Still culturally iconic: Why Hetalia should return to the spotlight

Hetalia is an anime adaptation of a gag manga by Hidekaz Himaruya that first gained popularity in the late 2000s. But even after decades of its release, this manga is still relevant to current times and a perfect anime to watch for those who love gaining knowledge about the history of our world.

The premise of this anime is simple: in Hetalia, countries are people who converse with each other while reciting bits of history in five-minute sketches. There is no grand plot or major narrative arc.

Instead, the audience is served bite-sized episodes packed with stereotypes, jokes, and occasionally genuinely interesting bits of historical trivia. It’s part high school anime, part historical satire, and part fever dream.

Despite being set primarily during World War II, the tone is light, irreverent, and silly to the point of absurdity. Hetalia has always existed in this strange paradox of being a show that jokes about world wars and genocide with a wink but also taught many tween fans their first lessons in world history. Somehow, impossibly, it became a phenomenon.

Additionally, this series is not a typical anime. It doesn’t have some sweeping lore with complex world-building, power systems, or even a conventional narrative arc. It’s episodic, goofy, deeply self-aware, and thrives on historical references mixed with biting parody.

And yet, even in its irreverence and absurdity, it has resonated with people on a level that goes far deeper than its gags or memes. The fact that Hetalia is trending on TikTok in 2025, of all years, speaks volumes—not just about internet nostalgia, but about the cyclical way media speaks to us in times of political unrest or personal turmoil.

Why Hetalia deserves another moment

In a world dominated by dark, gritty media storytelling, this series stands out as something weird, flawed, and deeply human. It’s not good in the traditional sense. But it is good in the sense that it made people laugh, think, connect, and grow. It deserves to be remembered. And maybe it deserves a real comeback.

There is, of course, a risk with this kind of satire. Some of the jokes age poorly. Some were never great to begin with. These are not complex characters. They’re caricatures. But that’s the point. The anime succeeds because it understands the limits of its own premise and uses that as creative freedom rather than a constraint.

Because underneath all the pasta jokes and strange historical gags, there’s an odd sort of educational value to Hetalia. No, it should not replace a history textbook. But the sheer volume of references, from the War of the Austrian Succession to the Cold War, gives viewers a jumping-off point for deeper learning.

Hetalia wasn’t perfect, but it wasn't dangerous either

Does Hetalia glorify fascism? That’s a critique that still floats around. But let’s be clear: while the show features anthropomorphized versions of the Axis powers (Germany, Japan, and Italy), it doesn’t celebrate them. It simplifies them—sometimes too much—but it doesn’t excuse historical atrocities. It doesn’t really address them at all.

That’s both the show’s biggest flaw and its clearest defense: this series isn’t a history class. It’s a gag manga turned five-minute short series. If you’re going into it expecting a nuanced take on international relations, you’re probably watching the wrong thing.

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That said, Hetalia’s cultural blind spots do merit discussion. Japan’s portrayal as a calm, stoic intellectual contrasts suspiciously with the exaggerated caricatures of other nations. Some fans have interpreted this as nationalistic bias. Others, more charitably, see it as Himaruya writing from a place of cultural self-awareness, using Japanese inside jokes that just don’t land with a Western audience.

The fandom, interestingly, often did the work that the series didn’t. Through fanfiction and analysis, fans explored the implications of characters’ roles in history, crafted thoughtful alternate universes, and even invented the historical subgenre—serious, often heavily researched stories that used the Hetalia characters to reflect on the true weight of their nations' pasts.

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