ko Yamori, an insomniac who regularly goes out on late-night walks to deal with sleeping troubles. One night, he runs into a mysterious young woman who calls herself Nazuna Nanakusa. She quickly reveals herself to be a vampire, and after showing Ko just how good life can be as a permanent night owl, Ko asks his new vampiric friend how to be like her.
Much to his disappointment and frustration, Nazuna reveals that the only way to be turned into a vampire is by falling in love with one. This, of course, results in the naive Ko being determined to fall in love with Nazuna. While the premise may not seem to have much to it on the surface, Call of the Night is an interesting coming-of-age tale that uses its supernatural twist to constantly bring a new challenge to the table for Ko and Nazuna to navigate as they bond.
6) My Instant Death Ability Is So Overpowered, No One in This Other World Stands a Chance Against Me!
One of the most ridiculous isekai titles of all time, My Instant Death Ability is a surprisingly self-aware, over-the-top comedy that opens by showing a bus filled with high school students suddenly being transported to another world and told that they must train to fight demons. Only the strong are favored, and the two students are left behind for being unremarkable in the eyes of the Sage that transported the students, Yogiri Takatou and Tomochika Dannoura, who are left to serve as fodder for a dragon.
In a hilarious – but very much expected – twist, Yogiri is able to instantly kill the dragon, realizing he’s been blessed with an “Instant Kill” ability. While it may lack some deeper exploration of the isekai genre, My Instant Death Ability is infectiously fun for what it is, and for anime fans looking for a bingeable popcorn watch, Yogiri’s adventures are more than worth a watch.
7) The Dangers In My Heart
For anime fans looking to polish off the waiting period between the spring and summer anime seasons, one truly can’t go wrong by binging The Dangers In My Heart, a high school slice-of-life series based on the original manga by Norio Sakurai. The anime follows Kyotaro Ichikawa, an extremely moody teenager who’s isolated himself from his peers and become something of a loner. Combating this is Anna Yamada – a quirky, albeit popular girl from Kyotaro’s class who he regularly fantasizes about killing.
While the series initially throws a very bizarre, and in many ways, concerning curveball at audiences regarding the relationship between its two leads, the development in Anna and Kyotaro’s relationship is absolutely adorable, and as Kyotaro begins to open up socially, his whole world opens in ways he never could have imagined. The Dangers In My Heart is a 25-episode love letter to quirky kids learning how to be themselves amid a bustling society that tries to mold young adults into behaving a certain way socially.
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