Anime Trending got the chance to join Anime NYC 2025’s roundtable interview session with New PANTY & STOCKING with GARTERBELT’’s Hiroyuki Imaishi (director et al.) and Hiromi Wakabayashi (concept planner et al.), where we finally got to ask what animator and director Yoh Yoshinari’s Special Specialist credit on the show signifies. The following is a collection of the responses that tickled our fancy the most (answers via interpreter, with a few alterations based on Anime Trending’s retranslation, and lightly edited for clarity):

Explaining Yoh Yoshinari’s Special Specialist Role

Imaishi: Well, it’s as it says. He’s just so special that there’s no other way to describe him. He’s doing work for Panty & Stocking that’s hard to put another name on.

Most people’s reaction upon seeing “Special Specialist” is probably, “This guy must be special,” and that’s exactly the reaction we want. 

So, this again goes back to the first series. It’s actually Yoshinari’s taste for the cartoonish design; it’s part of his essence. We also heavily rely on his vast library of special effects. So he’s kind of like one of the backbones of the production in that regard. He is, again, a special specialist.

Exaggeration in Anime

Imaishi: I believe that one of the key characteristics of anime as a medium is to be able to exaggerate an expression. I believe that anime, as a medium, is quite important to overly exaggerate a character’s portrayal. 

Letting the Animation Directors* Express Themselves

Imaishi: This actually goes back to Gurren Lagann. If you pay close attention to Gurren Lagann, each episode actually has quite the disparity on how the characters might look. This is due to my belief that each respective animation director should be able to express their own artistic direction. For that reason, I did something similar for Panty & Stocking — the older Panty & Stocking and the newer Panty & Stocking. I just believe that anime should be a platform for each animator to express their own direction. 

Wakabayashi: The popular trend right now is for a series to have very seamless, very on-model designs throughout the entire series, but it’s something that Imaishi feels is more interesting if each individual creator or animator can express themselves better.

*Despite the name, the animation director role relates to supervision rather than direction. There are cases where the animation director or chief animation director’s style is visible through their corrections.

©TRIGGER・今石洋之/NPSG製作委員会

Designer Koyama Shigeto’s Influence on Imaishi

Imaishi: In regard to colors, it’s actually quite recent that I’ve been starting to use a lot of these high contrast colors. To be more specific, it’s probably from PROMARE. I think the biggest reason behind this is that there’s this creator, his name is Shigeto Koyama [PROMARE’s character designer]. He’s very exceptional when it comes to the choice of his colors, and I think his influence is the biggest reason for my choice of coloring.

Imaishi and Wakabayashi’s Favorite American Superhero Comics 

Imaishi: Lobo. I’m a big fan of Simon Bisley.

Wakabayashi: Chris Bachalo. My favorite character is Death by Chris Bachalo. I’m just a big fan of the occult. That’s why Panty & Stocking also has the angels and demons kind of ideas.

Wakabayashi and Mickey Mouse 

Wakabayashi: I’d like to work with Mickey Mouse. There’s like a classic episode of Mickey Mouse where Mickey Mouse goes berserk — I think it’s “Runaway Brain.” I’d like Imaishi to direct something similar in that style if I were able to work with Disney. I want to work with big IPs such as Disney with Imaishi’s taste.

Imaishi Wanted to Direct the Hanna-Barbera Homage Skit

Imaishi: The entire series hasn’t been aired or streamed yet, but if I were to raise one scene that is currently available, it would probably be Episode 4, directed by Kai Ikarashi.* It’s the Hanna-Barbera homage episode. I personally wanted to do that episode myself, but I entrusted it to our younger talents, and I’m quite confident that he did a much better job than what I could have executed, so I’m quite happy with the results.

*Ikarashi is an animator and animation director who has storyboarded episodes like Cyberpunk Edgerunners Episode 6 and Tengoku-Daimakyo Episode 10 (directing the latter as well), and will make his series director debut with the recently announced Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2.

©TRIGGER・今石洋之/NPSG製作委員会

Wakabayashi’s Highlight from New PANTY & STOCKING with GARTERBELT

Wakabayashi: There are a lot of scenes that I like, but my favorite right now, the most memorable right now, is being able to display Panty’s soul in Episode 1 using the entire screen and being able to carry her soul on a mikoshi. I’m quite confident that this Panty & Stocking is the first and last anime to show such content using an entire screen.

Imaishi Says Working With Others Helps Your Own Artistic Identity

Imaishi: By working with many different individuals, I feel like I can keep my own taste, my own artistic direction, while keeping it fresh. For example, for Panty & Stocking, we’re working with a good amount of younger talents at the studio. For our previous works, I changed the [character] designer for almost every title. For PROMARE, it was Koyama, and for KILL la KILL, it was SUSHiO. So working with a different individual is, I think, the key to keeping it unique.

Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt Is A Series That Gives Imaishi a Mental Break

Imaishi: I feel that it’s a necessity to calm my mind. I need to do something that’s not so serious once in a while to soothe my mind. I would like to note that it’s not that I don’t like working on serious series. It’s just that once in a while, I need a break from it.

Does the presence of “Anal Penetration BDSM” in various Imaishi works mean something?

Imaishi: I do not have those sexual preferences. It’s just a joke.

Session attended by Isabelle Lee. Anime Trending questions prepared by Melvyn Tan.