The Fall 2023 Anime Preview Guide

SHY

Earth was on the brink of a third World War when super-powered individuals came forth from each country around the globe, ending the conflict and ushering in a new era of relative peace. Among those heroes, Japan is represented by a timid young girl known as "Shy." She may spend more time worrying about her own shortcomings than she does battling villains, but she'll show the world that despite it all, she still has the heart of a hero.

SHY is based on a manga of the same name by Bukimi Miki. The anime series is streaming on Crunchyroll on Mondays.

There's a reason that Spider-Man is the most popular superhero in the world—and has been for years. It's not because he's the strongest, smartest, or has the best powers. It's not because he has the most dynamic villains or the best supporting cast. In fact, many other heroes overshadow him in all those areas. What makes Spider-Man so popular isn't the “Spider” but the “Man” behind it: Peter Parker.

Peter is no different from any of us. He worries about money, love, and job security. He struggles with work-life balance—in addition to all the issues that come from being a hero. Yet, every day, he puts on the costume—and often fights threats far above his weight class—because it is the right thing to do. Because he has the power to help—which brings us to Shy.

Shy is a similar story. Teru, a 14-year-old girl has been given superpowers and is doing her best to be the hero she is expected to be. Of course, the big problem is that she suffers from crippling social anxiety. If things weren't stressful enough, she is the only superhero in Japan and so her every mistake and misstep is talked about extensively on SNS and in the media. The deck is stacked against her from the start.

Yet, despite all this, Teru wants to be a hero—to use her powers to help people. What destroys her spirit in this episode isn't people badmouthing her, it's the one person she was unable to keep safe. Teru is a literal child. She doesn't have the maturity or support network needed to get her through the endless stream of what-ifs: “What if I had done this or that?” “What if she dies because of my actions?” “What if I make an even worse mistake next time?”

Yet, when it comes down to it when seeing a person in danger, Teru runs to save them—even without her powers. She may never be able to fully accept the idea of not being able to save everyone but she can't stop being a hero. It's not the powers that make her one; it's the noble soul inside her. And that's what makes her a character I'm dying to see more of.

I have rarely gotten so angry on a character's behalf so quickly. Shy, an appropriately named young superheroine, is put in the unenviable position of being the only first responder equivalent at an amusement park when a roller coaster gets stuck on the top of a loop, trapping all the riders upside down. She leaps into action, even though she was throwing up from nerves just a moment before, but she fails to get the last person out before the ride begins moving again. Immediately, all the media outlets jump on the poor kid for "not saving everyone." Apart from the fact that this isn't even a true statement – Shy does stop the cars, it's just that the girl is injured – it's also a horrible thing to do to the one person who was trying to help…and did help, because no one died. Sure, no one knows that Shy is a fourteen-year-old girl named Teru, but the inherent unfairness is enough to make you scream. And since this happens within roughly the first eight minutes, that's a darn good hook.

Unfortunately, I didn't feel the same level of emotion for the entire episode. Pepesha, a Russian superhero who goes by Spirit, sucks all of the tension out of the scene when she arrives in Teru's bedroom. Granted, that's the intention – Spirit seems to be the comedy relief more than Teru's emotional support. It's just that having her pop up, be silly, and then leave while Teru grapples with the emotional fallout of being dragged through the media doesn't do much for the episode or the character. This kid is so distraught that she's even lost the ability to transform; she doesn't need someone stopping by with bad metaphors; she needs a person to tell her they understand and help her work through her emotions. She does get that later when the little brother of the roller coaster victim (who she saved) shows up at a disaster scene wearing a Shy hoodie, but the space in between those two moments could have been better utilized than by introducing Spirit. She's Teru/Shy's friend, yes, but she's just not helping the narrative with her introduction.

And what is that narrative? That's not easy to say. Spirit knows more about why superheroes appear than Teru does, and there's something that feels very untrustworthy about Unilord, the alien "in charge of" Earth's superheroes. (Maybe it's the fact that her face is fully covered? How does she breathe?) Unilord says that something nebulously bad is coming for Earth based on the darkness of people's hearts. Shy needs to be able to fight, especially since the implication seems to be that she's the only superhero in Japan…at least, so far. I'm intrigued but not yet completely sold, but Teru is such a believable, anxious person that I'm willing to give this another episode because I want her to find a way to believe in herself.

