Ushio & Tora (2015)

A boy, a spear, and a tiger demon who won't admit he cares.

Ushio Aotsuki treats his father's youkai stories as the ramblings of a temple-obsessed eccentric—until basement cleaning reveals a tiger-like monster pinned by a legendary spear. Tora is ancient, arrogant, and hungry for freedom, offering a deal: release me, and I'll... probably eat you last. Ushio refuses. Then the youkai come knocking—real ones, hungry ones—and the spear is the only leverage he has. The partnership is born from mutual hostility: Ushio wields the Beast Spear, which burns his soul with every use; Tora tags along because the alternative is another five centuries in a basement. What unfolds is a road movie through Japanese folklore, Monster of the Week giving way to a centuries-spanning conspiracy involving the spear's true origin and the white-faced entity Hakumen no Mono. MAPPA and VOLN deliver action with weight—spear impacts feel like tectonic shifts, and Tora's lightning isn't pretty, it's violent. But the series' heart is the slow alchemy of its leads: Ushio's stubborn humanity grinding against Tora's cynical pragmatism until respect, then something like affection, forms. The youkai aren't just bosses; they're tragedies given form—grief, obsession, duty twisted by time. By the finale, the spear isn't a weapon but a covenant. A shounen that earns its runtime, balancing spectral spectacle with a friendship forged in the simple, radical act of not letting go.

A middle-schooler partners with a sealed tiger-demon to fight Japanese folklore monsters using a cursed spear. Expect energetic battles, creepy creature designs, and some emotionally heavy arcs, but the tone stays firmly in classic shounen adventure territory.