A New Anime Stars a Character Who Transforms Into Buff Santa Claus, and It Seems Pretty Good

By Elijah Gonzalez | October 7, 2025 | 9:50am

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A New Anime Stars a Character Who Transforms Into Buff Santa Claus, and It Seems Pretty Good

As a firm believer that the December holidays should be kept in their own month, not to be discussed or gestured at until Thanksgiving is well in the rear-view mirror, it’s with great reluctance that I break that rule to talk about an early contender for the most interesting newcomer of the fall anime season: Sanda, a show about a kid who can magically transform into a very buff Santa Claus.

In many ways, the standout element of the show is right there on the tin: like Ultraman, Sailor Moon, the Power Rangers, or any number of Heshin heroes, our protagonist, Kazushige Sanda, can shift into a superpowered form. But instead of turning into a spandexed crusader for justice, his metamorphosis results in him becoming Kris Kringle, white beard, “ho, ho hos,” and all. It is a ridiculous premise, but one that the first episode of Sanda approaches with a mixture of intentional absurdity and surprisingly effective sincerity, as it introduces us to the messed-up teenagers at the core of this story.

Things begin in media res with the seemingly unfortunate line, “You know, a girl’s butt is colder than I imagined?” as our protagonist, Sanda, almost gets stabbed by a girl who has him pinned down. He’s being accosted by his co-classroom representative, Shiori Fuyumura, a girl whose sunken eyes and lanky physique make her look like she dropped in from a Tim Burton production.

sanda premiere

Much like us, Sanda is confused about why he’s about to end up on the evening news, because up until now, he and his classmate have had an amiable, if admittedly unremarkable, relationship. Luckily for our protagonist, this murder session is interrupted when another classmate shows up to school, prompting us to eventually get an explanation of what’s going on and why. It turns out that Fuyumura is convinced that Sanda is a “descendant of Santa Claus” who will transform if the right conditions are met. One of these conditions is wearing the color red (which Sanda refuses to do), hence the attempted stabbing. She needs this legendary Christmas figure to be real so she can save her best friend, Ichie Ono, who suddenly went missing several months ago—in this world where the tradition of Christmas has been abandoned, she seems to think that Santa Claus is basically a superhero who will stop at nothing to ensure a child’s wish is fulfilled.

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After Sanda refuses to put on a red tracksuit, Fuyumura finally catches him with her knife, turning his white school uniform very red. After a beat where she assumes she’s made a horrible mistake, she gets the answer she was looking for: Sanda is, in fact, a descendant of Santa Claus. He transforms into the beefy old man (who thankfully has regenerative powers) with a shirt-ripping flex. Despite almost being mortally wounded, Sanda, seemingly fully in Kris Kringle mode, resolves to deliver Fuyumura the ultimate present by tracking down her missing bestie.

If there’s something that immediately makes this oddball premise work, it’s Science Saru’s animation chops. The studio, known for a long list of visual stunners, such as Dandadan, Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!, and more, makes the most of this premiere, even while saving the animation fireworks until the end. Here, the world is portrayed in a scratchy art style defined by white, black, and red, hammering home the Christmas motif while also channeling the feel of an off-kilter children’s fairy tale.

Fuyumura’s design is particularly excellent, her combat boots and imposing stature eventually giving way to a sentimental flashback which serves as the heart of this first episode. Sure, she was trying to stab Sanda a minute ago in a very yandere fashion (the worst of the -deres), and she accidentally bombs their classroom later (it’s a whole thing), but her motivation is an achingly sincere one: she just wants her friend back. In a brief sequence that depicts her past, the color palette changes entirely, as a bright aesthetic represents the bright presence that Ono was in her life. Her companion promises to spend next Christmas together—it is very cute! And between Fuyumura’s many blushes, the unambiguously romantic duck boat date between her and Ono in the ED, and the fact that the story’s author, mangaka Paru Itagaki, has had LGBT+ characters in her stories before, it is entirely possible there’s a sapphic angle here, adding extra dramatic heft to Fuyumura’s goal of finding someone that’s seemingly been abandonded by everyone else.

As for Sanda, he’s there too, I guess! In all seriousness, one interesting angle to our protagonist is how deeply he doesn’t want to transform into Santa. Regardless of whether it’s meant as a stand-in for conveying the difficulties of puberty and reaching adulthood—something rather hilariously emphasized when Sanda remarks on how he now has old man eyesight—or is supposed to represent how kids never want to stand out from the crowd, the fact that the main character transforms into a yoked Father Christmas is quite funny and the show knows it.

Perhaps most impressively, the premiere also manages to actually be sort of cool when it wants to, as best represented by the animation flex that comes near the end of the episode. After Fuyumura forgets that she strapped a bomb to herself (to force Sanda to transform again), Santa Claus takes the blast. As his silhouette is engulfed in flame, the visuals take on the kind of loose, expressive aesthetic that Science Saru is known for, representing the chaotic nature of fire with similarly chaotic linework. As the straining form in the middle of the blaze expresses their resolve to rescue Ono, they extinguish the fire in a flex of winter cheer highlighted by a splash of red and white—again, it’s very silly, but the over-the-top spectacle of all it all makes this climax unironically adrenaline-pumping.

At this point, do I have a good grasp on Sanda’s greater narrative ambitions? Honestly, not really. Will this be a mystery story, as our central pair track down clues, or an action series where a yoked-out Santa beats up bad guys? I do not know. The (mostly) good news here is that Paru Itagaki of Beastars fame wrote the manga—while Beastars has some off-putting elements and the ending is generally considered not great, it made for a largely entertaining ride with some incredible moments. While Sanda may draw viewers in with the ridiculousness of its premise, it’s the affecting emotional hook from its overly stab-happy deuteragonist that has me interested in coming back for more. Oh, and Science Saru’s ability to convincingly animate a superhuman Santa Claus certainly helps too.

Elijah Gonzalez is an associate editor for Endless Mode. In addition to playing the latest, he also loves anime, movies, and dreaming of the day he finally gets through all the Like a Dragon games. You can follow him on Bluesky @elijahgonzalez.bsky.social.