The Anime That Won Winter 2026

[00:00] The best anime of winter 2026 was one

[00:03] that had no fight scenes, no magic

[00:06] systems, no dramatic powerups. It was 13

[00:11] episodes of two people living in a messy

[00:14] apartment talking to each other. And in

[00:17] my eyes, it beat out all other original

[00:20] anime from that season comfortably.

[00:24] Sure, it didn't touch the sequels like

[00:26] Jiu-Jitsu Kaizen or Frierin and so on,

[00:29] but the fact that we're even having it

[00:30] in the same conversation, making that

[00:32] comparison, it says something. This is

[00:36] Journal with Witch. It's a series that

[00:40] you should not judge based on its title

[00:43] because if you went in completely blind

[00:45] to this series, like many people did to

[00:48] be fair, you'd probably expect something

[00:50] completely different. Is there a

[00:51] journal? Yes, several. Is there a witch?

[00:55] No, actually no witch at all. You're

[00:57] going to need to go to a different

[00:58] italier for that. The Japanese title for

[01:00] this series is Ioku Nikki, which better

[01:03] translates to Diary of a Strange Land. A

[01:07] title which still does not accurately

[01:09] describe the show, but it's at least a

[01:11] lot more metaphorically similar. It just

[01:14] doesn't prepare you for what this show

[01:16] actually is. Perhaps I'm just too

[01:18] isachide pill where the light novel

[01:19] titles are very exact to what the

[01:21] synopsis is. So, welcome back ladies,

[01:24] gentlemen, and others. My name is

[01:25] Tristan, and this is Glass Reflection,

[01:28] where today we are talking about Journal

[01:31] with Witch. Let's jam.

[01:34] Makio is a 35-year-old novelist who has

[01:38] arranged her entire existence around not

[01:41] having to deal with other people [music]

[01:43] if she can avoid it. Not in a hikamorei

[01:46] type way, more of a people are a pain

[01:49] and I don't want to deal with them type

[01:50] way, which is fair. Her apartment is a

[01:53] mess. She forgets to eat. She has so

[01:56] many introverted traits built up that

[01:58] she broke up with her boyfriend because

[02:00] his emotional stability exhausted her.

[02:03] He seemed to have his whole life figured

[02:04] out. And you know that was a problem.

[02:07] Makio is a lot, but she knows that she's

[02:10] a lot and she's fine with being a lot.

[02:13] And then her sister and brother-in-law

[02:16] die in a car accident, leaving behind

[02:18] their young daughter, Assa. Assa is a

[02:21] girl that Makio doesn't know. She's the

[02:24] daughter of a woman who Mchio was not on

[02:27] the best of terms with. And since no one

[02:29] else in the family seemed to want to

[02:31] deal with this girl, Mchio takes it upon

[02:33] herself to bring Assa home. With zero

[02:36] preparations and no instruction manual

[02:39] on how to be the guardian to a teenager.

[02:42] That's the setup here. It is a series

[02:44] about two people from modern Tokyo who

[02:46] are trying to figure out how to exist in

[02:49] the same place, preferably without

[02:51] breaking one another. It's not as if

[02:53] they fight a lot. Quite the opposite,

[02:56] though things might have gone a lot

[02:57] faster if they did. Assa is a good kid,

[03:00] a very good kid. One who doesn't know

[03:02] how to process that her parents are

[03:05] gone, nor how exactly she can deal now

[03:08] with living with her aunt, an aunt who

[03:11] speaks somewhat negatively about her

[03:13] mom, the same mom she remembers loving

[03:16] so much. And if overall the show sounds

[03:19] quiet and chill, that's because for the

[03:21] most part it is. By design, this is a

[03:24] series that is almost,

[03:27] I want to say, aggressively quiet at

[03:30] times. It's a series where the most

[03:32] dramatic thing that happens in an

[03:33] average episode is Mchio staring at a

[03:36] blank document and a deadline looms

[03:37] overhead. It's 2:00 a.m. in the morning

[03:39] and she's living in a kind of despair

[03:41] that is common for someone in her

[03:44] writing profession while her teenage

[03:46] niece sleeps on a cot in the corner of

[03:48] her office. It would not surprise me if

[03:51] a lot of people out there would use the

[03:53] word boring to describe this series. I

[03:56] mean, I would use it as well, except I

[03:58] would use it as a compliment because

[04:00] Journal with which is in some ways

[04:03] boring, but it is doing it in a way that

[04:05] feels natural. It's trying to show us

[04:08] that an ordinary life is one worth

[04:11] taking seriously. Boredom and all. And

[04:14] also, as tragic [music] as it is, losing

[04:17] a sibling or a mother, those life

[04:20] experiences are more common than we

[04:23] think. And how people deal with that in

[04:25] different ways is not something that I

[04:27] see explored often. A lot of the

[04:29] episodes here are splitting our

[04:30] attention between Makio's adult

[04:33] storyline and Assa's more teenaged one.

