Parents' Guide to The Fire Hunter

TV Crunchyroll Anime 2023
The Fire Hunter TV show poster: Touko, Koushi, and Kanata are seen standing under a starry night sky, above them a bright red shooting star is shooting across the sky.

Common Sense Media Review

By Jeremy Looney , based on child development research. How do we rate?

age 13+

Drama fantasy anime is unyieldingly bleak, has violence.

Parents Need to Know

Why Age 13+?

Any Positive Content?

Parent and Kid Reviews

What's the Story?

THE FIRE HUNTER follows the story of two protagonists in different parts of a post-apocalyptic world. Touko (voiced by Misaki Kuno) is an 11-year-old girl who lives in a forest village, and Koushi (Shouya Ishige) is a 15-year-old boy living in the city capital. One day Touko is saved from a forest monster by a fire hunter who dies while saving her. With his last breath the hunter introduces Touko to his loyal hound, Kanata. Touko embarks on a journey to deliver Kanata and the hunter's belongings back to his family in the capital city. Unknown to Touko, the fire hunter is actually Koushi's missing father, and Koushi soon learns that his father may have found a special stone that could have the ability to save mankind from extinction.

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say : Not yet rated
Kids say : Not yet rated

This drama fantasy anime has a bleak and harsh setting that stands apart from other more violent titles. The Fire Hunter is unique in its story about survival in an uncaring and unforgiving world. There's violence and gore but it's not over-the-top, and it doesn't stand out as the main reason the setting is so bleak. Instead, the world is just cold, both literally and figuratively. After the last great war, a weaponized pathogen causes humans to spontaneously combust if they get anywhere near fire. This has led to small societies focused only on survival. The dire struggle for survival and limited resources have left everyone cold. There is little compassion or empathy for others, especially if you don't provide any survival value to others. For example, despite being only 11 years old, Touko is constantly berated for being useless; someone in her own family tells her that she's a curse and that they hate her because of a mistake she made. Despite the harsh setting, the story is interesting, and I found myself wanting to know more about what happened leading up to the apocalypse and who are the mysterious divine clans who've risen to power in the post-apocalyptic world.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about perseverance and Self-reliance, two themes in this show. How can you improve your resilience to hard times?

  • If you could not use fire or electricity like the characters from The Fire Hunter, what would you do? How would you handle this situation?

TV Details

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The Fire Hunter TV show poster: Touko, Koushi, and Kanata are seen standing under a starry night sky, above them a bright red shooting star is shooting across the sky.

What to Watch Next

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