Ask John: Does the Saki Sanobashi Anime Exist?

I just stumbled across a somewhat pervasive ongoing online search for a “lost” anime colloquially referred to by the names “Saki Sanobashi” and “Go For A Punch.” The “search” such as it is, seems rooted in a hoax. Although unconfirmed, a week ago someone under the name “u/SakiSanobashiOP” admitted on Reddit, “I am the OP of Saki Sanobashi. It’s fake, and I’m sorry.” Even if this anonymous confession is dismissed, I still have extreme doubt that this “lost” anime ever existed in the first place. I must emphasize that despite my extensive experience with anime, I’m not aware of everything that exists, so I can’t guarantee that this mysterious anime short doesn’t exist, but I’m extremely skeptical.

I’ve watched a lot of obscure horror anime including Roots Search (1986), Digital Devil Story: Megami Tensei (1987), Hell Target (1987), Maryu Senki (1987), Deimos no Hanayome (1988), Umezu Kazuo no Noroi (1990), Shoujo Tsubaki (1992), Toile no Hanako-san (1996), Inuki Kanako Zekkyou Collection: Gakkou ga Kowai! (1999), and the 2000 Yonimo Osoroshii Grimm Douwa & Yonimo Osoroshii Nihon Mukashibanashi OVAs. I’ve also watched a considerably amount of doujin anime. I spent my lunch breaks in the early 2000s watching fan created anime shorts on Nico Nico Douga. I’ve been exhaustively watching anime since. Maybe I’m being presumptuous or overconfident, but I suspect that if this morbid and grotesque “Saki Sanobashi” anime about imprisoned girls killing themselves out of desperation actually existed, I believe I would have encountered some reference to it before now. I have to say that the description outline of this “lost” anime sounds most to me like a made-up hybrid of the grim 1985 adult OVA Datenshi-tachi no Kyouen and Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (2002 game, 2006 anime). If “u/SakiSanobashiOP’s” confession is truthful, then even the passing similarities to “Feast of Fallen Angels” and “When They Cry” are coincidental at most.

Allow me to pose a suggestion. Viewers that want to see an obscure older anime short that will cause nightmares and forever scar one’s psyche should watch Renzo Kinoshita’s 1978 independently produced short film Pica-don. I saw this short broadcast on television in Malaysia (or perhaps it was Singapore) in 1979 (or perhaps it was 1980). I was a young child at the time, and this short horrified me and haunted my mind for decades following.

Now allow me to request assistance in identifying a particular anime. Back around 1990 during a late night screening at a convention, I watched an early hentai anime that I found unexpectedly sympathetic. The singular scene I recollect most vividly involved a small, nude bunny girl cowering in fear beneath a table. A laughing man depicted only as tall, inky shadow bends over and drags the helpless girl out by grasping her ankle.

Over the years I’ve thought that the episode may have been the 1987 Cream Lemon episode 21: Yumeiro Bunny. But it’s not. Likewise, the tone and style of the short I recollect was very similar to the 1984 Nikkatsu Lolita Anime three-episode series directed by Uchiyama Aki. But it’s not part of that series. As far as I’m aware, the OVA I’m thinking of isn’t part of the six-episode Wonder Kids Lolita Anime series, either. The Wonder Kids & Nikkatsu Lolita Anime series are the most likely origins of the OVA I’m thinking of, but I don’t believe either of those series contain the episode I recollect. There are many other early adult anime I haven’t watched, so perhaps someone can point me in a direction, if not supply a precise identification.