Mana Ashida
Scarlet (voice)
Overview
After failing to avenge her father's murder, Princess Scarlet, wakes up in the "Land of the Dead." In this world filled with madness, if she does not achieve her revenge against her nemesis and reach the "No End Place," she will become "Void" and cease to exist. Can Scarlet find a way to live at the end of her endless journey?
Cast
12 people
Reviews
5 min readThe Princess Who Couldn’t Die
I keep thinking about the moment Scarlet’s sword shatters. Not because it’s a grand, cinematic beat—though it is—but because it’s the first time the film admits its own rules might be broken. She’s spent the entire runtime swinging at ghosts, literally and figuratively, and when the blade finally snaps, it’s not just metal giving way.
It’s the illusion of control. Hosoda, ever the architect of childhood’s fragile magic, has built a world where revenge is both the engine and the trap, and Scarlet’s journey through the Land of the Dead is less about victory than about learning to live with the weight of wanting.
That’s the promise, anyway. Scarlet is a film of contradictions: visually sumptuous but narratively wobbly, emotionally raw but thematically overstuffed, a revenge tragedy that keeps tripping over its own ambition. It’s Hosoda’s darkest film, and in many ways his most personal—an admission that even the most carefully constructed fantasies can’t outrun grief.
The Land of the Dead is where Scarlet stakes its claim. Hosoda’s afterlife isn’t the sterile bureaucracy of Coco or the fiery pits of Dante; it’s a decaying kingdom of half-remembered dreams, where the air hums with the static of forgotten lives. The animation here is a marvel, toggling between lush 2D backdrops and jagged 3D figures that move like puppets with their strings cut.
It’s unsettling by design. The dead don’t glide—they lurch, their faces stretching into grotesque grins or collapsing into hollow-eyed despair. The effect is less "beautiful" than it is alive, in the way a wound is alive: pulsing, ugly, impossible to look away from.
But for all its visual daring, the Land of the Dead’s rules are maddeningly vague. Why can some spirits cross back into the living world while others are trapped? What determines who becomes "Void"?
The film never bothers to explain, and that’s where the trouble starts. Hosoda has always been more interested in emotion than exposition—Wolf Children’s werewolf lore is thin, but the ache of motherhood is rich—but here, the lack of clarity doesn’t just frustrate; it undercuts the stakes. If the rules are arbitrary, then Scarlet’s struggle feels arbitrary too.
And a revenge story without stakes is just a girl swinging a sword at shadows.
Audience Opinions
Audience 6.3/10
"A visually spectacular, sonically powerful anime epic whose ambitious Hamlet-inspired story stumbles under messy writing and thin worldbuilding."
Sweeping visuals, intricate environments, and a muscular sound mix create an impressive sensory experience, especially when the 2D and 3D animation styles shift between worlds and fuel large-scale action. latestnetflix.com's take is that the story, however, is widely seen as confused and underexplained, with an isekai twist on Hamlet that never fully coheres, leaving character arcs undercooked and the Land of the Dead’s rules frustratingly vague.
What viewers praise
- Striking visual artistry Backgrounds, environments, and large-scale set pieces are repeatedly praised as gorgeous, with several moments described as jaw-dropping on a big screen.
- Immersive sound and music Powerful bass, detailed sound design, and a memorable score create an enveloping atmosphere that heightens both action and emotional beats.
- Bold 2D–3D blend The switch from a more traditional 2D look to stylized CGI is viewed as a daring choice that often works, with the mixed techniques giving the afterlife sequences a unique identity.
- Inventive Hamlet spin The gender-swapped, afterlife-centered take on Hamlet, with hints of revenge thriller and isekai fantasy, is appreciated as a fresh, ambitious concept even by those who find the execution flawed.
- Dynamic action scenes Sword fights and large confrontations are singled out for energetic choreography and visual impact, delivering some of the film’s most engaging sequences.
Common complaints
- Confusing, uneven story The narrative is often described as messy or nonsensical, with plot turns that feel convenient, themes that do not fully land, and a shaky adaptation of Hamlet that loses cohesion as it goes.
- Weak worldbuilding Rules of the Land of the Dead, how characters arrive there, and the overall logic of the setting are left vague or unexplained, which pulls many viewers out of the film.
- Thin and exaggerated characters Several characters come across as wooden, overly virtuous, or cartoonishly evil, with limited nuanced development and relationships that do not feel fully earned.
- Inconsistent CGI animation While many sequences look great, some CGI shots feel stiff, cheap, or off-putting, creating a distracting contrast with the film’s strongest visual moments.
- Choppy pacing Important emotional and story beats can feel rushed while other stretches drag, resulting in a rhythm that leaves the film feeling both overstuffed and underdeveloped.
Recommended for
Visual-first anime viewers Mamoru Hosoda completionists Hamlet reinterpretation enthusiasts High-concept fantasy adventure fans Isekai-style action drama fans Big-screen spectacle seekers
Full Plot (Spoilers)
Spoiler warning
This section contains the full plot, including major story reveals. Overview above stays spoiler-free.
Buzz & Rumors
Public reportsThe prestige run still sold almost no tickets
Mamoru Hosoda's Scarlet premiered out of competition at the 82nd Venice Film Festival on 4 September 2025. TIFF and the New York Film Festival followed. Then the movie opened in Japan on 21 November and took about 270 million yen in its first three days, roughly $1.73 million. Belle, his previous original, had done about 890 million yen in the same window. latestnetflix.com's read is that North America, handled by Sony Pictures Classics after a late handoff from Columbia, added $629,038.
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That gap is the story. A four-and-a-half-year Studio Chizu film, co-produced with Columbia Pictures and Nippon TV, walked the festival circuit and then stalled at the multiplex. Wikipedia records Hosoda saying the look would be neither 2D nor "Hollywood-style CG." He told Variety the facial detail "would be extremely challenging to do with 2D, if not impossible." The official Japanese site lists Disney veteran Jin Kim among the character designers, which is the kind of credit that makes people expect a hit. Stunt work from Kensuke Sonomura and Saori Izawa fed the sword fights. Mana Ashida voices the princess. Koji Yakusho is Claudius. Masaki Okada is Hijiri, a 21st-century paramedic dumped into the same afterlife. ,
The U.S. date kept sliding. Early plans pointed to mid-December 2025 under Columbia. In August the North American rights moved to Sony Pictures Classics. An awards-qualifying IMAX run came first. The wider date landed on 6 February 2026. CBR still called the whole theatrical pass a disaster, and the numbers back that insult.
Annie nods after the flop
The Annies nominated Scarlet for independent feature, direction, and writing anyway. Crunchyroll put it up for Film of the Year. Venice's fan sidebar even handed Scarlet and Hijiri a couple prize. Critics split. Rotten Tomatoes sat at 72 percent. Metacritic was a mixed 56. IndieWire's Adam Solomons called it a visually impressive, narratively forgettable baroque fantasy. Hosoda once directed a One Piece movie, Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island. This one was supposed to be the grown-up follow-up to Belle. Ticket buyers treated it like homework.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoC6HKkwydg
Streaming is the second life. What's on Netflix dated the U.S. arrival to 6 June 2026, after a 17 May rollout in at least 15 other territories. Digital purchase hit in March. Discs in May. Scarlet is the Hosoda film festivals clapped for and audiences skipped. Netflix now owns the replay.
Entertainment rumors and trivia aggregated from public reporting. Treat speculation as unverified unless a cited source confirms it.
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