Bucchigiri?!

 Bucchigiri?! (ぶっちぎり?!) is an original 12 episode shonen comdey anime created by Kishimoto Taku and produced by MAPPA.  The anime originally aired during the 2024 Winter season.

     Tomoshibi Arajin returns to his hometown to find is overflowing with juvenile delinquents.  His high school life will be quite difficult surrounded by threatening muscle bound, fight obsessed men, but a cute girl in his class gets his attention and sends flutters through his heart.  The girl, Jin Mahoro, has ulterior motives in mind and invites him to a date only to have her brother Jin Marito challenge him to a fight before his gang.  Little does Marito suspect, Arajin has a secret weapon at his disposal.  A local legend exists around a race of super beings who imbue their strength to worthy individuals, honki, or genies.  Revaling it as a child, hes waved it away as the fantasies of youth.  While attempting to evade being beaten by members of a different gang, he hides in an abandoned shrine which is at the center of the legends.  As he desperately tries to defend himself he sets off an event that leads to the vessel of a genie named Seya to be embedded in him.  The genie appears, eager to merge with the weak young boy and become a legendary brawler.  Arajin tries to escape the genie and his strange expectations but is unable to.  While facing down the older and stronger Marito, Arajin agrees to join forces with the genie in order to lose his virginity.  Powers granted, the physically inferior Arajin delivers a clean shot on his opponent winning both his safety and respect.

    Arajin's childhood friend, Asamine Mataraka, is excited for the boy he admired to return.  He is desperate to rekindle their friendship and have him join him in the pursuit to be a honki.  Arajin wants nothing to do with him, brushing him off at every turn, focused only on dating Mahoro.  Marito is impressed with the new kid and invites him to be a member of his gang, the rival to Mataraka's gang.  Arajin, wanting only to be close to Mahoro, eagerly agrees to the invitation, pleasing Senya.  Senya only wants to fully merge with the boy and take on the mantle of honki, seeing the sudden immersion into youth gang life as the perfect outlet.  Arajin doesn't suspect anything form anyone and is purely driven by sexual desire.  When rival factions start to set up a major conflict between his school two gangs, he finds himself in the middle of what might become a blood bath.  But the real fuel behind the carnage is Senya and a another jinn with a rivalry for the ages.

    This is a strange anime all around.  Its a story about gangs of savage high school kids, most of which you can't take seriously because of how over the top their appearance and personalities are.  Then you toss in a tale around two jinn souls who have traveled time and space to continue their rivalry in modern Japan.  Not to mention the homeroom teacher who frequents a hostess club at every opportunity as a side story.  Arajins mom is ridiculous, hand waving everything that shows up at hr doorstep as a natural part of adolescence.  AT its core its about Arajin trying to come to terms with his own inadequacies and the guilt he struggles to express about his past.  Its a world were authority doesn't exist and hooligans are free to do whatever they want, with only their twisted honor as a safety mechanism.

    I had a lot of fun with this show.  The artwork is amusing and the directing goes a long way to enhance the absurdity of the story.  It is not as joke laden or brain melting as Cromartie High, but it is a good choice for fans of that older show.  A show about super naturally powered delinquents who are trying to straighten out personal issues that aren't earth shattering for anyone not living their world is best served with a smile.  If this series took its self seriously it would be boring and uninspired.  Instead it winks at the audience and gives us a ridiculous damn near steamy yaoi action comedy.  Tell me this isn't a boys love story...I dare you.

The series is available on Crunchyroll.