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Voting closes at 23:59 on Sunday, January 16 PST. As with last year, voting will be done through a Google form to make counting the votes easier. Vote here for your five (5) best anime of 2021: https://forms.gle/ehjvesiZpWjkw54C8 Sortable spreadsheet of qualifying anime: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1R0BOL1fkMhVM9Cr-jRrBlI-qGDGHqxPXF4JNKmkKBm0/edit?usp=sharing  YOUR VOTE WILL ONLY COUNT IF YOU VOTE IN THE GOOGLE FORM You can optionally vote for your honorable mentions and rank your top five. The weighted top ten will be determined by points, with 5 points going to first place votes and 1 point going to fifth place votes. Unranked votes will all be given a flat 3 points. I'd like to include a summary of the winners even if just in word cloud form, so please do post your reasons for your choices, even if all you have to say is "it's funny" or "Squark threatened to laugh at me for saying I would vote for it again last year even though I'm regretting it now." I encourage you to post in the thread even if you have nothing to say because it helps with the vote validation. If I don't know who you are, I might throw your vote out! Don't double vote, but if you're on the list below, you voted when I said not to, so you'll need to vote again.  The results: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3989334&pagenumber=3#post520778896 Previous AOTY threads: 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 Strange Quark fucked around with this message at 19:20 on Jan 17, 2022 |
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Dec 31, 2021 21:31
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Since I can't Vote for Tropical Rouge cause RULES my top 5 for the year are 1) Super Cub - Yeah it's pretty much an ad for the Honda Super Cub but it's such a good ad. Koguma slow growth upon picking up a cub is just done so well by the series, her growing Friendship with Reiko and Shii are all handled great. And the series also has a bit of melancholy as well. 2) Uma Musume Season 2 - Horse girls are back and this does what all great sequels too, improve on what works in the first series and toss out what didn't work. All the less than good stuff in season 1 with the coach is tossed and we get a great sports story that is shows triumph, the pain of injury and the comeback in 13 episodes. Also it manages to have some of the silliest gags while not ruining the actual tension of the races. And the ending is so good it's hard to believe that it's actually based on real life. Up there with the best sequel series and best Gacha anime 3) Laid Back Camp Season 2 - Is not as consistent as season 1 but still really good. Nadeshiko's solo camp and Rin's keeping an eye on it where perhaps the high point but this is still real good stuff and I eagerly await season 3 4) Non Non Biyori Nonstop,- Nyanpasu! 5) Love Live Superstar - The reduced cast actually helps keep the series more in focus and it's still has the charming boundless energy all Love Live series have. Fun entry and I look forward to more with this cast Honorable mentions for me: Otherside Picnic (Flawed Adaptation of strong source but I really love the source), Healing Good Precure movie, D4Dj, Blue Reflection Ray, Back Arrow, Jahy-sama And now on the flip side the worst 5 anime I actually watched to completion (Stuff I dropped after an episode doesn't count or stuff I avoided cause I knew I'd hate it don't count here) 5) Fena Pirate Princess - Crunchyroll co-production that tries to channel 00's anime and it does that by doing all the bad stuff 00's anime does. But what pushed it into the top 5 was it's just awful ending arc and ending that was not only bad but didn't fit the previous tone of the series. Again some 00's anime tried to do that at times and this shows it's perhaps not good to go back 4) Gekidol - I kinda of feel bad putting this here as Gekidol had IDEAS. In a way it almost reminded me of Key the Metal idol...Gekidol just was such a mess in how it tried to show it's ideas, the sheer pacing of the show being super weird (Doing a full play at the end of episode 1 was perhaps not the best idea) and just how weird and confusing things got. 3) LBX Girls - I like magical girl shows and power armor girl shows all the way back from Yuna in the 90's and I grade them with a wide curve. Which tells you how awful LBX Girls is for to make this list. An okay setting ruined by an annoying main character, pacing being