[04:35] With Makio, we get her new

[04:37] responsibilities. Uh, we have the ghost

[04:39] of her sister putting her down. We have

[04:41] the book that she's working on. For

[04:43] Assa, we have this girl attempting to go

[04:46] through her normal teenage life, but she

[04:49] still tries to present herself in a way

[04:51] that no one would know. She just lost

[04:53] her parents. She can hide it, and she

[04:56] does, though sometimes not as well as

[04:58] she thinks. [music] Mchio isn't a messy

[05:01] person in like a cute or quirky way.

[05:03] She's messy in a way where like things

[05:05] ended up in her apartment where they are

[05:07] because everything was just placed

[05:09] off-handedly. She would have dirty

[05:11] clothing spread out everywhere because

[05:12] it just needed to be moved out of the

[05:14] way at some point and not because she

[05:16] has some system for how she handles

[05:18] laundry. Laundry is something for future

[05:20] Mchio to deal with. She's socially

[05:23] awkward. She doesn't like talking to

[05:24] people. She finds it exhausting. And any

[05:27] competency that she has in that regard

[05:29] is more of a like a survival mechanism

[05:31] that she's developed rather than a

[05:33] natural personality trait. And yet, when

[05:36] AA needs someone to explain something

[05:39] about what she's going through, Mchio

[05:41] can do it. She is a novelist. So,

[05:43] despite how she personally acts, she

[05:47] does understand people quite well. She

[05:49] just can't always apply what she knows

[05:52] in her own life. But what really makes

[05:55] her work as a person, a real person,

[05:57] [music] and not just a character, is she

[05:59] has this level of fear underneath it

[06:04] all. Like Mchio is very upfront with

[06:06] both Assa and the audience that she is

[06:09] someone who really shouldn't be taking

[06:11] in a teenager. She's not really capable

[06:14] of loving her the way that Assa needs.

[06:17] Makio is not a cruel person, but she can

[06:20] only offer what is like acceptable in

[06:23] the role as a guardian, not as a mom.

[06:26] She can't be Assa's new mom. That is not

[06:30] and cannot be her role. So, with all of

[06:33] that, Makio is just terrified about

[06:36] [music] projecting all of the feelings

[06:38] she has about Assa's mom back onto this

[06:41] kid. This kid who is oblivious [music]

[06:44] and has nothing to do with any of that.

[06:47] Makio is fairly set in her ways, but

[06:50] she's still trying to get a handle for

[06:51] how best to care for Assa in her own

[06:54] way. And Assa just keeps [music]

[06:57] wanting direction. She wants help from

[07:00] people, but everything that she gets is

[07:03] vague. Either because people don't know

[07:05] how to help her or they don't want to

[07:07] say the wrong thing. Perhaps she gets

[07:09] this from like her therapist who just

[07:11] asks her to talk about whatever she

[07:14] wants or like when Makio texts her

[07:16] saying, "Oh, well, she's drained, so can

[07:18] you just pick up whatever you want from

[07:20] the grocery store." Whatever you want is

[07:23] what she keeps being told. But Assa

[07:25] doesn't know what she wants. [music] She

[07:27] has her journal full of scribbles and

[07:29] notes of things that people have told

[07:31] her, things that have stuck into her

[07:33] mind, but she desperately [music] wants

[07:35] to write something here. She wants to

[07:38] make lyrics for a song and then sing it

[07:40] to people. She keeps feeling like she

[07:43] has nothing to say. Throughout her grief

[07:45] process, Asa constantly imagines herself

[07:48] walking through a desert alone. [music]

