Sometimes an anime has such subtle foreshadowing that fans watch the series over and over, hunting for clues of what unfolds later in the series. Even if an anime's foreshadowing is ham-fisted and plainly in the face of the audience, it's still effective because it adds tension and audiences can't help but ponder how foreshadowed events will unfold. Other times, obvious foreshadowing is a hint that trope will be subverted with a vengeance.
Foreshadowing is a great tool to psychologically prepare audiences for conflict nosedives and plot twists. It can also set up the audience to be sure that one event is about to happen, only for events to take a drastic left turn, inverting traditional trope expectations. Whether the viewer picks up on it or not, effective foreshadowing is crucial.
10 Fruits Basket
Tohru Honda's childhood recollections about the story of the zodiac as a prelude to the entire series. Someone watching Fruits Basket for the first time won't realize how much heavy lifting that one childhood memory is doing in terms of foreshadowing. Tohru connects the zodiac folklore with her mother who passed away when she was young.
And not only does Tohru love the story of the zodiac, she feels a particular kinship for the cat. She cries over his exclusion. The zodiac affects Tohru's real life in a big way when she meets the Sohma family. When she finally meets the cat zodiac (which she always said was her favorite), she does indeed find that she feels an affinity with him.
9 One Piece
One Piece masters the art of Chekhov's gun. If there's even a tiny focus on an item or minor character detail earlier in the series, audiences and readers can bet that it will be greatly significant later. There are many moving pieces in One Piece, and the effective foreshadowing helps tie the vast world together.
For instance, one of Buggy's throwaway lines in a tale he tells his crew about Whitebeard and Roger is a direct link to his past with Roger and the One Piece. One Piece has over a thousand episodes, introducing new characters and powers. Hints at characters' existence in throwaway lines keep the series from being overrun with random, useless characters.
8 Attack On Titan
The Titans are terrifying, mystifying creatures in Attack on Titan. Their lore and power structures are carefully threaded throughout the series. The foreshadowing is so consistent yet subtle that the series' sharp twists and turns are truly shocking and gut-wrenching, but never beyond the point of audience disbelief.
Eren Yeager witnessed one of the most traumatic events at the hands of a Titan – he watched them eat his mother. And yet, he goes from wanting to destroy the Titans to becoming one of them. It takes a lot of careful foreshadowing to bring such a believable self-fulfilling prophecy like Eren's to life.
7 Princess Mononoke
Lady Eboshi is a great villain in Princess Mononoke because she's so complicated and has a nuanced character arc. She does villainous things because her image of a better future overtakes her empathy for others. She cares more about bettering the life of people she sees herself in than beings she would consider as "other," like the gods of the forest.
Lady Eboshi changes tracks in the end after she's brutally humbled by the forest gods. Her own words foreshadow that turn in her character arc. When she's first facing off with Moro and her wolf children in the movie, she warns her men that a wolf can still bite, even after their beheaded. Eboshi also threatens to cut off Ashitaka's cursed arm in a moment of anger. In the end, she loses her own corresponding arm to Moro's severed head which slithers and bites the limb off.
6 Inuyasha
Inuyasha visually unites its lovers with the Red Thread of Fate, which stems from Chinese folklore. Naraku and Kikyo discuss how threads of fate permanently connect two people together, that it's a fated meeting. It's interesting to note that one of the first strong yokai that Inuyasha and Kagome battle together is Yura of the Demon Hair whose hair binds them.
The soulmate bond between Inuyasha and Kagome is further hinted at in the anime opening, "With You." According to the mythology, the red string ties the fingers of two lovers together. In "With You," a red string ties Kagome and Inuyasha together by their pinky fingers.
5 Sailor Moon
Sailor Moon packs plenty of foreshadowing in just its opening sequence. There are many hints at not only the Dark Kingdom finale, but Sailor Moon's past life in the Moon Kingdom. There's also more symbolic, emotional foreshadowing in the opening.
In the opening, Tuxedo Mask pulls a Venetian-style mask from his face and Usagi leans back-to-back with her superhero alter ego, Sailor Moon. This may seem like on-the-nose imagery, but it hints at how Usagi and Mamoru both feel like two people in one body. Mamoru always feels like he's fractured and all he wants is to find his true identity. And Usagi has a total identity crisis when she discovers that she's not just a warrior for the Moon, but the lost Moon Princess.
4 Cowboy Bebop
At first, Cowboy Bebop seems like an episodic spaghetti western-meets-sci-fi. But the protagonists have long histories before the series begins, and those pasts play key roles in their future. Cowboy Bebop's ending is notoriously open ended where audiences speculate about Spike's true fate.
Many audience members rewatch the series, looking for clues about what the ending means. Oftentimes foreshadowing in the beginning of a series is a great idea because the audience is so busy orienting themselves in the world that they don't hyper-focus on every seemingly innocuous detail. The audience doesn't know until later that Cowboy Bebop is very much a love story – and the doomed lovers in "Asteroid Blues" hint heavily at Spike and Julia's fate.
3 Kiki's Delivery Service
Kiki's Delivery Service foreshadows its themes in a few ways, starting from the beginning. Right before Kiki leaves to start her training as a witch, her mother worries that the broom Kiki made isn't quite sturdy enough and insists that Kiki take her broom. That very broom ends up breaking later in the scene where Kiki realizes that she lost her magic from burnout.
Jiji's role in the film and the finale is also hinted at in an interesting way. There are several Jiji lookalikes in the movie, from a mug bearing a similar likeness to a plushie that looks exactly like him. Jiji assumes the place of the plushie to help Kiki out. But eventually Kiki doesn't need Jiji's help quite as much and Jiji goes on to nurture his own mini-Jijis – his kittens.
2 Howl's Moving Castle
The foreshadowing in Howl's Moving Castle is what makes it one of Studio Ghibli's most compelling love stories. Howl is first introduced to the audience and to Sophie with the words, "There you are, sweetheart...I was looking everywhere for you." Those words take on a whole new significance by the end of the movie.
At one point toward the finale, Sophie time travels and sees Howl as a young lad. She tells him that she knows how to help him and to find her in the future. And that's exactly what Howl does with his double-agenting and his moving castle – he's looking for Sophie. It's safe to assume that Howl is very purposeful with his first words to Sophie, and to him, it's just a matter of time until she figures out who they are to each other.
1 Berserk
The entire first half of the 1997 Berserk sets up for Griffith's fall from grace. He believes that he is a Chosen One, of sorts. He assembles a band of mercenary warriors who also believe in his "dream."
Yet there is always something about Griffith. Between the lighting and ethereal music, he takes on an almost saint-like countenance, but his carefully curated moods and blank eyes seem to suggest something more sinister. One of the first big clues that Griffith is happy to sacrifice innocents for his dream is how he acts at court by callously seducing a princess. It's the start of a terrible, terrible fall from grace.