Best Satoshi Kon Anime

As one of the greatest creative minds in anime over the past 20 years, Satoshi Kon's work has been a point of celebration for those desperate for anime to be seen as a serious art form, with many of his films ranking among the best. the best, side by side with the like Spirited away and Akira.

While he may have died young due to complications from pancreatic cancer, his legacy is hard to ignore and the impact he had on the anime scene, both as a writer and director, will be felt for years to come, especially from a few years on. his works have influenced major Hollywood films. But how do they compare to each other? These are all Satoshi Kon anime movies and series ranked.

Updated December 3, 2024 by David Heath: People angry at the praise of figurative sacred cows often argue that if they didn't create their great works/win the big game/make a new discovery, etc., someone else would. Satoshi Kon's untimely passing at age 46 didn't end the dreamy, philosophical anime projects that impressed cinephiles as much as otaku. Yet few have matched the quality of Kona's best work.

This is partly why Kon's last project, the Dreaming Machine, never went ahead after his death. Madhouse and MAPPA tried, but without Kon guiding his vision, production slowly ground to a halt. However, his finished works still remain and inspire people to this day, whether they are famous directors like Darren Aronofsky and Guillermo Del Toro, or up-and-comers who could become the next sacred cow of cinephile debate. So this list has been reworked and rearranged, pitting Satoshi Kon's works against each other to see which ones best showcase his style.

8 Good morning

Early morning routine summed up in one minute

• Studio: Madhouse.
• Running time: 1 minute.
• Available on YouTube.

Unless Dream machine will somehow manage to finish, the last work Kon worked on before his death was Good morning. There isn't much to the story as it just shows a woman getting up in the morning. As for the animation, it uses translucent photos that show the woman taking a moment to fully wake up. She might be watching TV, but the rest of her is still getting out of bed and grabbing something from the fridge. Only when she takes a morning shower is she fully put together and ready for the day.

For a brief minute it really captures that groggy, early morning feeling. That's not to mention its impressive animation, as it has more frames during its run than most 30-minute anime episodes. Still, it's just one of 15 segments designed for Nor*Kuri15where NHK commissioned various notable anime studios and their directors to create short films to fill the time between segments of their shows. Others include A meeting of cats by Makoto Shinkai, Project Omega according to Macross creator Shōji Kawamori and Project Mermaid according to Ghost in the Shell directed by Mamoru Oshii.

7 JoJo's Bizarre Adventure

How the Stardust Crusaders helped Kon get into directing

• Studio: APP
• Running time: 35 minutes per episode.
• episodes: 13.
• DVD only.

Everyone has to start their work somewhere. Before Perfect blue Satoshi Kon made him a household name, collaborating with Katsuhiro Otomo on several of his projects. He did some invaluable artistic assistance on Akira manga, before providing key animation and background art Roujin Z. But the spark that led him to direct the anime itself came from an unlikely source: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. Prior to the 2012 anime, fans only had APPP's OVA series available to them Part 3which wasn't exactly easy to find and is now much harder to come by.

Kon's biggest contribution came in Episode 12, where he provided the script and script for Joseph Joestar and Kakyoin's first encounter with Die. The OVA is overall more condensed and not as good as its 2013 successor, but it has better direction thanks in part to Kon and others. Dio's time-stopping abilities are more subtle and terrifying compared to the bombastic time-fart effects of later series. They impressed producer Masao Maruyama to offer him a chance to direct a small project titled Perfect blue.

6 Memories

Three short stories and Kon wrote the best one

Kon got the job of directing Perfect bluealthough it was not to be completed until 1997. Meanwhile, he worked with Katsuhiro Otomo on his anthology film, Memories. Otomo's name gained the most popularity as he came up with the short stories on which his three segments are based and showed his own impressive direction in Cannon fodder short. However, the best short film, and the only one that is actually about memory, was written by Kon.

Magnetic rose sees space rescue engineers Heintz and Miguel explore an abandoned space station with a surprisingly intact classic European-style interior. They learn that it once belonged to the opera singer Eva Friedel, who disappeared decades ago. By the time Heintz and Miguel are on the ship, she would be extremely old if she wasn't dead, yet they soon come face to face with a young singer or whatever that uses her image to manipulate them into staying. Although not his director or producer, Kon's tragic story is a good example for his feature films.

5 Agent Paranoia

Kon's only TV series shows how powerful ideas can be

For example, Agent Paranoia was the only TV series that Kon could fully direct and works in a similar field as Magnetic rose and Paprika. At first it's about Tsukiko Sagi, a character designer trying to uncover the identity of 'Li'l Slugger' – a boy in a cap and roller skates who attacked her with a baseball bat. Subsequent episodes follow Slugger's other victims, the predicaments they get into, and the paranoia his sudden attacks cause in Tokyo's Musashino district.