[07:50] It is vast. It is empty. and it works

[07:53] really hard to showcase just how lonely

[07:55] Assa has become, even if she doesn't

[07:57] realize it at first or can't vocalize it

[08:00] later. So, between the pair of them,

[08:02] like Makio could have had like some kind

[08:04] of development on becoming a proper

[08:06] mother figure to this young girl with

[08:08] Assa being the child she never had. And

[08:11] like AA could have some big inspiration

[08:14] moment about how she now wants to handle

[08:16] her life, but none of that really

[08:18] happens. These two don't have some kind

[08:21] of like big reconciliation to get them

[08:23] closer as a family. At no point do they

[08:26] tell each other, "I love you." Even if

[08:28] their actions might say otherwise,

[08:30] though, to be honest, I think I find it

[08:31] hard for Makio to for me to imagine

[08:34] Makio saying that to anyone under any

[08:36] context. There's a layer of warmth to

[08:41] the series, but also an occasional bit

[08:43] of friction. Like the show is helping us

[08:46] to have a sense this relationship, the

[08:48] relationship between these two

[08:49] characters is the most interesting thing

[08:52] here. And it really is because if you

[08:53] had a child teenager who hears their new

[08:56] guardian speak with apathy toward their

[09:00] parents' death, that would be a kind of

[09:03] freakout moment and deservedly so. But

[09:05] Assa doesn't do that. Instead, we get

[09:07] the emotional writing that proves the

[09:10] show is earning its reputation. Assa

[09:13] doesn't respond to her parents' death

[09:15] with sadness. She actually responds with

[09:18] anger, but it's not anger in the

[09:20] traditional way. She doesn't scream or

[09:24] yell or get upset. But the anger is

[09:27] still there. It's just buried, muted,

[09:30] and hidden for the vast majority of the

[09:32] series until it's not. It is without a

[09:34] doubt one of the more honest depictions

[09:37] of both adolescent and adult depression

[09:39] in grief that I've seen in anime. like

[09:42] period. It's not a stereotypical

[09:44] depiction because well, how someone

[09:46] deals with this situation can't really

[09:48] be stereotypical. We all handle these

[09:51] things in a different way. And I really

[09:53] do appreciate how this series has taken

[09:55] a a different path from the norm. But

[09:57] then again, I feel like the norm is to

[09:59] just not talk about it at all. So

[10:01] instantly, this is better. From a story

[10:03] perspective, there's only one real

[10:04] caveat that I need to add here because I

[10:06] think it would be wrong of me to not

[10:08] mention it. This anime is an adaptation

[10:11] of, if my counting is right, 32 of the

[10:14] manga's 54 chapters, so only like 2/3 of

[10:18] it. If you watch this without having

[10:20] read the manga beforehand, it does land

[10:23] exceptionally well. But as with most

[10:25] incomplete adaptations, there is always

[10:28] missing threads, a subplot about Assa's

[10:31] dad that is more or less completely

[10:33] gone. We don't get much of their

[10:34] relationship at all. The show has an

[10:37] ending that well, it lands, but manga

[10:40] readers will argue that it didn't do it

[10:42] as well as they'd hoped. But to me, the

[10:45] story that made it here to our screens

[10:47] is about as honest and human as anime

[10:50] got this year so far. And so, at the end

[10:52] of the day, is it worth it? Short

[10:55] answer, yes. The longer answer is also

[10:58] yes, though with some caveats attached.

[11:01] The caveats will end up being, you know,

[11:02] what determines if this show is a new

[11:04] favorite of yours or just something that

[11:06] you're going to bounce off of within

[11:07] three episodes. I am quite surprised

[11:08] though at the amount of high praise that

[11:10] the show has gotten since it started. I

[11:12] mean, this is the kind of show where I

[11:14] expected a level of cult following. But

[11:17] at the time of writing the script for

[11:19] this video, the series had a score of

[11:21] 8.75 out of 10 on my anime list, and

[11:24] that put it at number 49 on their chart

[11:27] for the best anime of all time. This was

[11:29] also like over a month and a half after

[11:31] the season ended. Like, if it's still

[11:33] airing and people are still talking

[11:35] about it, that's one thing. But I would

[11:36] have expected it to be kicked off the

[11:38] top list by now. But for a quiet little

[11:40] 13 episode drama series about a novelist

[11:42] and her niece in a season that was as

[11:45] stacked as winter 2026 was, I always

[11:49] shocked and surprised. Journal with

[11:51] Witch did not have like a guaranteed

[11:54] built-in audience like the sequels did.

