Shojo has been making a massive comeback in recent years, with more anime adaptations than ever before being announced to adapt some of the most popular manga from magazines like Hana to Yume and Ribon. Series like A Sign of Affection, My Happy Marriage, and the Fruits Basket reboot have proven that the demographic is in high demand. One of the newer anime series slated for 2025, the anime adaptation of Mayu Murata’s Honey Lemon Soda, has been one of the most highly anticipated projects in the shojo community, and now, it finally has a trailer to hype up fans.
Honey Lemon Soda is a high school romance that centers on Uka Ishimori, who was named “Stone” in middle school due to her social demeanor. Despite her stoic reputation, she’s determined to reinvent herself upon entering high school, which is when she meets Kai Miura, whose flashy sense of style and personality reminds her of lemon soda. The two begin to grow closer with time and inevitably foster a much deeper relationship past Miura’s attempts to nudge Ishimori out of her shell.
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Honey Lemon Soda’s Success Is a Testament to a Classic Formula
While Honey Lemon Soda‘s premise seems relatively common among shojo titles, the series has been praised numerous times for just how well it expands and improves upon an age-old shojo formula. The manga began serializing in Ribon in December 2015 and, as of February 2024, had well over 12 million copies in circulation. Additionally, the series was nominated in the 45th Kodansha Manga Awards in the shojo category.
Aside from the manga’s commercial and critical successes, it’s also been able to branch into other forms of media before receiving an anime adaptation. In 2020, Honey Lemon Soda received a live-action adaptation starring Raul from Snow Man – a popular Japanese pop idol group – as Kai Miura and Ai Yoshikawa as Uka Ishimori. The film was a hit in Japan and even featured music by Snow Man.
The upcoming anime adaptation, produced by J.C. Staff, already has a lot of hype surrounding it. Originally announced in March 2024, the anime adaptation is set to be directed by Hiroshi Nishikori, who has previously worked on Azumanga Daioh and A Certain Magical Index. Other staff members include Akika Waba (BanG Dream! It’s MyGO!!!!!, Noragami), who will handle series composition and scriptwriting, and Aimi Tanaka , who will be in charge of character design.
The Honey Lemon Soda anime adaptation also features an absolute powerhouse of voice actors. Its roster includes the talents of Shougo Yano (Mafuyu in Given) as Kai Miura, Kana Ichinose (Fern in Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End) as Uka Ishimori, Rie Takahashi (Emilia in Re:Zero) as Serina Kanno, Shunichi Toki (Teppei in Blue Lock) as Tomoya Takamine, Taku Yashiro (Kouichi in Horimiya) as Satoru Seto, and Miyari Nemoto (Pikachu in Pokemon Evolutions). The anime adaptation of Honey Lemon Soda will begin airing on January 8, 2024, and will be streaming on Crunchyroll.
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