June 19th, 2025
Summer 2025 is shaping up to be a great time to be a Kaiju No. 8 fan – season 2 premiers in July, the manga is reaching it’s epic conclusion, and there’s even a new video game getting a demo at Anime Expo! If you need even more of an excuse to get hype, check out the trailer that just dropped for season 2 here (hello, Gen Narumi!). If the trailer is any indication, this season is gonna bring the intensity up to 100, so hang on to your power suits!
New to the Kaiju hype? Here’s the deal:
After their hometown is completely destroyed by a kaiju attack, childhood friends Kafka Hibino and Mina Ashiro make a pact: one day, they’ll join the Japanese Anti-Kaiju Defense Force (JAKDF) and fight to protect others from the same fate. They grow up sharing that dream, but life takes them down very different paths. Mina goes on to achieve that goal and rises through the ranks to become the captain of the JAKDF’s 3rd Division. She’s known for her sharp instincts and her devastatingly precise shooting—she’s a true force on the battlefield and widely respected for her combat skills.
Kafka, unfortunately, hasn’t been so lucky. He’s tried to pass the JAKDF entrance exams multiple times but keeps coming up short. Now in his early 30s, he’s settled into a much less glamorous job on the kaiju clean-up crew, disposing of monster corpses and handling the dirty work after battles are over. It’s not what he dreamed of, but it’s still kaiju-related… sort of.
Everything starts to change when a new part-timer named Reno Ichikawa joins the clean-up team. Reno is young, ambitious, and totally focused on joining the JAKDF. His determination reignites Kafka’s old dream, pushing him to give the exams one last shot. But just as Kafka starts to get serious about turning things around, something completely unexpected happens—a mysterious, parasitic creature enters his body through his mouth, and he wakes up with the ability to transform into a humanoid kaiju.
Suddenly, Kafka is more powerful than he ever imagined, but with that power comes a huge risk. The JAKDF is actively hunting down this new humanoid kaiju threat—meaning Kafka himself. After a tense escape and a few close calls, the military gives him the codename “Kaiju No. 8.” Despite the danger and the constant fear of being discovered, Kafka decides not to give up on his dream. He applies to the JAKDF once more, determined to protect people just like he and Mina once promised—only now, he has to do it while hiding the fact that he’s also one of the very monsters they’re supposed to be fighting.
Check out the first five volumes here:
Volume 1
Volume 2
Volume 3
Volume 4
Volume 5
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