Anime Like Leviathan
It makes you believe a whale can be a warship. Studio Orange's CG does the thing hand-drawn animation can't: the Leviathan reads as a breathing ecosystem, bats and bees and hydrogen sniffers all riding one enormous living hull, while Alek's Stormwalker stomps through the Alps like a furnace with legs. That Darwinist versus Clanker split isn't set dressing, it's the whole argument, and the show is smart enough to let the two kids figure out that neither side's engineering is the villain. Deryn strapping into a Huxley ascender while lying about her name to everyone who matters is the exact kind of tension this premise was built for, and Dr. Barlow's loris steals scenes it has no business stealing. Be warned: three novels crammed into twelve episodes means the back half sprints past character beats the first half earned. The opening arc is genuinely great, and Deryn Sharp deserved a longer runway.
SYNOPSIS
A runaway prince fleeing across a fractured Europe and a girl masquerading as a soldier find themselves thrown together on humanity's greatest weapon: the HMS Leviathan, a colossal airship built from living, genetically engineered tissue. As the Austro-Hungarian heir and British Air Service recruit, Alek and Deryn should be enemies, but survival aboard this breathing, biomechanical beast forces an unlikely alliance. The Leviathan itself becomes both character and setting, a magnificent creature that demands respect and constant vigilance. Around them, a reimagined 1914 unfolds where nations wage war with biotechnology instead of traditional machines, where loyalty carries lethal weight, and where identities are weapons as dangerous as cannons. What begins as a desperate escape transforms into something larger. Alek and Deryn must navigate shifting allegiances, their own conflicting beliefs, and the terrifying question of whether the Leviathan truly serves humanity or hunts its own masters. Packed with aerial combat, political intrigue, and a friendship forged in impossible circumstances, this adventure pulls you into a war that rewrites history itself.
