I Watched Galverse So You Didn't Have To ☆☆☆☆☆
(Posted June 25, 2025)
As a grill with a fiery hatred of NFTs and cryptocurrency, pun fully intended, it’s rather ironic that I’ve become likely the only expert on NFT related anime. While shitty NFT cartoons have gotten plenty of coverage, I saw no one was willing to torture themselves by digging into the anime side of things. So I strapped myself in Clockwork Orange style, watched a mostly bland as hell show, and wrote about the state of NFTs within the anime industry. Within that article I discussed Galverse, which just released its OVA on YouTube free to watch for everyone. So I figured hey, I could take one for the team and get through a single OVA, right?
Several potential Nazi dog whistles and 22 minutes later I was left stunned by the absolute mess that I had just witnessed. Not only did I watch Galverse so you didn’t have to, I highly recommend making sure others you know should NOT watch Galverse in any capacity.
Now before we go on, two notes: I will be discussing Nazi dog whistles here as previously mentioned as a general content warning. Second, I really hate NFTs and anything crypto. I also live in the US where fascism is on the rise and particularly terrifying right now. So it’s fair to say I might be inclined to have an ungenerous view of everything I saw in this anime. If you want to dismiss what I have to say because of this, I can’t stop you, but I highly recommend reading through this whole thing yourself to form your own opinions.
*June 26th Edit: After some further glaring issues were pointed out to me by a lovely person I won’t name so they don’t end up facing harassment (you know who you are if you read this, thank you) I have added even more potentially troubling things to this post.
The folks behind Galverse always seem to not mention how the project is deeply tied to NFTs in general anime spaces, leaving a lot of viewers simply excited to support what they view as an independent animation attempting to revive cell animated styled anime in modern times. They also don’t seem to like mentioning how much AI generated artwork is connected to the project either. The fact they feel the need to lie to people and trick them into watching this in the first place already started raising alarm bells in my head.
*Edit: Production staff for Galverse have claimed "There was no AI used in the creation of the Galverse anime." The interview previously linked in this paragraph has them discussing how it was used in the process of creating concept art. So sure, it wasn't used to draw the OVA itself but it's clearly a part of the process. It's also extremely clear from that interview how much the Galverse crew heavily supports AI generated content and hopes to see it used in the future.*
But whatever, I’m sure a potential reference to hailing Hitler within the first minute of watching this anime, right? As I know sarcasm over text isn’t always easy to read, let me make it clear: there’s an 88 reference right off the bat, with 8,888 Galverse fragments spread across the universe.
For those who may not know, 88 is a Nazi dog whistle as the eighth letter of the alphabet is H and two of those amounts to “heil Hitler.” Now hey, this could just be a shitty NFT anime wanting plenty of AI generated girls to sell out of literal vending machines to scam crypto bros out of their money… You might be right! That’s what sucks about dog whistles, they are made to be ambiguous, hard to prove. Hell, when I was first watching through, I even kind of joked that I hoped it wasn’t a Nazi reference. It’s all the other dog whistles that followed that gave me the kind of sinking feeling when you know you’ve stumbled onto something truly disgusting.
*Edit: As some have tried to complain I seem to know little about Japanese media and culture despite how I write about it and research it on a regular basis, yes I know that 8888 is associated with applause in Japan. There's a reason I initially didn't try to take it as anything too serious after all. This added up with the rest of the dog whistles in this article is why I was alarmed.*
Our main character Zero sci-fi magical girls her way onto a planet being consumed by war, with one side… Essentially committing a genocide against another group with far less superior fire power and resources to defend themselves. Hahaha… Is my bow tie too tight? It feels like it’s getting hotter than usual in here…
Now look, to be fair, these folks who are desperately fighting back are clearly the heroes in this scenario. And yes, Israel has been doing some horrifying things to the people of Palestine. I’ve literally written about this using anime as a lens before. It’s not that they might be taking this approach that is the issue, it’s how the story is approached that makes it worth raising an eyebrow.