That sounds simple enough, but as the hype surrounding Li'l Slugger grows, the more things get lost because the little details don't add up. Just like Magnetic rose saw his characters being controlled by their memories, Agent Paranoia it shows how people let their fears rule them, whether Li'l Slugger is a real threat or a social phenomenon like the Mad Gasser of Mattoon. It's an effective psychological thriller that will make the audience think while it shakes their heads in its 13 episodes.

4 Paprika

The dream detective story shows how reality and fantasy are not so different

• Studio: Madhouse.
• Running time: 90 minutes.
• Available on Tubi and AppleTV+.

Kon's latest feature project, Paprikabrings his slim work closer, as it was also a psychological thriller based on a novel. Not that it was planned because Kon wanted to adapt Paprika a novel since 1998. His themes of how illusions and memories can affect reality and vice versa caught his attention. He dealt with similar topics Actress of the Millennium and Agent Paranoia mainly because he hoped to animate Paprika one day. He finally got his chance at the beginning of the 21st century, when he was given the go-ahead by its author, Yasutaka Tsutsui.

On the surface, he sees research psychologist Dr. Atsuko Chiba, who helps her patients by delving into their dreams as Paprika, the dream detective. But when the technology to do so is stolen by a “dream terrorist,” he enlists the help of Konakawa, a detective and program patient, to track him down. Underneath, the film shows how fiction and reality are not so different from each other and how people shape them according to their own. His surreal paintings inspired a dreamy thriller Beginningbut even Christopher Nolan couldn't match Kona's dynamic visuals.

3 Perfect blue

Kon discusses how the internet amplifies obsession and dissociation

Darren Aronofsky expressed appreciation for Kon's work, although he disavowed his film Black swan drew inspiration Perfect blue. They cover similar ground (female protagonists crack under pressure until they can no longer tell what's real) but go through different circumstances. for one PBMima is torn between a forced career shift from pop idol to TV actress, an obsessive stalker who follows her every move, and a website written by someone pretending to spread false information about her.

It's also technically an adaptation of Yoshikazu Takeuchi's novel, except Kon was less faithful to it than he was. Paprika. Its subplot about how the internet can help stalkers attack their targets directly and indirectly, and Mima's growing psychosis as she loses track of who she really is, all come from Kon. Other internet thrillers tend to age pretty badly (Hackers is pure 1990s cheese), but online stalking is still a serious problem today, Perfect blue is still as relevant and anxiety-inducing today as it was in 1997.

2 The Godfathers of Tokyo

How Kon uses Japanese social issues to tell a feel-good story

• Studio: Madhouse.
• Running time: 92 minutes.
• Available on Amazon Prime, Hoopla, Tubi, PlutoTV and Freevee.

The Godfathers of Tokyo it's mild on the reality-meets-unreality themes that Kon's other films have, as many of its issues are grounded in realism. Japan has homeless people who are left homeless for various, often complex, reasons and are horribly abused.

But homeless hunters, criminal gangs and rickety nativity scenes are just some of the many obstacles facing alcoholic Gin, trans woman Hana and runaway teenager Miyuki when they find an abandoned baby on Christmas Eve. He also doesn't shy away from how rough and ugly things can be, especially when trying to find the child's parents. Still, they help show how hope can help people reach their happy endings. It's the perfect picture for people who want a dollop of seasonal cheer rather than the saccharine overdose that other holiday TV specials offer.

1 Actress of the Millennium

Breaking hearts instead of bending minds

• Studio: Madhouse.
• Running time: 87 minutes.
• Available on Amazon Prime, Peacock, Retro Crush, Asian Crush, Shout and Freevee.

Most fans are familiar with Kon's harder work, where he dives into people's minds to make them more paranoid, anxious, and thoughtful about big ideas, like the fine line between fiction and non-fiction. But it is used for production Actress of the Millennium stand out because it uses this thin line to tell a romantic story. Instead of shocking the audience, it should bring them to tears. It follows filmmaker Genya Tachikawa as he interviews famous actress Chiyoko Fujiwara about her career, with key events in her life told through scenes from her most famous films.

Genya and his cameraman Ida are literally drawn into her scenes, including her actual flashbacks as they learn why she got into acting in the first place. These scenes set in occupied Manchuria are heartbreaking enough, but only serve to make their twist all the more heartbreaking. It's a powerful, bittersweet film that shows how powerful Kon's storytelling can be and how sad it is that he didn't make more romances like this.