a mess, and the production falling apart that we get a flashback episode with no new animation and the finale is super full of static shots and bad direction. An all around boring show 2) Vladlove - Mamoru Oshii's return not only to anime but comedy anime as well and I wish he'd go back to live action. Billed as a Yuri comedy it really doesn't have a lot of comedy beyond the Castlevania episode, consists of a lot of talking and boring literary references and jokes. And perhaps the biggest crime is the main pair really don't spend a lot of time together or getting a lot of time to devlop as a couple. Instead we get more jokes with the annoying muscle guy. Oshii's Lupin stuff has been better but this is a huge misfire and would easily be the worst of the year if it wasn't for.... 1) Wonder Egg Priority - This started out so promising - Our main character wondering why her best friend committed suicide and buying wonder eggs to bring her back to life. Show starts out looking like it's going to deal with social and LGBT issues in a positive thoughtful light...until cracks start showing and it's focus on LGBT and social issues start looking less thoughtful and more...bad. But even with those cracks I probably wouldn't have put it down as the worst if it wasn't for the final episode which just took the interesting premise of the series and just shat on it by making Ai's best friend the real bad guy and the teacher that was framed super Creepy at the start as a good character. Just awful stuff and easily makes Wonder Egg the worst show of 2021 and if any awards give it anime of the year I'll laugh at them
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Dec 31, 2021 22:10
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The worst thread willl be posted by namtab, you'll get your chance to talk about it there
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Dec 31, 2021 22:11
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The only seasonal I watched worth voting for was Attack on Titan: The Final Season Part 1, but barely even then as it wasn't the final season. At last an adaptation that is as ugly as the source manga, rectifying the fatal flaw of the Wit Studio version. It's virtually the same show otherwise frankly, which is good for me as I enjoy it!
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Dec 31, 2021 22:12
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1. SSSS.Dynazenon 2. Non Non Biyori: Nonstop 3. Yuru Camp S2 4. Uma Musume S2 5. Super Cub Not all of Dynazenon worked as well as Gridman for me but the competition just was really kind of thin for what I watched in 2021. NNB and Yuru Camp fulfilled the SOL quota but Camp leaned a bit too hard into being a travel brochure advertisement so they're in that order. Super Cub kind of lost me towards the end with some of its later episodes (it's also a giant ad but at least that was expected) and I did consider it replacing it with Jahy which was my top Honorable Mention.
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Dec 31, 2021 22:19
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1. dynazenon good cast, good mecha stuff. chise got a little screwed for screentime but thats hardly the worst complaint to have. 2. healin' good precure  the only anime for 4 year old girls brave enough to have an ending where all the magical nature animals the girls protected agree that if humanity acts up again they should just genocide them 3. uma musume good sports show 4. d4dj funny 5. kageki shoujo has an insanely dull middle portion but ends with a scene where a girl gets a shonen power up but for acting via thinking about the time a lesbian gyaru hit on her
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Dec 31, 2021 22:24
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I only finished 5 shows this year, conveniently Oddtaxi - well produced, well acted, interesting characters and dialogue. I'm not usually a fan of anthropomorphic animal characters, but it worked well in this. Megalobox 2 - looked and sounded great. Positive portrayal of immigrants. Sonny Boy - I still don't really know what happened in this, but I enjoyed watching it and really loved some of the visual touches like Rajidani's inventions having a white outline Super Cub - love niche interest stuff like this, though it was feeling a little thin by the middle of the season Those Snow White Notes - nice introduction to shamisen music even if the story/characters ultimately fell flat for me.
