{"id":1173923,"date":"2026-02-13T12:38:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-13T12:38:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.polygon.com\/?p=557561"},"modified":"2026-02-13T12:38:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-13T12:38:13","slug":"witch-watchs-ms-makuwa-is-my-kindred-spirit-in-anime-fandom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/witch-watchs-ms-makuwa-is-my-kindred-spirit-in-anime-fandom\/","title":{"rendered":"Witch Watch\u2019s Ms. Makuwa is my kindred spirit in anime fandom"},"content":{"rendered":"
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<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There\u2019s only two episodes of Witch Watch<\/em><\/a> out right now, but I\u2019m certain that the character I relate to most isn\u2019t bubbly teenage witch Nico, her stoic ogre familiar (and childhood crush!) Mohito, or any of their classmates. It\u2019s actually their homeroom teacher, Ms. Makuwa \u2014 who in addition to having to wrangle a class full of magical teenagers, also has to pretend to be #cool in front of them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the episode where Nico and Mohito attend school together for the first time, Ms. Makuwa leads the class in a simple icebreaker, where each student introduces themselves with a fun fact. She kicks off the introductions with her name, but stops herself from blurting out that her favorite thing to do is to read manga.<\/p>\n

Instead, she saves face(???) by over-enthusiastically announcing that she enjoys mambo dancing instead. <\/p>\n

Ms. Makuwa does not<\/em> want a class of teenagers tearing her to shreds for enjoying manga, so she keeps it a secret. Yet during the entire icebreaker, she keeps making comparisons to her favorite manga characters. When one of Nico\u2019s spells backfires and accidentally makes Mohito\u2019s hair shoot up in size, Ms. Makuwa compares him to Adult Gon<\/a> in her head. Then, she promptly decides she isn\u2019t going to worry about it and reminds herself that Kurapika is her fave anyway (this is why we\u2019re kindred spirits<\/a>).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been there. I get it! I go through life thinking, Wow, this really reminds me of X fictional character\/situation<\/em>. A lot of times, those situations and characters are <\/em>from anime. When I make instant coffee, I giggle and think about Tamaki drinking the \u201ccommoners\u2019 coffee\u201d in Ouran High School Host Club<\/em><\/a>. During my weekly swim team sessions, I pump myself up by thinking of Haikyuu!!<\/em> and other sports anime<\/a>. If I need to think of what to make for dinner, I reminisce about my favorite episodes of Food Wars<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>When you\u2019re that enthusiastic about fiction, it seeps into real life in the most delightful ways. <\/p>\n

So, it\u2019s particularly fun to see a character have that same approach, even for something like her student\u2019s weird hair. And I completely understand why she wants to hide it from her students! I\u2019m lucky that most of my friends, and also my coworkers, totally understand when I say \u201cThat guy was so ripped; he reminded me of Toji Fushiguro without the worm<\/a>.\u201d But if I said that to my mom (who somehow still can\u2019t remember that I like Pok\u00e9mon), she\u2019d probably think something was wrong with me.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the added layer of Ms. Makuwa being a character in<\/em> an anime, making comparisons about real life manga and anime. Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku<\/em><\/a> did something similar, since all the characters involved were major dorks who loved video games, manga, and anime. But in Witch Watch,<\/em> it takes it to another level, because it\u2019s not a slice-of-life anime about anime-lovers. Instead, Ms. Makuwa is a side character in a story where the over-the-top shenanigans that she reads about in Hunter x Hunter<\/em><\/a> and Demon Slayer<\/em><\/a> can and will<\/em> happen. There\u2019s a fun sort of self-awareness in that and I can\u2019t wait to see what other magical hijinks Ms. Makuwa witnesses and what other anime she\u2019ll reference \u2014 or if she\u2019ll ever be comfortable to share those references with the class.  <\/p>\n

\n

New episodes of <\/em>Witch Watch drop on Sundays and stream on Netflix, Hulu, and Crunchyroll. The English dub comes on April 27.<\/em><\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s only two episodes of Witch Watch out right now, but I\u2019m certain that the character I relate to most isn\u2019t bubbly teenage witch Nico, her stoic ogre familiar (and childhood crush!) Mohito, or any of their classmates. It\u2019s actually their homeroom teacher, Ms. Makuwa \u2014 who in addition to having to wrangle a class full of magical teenagers, also has to pretend to be #cool in front of them.\u00a0 In the episode where Nico and Mohito attend school together for the first time, Ms. Makuwa leads the class in a simple icebreaker, where each student introduces themselves with a fun fact. She kicks off the introductions with her name, but stops herself from blurting out that her favorite thing to do is to read…<\/p>\n

Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1173924,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1173923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-polygon"],"yoast_head":"\nWitch Watch\u2019s Ms. Makuwa is my kindred spirit in anime fandom | Arcader News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There\u2019s only two episodes of Witch Watch out right now, but I\u2019m certain that the character I relate to most isn\u2019t bubbly teenage witch Nico, her stoic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/witch-watchs-ms-makuwa-is-my-kindred-spirit-in-anime-fandom\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta 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