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If you’ve been keeping up with anime this season, you can’t have missed everyone talking about Dan Da Dan. Between the over-the-top action scenes, the wild concept, and the gorgeous animation, the series has been a hit for both Crunchyroll and Netflix. However, one of our favorite scenes so far was inspired by the cozy slice-of-life scenes of Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli. 

Yes, you read that right. Even though Miyazaki’s work seldom has the sexual overtones and frantic action of Dan Da Dan, one of the biggest hallmarks of the legendary anime director had a big impact on Dan Da Dan’s creator, Yukinobu Tatsu. In an interview, he discusses how his experience working as a manga assistant for very low pay shaped his view of food in his work. “I myself was poor at one time. When I was an assistant, my boss gave me 1000 yen (approximately $6.50) and said, ‘Go get a midnight snack.’ I was incredibly grateful for that 1000 yen.”

The idea of food being a reward for hard work stuck with Yukinobu. If you’ve seen episode four of Dan Da Dan, you’ve seen that philosophy in action. In the cozy scene that comes straight after Okarun and Momo beat Turbo Granny, they settle down for a meal of crab legs with Momo’s grandmother. It is a sweet scene that doesn’t just serve to give the reader a chance to catch their breath after such a wild scene – it is a reward for the group after their first really big fight.

Like the rest of us, he is a fan of Hayao Miyazaki’s work, which often uses meals to give a sense of accomplishment and comradery. “In Miyazaki’s [films], people who have worked always eat. That’s because they can’t work anymore. I make my films in the same way so that there is always a meal after working,” Yukinobu explained.

As different as Dan Da Dan is from Miyazaki’s beloved films like My Neighbor Totoro or Princess Mononoke, the power of food to give us a well-deserved break runs through both. Because, no matter who we are, at the end of a long day, we need to refuel, regroup, and spend time with those dearest to us so we’re ready for the next big day.

Each week, Popverse's resident anime expert Trent Cannon runs down the latest and, dare we say "greatest," in anime and manga in Popverse Jump. Some recent columns have included... 

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• Piracy is baked into anime's past, but, like Crunchyroll, we should move on from it
• Flying whales, mechs, and Miyazaki vibes: Inside Netflix's Leviathan anime with the people who made it
• How AI translations of manga continues the 'enshitification' of the medium, and why Japanese publishers are "less precious" about it
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• The Summer Hikaru Died delivers its cosmic horror at an agonizingly slow pace
• The one thing that Dan Da Dan does better than Demon Slayer ever did
• Studio Ghibli movies have never been as cozy as you think they are and that's what makes them magic