Call of the Night is a relaxing vampire anime about an antisocial middle school student named Kou. One night wandering the streets, he encounters a mysterious woman named Nazuna, and she turns his world upside down. As Kou gets to know her, he discovers that she's a vampire who has lived for decades and has been searching for a special connection. Together, the two explore the city's dark and vibrant nightlife and discover a hidden world of insomniacs, vampires, and unconventional love.
Nazuna's relationship with Kou is purely transactional, so they say. She drinks his blood; he wants her to turn him into a vampire. The blood-sucking is played up to be sexual and embarrassing for Kou, and the joke never gets old. She is a very mysterious and powerful vampire who can fly and possess super strength. Her true intentions are mysterious, which makes her fascinating, but like Kou, she seems to be looking for a companion. She also acts as a mentor to Kou, teaching him about the supernatural world and helping him learn about love, vampirism, and vibing out at night.
Kou is a relatable main character by design. He's antisocial, intelligent, loves big boobs, and feels free during the nighttime. Kou frequently narrates his thoughts, typically his feelings about Nazuna and explains the reasoning behind his behaviors. It's typically apparent what he's thinking, but the way he describes his thoughts is very poetic, so I can't fault the show too much for its wordy script despite its simplistic story. Kou's character arc consists of gaining self-confidence, understanding romance, and embracing his introversion. Through Kou, the show scratches the surface of intriguing subjects like sexuality, aromanticism, and intimacy.
What is the "story" of Call of the Night? There's not much, and that's ok. The anime is practically episodic, and each one is about a problem Kou or one of his friends has that needs to be fixed. Making nighttime friends, considering the future, and contemplating romantic feelings are common. Call of the Night is an anime you watch for the vibes. It is designed to be watched on a laptop in bed at 2 am with the lights off. The writing gets dicey when you question the anime's unique supernatural logic.
The premise requires Kou to fall in love with Nazuna to achieve his dream: to become a vampire. The rules are shaky; how do you actually gauge love? Is it measurable? A thing I like about the show is how it does develop their romance, and even though the age gap is unethical, they ride the line. Obviously, the author wanted to make an age-gap romance and had to write rules to accommodate that, and the rules aren't solid, so what you get is apparent fetishes hidden in plain sight. The more the characters say, "I'm only falling in love with her because she's turning me into a vampire", the more obvious it gets. Don't look at me like that. It's a fetish. Biting, saliva, domination, do I need to spell it out for you more?
They avoid making the relationship creepy by telling the story from the young boy's perspective. He's attracted to Nazuna and tells us so with his narration, but she is only in it for his blood. Things only become a bit suspicious when she becomes jealous of him with other girls. That's when the age-gap bias in the source material pokes through, so if you can ignore a couple of weird moments, the rest is fine. It is a little contrived how they are forced to fall in love within a year, or Kou won't become a vampire. Yes. Does it make sense? Not really, no. But the ticking time bomb plot device adds a sense of urgency.
The art style is very detailed, and the backgrounds are beautiful. The characters are all very well-designed and the colors used are vibrant and eye-pleasing-such a visually distinctive galaxy purple color palette. The animation is minimal, which benefits the quality of the background art. There are a couple of fight scenes that are brief but well-animated.
The soundtrack combines calming and nostalgic mellow sounds with a relaxed, laid-back feel. It incorporates hip-hop and jazz elements and features low-tempo beats, heavily filtered instruments, and noise-based textures. There's one chill, hip-hop insert song throughout the season used frequently, but it never got old. It always fits the vibe and is a joy to the ears.
With a mix of romance, slice-of-life, and comedy, Call of the Night is a must-see for fans of vampire anime.