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Dec 31, 2021 22:45
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Attack on Titan Final Season - Different studio and increased CGI aside, the show is still excellent. It has the human story, it has the world building, it has horror, drama etc. It was pretty dumb to call it the final season but it's so goddamn good that I forgive it. Godzilla: Singular Point - A real breath of fresh air, this is a more hard sci-fi look at Godzilla. The story starts small and balloons to apocalyptic proportions but still manages to be consistently fun. Ultimately, any show that has Jet Jaguar fighting a hive of immortal crab-spiders with a spear made from a kaiju-spine is alright by me. Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S2 - Cute, funny and gay. They managed to thread the needle again and make a remarkably great and heartwarming show out of this source material. Even Ilulu is good! So I'm a spider, so what? - I know the production values are below average, they made some questionable editing decisions and half the story is kind of crap but I love the other half enough that I don't care dammit! The main character is consistently engaging with fantastic voice-acting. The plot is intriguing and fairly dense but not impenetrable. This series impressed me in ways beyond a lot of other shows in the genre. SSSS:Dynazenon - I actually would have voted 86 over this if I noticed it but since I have to commit now, Dynazenon is a lot of fun and a visual treat. It has a ton of character to it and some outstanding visual storytelling. It isn't nearly as good as Gridman and that's the biggest knock against it. Honorable mentions: 86 - It's better than Dynazenon. Dr Stone S2 - Less cool science poo poo than S1, but still good. Realist Hero - I was digging it until they started setting up the harem and glorifying the MC a bit too much. Zombie Land Saga S2 - It was a bit inconsistent, sometimes excellent and sometimes outright dull. Junko's song kicked rear end. Wonder Egg Priority - Absolutely outstanding for 80% of the show. Then it epically shits the bed and pukes on it for good measure. I'd still recommend watching up to that point tho. Nephthys fucked around with this message at 23:13 on Dec 31, 2021 |
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Dec 31, 2021 23:03
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SSSS. Dynazenon – As good as its prequel in my opinion. Better Robot vs. Kaiju fights due to the larger and more involved hero group but the introspective character writing, while still good, is weaker and spread a little thin due to the same reason. Vivy: Fluorite Eye's Song – A really good soundtrack with some fabulous in story vocal songs, stellar fight animation and a plot that was ambitious and while it falls apart if you think about it, was great fun while watching. Zombieland Saga Revenge – Also a really good soundtrack with some fabulous in story vocal songs. Episodes vary between some really good character focus stories and typical idol fare. Shout outs (notably not honourable mentions) to EX-ARM – My interaction with this consists of reading the post-mortems and watching the funnier clips which were good for quite a lot of laughs. Sure it may be considered the “worst anime ever made” by many but it’s enriched my life by existing and isn’t that what matters in the end? The first half Wonder Egg Priority – This was pretty good. The second half was … less so.
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Dec 31, 2021 23:15
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I'm trying to finish Vivy before the end of the year, so it might manage to slip in here, but from what I've watched, this was the best year for anime since 2018. Definitely a much more interesting pool to deal with, and having movies next to shows kind of makes it a pain to narrow down to 5. Still, running away this year of all years is right out, so let's get going. Shows only: 5) The fifth spot is pretty hard to choose. Vivy's a fun action series with time travel and AI nonsense, Super Cub is a really calming ad for Honda... but ultimately, I'm going with Heike Monogatari, a show that feels like it should go somewhere on a list, even if it's too uneven to be number 1. It was a show of amazing moments that didn't quite come together, but somehow they worked anyway, coming to a satisfying conclusion. 4) Attack on Titan the final season. Not final, and the way the manga ended left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth, but it's still an incredibly strong arc, even with the sometimes awkward animation. 3) 86. The second season's not done yet, so we'll see how that lands, but right now it's one of the stronger mech anime in a year overflowing with them. The fights are uncommon, but they're some of the best CG combat around 2) SSSS Dynazenon. The semi-sequel to Gridman, my show of 2018, it pretty much lived up to expectations. The structure of the reveals in the first show was stronger, with more surprises that make perfect sense in hindsight, and fewer unexplained events just kind of sitting there, but that didn't seriously harm the show overall, while seeing Knight again and the wider protagonist dynamics helped make up for it. A weaker year, this would be number 1. But it's not a weak year. Nowhere close. And number 1 shows that pretty clearly. 1) Odd Taxi wasn't a show I was planning to watch at all, and people talking it up like everyone needed to watch it didn't do that much to change my mind. But eventually the talk about the snappy dialogue and clever plot made me catch up as it finished, and I'm glad I did. Great voice acting, smart plotting that paid off what it set up over and over, good humor, interesting characters... It's just a really good show, and one that's pretty easy to recommend on top of that, with very few of the caveats a lot of anime need. And that's leaving off even more shows I enjoyed watching, from Rumble Garrandoll and its mecha parody to Nomad's gritty recovery story to the variety of Star Wars Visions to Pui Pui Molcar being, well, itself. My actual votes put Shin Evangelion at 1 and Hathaway at 3, which could be a short essay on its own, but yeah. This was (mostly) a good year, anime-wise. Of course, there's still going to be plenty to talk about in the negatives, but that's another thread.
