Nobody talks about this one. Bobo-kun is five minutes of a fire demon eating coal in the dark, nothing more, and somehow that becomes the most restful thing you'll watch all year. The animation moves like breathing, each piece of fuel disappearing into warmth, and you realize you're watching pure comfort distilled to its smallest form. It's a preview of Calcifer before he became plot device, back when he was just appetite and contentment. This is what Ghibli makes when nobody's watching but the people who need it most.

Bobo-kun is a short animated film made for screening at the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka, one of the works in its Film Guru Guru program. Its subject is a fire demon named Bobo-kun, who spends the film devouring lump after lump of coal. The character was later reused as Calcifer, who appears in Howl's Moving Castle.