What We Watch in Our House — Disney, Ghibli & More 🎬✨
There’s something about watching movies and anime with your kids that completely changes you.
My boys are obsessed with Coco and Zootopia. We’ve seen them so many times that I’ve lost count — but here’s the thing: every single time, my kids spot something new. A character hiding in the background, a tiny detail on a building, a little joke I never noticed. It honestly amazes me. Kids really do see the world differently!
Watching the same movie over and over with them has actually changed the way I enjoy it too. Now I find myself paying attention to details I never noticed before — backgrounds, tiny expressions, little hidden jokes. It’s like watching with fresh eyes every time.
What I Watch 🎬
As for me, I have my own long-time favorites. Bleach, Spy x Family, The Apothecary Diaries, and Studio Ghibli films have all had a special place in my heart for years.
Bleach holds a special place — I love the world-building, the character designs, and the soundtrack. I watched it when it first aired and came back for Thousand-Year Blood War. Seeing it return with that animation quality felt like a gift to everyone who grew up with the original series.
Spy x Family won me over completely. Anya’s expressions became a whole language in our house — my sons and I communicate almost entirely in Anya reaction faces now. The balance of action, comedy, and genuine warmth is something very few shows manage, and SPY×FAMILY makes it look effortless.
The Apothecary Diaries (薬屋のひとりごと) was a more recent obsession. Maomao is such a refreshing protagonist — sharp, practical, and deeply observant. The setting (a fictionalized historical Chinese imperial court) is beautifully realized, and the mysteries are genuinely interesting. I finished the season far too quickly.
Studio Ghibli — Always Coming Back
You can’t talk about what Japanese families watch without talking about Studio Ghibli. In our house, Ghibli films are background noise, comfort food, and high art all at once. My boys will happily rewatch My Neighbor Totoro or Spirited Away on a rainy afternoon without any prompting from me.
What I love about showing Ghibli to my kids is how naturally the films handle things that are hard to explain — grief, change, growing up, nature, fear. They never talk down to children. They just tell the story and trust kids to feel what they need to feel. That approach has always moved me.
My personal Ghibli ranking changes depending on my mood. Some days it’s Nausicaä. Some days it’s Howl’s Moving Castle. My older son is firmly in the “Porco Rosso is underrated” camp, and I respect that opinion deeply.
Watching Anime as a Japanese Family
There’s something interesting about watching anime as a Japanese person — especially with kids. A lot of the cultural context that non-Japanese viewers have to look up just… lands naturally. School scenes, festival episodes, the specific way characters eat convenience store food — none of it needs explaining. It’s just life, animated.
At the same time, I’ve started to notice things I might have taken for granted — the way Japanese emotional restraint shows up in how characters express love, the food that appears in family scenes, the way seasonal changes mark the passing of time in a story. Watching with my kids has made me more conscious of these things, and I find that I appreciate them more.
Movie Nights in Our House
We’re not big on schedules for watching — it tends to happen on rainy days, long weekends, or nights when nobody wants to go anywhere. Someone picks, we drag out the cushions, and we watch. Sometimes we make popcorn. Sometimes we have leftover snacks from a convenience store run.
My younger son will inevitably fall asleep before the end and then insist he didn’t. My older son will ask questions about the plot that reveal he’s thought about it much more than he lets on. And I’ll probably cry at Coco for the fourteenth time and pretend I didn’t.
These are some of my favorite moments. 🎬✨
