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It’s always fun to find an anime adaptation of a new-to-us manga is about to start running after the English release starts running, and that’s what’s going on with Yen Press’ Lil’ Miss Vampire Can’t Suck Right. It started running in the US in July 2025, but already the anime will appear in time for Halloween with an October 2025 launch. Given how cute and even silly the manga is, it gives me high hopes for how the other adaptation will turn out.
Editor’s Note: There will be mild Lil’ Miss Vampire Can’t Suck Right manga volume 1 spoilers below.
Tatsuta Ootori and Luna Ishikawa are classmates in school, and she’s a recent exchange student. Oh, and she’s a vampire. Which isn’t scary. Everyone is fine with it, and it seems some even find it rather cool. Except when the two end up on cleanup duty together, Tatsuta learns her secret. We see her constantly snacking because she’s absolutely terrible at sucking blood. He feels bad for her and agrees for her to take a sip. While Luna’s still bad at finding veins and getting something to eat, she also finds that his blood is so delicious that she’s actually able to eat more than usual.
While in most manga, this would be setting up a romance (see Call of the Night), I like how instead Lil’ Miss Vampire Can’t Suck Right sets it up more as a friendship. Tatsuta, while intimidated by Luna initially, immediately responds to the first feeding frenzy as “I’m a mom now.” Her sucking his blood is never shown as being sexy in any way. Instead, after the first one is done, he has multiple bandages on his arm and both looks pale and emaciated.
This ends up basically growing so Tatsuta is genuinely taking care of Luna, who’s something of a girl failure. She’s not able to suck blood from people! She is incredibly messy. She’s clumsy. She’s constantly snacking, even when she shouldn’t. When she sneezes, she doesn’t blow her nose. He’s not just helping ensure she stays fed and alive. She’s basically growing up. Plus, through his influence, we see her open up to other characters. It’s all very endearing.
Not to mention, Luna’s character design is cute. Her standard appearance is very sweet. But even cuter is the fact that when she sucks blood, she shrinks down to the size of a baby or child. So when she’s sucking on someone like Tatsuta or another friend, she ends up looking like a chibi version of herself. It’s a fun design choice that also makes sense when you consider she’s out of energy and refueling.
The structure of the four-koma panel mini comics in the Lil’ Miss Vampire Can’t Suck Right manga volume also help emphasize just how cute the series and Luna both are. In the first one, a classmate is asking her about her favorite food. It turns out, she loves garlic. But she realizes that hurts her image if she brings that up. So she plays it off and instead says blood is her favorite thing.
Lil’ Miss Vampire Can’t Suck Right is such a funny and cute manga, and it makes me hope the anime adaptation maintains that same atmosphere. From the outset, we’re presented with a heroine who is adorable and attempting to maintain the illusion of what a vampire should be. When she makes a friend who knows her secret, Tatsuta doesn’t see it as sexy or a chance to get close to a love interest. Instead, he’s seeing himself as a mom feeding her kid and as a test dummy. Sure, I definitely expect we could see it involve some romantic elements later on. But for now, it’s just adorable and unabashedly silly.
Volume 1 of Lil’ Miss Vampire Can’t Suck Right is available now, and Yen Press will release volume 2 of the manga on January 20, 2026. An anime adaptation will air in October 2025.
