Admittedly, a lot of us had ignored anime series for a long time (a lot of us reduced the genre to what I knew from my childhood: Mila Superstar, The Kickers, Sailor Moon and Pokémon). However, most of us have changed that in recent years, caught up on a few classics and now follow with great interest what’s new. So we recently came across the Beastars series which is a massive hit among fans. It’s based on a popular Japanese manga and already has two seasons under its belt. Fans of the series have been yearning for a new season and we have got the updates for you. Let’s get started.
Beastars Season 3: All You Need To Know
What happens in Beastars?
The action takes place in an unnamed city where animals of all species live together. Carnivores and herbivores, hunting and prey animals. Similar to Disney’s “Zootopia”. It’s just that Beastars is much more realistic, that is to say, darker. Because, unlike Disney, despite the appropriate laws, herbivores are repeatedly killed and eaten by carnivores. Such incidents are then widely discussed in the media and terrify the herbivore community.
Which are some of the prominent characters of the series?
Series protagonist of Beastars: Gray Wolf Legoshi. The story begins when a student, Tem, an alpaca, is killed and eaten at Cherryton High School one night. The focus of the plot and also of the suspicious students is in the following on the young gray wolf Legoshi, who is incredibly at odds with himself and his role in this society. He knew Tem from the school’s drama club, which is about to have its annual performance. At the same time, the older student Haru, a snow bunny, is introduced to the plot. She appears to be an outsider, as she is seen for the first time eating her dinner alone outside of the cafeteria while being bullied by three other students. Oddly enough, Haru doesn’t seem particularly concerned. One night, Legoshi and Haru cross paths on campus. What happens there will not be revealed (spoilers!), but here an old motif – hare and wolf – is taken up and expanded with facets that usually do not appear in this context.
What makes Beastars special?
The refreshing thing about the series is that while it’s all about animals, it raises deeply human questions: How can society function? To what extent are the individual’s actions determined by his biology? What space may be given to one’s own impulses and drives without making oneself guilty? What is morality? What does it mean to be perceived in a certain way in society? And how do you perceive yourself at all?
The trailer for the series. But don’t worry, this show is also available in Japanese for the subs over dubs purists.
Despite all the adverse social circumstances, the main characters are concerned with realizing themselves. Legoshi, who is read as a wolf, likes to stay in the background, tries not to frighten his classmates unnecessarily and devotedly takes care of his pet – a tiny little beetle. None of this helps him in a toxic environment. Haru struggles with the fact that as a herbivore she is a classic prey and flight animal. Since her life can end at any time, she tries to live in the here and now, at the moment, as best she can. She does this best during sex. The way her classmates treat her illustrates very well what is behind the term “slutshaming”.
As the series progresses, we learn more and more about the past of the main characters, which makes their actions easier to understand. It’s very nice to be able to suddenly understand the same character traits that were confusing and surprising at the beginning. Especially the inner monologues are graphically beautifully and originally implemented so that they clearly stand out from the rest of the plot.
Beastars is an anime adaptation of a shonen manga, which means it is primarily aimed at a male and youth audience. These often have a male protagonist who lives in a world with which the target group can more or less identify. This also explains why there are only a few female characters who appear in the plot at all and who are introduced in more detail. The series would probably not pass the Bechdel test, because both Haru and the gray wolf Juna, who appears in the further course, play a role mainly because of their relationship with Legoshi.
Especially since the society that is drawn is conservative through and through. Consumption of pornographic material is stigmatized as perverse even by peers. Discipline and duty permeate every corner of high school—whether it’s academic demands or the expectations of the next drama club performance. On the one hand, we would have wished that the series could have been done without all that. On the other hand, we wonder if what was special about her would then be even more special.
Where can you watch Beastars?
The multiple award-winning manga series “Beastars” tells of a fragile anthropomorphic society. The anime adaptation recently started streaming on Netflix. Some characters in “Beastars” are also externally inspired by real people.
