Best Song: “Sayonara Jinrui” by Sakurako and MuuMuu  – (Uchuujin MuuMuu ED1)

It may be a bit of a cheat to choose a remake of an old song for this category, but best is best and I loved this take (with help from Kuricorder Quartet) of Tama’s 1990 hit. Not only a great cut but totally fits the mood of the show.
Honorable Mention: “Shimajin no Takara ” by Hina and Kana (Okinawa de Suki ni Natta Ko ga Hougen Sugite Tsurasugiru ED), “Kensou” by Sheeno Mirin featuring Aile the Shota (Dekin no Mogura  ED)

Best Soundtrack: Uchuujin MuuMuu

Never was a badn better suited to deliver an anime soundtrack than Kuricorder Quartet with Uchuujin MuuMuu (which sweeps the first two awards of the night). This is their second win, having also blown away the field in 2012 for Tsuritama. It’s impossible to listen to Kuricorder and be in a bad mood – there’s nothing like them.
Honorable Mention: Wandance, Okinawa de Suki ni Natta Ko ga Hougen Sugite Tsurasugiru

Best Original Screenplay: Apocalypse Hotel

Every year of late I consider dropping this category, because we just don’t get enough good original anime most years to make it competitive. For 2025 I have to give it to Apocalypse Hotel, a good show but not one for which writing was especially its strength. And I’m hard-pressed to come up with any runners-up because I only managed to finish a couple of original series.
Honorable Mention: None

Best Adapted Screenplay: Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu

As always the more competitive category (all ten in the top 10 this year were manga adaptations). The Summer Hikaru Died gets the nod for doing a really admirable job of communicating the same suffocating tension as the manga through different means (part of the credit goes to the direction too, obviously).
Honorable Mention: Boku no Hero Academia: Final Season, Dandadan Season 2

Best Art Direction: Ogura Hiromasa (Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun 2)

A look at some of the anime Ogura Hiromasa has done art direction or backgrounds on is truly astonishing for both breath and quality. FLCL, Spirited Away, Summer Wars, Kuroshitsuji, 91 Days – it just does on and on. This was one of the strongest categories in a reasonably strong anime year, but Hanako-kun was so gorgeous, so surreal, so alive visually that I couldn’t possibly go in any other direction. It was a great season for a great series and Ogura’s work was a big part of that.
Honorable Mention: Dandadan Season 2, Dekin no Mogura, Gachiakuta, Sanda

Best Animation: Gachiakuta

This is not a walkover the way it has been some years. But on balance I think Bones comes out on top with Gachiakuta. You know the baseline for their work is always going to be high, and this isn’t the only Bones series that was in the running. But Gachiakuta does the best job of pairing sakuga with stylistic flair and that’s what puts it over the top for me.
Honorable Mention: Boku no Hero Academia: Final Season, Apocalypse Hotel

Best Character Design: Tanabe Youko (Dekin no Mogura)

This is always a bit of a tricky category, given that most of the nominees are working off existing manga designs. But Eguchi Natsumi’s visual style is so unique that it’s hard to capture the essence of it on-screen. She’s been lucky in getting great adaptations for both her major works, though, and Dekin no Mogura is Brain’s Base’s best work in a decade, probably. Now how about a second season?
Honorable Mention: Sanda, Gachiakuta

Best Supporting Actress: Sakamoto Maaya as Rafal (Chi. Chikyuu no Undou ni Tsuite)

You can pretty much pencil in Sakamoto as at least a nominee for any role she takes on (and she’s a great singer, too), but she really excels playing young boys too smart for their own good. Rafal was the bookend for Orb and although his return for the final arc was a bit (well, a giant bit) of a head-scratcher, Sakamoto was consistently superb in the role. She carried the series for the first few episodes, setting a tone that would lift it for much of its run.
Honorable Mention: Kusunoki Tomori asi as Miyao Nemu (Witch Watch), Kowaka Wakana as Kurebayashi Rie (Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu)

Best Supporting Actor: Kiuchi Hidenobu as Tenkubashi Wataru (Uchuujin MuuMuu)

Three statues for Uchuujin MuuMuu is quite a thing, and makes me wonder if I undersold it in the year-end top 20 list. I loved everything about veteran Kiuchi’s performance as Tenkubashi, in many ways the stealth main plot driver of the series. He’s funny, formidable, sad, and pathetic in turn, never losing an ounce of authenticity along the journey. The essence of a great supporting performance.
Honorable Mention: Yamaji Kazuhiro as Harmageddon (Apocalypse Hotel), Miki Shin’ichirou as Environment Checker Robot (Apocalypse Hotel)

Best Actress: Wakayama Shion as Ayase Momo (Dandadan Season 2)

