The moment I realized I was skipping the wrong parts of every anime opening

I used to always skip the first 30 seconds of an anime opening (you know, before the song really kicks in) because I thought it was just filler. But last week I sat through the full opening of Frieren for the first time after someone on Reddit mentioned hidden visual clues in those first frames. I went back and checked episode 3, and sure enough there was a small character detail I had missed every single time. Now I wonder how many plot foreshadowings I've just glossed over for years. Has anyone else had that moment where you realized you were watching anime on autopilot and missing actual story setup?

2 comments

2 Comments

wendy6746h agoTop Commenter

yeah but now you gotta wonder how many shows actually hide stuff that well vs just having boring intros. like what about shows where the opening changes every few episodes? are you rewatching all of those too or just trusting your skip game was fine all along

carr.willow4h ago

Push back hard on that. From my experience, a show that changes its intro every few episodes probably put way more thought into those intros than most shows do with their static ones. I'd argue you should be rewatching those specifically, because the changes themselves might be clues or character development in disguise. Take something like The 100's intro that added characters' names only after they got their marks, or Game of Thrones' map that updated as territory shifted. If you're just hitting skip you're actively choosing to ignore storytelling the creators took the time to build. Trusting your skip game is basically admitting you think the show's details don't matter, which your mileage may vary but I think that's a weird line to draw.