Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”: Details

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak” is the episode that truly turns this anime into a military science fiction story. It’s hard not to see it as such when you have so much radio chatter in military lingo going around as dialogue. That, and the immense amount of gunfire and reloading details.

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak” is the sixth episode (you can read reviews for Ep. 1, Ep. 2, Ep. 3, Ep. 4, and Ep. 5 here) season of this anime series. Said anime is the anime adaptation of the military science fantasy adventure manga of the same name by Naoya Matsumoto. Production I.G (Ghost in the Shell, Psycho-Pass, Haikyu!!) is the studio behind this anime. Crunchyroll is licensing this anime for its NA debut.

Tetsuji Nakamura is the director behind Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”, with Ichirō Ōkouchi as the writer, and Kazuya Nomura doing the storyboard. As for the Kaiju No. 8 anime as a whole, Shigeyuki Miya and Tomomi Kamiya are co-directing this anime. Ichirō Ōkouchi is the overall writer of the anime, while Yuta Bando composed the music for the same.

Speaking of music, this anime’s opening theme music is “Abyss” by Yungblud (AKA Dominic Richard Harrison). Meanwhile, “Nobody” by OneRepublic is the ending theme music.

Voice Cast

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak” features the voices of Masaya Fukunishi (Nazeeh Tarsha in English dub) as Kafka Hibino, Asami Seto (Katelyn Barr in English dub) as Mina Ashiro, Wataru Kato (Adam McArthur in English dub) as Reno Ichikawa, Fairouz Ai (Abigail Blythe in English dub) as Kikoru Shinomiya, and Kengo Kawanishi (Landon McDonald in English dub) as Soshiro Hoshina. Other notable voice roles in this episode include Yūki Shin (Ben Stegmair in English dub) as Iharu Furuhashi, Keisuke Koumoto (Howard Wang in English dub) as Haruichi Izumo, Shunsuke Takeuchi (Jonah Scott in English dub) as Aoi Kaguragi, and Sayaka Senbongi (Celeste Perez in English dub) as Konomi Okonogi.

We even have a moment of Hiroyuki Yoshino (Alejandro Saab in English dub) as Kaiju No. 9.

When and Where to Watch

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak” made its airing and streaming (aka. simulcast) debut on May 18, 2024. You can watch this episode only on Crunchyroll. In fact, you can watch this anime as a whole only on Crunchyroll at the moment.

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”: Synopsis

Alas, Kaiju No. 8 is an ongoing anime series. In fact, Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak” only premiered four days ago as of this writing. Thus, you will all get the official synopsis for this episode from Crunchyroll instead of a spoiler-filled plot summary. You can check out that synopsis below:

It’s time for Kafka’s first mission, and he witnesses the true power of the Defense Force when a Kaiju strikes a nearby city.

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”: The Good

Usually, the best part of this anime is its story. This is still somewhat true for Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”. It does have a fascinating story courtesy of Naoya Matsumoto, since it reveals just how deep into the military sci-fi the anime can get. With all the radio chatter, gunfire, airstrikes, and launching of rocket artillery; you could be forgiven for thinking this episode is a scene right out of Independence Day or any of the big budget military sci-fi films you see in media. At the very least, this will be a treat for fans of military sci-fi.

Which brings us to the noticeable reason why this episode is great: the action. There’s a noticeable emphasis on explosions, rocket trails, and reloading that will definitely feel familiar to fans of military fiction and action junkies alike. It all looks very well polished and nice, like those aforementioned big budget military sci-fi films. You will definitely feel the shock and awe in this episode.

Which of course brings us to a big reason why that action works: the animation. Production I.G definitely put a lot of their budget for this episode in the animation quality, and it pays off massively. Every explosion is accompanied by the starburst-like spray of shrapnel and incendiaries in a way that’s very much eye candy. Every shot from Mina’s cannon is immediately followed by some impression energy blasts. Thus, action junkies will definitely cheer this aspect of this episode.

Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”: The Bad

Alas, there is a bad point to the otherwise great work that is Kaiju No. 8 Ep. 6 “Sagamihara Neutralization Operation At Daybreak”. That would be the lack of character exploration and development. All of that mostly grinds to a halt during this episode in lieu of the giant battle against the kaiju. However, it doesn’t completely stop. We do get bit and pieces of characterization over the course of the episode. But all in all, the action is what takes precedence over the characters, and that’s not a good thing. A story lives and dies based on its characters. If it grinds to a halt like this, then it’s not a good sign for the story.

Fortunately, we do have other anime series that do focus on its characters. Spice and Wolf: MERCHANT MEETS THE WISE WOLF is a great example of that, and so is Black Butler -Public School Arc-. We even have Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba if you want both action and great character development and exploration. However, you may be one who just wants more mindless action. In that case, you might want to check out Solo Leveling.

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