I could oh so very easily have given Sakamoto Maaya the sweep here for Kuroshitsuji, and objectively I probably should – her work as Ciel was as great this season as it’s ever been (and that’s a high bar). But there’s something to be said for spreading it around, and Wakayama’s turn as Momo in Dandadan is really deserving of recognition. She captures the Momo of the page so perfectly it’s an utterly seamless transition.
Honorable Mention: Sakamoto Maaya as Ciel Phantomhive (Kuroshitsuji), Ogata Megumi as Hanako-kun (Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun 2), Shiraishi Haruka as Kujirai Reiko (Kowloon Generic Romance)

Best Actor: Nakamura Yuuichi as Mogura Momoyuki (Dekin no Mogura) 

Best character of the year, best actor – the synergy works. Mogura is a pretty unique figure in modern anime. He’s a man of tremendous depth, full of internal conflict, and someone whose public persona belies who he truly is. It’s too easy to dismiss largely comic performances against “dramatic” ones, but both are brutally difficult and here, Nakamura passes back-and-forth without a hitch.
Honorable Mention: Uchiyama Kouki as Kotani Kaboku (Wandance), Yamashia Daiki as Midoriya Izuku (Boku no Hero Academia: Final Season), Umeda Shuuichirou as Indou Hikaru (Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu), Kobayashi Chiaki as Tsujinuka Yoshiki (Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu)

Best Director: Takeshita Ryouhei, Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu

It was a great year for Cygames, which went into 2025 as a relative unknown quantity for anime and emerged as a rising star. Takeshita Ryouhei is not a big name, and while his resume is extensive it consists mostly of lesser roles. But he did a pretty flawless job directing Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu, a tough project to transition from the page to the screen. When you watch this series as a manga reader you appreciate how every decision, every innovation was the right choice. If Cygames is now a name to watch, Takeshita-sensei’s certainly is too.
Honorable Mention: Suganuma Fumihiko (Gachiakuta), Fukui Youhei (Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun 2)

Best Romance: Kao ni Denai Kashiwada-san to Kao ni Deru Oota-kun

After a couple good years for anime romance (2023 was the best ever) 2025 was a step back. Not a single romance/romcom made my top 10, but  Kao ni Denai Kashiwada-san to Kao ni Deru Oota-kun was the best of the lot. Junior high romcoms are where most of the manga quality is these days – there are a bunch more out there begging to be adapted – and this one provided an overdose of charm and cuteness every week.
Honorable Mention: Aharen-san wa Hakarenai Season 2, Kono Kaisha ni Suki na Hito ga Imasuu

Best Comedy: Dekin no Mogura

The only question for me is whether to classify Dekin no Mogura as a comedy. In the end I think it meets the description, even as it dabbles in fantasy and drama. It wasn’t a great year for anime comedy but Dekin no Mogura was a great show, a comedy with so much more going for it.
Honoroable Mention: Witch Watch, Kao ni Denai Kashiwada-san to Kao ni Deru Oota-kun, Uchuujin MuuMuu

Best Drama: Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun 2

Often the winner of this category is also the best series of the year (though not last year) but it’s not an automatic. I very seriously considered Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu, but in the end I think the drama in Hanako-kun was just that little bit more powerful, the product of three cours of brilliant writing and adaptation fostering a deep bond with the characters.
Honorable Mention: Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu, Rurouni Kenshin: Meiji Kenkaku Romantan – Kyoto Douran

Best Series: Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun 2

And indeed, this is one of those years. It was a “normal service has been restored” sort of year for anime, with dramatic series and manga adaptations dominating the top categories. Hanako-kun was the best show, period – there’s just not a lot else that needs to be said.
Honorable Mention: Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu, Boku no Hero Academia: Final Season

Best Picture: Open

Honesty compels me to admit (that’s the second straight year I’ve opened with that) that I didn’t see a single theatrical anime released in 2025. I will see some for sure – 100 Meters, the CSM film for starters – but nothing compelled me to go to the theater to watch it raw, and my schedule hasn’t allowed me to watch anything on streaming yet. So I reluctantly leave this statuette unawarded for 2025.

This year’s Oscars very much reflect the sort of year it was in anime. No series dominated and the accolades are shared across a wide swathe of shows. Three won three statues – Jibaku Shounen Hanako-kun, Dekin no Mogura, and Uchuujin MuuMuu (the most ever from a series that didn’t make the top 10). And no less than 10 series got multiple Honorable Mentions, led by five for Hikaru ga Shinda Natsu and four for Boku no Hero Academia: Final Season. It also reflects the parity across the schedule that several top 10 series took no categories, including HeroAca, Kuroshitsuji,  RuroKen, Kowloon Generic Romance, and Kingdom.

One more time, let me thank everyone for supporting LiA in 2025 by reading, commenting, and subscribing to the YouTube site.  And obviously to those of you who stepped up financially a very special thank you – I’m humbled by your generosity and will do my best to repay it.  The fight for financial survival goes on – I’m looking at a huge rise in hosting costs this year – but LiA is still here thanks to you.

Stay frosty, and have a wonderful 2026!

Enzo