Anime to Celebrate Summer!

Whoo! Summer is here with all it’s barbecues, fireworks, and days at the beach! The weather might be a bit too warm, but cooling down with some shaved ice or frosty lemon-aid is so nice! And what’s also lovely about this time of year? Anime Summer story arcs, of course! What could be more charming than the anime ladies showing off their frilly swimsuits or the anime gents swooping in to save damsels in distress of drowning?

If that well used anime element isn’t your thing, maybe you would be enchanted by a seaside snack shack with a waitress that’s a squid? Or maybe spending the Summer interning as a magic girl trainee is more your thing? Perhaps watching a swim meet of some very fit gents is what you’re looking for this Summer? Or having a little Summer adventure in an island location is what your Summer calls for? Whatever kind of Summer you’re looking forward to when the weather gets toasty, there is sure to be an anime to fit your fancy! So let’s check out some sizzling Summer anime!

Squid girl

Squid girl is about a girl with tentacles for hair and some of the abilities of a squid, who came out of the sea to conquer the world. And once she subjugated all the filthy humans, she would force them to stop polluting the oceans. Or at least that was Ika Musume’s plan. She never got passed the beach. The first place Ika happened upon was a beach shack cafe, and one thing led to another and she accidentally put a great big hole in their wall. The two sisters that own the cafe insisted that Ika had to work at the cafe to pay for the repairs. Ika might be an egotistical megalomaniac bent on world domination, but she’s not the smartest squid in the sea, so she agrees. So the rest of the anime is about her working at the cafe as she tries and fails to take over the world, over and over again ala Pinky and the Brain.

Someday Dreamers

Someday Dreamers is a cute anime about a county girl that moves to the big city to complete her training as a mage. In this world, people can be born with magical powers, but the powers are highly regulated so if you want to use your magical powers for your occupation you have to be trained and get a license first. And that’s exactly what Yume Kikuchi is planning to spend her Summer doing. Unfortunately for her, she’s the daughter of a very powerful mage and a bit of a country bumpkin, so she gets into quite a lot of trouble along the way. Like she has the power to make something from nothing. This is a skill that’s very rare, as in only Yume’s mother and Yume can do this. So when Yume tries to repay someone by making money appear, the money doesn’t come from a bank, it’s made from nothing! Needless to say, this made a lot of local officials rather hot under the collar when they found out about it. Well, at least her Summer internship won’t be boring!

Free! Iwatobi Swim Club

Free! Iwatobi Swim Club is an anime about a local public swimming pool that after many years of disinterest from the community is planned to be closed. When local high school boys that have fond memories of swimming there when they were younger find out about the planned closure of the pool, they decide to form a high school swimming team to bring attention to the under appreciated local icon. This anime is great for both sports anime fans and non sports fans alike! There is plenty of very fit gents doing quite athletic things, but there is also quite a bit of drama, friendship building and team building in this anime. Not to mention a dash of comedy and some high school boy antics! Though this anime doesn’t take place exclusively in the Summer, it certainly has a Summery feel, no matter what season the characters happen to be in.

Umi Monogatari

The anime Umi Monogatari is a sweet anime about friendship, finding happiness where you can, letting go of sadness, and the bond of sisters! And on top of that, there’s mermaids! Okay, so the “mermaids” don’t actually have fins, but they live in the ocean and have magical powers, so that’s pretty mermaid-ish! One day the mermaid sisters Marin and Urin find a ring and they realize that it probably belongs to someone on a nearby island. Being very honest ocean dwellers, they decide to leave the water for the first time and go to the island to try to return the ring. Unfortunately, returning one little ring turned out to be a whole lot more complicated than either of the mermaids were expecting. Every thing went awry, from making a new friend whether they wanted to or not, to the owner of the ring not really wanting it back, to accidentally releasing an evil power and suddenly becoming a magical priestess on dark magic clean up duty! For these two little mermaids, being a good Samaritan was not an easy task!

Happy Summer Solstice!