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Dec 31, 2021 23:31
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I only watched one anime this year but Blue Reflection Ray was pretty good.
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Dec 31, 2021 23:54
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1. Non Non Biyori s3 - the final season of my fav anime was never not going to be in this spot 2. Sonny Boy - it's unique and uncompromising and beautiful 3. Odd Taxi - nothing more satisfying than when a good mystery comes together. excellent script and performances 4. Maidragon s2 - it's still a good ecchi comedy with unusually insightful moments of gravitas. the elma/tohru stuff was a really strong addition this season 5. Godzilla S.P. - i had a lot of fun following the layered pseudo-science mystery this set up, cool approach to a godzilla story honorable mentions: Dynazenon, 86 s1, Pui Pui Molcar very good year for anime overall
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Jan 1, 2022 00:00
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Top 5: 1. Heaven Official's Blessing I realize this one barely counts as a 2021 show but since I didn't get to vote for it last year I am now. 2. SK∞ Ridiculously fun, still enjoying all the fanart crossing my feed even now 3. Thousand Autumns  4. The Defective Neat worldbuilding and the cgi animation suited the sci-fi setting; I had a lot of fun watching it but wish the ending had been a little more like an actual ending because idk if it'll actually get another season or not. Hoping Seven Seas licenses some Priest novels to go in their danmei line and I can at least read it someday. 5. 2.43 Had kind of a slow start but picked up once the other team showed up, gave it a 7/10 in the end, solid sports show. Probably wouldn't be in my top 5 if I'd finished more shows though. Shows I haven't finished but if I had would have gotten a real vote (honorable mentions): 1. Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire -- Been having a ton of fun watching this and I'm dying to get back to finishing it once I have enough internet to stream again 2. The Buried Tree Devil -- I watched about 90% of this one and it looked great and seemed to have a neat story but since it never got any official subs or even decent fansubs actually understanding what was going on dialogue-wise was a real struggle. I stopped before finishing because I thought a group was picking it up but they never went past episode 2  3. Kemono Jihen -- what I've watched so far was a solid adaption and I'm really hoping it gets another season (and for the manga to get licensed) 4. Link Click -- Probably would have been in my top 3 if I was done with it, super good show 5. Mo Dao Zu Shi S3 -- haven't got around to watching it yet but pre-emptively giving it a 10/10
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Jan 1, 2022 00:26
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1) SK8 the Infinity- Fun and excellent cast of characters with a nice personal story and an incredibly over the top villain and final episode. #JusticeForShadow 2) ODDTAXI- Well plotted, well voice acted, all the connections between the seemingly unrelated characters building up and finally paying off leading to a pretty unique anime for me. Also let it be known the ending is good  3) Megalobox 2: Nomad- An incredibly strong first half leading to a somewhat dragging second half with a weak villain, but made up by Mac being an insanely compelling character. 4) Hanma Baki: Son of Orge- an insane season that starts off with Baki shadow boxing a mantis and somehow gets even crazier   5) Jujutsu Kaisen- Kind of a bias here since I love the manga, but an excellent adaptation all around. Honorable mentions in no particular order SSSS Dynazenon Beastars Season 2 Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S Komi Can't Communicate First half of Wonder Egg Priority Godzilla: Singular Point Electric Phantasm fucked around with this message at 00:47 on Jan 1, 2022 |
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Jan 1, 2022 00:41
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Also want to say good work on the google doc OP, the pictures and English titles made the titles I watched easy to find and helped me remember some of the stuff I forgot aired this year.