[11:56] It was a new adaptation of a manga that

[11:59] itself didn't see much chatter within

[12:01] the wider discourse of the fandom. And I

[12:03] mean, on paper, the synopsis might not

[12:06] be considered all that special to a

[12:07] majority of people. And despite all of

[12:10] that, I mean, it won the season for me

[12:12] anyway. Sure, the sequels and the larger

[12:15] franchises will win the war of discourse

[12:18] in the long term. Yeah, okay, fine. But

[12:20] if I'm just talking about shows that

[12:22] started in that season, Journal with

[12:24] Witch was at the top for me. It's on my

[12:26] short list for anime of the year

[12:28] already, though, you know, the

[12:30] competition is getting pretty stiff as

[12:32] the year progresses, but you know, I

[12:34] don't feel like I'm alone with this

[12:36] opinion. I normally am, but this time

[12:38] I've got backup, and that just feels

[12:40] great to be honest. When it comes to

[12:42] like caveats, the slower pace and the

[12:45] introspectionheavy nature of the series

[12:47] is going to make people drop off. That's

[12:49] fine. That might end up being something

[12:51] that stops it from like truly reaching

[12:54] [music] uh more mainstream success

[12:56] because this is a series that asks for

[12:59] your patience and it wants you to meet

[13:01] it where it is rather than it rushing up

[13:05] to meet you. The show's not going to

[13:06] drop you with a cliffhanger to try and

[13:08] bring you back next episode or beg for

[13:11] your attention. But if you can handle

[13:13] that, if you can appreciate the warmth

[13:15] that it offers, you know, within the

[13:18] depths of loneliness that the show

[13:20] explores, you're going to find it all

[13:22] the more rewarding. If you have seen

[13:24] comments from people who have bounced

[13:25] off the show complaining or lamenting

[13:27] that it was too slow or too quiet, they

[13:29] are just looking for something else. And

[13:31] that's fine. There's plenty out there

[13:34] for them. Even my my biggest personal

[13:37] criticism against the series is

[13:38] something that I don't really think is

[13:40] fixable. so I can forgive it. And as I

[13:43] mentioned earlier, this doesn't cover

[13:45] everything from the manga. There are

[13:46] plot threads that got cut, subplots

[13:48] dropped, and the ending is a bit

[13:50] different from the original material

[13:52] because things are missing. But with how

[13:55] long anime seasons are, I'm not sure how

[13:59] best we could have fixed that without

[14:01] then introducing new problems. A second

[14:04] core of the series would have made

[14:06] things drag even with the extra

[14:08] material. There's not enough or full 24.

[14:10] and then doing these episodes but then

[14:12] having an OVA to cover everything else

[14:14] afterwards would have still left this

[14:17] without an ending. One that would

[14:19] probably have been worse than the one we

[14:20] got. So really I just feel like it's a

[14:22] limitation on what the series can do

[14:24] with only 13 episodes. So here's my

[14:27] bottom line with it. Journal with Witch

[14:30] is the kind of show that that reminds me

[14:32] why I started watching anime in the

[14:33] first place and why I've been talking

[14:35] about it since 2009. And it's not just

[14:37] because of like how much I relate to

[14:39] Makio as a character, though that is

[14:41] certainly part of it. This is the kind

[14:43] of show that I won't say treats you like

[14:46] an adult, but it definitely is one that

[14:48] respects your time. You don't have to

[14:50] interact with it, but if you do, you get

[14:53] rewarded for it. This is a show that

[14:54] believes that 13 episodes showcasing the

[14:57] small moments of two people trying to

[14:59] navigate grief is worth it. It is not a

[15:02] perfect adaptation, but I don't think it

[15:05] needs to be. And what we got is more

[15:07] than enough. So the real bottom line, if

[15:10] you haven't watched it yet, you probably

[15:13] should.

[15:14] And that's it for our show today. Thank

[15:16] you for watching if you haven't seen

[15:18] Journal with Witch. It's available for

[15:19] streaming over on Crunchyroll. And I

[15:21] urge you to do that at your earliest

[15:23] convenience if you haven't already. I

[15:25] also wanted to give shoutouts to

[15:26] supporters [music] of this channel over

[15:28] on Patreon. This video is not sponsored,

[15:30] and the more support that we get over

[15:32] there, the less sponsors that Glass of

[15:33] Flection will need at any given time.

[15:35] [music] So, an immense thank you

[15:36] especially to patrons like Siri Yamako,

[15:39] Ryen Bonapart, Omar Showman, Ross

[15:41] [music] Emerson, Hector Montto, Mayor

[15:44] Geekwig, and Aiden. We can't continue

[15:47] this without your support. So, however

[15:48] much you are able to help, I am

[15:50] eternally grateful. So, subscribe if you

[15:52] haven't, hit the like button if you

[15:53] enjoyed the video, and until next time,

[15:55] whenever that happens to be, watch more

[15:58] anime and stay frosty.