In the whodunit psychological thriller “Beastars”, the Japanese illustrator Paru Itagaki explores the animosity among predatory and prey animals. The deadly attack on an alpaca deeply shakes the already suspicious co-existence of carnivores and herbivores at a school.
Who has the alpaca stallion Tem on his conscience? The police suspect that one of the carnivores at school and thus one of his classmates was the perpetrator. The gentle gray wolf Legoshi also belongs to the group of suspects, because he is not only the lighting technician at the theater company, to which Tem also belonged, but was also a good friend of the victim.
Has he perhaps succumbed to his true nature and feasted on the helpless herbivore? From now on, the already suspicious herbivores approach their carnivorous classmates even more cautiously. Rumors are circulating. And Legoshi? Regardless of the circumstances, he’s trying to do one last favor for his friend Tem.
A predator in emotional chaos
Shortly after the murder, which has not yet been solved, Legoshi also meets Haru, a delicate rabbit girl who triggers conflicting feelings in the large predator. He feels drawn to her and even wants to devour her whole body.
Friend or foe?
Did his instincts actually take over or is there another reason Haru is attracted to him? Haru, on the other hand, believes that, as always, he is simply dealing with an impulsive young male and makes the gray wolf a clear offer.
Legoshi isn’t the big bad wolf we know from fairy tales, and yet one last doubt remains as to whether a monster isn’t slumbering within him. He himself struggles with his natural instincts.
It is precisely this contrast between his apparently peaceful character and his frightening appearance that makes Paru Itagaki’s character so interesting.
Everyone is different and that’s a good thing
The promiscuous dwarf rabbit Haru acts as a counterpoint in the manga series. The Phytophage Girl is not a dedicated Judy Hopps. She is a confident, brave rabbit who cares little about conventions and categories, let alone racial and class boundaries.
Unlike Legoshi, she wishes to act according to her instincts. This puts her in an outsider position in this adapted but fragile society.
For Paru Itagaki, a good story always makes for a consistent theme. According to a statement in an interview, “Beastars” is about the message: “Everyone is different and that’s a good thing”.
In addition to the two main characters, there are countless emotionally well-crafted characters in “Beastars” such as the influential red deer buck Louis and the buddy Labrador male Jack.
They are all unmistakable, not least because Paru Itagaki also has real-life role models for her characters, such as the French actor Mathieu Amalric for Legoshi, whose expressive face is unmistakably reflected in the features of the gray wolf.
Nevertheless, typical animal behaviors such as the anxious flattening of the ears appear natural in the humanized creatures and this is primarily due to Paru Itagaki’s drawing skills.
The artist uses a loose, lively line that is reminiscent of children’s book illustrations and draws her comic pages in the same way, often designing the patterns and backgrounds by hand and using raster foil, especially for surfaces, decoration and the play of light and shadow.
How many volumes of the manga are there?
In Japan, there are already 22 volumes. Her style dispenses with clean perfection and, with its sketchiness, comes close to the works of classic Japanese Gekiga artists, without neglecting the modern visual language. Paru Itagaki also always follows her belief that a good page layout should contain a locating panel that allows the reader to understand the situation.
The multi-award-winning manga series, which already comprises 17 volumes in Japan, was adapted into an anime TV series of the same name by the Japanese anime developer Studio Orange recently. A second season followed soon enough. Netflix secured worldwide broadcasting rights. The series has been running there since March.
Beastars is a shonen manga streamed since October 2019. The manga is drawn by Paru Itagaki. She is the daughter of Keisuke Itagaki, who is best known internationally for Baki the Grappler. But she had kept her identity as his daughter hidden for a long time and only revealed it after she had celebrated success on the market with Beastars, her first long series.
Has Beastars won awards?