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Jan 1, 2022 00:47
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Sakurazuka posted:I only watched one anime this year but Blue Reflection Ray was pretty good. oh my god i forgot to vote for blue reflection ray
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Jan 1, 2022 01:03
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drat I jumped the gun there, huh. 1) Nomad - Megalobox S2. Huge departure in tone from the previous season, great mingling of Spanish to establish the nomad refugees in the story and theme, just satisfying as all hell. 2) Eva 3.0+1.0 The first chunk of the film is so not-eva in tone that it ends up being a beautiful exploration of the things we think are the rock-solid foundations of the series. Wastes the back half with top many particle-Evas and doesn't come close to some of evocative work done in EoE, but gently caress is, I've waited years for this. 3) Jobless Reincarnation Getting through S1 was kind of a slog considering the mind of a 20-something NEET is stuffed inside of a child and fully pervs out over poo poo left and right. But the story focus shift, amazingly well done animation and backgrounds, and a really sobering look at just how the dude became a self-loathing sack of sad in the previous life ended flipping it around for me. 4) So I'm A Spider, So What? I'd probably drop this a little higher save for the rushed CGI that dragged down the human fights. 5) obligatory Nagatoro nod What can I say, I love those two dumbasses. Honorables: SSSS Dynazenon Didn't grip me the same way that the previous series did
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Jan 1, 2022 02:16
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Honorable Mentions Uma Musume Season 2 -- Takes a sugary gacha franchise about girls who are also horses and so they MUST RACE RAAAAGH and uses real-life events to build a compelling story. A great sports anime with a bunch of added silliness. It's not my AOTY but if you were to measure the emotional distance between what I expected and what I got this anime comes in at #1. You can watch Season 2 on its own (like I did) and get straight to the goodness, but if you really liked what you found and want more, or are a rabid completionist, you can always watch season 1 too. Heike Monogatari -- I enjoyed this one quite a lot, mostly for the artistry and Biwa's performances. There are times when you can practically feel yourself sitting on a tatami mat listening to a traveling songstress recant tales of the doomed Taira clan. That said, its runtime needed to be longer. Individual character arcs are built up and some of them hit home, but overall the blistering pace just wasn't the best fit for this kind of story. Still liked it though. Re:Zero S2 -- "Hey Mals, I thought RE:0 S2P2 sucked? What gives?" Mmmm, nah. S2 did get rough at times -- you can clearly see that the staff were struggling against animation deadlines -- which results in characters spending a (*40K Ork voice*) bunch o' times TALKIN' when they shoulda been FIGHTIN'. And there were also some plotlines carried from the source that could've been dropped entirely. Yea that's right WN fans: Ryuzu Meyer could've been completely excluded and the story would've been better for it. Bring it! But even despite all that, S2 (I'm including Part 1 and 2 together) had multiple of the strongest episodes of the series. It also addressed the series' biggest "Why doesn't he just do _____?" issue head-on, and the main leads conjured their largest character growth yet because of it. The amount of minutes of animation we got was also insane: I can't think of another anime that skipped both its opening and ending so often to cram in as much as they could. We probably won't see it happen again for a long time. I'm eagerly looking forward to the next adaptation, despite the aforementioned wobbles. 86: Eighty-Six -- One of the few anime I've dropped, and then picked back up and liked it. The first few episodes were not my thing, the sense of gravitas and grounding of the world was warped, and naive. But what saves this anime is a series of reveals and bold choices that pay off in spades. Alas, I have not actually finished the second half of it, and since the last few episodes won't be airing until March of next year, I'm putting this one on hold. Don't be surprised if you see this on my AOTY list next year. Now, on to AOTY... #5: Odd Taxi I imagine that this will be high on a number of others' lists this year, so I'll keep my description short. An unconventional art style that ends up being plot-relevant, paired with a wide variety of characters that span the entire gamut of personalities, from an attention-seeking-wannabe to a yakuza enforcer