About “Bakemonogatari” in a few words:

Bakemonogatari is a Japanese anime series based on a series of light novels written by Nisio Isin. The series follows Koyomi Araragi, a high school student who becomes involved with various supernatural creatures and helps them with their problems. The show is known for its nonlinear storytelling, striking visual style, and witty dialogue. Each arc focuses on a different female character, each with her own supernatural affliction, and explores themes of adolescence, identity, and relationships.

Meet the characters from Bakemonogatari

Koyomi Araragi

Koyomi is that sleep-deprived but stubbornly decent protagonist who keeps stepping into other people’s supernatural messes like it’s his hobby. He chews on terrible puns, rescues troubled girls at terrible personal cost, and yet somehow keeps a weird sense of honor (also he’s a vampire but not one of those glamorous, everything-is-epic vampires — more like a sleepy, bandaged weirdo). He obsesses over logic and morality and then does impulsive, dumbly heroic things anyway, which is the whole point, right? Honestly he can be exasperatingly self-sacrificing and annoyingly relatable all at once.

Hitagi Senjōgahara

Hitagi is a walking paper-cut: razor-sharp wit, deliberately cold, and will literally stapler you if you push her — in the best way, I mean, she’s terrifyingly efficient with stationery as weaponry (don’t bring loose leaf near her). Underneath the icicle sarcasm there’s this tiny, stubborn heart that clings to people who actually see her, and she oscillates between absolute venom and unexpectedly clingy in a way that never stops being adorable. She’s terrifying and sincere, like a beautiful trap, and sometimes she’ll admit a mushy thing and then immediately insult you about it. Also, she weighs nothing? Which is weird but iconic and I keep thinking about it at 3am.

Mayoi Hachikuji

Mayoi is the eternally lost little ghost who somehow gives the best life advice while being a perpetual overeager child — backpack, lollipop energy, and a tragic backstory wrapped in sugar. She’s snarky, blunt, and also impossibly wise for someone who can’t find their way home; she will tease you and then drop an unsettling truth like it’s candy. She’s playful and petty and secretly a tiny philosophical wrecking ball, and you can almost hear her giggling as she ruins your assumptions. Also she hates directions but always knows which emotional street you’re on.

Suruga Kanbaru

Suruga is the sporty, sharp-tongued tomboy with a soft spot for manga and a very dramatic monkey-paw incident in her past that makes her both fierce and chaotic. She’s sweaty and blunt and ridiculously talented athletically (like, will-outrun-your-ego), but also flinches at her own desires sometimes — messy, human contradictions everywhere. She’s flirty in a way that feels more like earnest curiosity than seduction, and she has this weird habit of carrying around sports scars like badges of a very complicated life. Honestly, she’s the “I’ll punch a problem and then cry about it” type and I love it.

Nadeko Sengoku

Nadeko starts as this painfully shy, cinnamon-roll type and then quietly spirals into something dark and mythic, like a cursed garden that blooms venom behind a polite curtain. She’s soft-spoken and polite but there’s this simmering obsession and resentment that gets weaponized by supernatural nonsense, so one moment she’s nervous and clumsy and the next she’s eerily resolute. There’s something tragic about her sweetness being used as a shell for something vengeful, and that contrast is deliciously uncomfortable. Also she collects cute things? And also snakes? Sometimes both, sometimes neither — it’s complicated.

Tsubasa Hanekawa

Tsubasa is textbook perfect: top student, cat-lover, amazingly composed — except when her inner oddity (Black Hanekawa, hello) decides to punch a hole in that perfection and howl at 3am. She balances intellect and empathy in a way that makes her sound like the calm in every storm, but don’t be fooled, there’s a messy, animal howl under the neat hair and glasses. She’s unnervingly smart and somehow morally pure, and also secretly hoards subtle impulses like one collects stray cats. Honestly, she’s the kind of person whose diary would be both clinical notes and poetry about midnight empty streets.

Karen Araragi

Karen is the explosive, justice-obsessed little sister who fights first and asks awkward questions later, with a thousand percent more enthusiasm than sense. She’s hot-blooded, heroic in a very loud, yamato-damashii way, and will tackle bullies and slogans with equal intensity — but she also has a surprisingly tender side when it comes to family. She runs on righteous anger, terrible motivational speeches, and an unshakeable belief in doing the “right” thing even if the “right” thing is kind of chaotic. Also she might start a neighborhood patrol or a spontaneous karate class at any moment, so be ready.

Tsukihi Araragi

Tsukihi is the smaller, enigmatic Araragi sister — looks delicate, acts like a firecracker, and apparently has immortality vibes that make everything she touches quietly dramatic. She’s whimsical and petty and can switch from tea-party sunshine to volcanic temper in one blink, which is both terrifying and adorable. There’s something mythic under her surface (phoenix-y, right?) so she’s equal parts fragile bird and eternal spark-plug. She’ll insult you with a smile and then perform an inexplicable domestic ritual and you’ll be weirdly charmed.

Shinobu Oshino

Shinobu is the ancient vampire trapped in a small, lollipop-sized body who speaks at the speed of ennui and somehow collects donuts like they’re sacred relics. She’s stoic, sardonic, and devastatingly aware of centuries of nonsense, but she also gets weirdly clingy with Araragi and has these odd tender moments that crack the centuries-old facade. One moment she’s lethal and flatly terrifying, the next she’s asking for a snack and making passive-aggressive comments about your life choices — mood swings are eternal, apparently. Also she alternates between cryptic omniscience and bratty one-liners, and I actually live for it.