You see, all of the people on the planet who were rich? They were able to escape and just avoid the war! Now hold on, isn’t cryptocurrency and investing in NFTs supposed to help the average Joe (or I guess Taro in this case) make a bunch of money outside of those pesky regulated banks?!? Oh wait… Banks…
Yeah, the concept of “Jewish Greed” or the idea that Jewish people are all rich and have tons of money, has been a long-standing antisemitic trope. Jewish people were literally not allowed to join guilds or even own land in many places, forcing them to work as financiers historically. People who back cryptocurrency have quite the history with being antisemitic and the discussions of lacking regulations and avoiding mainstream banks can often be further dog whistles.
Furthermore, we end up learning that this war taking place on the planet was orchestrated by a shadowy cabal behind the scenes to make two groups fight each other. The kind of thing clearly lined out in the most widely distributed antisemitic publication of all time, The Protocols of Zion.
*Edit: Making this even worse is the name of the forces currently causing the war on the planet, the Gevurah. In the Kabbalistic Tree of Life, Gevurah holds the position of the fifth sephirah. It is associated with the concept of law and judgement. They have determined that, “the people of Amatera are worthless” and have decided to kill them all. There have been plenty of anime and manga that have decided to draw from Kabbalistic imagery over the years, thinking it cool or exotic, but this deliberate choice feels like it involves an underlying understanding of its concepts to use it purposefully as a reference.
This becomes a bit more clear when focusing on the planet under attack, Amatera, quite a clear reference to Amateru Kami, or the goddess of the sun Amaterasu. The Japanese imperial family claims it descends from Amaterasu and is a part of the Yamato Dynasty.
To understand why this matters, you must understand a bit more about Japan’s particular history with antisemitism. Part of the racial science Japan was indoctrinated with was that Japanese people were of the “Yamato Race.” Calling settlers of mainland Japan “Yamato people” only became an antiquated term after World War II due to its basis in pseudoscience and racism.
As explained by Aya Fujiwara, a postdoctoral Fellow at McMaster University, “[T]he Emperor was the most natural symbol to promote primordial national sentiment and superiority of the Yamato race - the term that the Japanese used to distinguish themselves from others. This term meant a noble race, the members of which saw themselves as ‘chosen people…’ Imported to Canada by Japanese intellectuals, a ‘common myth of descent’ that Japanese people belonged to the noble Yamato race headed by the Emperor since the ancient period was one of the core elements that defined Japanese-Canadian ethno-racial identity in the 1920s and the 1930s.”
Some of the best selling books in Japan for a period of time were purely about antisemitic conspiracy theories with some of these books being reprinted as recently as 2019. Some of the theories espoused in these books include the idea that Jewish people were to blame for Japan’s involvement in World War II and its eventual loss of the war.
There has been a long history of antisemitic publishing taking place within Japan. Jewish people have been blamed for tsunamis and earthquakes in Japan. The director of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics opening show had to be dismissed for antisemitic comments. This sadly is an issue Japan will likely have to reckon with long into the future.
So a shadowy cabal using a group named after a Jewish concept to secretly orchestrate a war against a group meant to represent Japanese imperialism? That is dripping in Japan specific antisemitic tropes? It’s an extremely bad look. Said evil shadowy cabal working to destroy the “mother planet” to set off all the events in Galverse just makes it extremely more uncomfortable. It stinks of “die vaderland” Hitler himself so often spoke of. Said motherland was "invaded by people who hated it" and was destroyed too. Literally following some of these antisemitic conspiracy theories that had been made popular in Japan. Just fucking yikes all around.*
Now that the yikes meter is up to eleven, lets- wait, a guy with a camera for a head? Is that a skibidi toilet reference? Isn’t its creator dafuqboom a serious racist who made fun of George Floyd’s death, has said the N-Word, and done lots of other heinous shit? While this one is a bit of a full yoga stretch, I couldn’t just ignore it at this point.