In 2019, the manga was adapted into an anime. Itagaki was also able to win numerous prizes for the series. In 2018 she received the Manga Taisho Award and Young Artist Award at the Osamu Tezuka Culture Prize. She also received the award for Best Shonen Manga at the 42nd Kodansha Manga Awards.
What disrupts the peace in Beastars?
The peaceful coexistence of herbivores and carnivores at Cherryton School is disrupted by a beastly event: Alpaca Tem has been killed! The new atmosphere can be felt in the theater group in which Tem was a member, and there are rifts between the members. Gray wolf Legoshi in particular is viewed with suspicion. Legoshi is as tame as a lamb and wants nothing more than to live peacefully with the other animals. Little does he know that Tem’s death was just the beginning of something big.
A world in which there is a fragile peace between the herbivores and carnivores is the setting of this story. Cherryton High is a school that caters to both predators and herbivores. Our protagonist Legoshi is a gray wolf who tries to attract as little attention as possible – he doesn’t want to scare off his classmates with his appearance. But tragedy strikes: Tem the alpaca is murdered, fueling resentment between the carnivores and herbivores at Cherryton High. Who is behind this horrific crime? As if that wasn’t causing enough excitement, Legoshi seems to be taking a keen interest in the cute dwarf rabbit, Haru. Can this go well?
What initially sounds like a school mystery thriller with a touch of romance develops into a very profound and multifaceted story. We were honestly surprised at how quickly we were captivated by the unusual characters. The story is thought-provoking because you can draw parallels between the problems that prevail in the world around Legoshi and his friends and the problems of our own society.
Even if the drawing style seems more sketchy than some, it is very fascinating how the mangaka manages to give the animals so much expression and feeling. All in all, the interplay of drawings and story is very coherent.
It doesn’t take long for you to notice that everything here has been thought through very carefully. The twists and turns of the first volumes and the further development of the characters definitely make you want to read on. We look forward to each new volume in this series.
You shouldn’t be put off by the animal characters and give the whole thing a chance. The series deserves all the hype it has been receiving (and then some). There’s a lot more to it than meets the eye.
Will there be a season 3 for Beastars?
If you love Beastars, you will be thrilled to know that the popular anime series has been renewed for its third season. While Beastars was marketed as a “Netflix Original Anime Series”, the streaming giant just held the international broadcasting rights. The decision to renew or cancel the show was in the hands of Studio Orange and the Japanese broadcast partners. Thankfully, the show had enough of a fan following for the studio to renew it for a third season.
While that’s great news, it shouldn’t really come as a surprise to the fans of the show. After all, there are numerous volumes to choose from and the show’s immense popularity ensured that the showrunners will be interested in making another season.
How popular is Beastars?
While Netflix has always been notorious for withholding official viewership stats, the anthropomorphic anime series is incredibly popular worldwide. It has a score of 7.9/10 on MyAnimeList with over 140,000 reviews. The manga series also has a lot of volumes so it’s not like the showrunners have a shortage of source material to make the series. A lot of times, running out of source material leads to a lot of shows being cancelled. That isn’t even remotely the case with Beastars so far.
Season 2 of Beastars ended with the story hovering around chapter 99 in the 12th volume of the manga. Currently, there are 196 chapters and 22 volumes of the manga. So there is clearly enough material that can be adapted for new seasons.
When will Beastars season 3 be released?
When it was announced that Beastars had been renewed for its third season, the release date wasn’t announced to the world. However, based on the production schedule of the previous seasons, it can be estimated that fans will be able to enjoy season 3 of this incredible anime series sometime in 2022.
Keen fans would’ve noticed that this might coincide with the spring anime slate. However, that is applicable to Japanese broadcasters only who usually premiere it before the rest of the world sees it on Netflix. Netflix usually releases the Beastars seasons a few months after the domestic finales. So if Beastars Season 3 arrives in Japan in spring 2022, Netflix subscribers can expect to see it by fall of 2022. It was also revealed recently that the third season of Beastars will be its last, regardless of how much longer the manga series goes.