This controversial new Netflix anime features cat girls, addiction, and lots of poop jokes

This is without a doubt the strangest new anime of the summer Let’s not beat around the bush: for better and worse, the first episode of Chainsmoker Cat is downright vile. While viewers may go into this series expecting another lighthearted hobby anime about the joys of nicotine — Smoking Behind the Supermarket with You is great, but it might as well have been bankrolled by Big Tobacco — this premiere is a spiraling descent into cat girl depravity. It’s gross, weird, and seems to know what it’s doing with heavy themes about addiction, until overly broad slapstick humor flies in like a car crash. The result is a bit of a mess, but a fascinating one. This story begins as our titular chainsmoker cat, Yaniko (Yūko Natsuyoshi), takes a long drag on her balcony. She exhales a billowing cloud as the camera match cuts to a dandelion being blown apart, its seeds carried by the wind before falling like fresh snow. And then a bunch of nasty stuff goes down. From these first moments, it’s clear that this is a very well-produced episode of television. The team at Bibury Animation Studios (Witch Watch; The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You) renders the minute de