Kara Dennison
July 17, 2025 
With all the big new anime coming out this summer, you may have missed a little show called Milky Subway: The Galactic Limited Express. And if so, we can’t blame you. It’s a short CG subject tucked away on its own YouTube channel. It’s also the sequel to Milky Highway: a Baby Driver-esque short from 2022 about a pair of girls who get a little too enthusiastic about their driving mix. What happens when you get pulled for speeding in space? Community service, of course… but also so much more. Read on to find out why this bite-sized series will be your new anime fave!
A Cool Retro-Future
Milky Subway takes place in a spacefaring world that’s at once futuristic and retro. There are hovercars, space subways, and aliens. But everything is lived-in and well-used, and these futuristic settings all look to be a few decades old rather than shiny and chrome. It’s cool stylistically, yes. But there’s also something very real about it. We can believe that the characters have lived, worked, and commuted within this world for all their lives and consider it “normal.”
Adding to the retro feel is the show’s theme song: “Gingakei Made Tonde Ike!” by girl group Candies. The 1977 hit brings some honest-to-goodness Showa era feel to this Reiwa-era production.
Lovable Characters
One of the best things about the original Milky Highway short was the natural feel of the dialogue. Deadpan cyborg Makina and cutesy superhuman Chiharu sound like real people, less beholden to the conventions of anime voice acting. They mutter, they talk over each other… in other words, they sound like two friends naturally chatting with each other. And Milky Subway, now stacked with an all-star cast, continues to deliver on that more natural style.
Now, Makina and Chiharu are accompanied by fellow law-breakers as they take on their community service. The job? Clean the subway. The new arrivals to the cast have a similarly conversational tone, each as excited to be there as the next person (i.e. not at all). Combined with facial animations full of personality, this is as much of a treat to watch as it is to listen to.
The Horrors
Sadly for our heroines, Milky Subway does not go easily for them. Makina, Chiharu, and their fellow young offenders discover blood on the floor of the subway. But that’s just the beginning. Soon, things get well out of hand, and it’s going to take some serious effort to get things back on track.
Then again, considering the series starts with Makina the cyborg in a state of severe disrepair, we can only imagine what happened out there. Fortunately, the episodes are short and they’re all subtitles. So it’s easy to jump on and start enjoying this one-of-a-kind sci-fi series!
Milky Subway: The Galactic Limited Express is now streaming on YouTube.
