Twins Hinahima

When I heard that this was made 95% with AI, I was curious—and honestly, I was expecting something worse. Current AI technology in 2025 still doesn’t feel good enough to produce a full anime. It struggles with animation, maintaining coherence in long conversations, and AI-generated voices still sound awkward (I recently watched the Super Cube AI-generated dubs, and they were pretty rough).
If you're reading this review ten years from now, this might no longer be the case, but as of today, AI still isn't ready for certain tasks.

That said, this episode really surprised me—it was actually very good. I haven't checked all the details of ... the production, but just by watching, it’s clear that only the animation (and maybe parts of the script) were AI-generated. The music and voice acting were definitely done by humans. Overall, the weakest part of the anime is some of the animation. And I'm not saying that because of the usual hate AI productions get; it’s just my honest opinion. Some scenes look a bit stiff, but even then, it's not terrible at all.

The story itself was really enjoyable: it follows a couple of girls trying to go viral on TikTok—until (SPOILERS) it's revealed they are part of a virtual reality, a memory recording of a real person who visited the place to reminisce about her youth and her sister (who I theorize is deceased in real life). It was quite endearing.

Just a final reflection: human society struggles with big changes, and AI is a huge one. Many jobs are disappearing, but at the same time, new roles are emerging that didn’t even exist a few years ago. I once read that "humans aren't built to seek happiness; they're built to seek predictability." People today grew up in a world without AI, so they have strong preconceptions about how art should be made.
This anime is a perfect example—people are hating on it just because part of it was made with AI.
If you're reading this in 2045 and you’re, say, 15 years old, you might find this way of thinking strange. But this is genuinely how people felt in 2025.

It’s kinda weird, but I liked it. A pair of twins doing stuff for online views, when strange things happen.

It seems people dislike it because of the use of AI.

People are saying that 95% of the anime was made with AI, but that is not correct, only the animation part was done with AI.

The staff drew the characters, took photos, and illustrated a storyboard, then put all three elements into an AI software that animated the storyboard, illustrations, and photos. The resulting animation was then retouched by hand, and the other elements such as voice, music and sounds were added.

Have you seen those videos ... of people using AI to animate old photos? That’s basically what the staff did.

If staff hadn’t used AI, then Twins HinaHima would have been a picture drama.

Disclaimer: I'm not pro or against AI. I use it for my day-to-day job and I think it can be of great help, if used correctly.

Now, onto this product. They claim 95% of the shots have been produced using AI.

Is this product good?

From a classic-animation perspective, it is not. For the most part it's rotoscoped CGI with an AI filter on top. And while the AI fixed some of the usual issues with CGI, it introduced other problems, known to everyone who is familiar with that technology: flickering and lack of continuity.
They might not be evident to untrained eyes, but they're present in most of ... the dynamic shots of this episode: unstable lineart, elements that change shape and coloring (ears, ribbons, hair, hands, roads, grass, etc), lines that intersect solid objects (e.g. hair going through bodies and clothes)... these 30 minutes are filled with those mistakes. If you're not watching closely you might miss some, but you don't need to be a professional to catch most of them.

The story in itself isn't bad, just a bit shallow. But you can't expect much more given the runtime.

Credit's due when it's due, the final part of the show was actually OK, and the uncanny image manipulations and transformations provided by the AI were actually perfect for that surreal beat of the story. Now, THAT'S how to properly use AI. Direction was also pretty good, in general, with interesting shots.

I think this product shows how in the future studios will have more options.
With the current technology AI can't replace good animation. This episode is a testament of that.
However, when a show is on a tight budget, AI will provide alternatives to the usual "PowerPoint slideshow" we are used to see.
Between this and a sideshow, I'm not sure which one is better. AI animation is much more dynamic, but unless they fix the flickering and continuity issues, you will experience jarring inconsistencies. We are still in "uncanny valley" territory. On the other hand, sideshows are more consistent, but static and less exciting.

All in all, I don't think this product is terrible. However, I can't recommend it to anyone. It has no other value than being an interesting experiment. The story is poor and the animation lacklustre for today's standards.
Makoto Shinkai produced Hoshi no Koe all by himself in 1 year. Without AI. Similar runtime, maybe a bit rough (he worked on it alone, after all) but artistically astounding and with a very deep story. Absolutely gorgeous.
It took 1 year and a half for studio KaKa to produce this thing, with the help of AI and with multiple people working on it.
Let that sink in.