Disney Twisted-Wonderland The Animation – Episodes 1-3

What’s it about? When regular high school student Yuuten finds himself stranded in the magical realm of Twisted Wonderland, he must brave the students of Night Raven College in order to find his way back to Japan.

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I want to start off by saying I have elected to cover episodes one through three, leaving out the recently released episode four due to the first three episodes being a complete arc. I feel that they’re the best way to get a taste for what wickedness threads Twisted Wonderland. With that, I want to dive right in because I have thoughts on anime that should appeal to me, despite being something of a Disney hater (I just don’t like musicals, okay?) and just generally not liking the characters at all outside of Kingdom Hearts, where I like the pretty boys much more than like…Simba’s bad uncle and Pete the Cat.

So…

…These first three episodes begin with Emma Yuuken, a high school second year who is you. No, no Yuu—well, yes, Yuu, but also “you” because he’s the mundane (magic-less) focal point with which we enter the world of Twisted Wonderland. And enter we do because we get like, five minutes with Yuu before a dark carriage with a mirror to another world whisks him away. But for what purpose? The full breadth of that is yet to be revealed.

What does exist is a cadre of beautiful male students, all handpicked by the Dark Mirror into a cadre that feels more like a cult of bishonen than a proper school entrance ceremony. Each student is there not by luck, but seemingly by a twist of fate, having enough magical aptitude to qualify to haunt the hallowed halls of Night Raven College under the mythic eyes of seven great Disney villains that came before them. Only in this world, they’re not villains: instead, it’s the heroes who are wicked, and certainly not wicked for good in the eyes of the students who hail from villainous roots.

What ensues from his rocky begining is Yuu’s entry into the world of magic: spells abound, as do ghosts and monsters. In the middle of it is a teen who just wants to make it to his kendo match, which is never gonna happen. Yuu finds himself at Night Raven College with the potential to find a place–if he can survive.

At its core, this show is for the girls who either like the source game and manga or for someone like my past self: a person who doesn’t like nor love Disney but is socially inundated with enough references and knowledge of where the source “history” of this world dwells in the larger universe to enjoy seeing it applied to idol-pretty boys. That is to say that, as someone with a queer passion for Kingdom Hearts and a love of pretty boys, this is Just Okay. 

I mean, sure, the show is pretty and honestly, the dubwork is stellar: everyone is having so much fun, and it’s clear they’re really leaning into the magical-teen drama of it all to the show’s advantage. It’s also leaning hard on shipping potential between the pretty boys, which like….it’s fun, but it’s Disney. The company that pats itself on the back for having a new First Gay Character because Josh Gad danced with a guy but then pulls an entire episode of a show with a trans character in it is not gonna let these boys kiss.

I will say that I find the foundations of this world interesting. In Twisted Wonderland (the place, not the title) there are the Great Seven, seven notable villains who, in the world of TW, are elevated to the level of royalty. It is a bit jarring because we go from glitzy 2025 anime to clips of classic Disney villains in action in their own mediums, reminding you that this is a joint venture; but even still, it’s compelling. They’re much more grandiose here too: Jafar becomes the Sorcerer of the Sands and stood against a fraud (Aladdin) and Ursula becomes the Sea Witch that helped mermaids through their troubles. It’s not the fault of those around the heroes that their woes went unheard: here, instead, the heroes we know are completely at fault. 

It leave space to imagine Yuu’s perspective as a teenager living in Japan, where Tokyo Disney is very well a place he might have gone on his school trip. These characters are no longer just villains on the silver screen or a dusty DVD. They’re real people, and it leaves him, and the viewer, at odds in a world where Japan sounds like fiction and no character can pronounce Yuuten’s name because of how fictional it sounds. This is what ultimately makes Twisted Wonderland interesting to me, even if I probably will only keep up with it in batches of episodes.

Twisted Wonderland is the kind of show that, at fifteen, would have made me have my heart stop, restart, then explode in my chest from the amount of blood rushing to my cheeks, because it was the kind of indulgent pretty boy media I loved to consume. Now, it feels a bit like Ensemble Stars meets Fire Emblem: Three Houses—which is enough to hold my attention, but not necessarily engage me. I suspect that that’s because I don’t have any connection to the game, nor a vested interest in Disney media. 

Ultimately, that’s not bad because while this show really is Just Okay, it’s not style over substance. There’s clearly a story here to gateway people into the franchise, even if it’s not a story for me. I do look forward to seeing people engage with this, even if I’m on the periphery, because I’m ultimately always happy when people get more media they love. 

My verdict? If we did stars here, this would solidly be a 3: not stupendous, not outrageously bad, just kind of okay, echoing the vibes I used to love but have mellowed from as a thirty-three year old who prefers daddies over bishounen in their anime.