It's a weird time for me as a lifelong fan of superheroes. The media landscape is more flooded with these stories than ever before, yet that volume has only diluted what made the best of the subgenre unique. For every series or movie that captures what I like about cape comics, dozens exist solely to fill in the margins of a cinematic universe or continuity I stopped feeling attached to long ago. So whenever a story can make me tear up like SHY did with this premiere, I know it's worth holding onto.

Much of my affection comes down to how well-realized our heroine is. The way Teru's anxiety – and her fear that it will define her for the rest of her life – is articulated feels very real. It's not just that she gets shy (get it?) around strangers, but that she constantly feels the pressure of others judging her, anticipating the worst, and internalizing any negative attention far more readily than the positives. That's a paralyzing force when you're just an anonymous kid, but when coupled with the responsibilities of being a superhero, suddenly, it feels like every eye in the world is staring derisively down at her. Yet allowing that pressure to crush her means losing literal lives through inaction, building the pressure higher and higher in a shame death spiral. On that same note, seeing her stand up again and face not just physical danger but her internalized fears is a triumphant moment of catharsis. It's a fantastic character arc to follow through this first episode and punctuates all the superheroics with a distinctly human element that gives these stories their actual impact.

The production is equally impactful, courtesy of director Masaomi Andō's signature touch. He's adapted his love of on-screen paneling and cutaways to approximate the style of a classic comic book, complete with signature sound effects and logo sequences. What's more, the attention to mood and atmosphere that characterized Scum's Wish and Astra Lost in Space is in full force here, capturing the heroic highs and despondent lows of Teru's conflict. It works beautifully, granting a level of gravitas that a more typical approach might have missed. The action in this episode is short but reads cleanly and delivers the tension of a high-stakes emergency well.

It all comes together for a stellar introduction that feels like it could build towards something special. I haven't felt this immediately gripped by a superhero story since the opening chapters of My Hero Academia, and anyone who knows my feelings on that series will understand just how high of praise that is. This is the good shit, y'all; an easy recommendation even in a stacked season like this one.

So far as your basic Marvel/DC-style superhero story goes, Shy does a pretty okay job. It's got good production values, solid character designs, and it moves through all of the beats of the “Discouraged hero loses their powers and throws away the towel…until they don't, anymore!” story with no muss and no fuss. If what you need this fall is a slice of Western-comics styled super-heroics with an incredibly anime protagonist (you know, aside from that other one), then Shy will probably be a decent way to kill a half hour every week, though it is impossible to tell if there will be a lot more that it can offer just yet.

If anything is going to determine the audience's reception of this show, it would be whether they can vibe with the titular superheroine. Protagonists with crippling social anxiety that is played mostly for comedy are a dime-a-dozen these days, weirdly enough, though I don't know how well Shy's particular hang-up mesh with the comic-book adventures of the story she is in. She's not unlikable, per se, but I can't deny that I found myself getting a little annoyed at her “woe is me" routine in the face of not being able to prevent that girl on the faulty roller-coaster from getting injured. This is hardly a novel storyline for a superhero story to cover — I'm pretty sure it's become the running joke of Peter Parker's life, at this point — but you usually need to earn that pathos over a lot of storytelling time. Making this the first impression of Shy that we get, though? She's no Ms. Marvel, that's all I'm saying.

Still, I also can't help but feel like there's something this premiere isn't telling us. The oddly convenient way that Shy finds herself thrust into perilous situations; that creepy little kid that's always hanging in the background; the way that the drunk Russian lady seductively convinces Shy that the mother in that burning building didn't die when I am pretty damned sure that we saw her get roasted to a crisp…I dunno. It could be me just getting my hopes up, but maybe Shy will have more than just the usual twists up its sleeve to keep things interesting. Time will tell!