Dan Da Dan is horny and gross and frankly really intriguing

The first episode of the Dandadan anime adapts a scene that nearly put me off the manga entirely.

In it, a teenage girl is abducted by alien perverts who strip her to her underwear, strap her down with limbs spread, and promise to do sex to her with their “banana organs,” which are horrifying mechanized phalluses, bristling with attachments and wider than one of her legs. It’s arguably even more horrifying when converted to motion in the anime.

Sure, the girl — Momo Ayase, our cool girl protagonist who believes that ghosts exist, but not aliens — destroys the aliens with her psychic powers before they can touch her, but I balked. Nearly naked teenage girls in nonconsensual sex situations was not my idea of a good time. I pressed on, out of trust in the people who’d recced the manga to me, and a few issues later — in a scene adapted in this week’s episode 3 of the anime — Dandadan clicked for me.

As a boy — Ken Takakura, our nerd guy co-protagonist who believes that aliens exist, but not ghosts — desperately, hilariously, raced to find somewhere to pee, I thought: Oh, I get it, it’s about how the experience of being a horny teenager is the same as approaching a terrifying and potentially threatening unknown.

[Ed. note: This piece contains some spoilers for the first three episodes of Dan Da Dan.]

Dan Da Dan, now streaming on Crunchyroll and Netflix, is the highly anticipated anime adaptation of the hit manga of the same name (styled there as Dandadan), produced by Science Saru (Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, Devilman Crybaby) on the work of mangaka Yukinobu Tatsu.

The basic premise of both series is of Momo and Ken’s enmity turning to odd-couple friendship as they face all manner of bizarre aliens and ghostly threats. The action begins after a chance meeting, when Momo dares Ken to go to a ghost hotspot, and he dares her to go to an alien hotspot. He gets possessed by a horny ghost called “Turbo Granny,” her abduction unlocks her psychic powers, and those powers turn out to be the only thing that can keep Turbo Granny from taking over Ken’s body and killing everyone he knows.

Dandadan’s horror elements took the fore at my first, second, and third glances, enhanced by Tatsu’s incredible draftsmanship and composition. But as I gave the manga time to peel back some of its layers, Dandadan revealed that it’s high-key a comedy, and low-key a romantic comedy.

Despite Ken’s utter social ineptitude, he’s an honorable guy who isn’t trying to get anything out of Momo — unlike her first boyfriend, who, despite looking like her favorite actor, is a shithead who just dumped her. She and Ken are both weird kids who struggle to make genuine connections with their peers — Ken has no friends at all, Momo’s friends tease her for crushing on the Japanese equivalent of a Tom Selleck type, she’s deeply insecure about showing any sign of being weird. Maybe they could work out some of their issues if all this ghost and alien stuff wasn’t getting in the way.

Unraveling the consequences of Ken’s Turbo Granny possession takes up the bulk of the manga’s first arc, and at every turn, Dandadan asks the two teens to reckon with each other’s bodies in the funniest and most mortifying ways. Aliens and ghosts keep showing up and demanding to take possession of either of their “banana organs.” The curse of the Turbo Granny has made Ken’s penis disappear, to his horror and Momo’s immediate interest — but it’s the idea of her looking in his pants that is even more horrifying than there being nothing in there.

In order to keep the curse at bay, Momo must have line of sight on Ken at all times, which isn’t too tricky until, in a scene in this week’s episode, he realizes he has to pee really bad. A wild chase scene ensues as he refuses to drop trou in front of a girl, and she refuses to let him turn into a demon inside her house.

That’s when it all came together for me: In Dan Da Dan, the idea of having sex — or of having private parts, or simply of having your body regarded by peers who might potentially be attracted to you — is just as horrifying and ridiculous as evil ghosts and probing aliens being real. It’s about the unnerving age between “Ew, cooties” and an adult’s (ideally) comfortable relationship with sex and bodies.

The issue isn’t that there’s nothing for Momo to see in Ken’s pants right now, it’s that boys shouldn’t let girls look in their underpants! Boys shouldn’t look at girls when they’re undressing. Girls shouldn’t look at boys in the bathroom. Don’t regard or be regarded by those of another gender!!!!!

Yukinobu Tatsu has never revealed what Dandadan’s title, three rhythmic syllables of mystery, means. But in absence of confirmation or context, I like to think of it as a tidy little onomatopoeia for a pounding heart (lifted directly as a percussive element in the anime’s first theme song by Creepy Nuts). The kind of racing pulse that comes from seeing your crush, terror for your own life, and teenage awkwardness each in their own time.

Would you rather die from ghost possession, or let a cute girl see your gross body while you poop? To these two teens, these are equal stakes, and the draw of these risks — the risks of sex, of dating, of seeking validation from peers, of trying to find someone who shares your weird interests — cannot be denied. Sometimes the supernatural has lessons for the mundane: Whether the person that wants you to put out is a creepy alien you hate or the crappy boyfriend you like, you don’t owe them shit. Roundhouse kick them in the head or destroy them with your new mind powers, and get the fuck out of there.

In giving Dandadan a second chance beyond its initial, shocking abduction scene, I’ve discovered a manga, and now an anime, that’s really chewing on the horror of the mundane teenage body in fun ways. And is way less rapey, in aggregate, than the first episode led me to assume.

Now, look. I’m still not a huge fan of Momo’s grandma being so hot and looking so young. But there’s a lot more going on under the hood here than I thought. Maybe, eventually, Dandadan will have me going to bat for Grandma Seiko’s giant anime boobs. Maybe not. But it’s at least hooked me in for the rest of the arc where they fight a giant crab from on top of a train.