*Edit: Several people keep saying that this bit of the article was absolutely silly while seeming to miss where I called it a “full yoga stretch.” Yes, I am aware this isn’t a serious thing to accuse the anime of being meant to promote a hateful message from. Sarcasm does not read well over text.*
Anyways, back to more serious issues, won’t anyone think of the children?!? Not in the funny Simpsons reference way, but in the disgusting QAnon kind of way with a dash of the 14 Words for some added vomit-inducing spice.
“Save The Children” was a defining mantra for QAnon groups, “a kind of ‘QAnon Lite’ on-ramp — an issue QAnon believers could talk about openly without scaring off potential recruits with bizarre claims about Hillary Clinton eating babies, and one that could pass nearly unnoticed in groups devoted to parenting, natural health and other nonpolitical topics.” Add to this the fact that Ring, our other main character of sorts for the OVA, is fighting to secure the future for children… The only word missing in these sentiments are “white.”
It just keeps getting even worse when we meet our Black coded antagonist. The one who is working with the aforementioned shady cabal. The one that seeks to, “destroy all forms of life worthless to the galaxy.”
The Great Replacement Conspiracy has long been used to fuel racist hate and incite violence. This Black coded character being one of the people fighting against our little group of freedom fighters trying to protect the future of the children? It’s a puzzle that’s extremely easy to put together. To be fair, this character does turn slightly less evil and try to even slightly help by the end, but it’s still a pretty terrible look.
*Edit: As if there weren't enough problems with this anime, the multi-eyed wheel summoned by the shadowy evil group to try and destroy the planet at the end also has its roots in Jewish imagery, looking similar to the Ophanim. Yes, the many eyed angels typically referred to in today’s culture as “biblically accurate angels” have a proper name. A small piece of trivia learned while researching this offensive and depressing drivel of an anime. Once more, the use of Kabbalistic imagery or ideas from the Bible isn’t by itself a red flag, it’s how they are combined within this story that inspires concern.*
“So what Grill, are you meaning to tell me the mother of the kid who created Zombie Zoo and Ayaka Ohira used NFTs to try and spread antisemitism in the anime community?” No, partially because I don’t want to be sued into the ground, but partially because there’s a far more logical explanation. I’ve been showing how this anime is antisemitic and downright racist throughout this little review all why pointing at how cryptocurrency and NFT communities often are populated by people with similar views.
Right now, it's entirely possible either a few edgelords or some determined neonazis are giggling their heads off while watching this OVA premiere knowing that they sneakily contributed these terrible dog whistles and themes to it. You see, Galverse is made with a WAGMAA — “we’re all gonna make an anime” — approach which “allows community members to take on assignments like art, design, marketing, QA, and writing.” Outside of how disgusting exploitative this is, with the only payment being that their “digital collectible character might make an appearance” in a Galverse project, this makes it entirely plausible that literal neonazis contributed to the writing of the episode.
Edit: I feel foolish for previously missing the scenario writers in the credits. I own my mistakes, so I'm mentioning I had this part messed up earlier. However, there are still some issues to be discussed here, so let's tackle them. I've been told by a WAGMAA intern that in the end, their involvement was extremely minimal, despite what the company might have claimed publicly. However, it's still entirely possible subtle concepts or the like that were contributed by folks involved in the project ended up working their way into the final product. Either way, whoever went over this final script managed to miss some seriously glaring tropes being used which deserve some raised eyebrows.
I would love to see some shows inspired by cell animation again as much as many other people, but this isn’t the kind of project anyone should be getting behind. It’s funded through NFTs, uses shitty AI generated artwork as part of its production, and is full of antisemitic dog whistles. Hell, I didn’t even get to discussing just how bland the storyline is otherwise, how certain animations are clearly wonky or off model, and how the storyboarding and animation is clearly sloppy at points because I had to spend so much time detailing just how fucking disgusting its story was to begin with.
Galverse deserves to be nothing more than an infamous footnote in anime history and I not only recommend you do not watch it, but actively encourage everyone you know not to watch it as well. Don’t let this kind of insidious shit fester within the anime fandom, do what you can to help it die.
