Ibara no Ou

When a deadly virus known as Medousa sweeps across the globe, turning people to stone with no chance of recovery, humanity finds itself on the verge of destruction. The only hope is the Venus Gate Corporation's shocking new plan: to put 160 people in cold sleep for up to one hundred years, or until a treatment is developed. Kasumi Ishiki is one of the fortunate to be selected, and though she fears being separated from her twin sister, Shizuku, the girls hope that they can be reunited in the future.

When Kasumi awakens, however, the world is not what she expected. The cold sleep facility is covered in thorns, and strange monsters start attacking them. Although most of those who have woken up die in the immediate confusion, Kasumi and a small group of survivors begin to investigate the maze-like facility and unravel the secrets of Medousa, as well as the true intentions of the Venus Gate Corporation.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Owen, Marco Main

Morikawa, Toshiyuki Japanese

Ishiki, Kasumi Main

Hanazawa, Kana Japanese

Laisenbach, Timothy Supporting

Yajima, Akiko Japanese

Roznovski, Alice Supporting

Kuno, Misaki Japanese

Ishiki, Shizuku Supporting

Sendai, Eri Japanese

Turner, Katherine Supporting

Ohara, Sayaka Japanese

Hewitt, Walter Supporting

Fujita, Yoshinori Japanese

Ambler, Judith Supporting

Vega, Ivan Coral Supporting

Isobe, Tsutomu Japanese

Owen, Laura Supporting

Kawasumi, Ayako Japanese

Cook, Justin Producer

Uchida, Kenji Producer

Tsuchiya, Yoshimasa Producer

Kimura, Junichi Producer

Reviews

Dec 30, 2024

darth_kaiser_x

Recommended

Here you will have to pay close attention or watch it more than once because the plot at a certain point is a bit confusing but very well crafted, each character has a lore that will make sense in the end and he is not there for nothing, he is not just a puppet, you can feel empathy for the main characters, the plot twists are very good and very well placed throughout the story taking you by surprise on certain occasions, the plot makes you believe that the story is going in one direction and ends up going completely in the opposite direction, the ... animation is very well crafted and it pays attention to the details so pay attention, if you like a more heady anime you will definitely like this one, the protagonist is scared at first and you may even think that something bad will end up happening to her but she manages to have attitude in the key moments of the story even though she seems like the typical "helpless damsel" and as time goes by she proves otherwise, as I said at the beginning you will need to pay close attention or you will easily get lost in the story and you will end up dropping the movie without understanding anything.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Oct 6, 2025

Siluetta

Mixed Feelings

Beautiful chaos. Interesting, dark, but uneven. A great concept that didn't quite live up to its own weight. King of Thorns is an adaptation of Yuji Iwahara's manga, aiming to condense a long, complex story into a single film. The result? A lot of disorder, but also a few truly atmospheric moments.

Animation & Art Style
A huge plus here. 🔥
The scenery is impressive, overgrown ruins, post-apocalyptic nature, dark tunnels and biological horror-style monsters. The combination of 2D and 3D worked surprisingly well.

Sound & Music
The soundtrack is atmospheric and, at times, builds tension really well. Especially in the first half of the film, you can hear ... the horror and thriller influences. The voice acting is fine, although at times the dramatic scenes sound a little too theatrical.

Enjoyment & Overall Thoughts
King of Thorn is a film with enormous potential, a great idea, a good atmosphere, cool characters, but it tries to be too many things at once. It wants to be a horror film, a psychological drama, a philosophical parable and science fiction all at the same time. The result: instead of wow, we get a bit of confusion. Still, if you like survival, mystery and post-apocalyptic atmospheres with a touch of symbolism, it's worth watching. Not for the plot, but for the atmosphere and visual experience.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Jun 13, 2020

Andre_Alexander

Not Recommended

Spoiler free article: A short description that's just a bit longer than normal synopsis to give you rough idea what to expect from this anime. Conclusion for TL;DR at the end of the articles.

Reading time: 3 minutes read

Review:

I'm interested in this anime because I'm curious as for what the japanese thinks the world will react if a global pandemic happened. The premises are good enough, the analogy to sleeping beauty are also quite intriguing, the story started well, with a lot of mysteries waiting to be solved, I sat comfortably enjoying this movie, however it didn't last long, the sudden step up in pacing aren't ... followed with enough explanations or clues, it's getting worse overtime, then plot holes started to popped out like weeds in early spring times, literally everywhere, for example: a normal high school girl, suddenly have a marksmanship similar to special forces, able to operate highly secured computer system, and many others, anti climatic death, useless action scenes, rushed plot towards the end, oh and lots of deviation from the manga, might as well named this with different titles altogether due to the huge discrepancy of both quality and storyline.

The arts are promising at first, but after a while the lack of details here and there became apparent, the bad CGI also proved that it's not as promising as before. The quality of the visuals are consistent, consistently going downhill that is. It's a bit above average at the beginning, then end up to below average at the end, is it due to the diminishing budget or time? I don't know, but most people would be able to see the reduction of details and fluidity of movement in the latter half of the show. The character designs aren't the greatest, but since it's adapted from a manga, it's not their fault that it's so...average.

The music are the other things that supported this anime so that it didn't crumble in the middle of it. As bad as the story itself turned out, the OST along with the visuals managed to salvaged it a bit, fitting perfectly with the supposed atmosphere in the scenes, MISIA is a singer whose voice are always welcomes, just like in the Iron Blooded Orphans, combine her voice with this old player in the industry, Toshihiko Sahashi, as the composer, you got this great music. The seiyuus are the MVP here, with the bad script writing, they're still able to bring some characters to be somewhat believable. The tension when they speak are there, it's not soulless. On the other hand, the sound effect barely made it with passing score, it's borderline bad with a couple wrong sounds at the wrong place and time.

Conclusion:

Reasons to watch:
-A bit above average visuals?
-You want to see how bad your favorite manga get butchered...

Reasons NOT to watch:
-A critical weakness in story department

Reviewer’s Rating: 2

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	Poll: Ibara no Ou Episode 1 Discussion ( 1 2 ) Luna - Jan 16, 2016	97 replies	by JackCompletes »» Dec 31, 2025 10:08 PM
	Ibara no Ou Esheraz - Nov 28, 2013	2 replies	by Y-MELLY »» Dec 5, 2025 12:41 AM
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