to a c-tier-idol to a comedian finally making it big to a taxi driver, whose lives are all interwoven in a crime drama with a nice dose of humor. It's pretty fantastic, and for anyone who's tired of the usual anime personality archetypes, Odd Taxi would be the first thing that I point them to. #4: Vivy: Flourite Eye's Song Whew, what was up with Spring Season? Not one but two of my best-ofs for this year!? Crazy. If I had to vote purely on the best-looking anime of 2021, Vivy would be #1. Studio Wit's specialists were paired with an anime that made use of their talents like two perfectly-fitted jigsaw pieces. Wit may have been the ones making Vivy, but it feels like an anime such as Vivy was made for Wit. But enough of gushing about looks; how's the plot? We start about half a century in the future, where an autonomous songstress AI named Diva is struggling to fulfill her mission. Her singing might be technically flawless, given that she's an AI who never tires, but she struggles to captivate anyone. In this world, all AIs are governed by a singular mission, and hers is to make people happy with her singing. Naturally, she can't make them happy if they're all dead, which is how she gets roped up in a conspiracy to sabotage AIs after a rogue AI virus shows her apocalyptic images of humanity's slaughter that it claims will happen in a century. I very much appreciated that the show commits itself to Vivy's perspective as an AI, whether it was her having conversations with other AIs in a fraction of a second or loading her consciousness up through a database or coding an entirely separate personality as a means of dealing with trauma. There are human characters, but they remain in supporting roles rather than stealing the show. It'd be like if Terminator 2 shot the movie entirely from the terminator's perspective, and that terminator was also really into singing. Oh, and you get to see that terminator struggle and bit-by-bit succeed in becoming human in spirit. And that's the highlight of this anime, for me. Vivy's alien struggle to understand humanity was grounded and relatable. The only reason this isn't my number 1 of the year is because, plot-wise, the first half was phenomenal and the second half was merely enjoyable. Yea, I wasn't a fan of the final villain, I was hoping for more. But even then, every episode still managed to have something in it that wowed me, and the first half was so drat good I can't not include Vivy as one of my favorites of the year. Just, uh, don't watch the last twenty seconds of it. Completely pointless and undermines what came before. #3: Sonny Boy Going into this anime, I read "cast of 30+ school students", "transported to another world", and "start developing powers", and was immediately ready for a hackneyed death-game on a remote island with body parts flying everywhere. Turns out, the show couldn't be further from that (despite the best efforts of one of the characters). Good luck getting anyone to coherently describe the plot of Sonny Boy. Yea, you could hand-wave it all with the ever-vague "It's a growing up metaphor." But that doesn't really describe what Sonny Boy is. If you put a gun to my head and asked me to describe Sonny Boy, I'd say, "A bunch of students in a limbo-like paradise discover that God plays dice with the universe, and that they are all just one of the sides of the dice that didn't come up." From the get-go, Sonny Boy is cinematically different from most anime: silence pervades throughout until it is briefly punctuated by its eclectic, awesome OST. The screen goes pitch-black for long enough that you wonder if your TV broadcast cut out, only for that darkness to be pierced by bright color shining through. Every episode starts in-media-res, skipping over the usual panicking and homesickness that would have eaten up valuable runtime. Honestly, the closest anime I can think of to Sonny Boy is (the original, and only) Fooly Cooly. It's like that, but substitutes the zaniness for pensiveness, and is also less straightforward. For some, that's going to be a problem -- concrete answers are hard to come by here, and I wouldn't blame someone for dropping Sonny Boy because of it. But it also makes it entertaining to watch, when every adventure the main characters get up to not only reveals new, strange rules of their world but then ties it back to philosophical ponderings on solitude, achievements, conformity, and even deathless death. And it does something like this every episode! I loved Sonny Boy. I loved the characters, I loved the artwork, I loved the soundtrack, and even if I struggled to understand them, I loved the themes. Also, a shout-out for making a character who is actually smart, rather than the usual "I knew you knew that I knew that