Somali to Mori no Kamisama

In a world where humanity is a forgotten delicacy, hunted to the brink of extinction by a myriad of spirits and creatures, a silent golem discovers a lone human child. Somali and the Forest Spirit presents a journey through a breathtakingly beautiful fantasy world, a place of vibrant colors and whimsical beings. But this picturesque landscape hides a stark reality: the young girl, Somali, is in constant peril. Her protector, the Golem, is a being with no emotions and, more critically, a rapidly dwindling lifespan. Their quest to find a safe haven for Somali becomes a poignant race against time.

The artistry of this series is ... a feast for the eyes, with stunningly detailed backgrounds that bring its fantastical setting to life. Each new location, from lush forests to bustling monster-filled towns, is a vibrant and imaginative vista. This visual splendor creates a sharp, compelling contrast with the dark premise of the world. Humans are a hated and hunted race, and Somali's survival depends entirely on a fragile disguise—a horned hood that masks her true nature. This constant, underlying tension adds a layer of depth to the otherwise gentle, slice-of-life progression of their travels.

At its core, the narrative is a tender exploration of a father-daughter relationship formed in the most unlikely of circumstances.Somali is endlessly curious and full of innocent energy, while the Golem is her stoic, emotionless guardian. The dynamic between the two is the heart of the story, as the Golem, a being who shouldn't feel, finds its purpose disrupted and its existence redefined by the need to protect this child. The bond that blossoms between them feels genuine and is developed with a touching sincerity that is both heartwarming and heartbreak

The series masterfully balances its tone, weaving moments of pure, unadulterated joy with a persistent sense of impending sorrow. It explores powerful themes of unconditional love, found family, and prejudice with a gentle hand.The journey is not just a physical one across a perilous land, but an emotional odyssey for its central characters. Knowing the Golem is slowly breaking down and that his time with Somali is finite casts a bittersweet shadow over every happy moment, making their shared experiences all the more precious and deeply moving.

Somali and the Forest Spirit is a truly special anime, a rare gem that combines breathtaking visuals with a profoundly emotional story.[ It is a heartfelt and beautifully animated tale about love and sacrifice in a world where such things are scarce. The journey of the stoic guardian and the cheerful child is a memorable and poignant experience, a beautifully crafted fairy tale that will linger in the mind long after the final frame.

This anime was alright, I guess.

The artwork was really nice. The scenery was especially beautiful, and the places the characters went to were interesting and memorable. There were lots of different creatures and plants, and I really enjoyed that aspect of it. The music wasn't too bad either. It suited the show well, and it was relatively catchy.

The story left me unsatisfied. It was fine, but..it could have been much better. The characters were fine too, but a lot was left unexplained. A lot of characters were introduced, but then dropped, so it made me feel detached from them.

Overall, it was just "meh". Unless you ... really like the art style, your time is probably better spent watching something else.

First of all, I tend to retitle this as Loli and the Creepy Dad—the only problem is, I'm not sure if the little girl is to remain the forest spirit's fake daughter, or if she is eventually to become his waifu, similar to the disgusting turn of events in the initially wholesome Usagi Drop.

What is it with anime and weird magical creatures with minimal or non-existent emotions looking after teenage or prepubescent girls? Other shows include The Ancient Magus' Bride, featuring a rather stupid-looking skull with clothing that buys a teenage girl from an auction and has a romantic/dad/husband relationship with her (it's kind ... of hard to tell without seeing the whole series). There's another manga with a similar premise to the Somali anime, but I can't find the name.

There's really no funny business in Somali—this is a fairly wholesome show (for the time being), and the target audience seems to be mostly children. But, wait, what's with that name? When I think of the word Somali, I think of the Somali people from the country Somalia. Why is a character in a fantasy anime named Somali? Perhaps this seemed an exotic name to the Japanese creator, who might have never looked at a map or had much of an interest in geography or anthropology? The name actually comes from the cat who found Somali, but it's still a strange choice.

Little Somali appears to be an abused and abandoned slave when the forest spirit finds her. Seeing as his role as a forest spirit will soon end, he goes on a journey to find her a group of humans she can remain with.

The human race was wiped out, replaced by cities resembling the cantina bar from Star Wars. It seems the creator attempted to make nearly every individual creature unique. It's common for fantasies to be multicultural, but this is taking it to extremes--in a crowd I could almost never spot two characters that looked remotely the same in multiple cities, except for examples such as Kikila's family and the witches. Only the mixture of goats and dogs at the end seemed to have a distinct culture (I guess the witches, too). I suppose the main reason was that it was more fun to draw such a diverse range of characters, and it does provide a lot of visual variety. Many of them look like anthropomorphized animals, but there are also harpies, oni, talking cats (with extra eyes), and witches that look like humans but have an enhanced lifespan and magical abilities. It really appears that there isn't an intention to create distinct cities and cultures, but more so a tendency to have a lot of interesting locations and creatures to look at. There are advantages and disadvantages to both approaches, but the choices here sometimes made the world building feel very random.

Unfortunately, the forest spirit plays the emotionless drone-looking character with maximum blandness, where he seems emotionless, but either his true emotions are buried away, or he comes to understand human emotions by traveling with Somali. Somali, as a child, is a simple character, and though they meet many other characters along the way, they soon part after 1-3 episodes. Nothing is very memorable other than Haitora and Uzoi's relationship, which has a few parallels to that of Somali and the forest spirit, while also exploring human and grotesque conflict (grotesque is what humans call non-humans). The only characters to reappear later are Shizuno and Yabashira, and while they work okay as support, they seem primarily there because they are familiar yokai to the Japanese.

Similar to shows like Plastic Memories, the basic setup and the writing are meant to evoke maximum tears and sadness, with Somali afraid "dad" will leave her, and the forest spirit realizing his emotions and feeling like the father she never had. If you don't mind a slow-paced and sappy "non-biological father/daughter" relationship and take the concept of "found family" seriously, then you could do worse, but there's not much of interest here other than the fantastical art, which sometimes brings to mind Ghibli, especially with the strange foliage and glowing mushroom caps, and the forest spirit's similarity to the golem in Castle in the Sky, though Somali and the Forest Spirit is not nearly as well animated or produced.