you knew because I observed that scant detail months ago with my photographic memory and also I'm a genius inventor" tripe that anime is so chock-full of. #2: Megalobox: Nomad I can't believe that a sequel to an anime I was ambivalent about landed here, but here we are. Also, more Spring anime. Go figure. I respected the first season, but didn't enjoy it much. It managed the impressive feat of being both cliche and anticlimactic. But the second season is such a higher step up from the first it's unreal. Seriously, I had to check if it was the same director because it felt completely different. And it stands well on its own, too; you could jump right in at S2 and not feel lost. Set five years after the end of the previous entry, we face a Joe who is at his lowest. He's lost everything except boxing, and arguably even that. From here on out, every battle and defeat Joe experiences hits hard. And that makes every victory, and even the losses, fulfilling in ways that most anime don't get the chance to. I was impressed that the anime didn't pull its punches regarding the plot beats surrounding Joe. And it wasn't just him: pretty much every character gets fleshed out really well, each with their own metaphorical battlefield. Winning isn't in the cards for all of them, and the way those characters confront that left me satisfied. Everything they do feels earned. I haven't even mentioned the killer soundtrack, and what is probably the best ending song of the year. If you haven't watched this one yet, you should. #1: Drum roll... Drum roll... Drum roll... #1: SSSS.Dynazenon "_____ is a teenager at Normal High School. Down on his luck, he encounters a mysterious stranger named _____ who informs said teen that he is one of the special few who can use _____, a weapon that can transform and combine please buy our toys into ______! And that is the only thing that can stop gigantic ______ from wreaking havoc on his hometown! The monsters are being controlled by ______: an ORGANIZATION of EVIL that seeks to destroy the ([__] school / [__] city / [__] world)! Now, he and <X> other similarly-relatable-and-marketable teens need to team up to stop them! While also going to school! While also learning how to pilot _____! Will the new friends be able to defeat the monster of the week and preserve the status quo!? Yes LOL Tune in every episode to find out! Repeat for several seasons, maybe a movie or two, until the characters are so flat and one-note that the target demographic loses interest." You've probably known of some show like the above description. I initially bounced off of Dynazenon. The intentional mimicry of tokusatsu that the action scenes follow never really appealed to me, even in the previous SSSS.Gridman. But unlike the previous installment, the fights felt especially lacking in gravitas and the characters didn't seem to care that much. The villains were strangely flat, especially for a franchise whose previous entry was all about humanizing and exploring its main villain. It was never really clear what their goals were. I wasn't really sure why the character of Chise was even included in the anime. A bunch of mysteries were left unresolved, and the romance, while human and real and cute, left me wondering why it had eaten up so much screen-time. So, what happened? Why on earth is this my #1 anime of 2021? Well, sit down friends, and I'll tell you. First off, while yes, the characters are all new and you could jump straight in without watching SSSS.Gridman: don't do that. You see, Dynazenon is playing a game with its audience from the very beginning. A game that only those who watched Gridman will be in on. From the start, they know that Gridman-watchers are going to be asking "Who's going to be it? Who's going to be the one? The show drops little hints: it could be this person. It could be that person. It could be any one of them. And using your own attention against you, the direction starts to control the way you think. It's subtle, but it's there. With a little bit of priming the audience, the show knows that a quick shot of a side-glance suddenly implies a world of conflict repeating itself. That a bit of verbal hesitancy implies murder. That a sticker on a phone serves as a window into a character's mindset. That a pin on a hat denotes special status. And the details, once connected, reveal other details that previously you missed. But that by itself wouldn't be enough to justify an AOTY contender. No, what happened was I started digging into the details that Dynazenon hid within itself. Looking online to see what other people had noticed. And during my digging, I came upon a fan theory. A theory that not only explained almost every unresolved mystery (except one*), but what it was that the villains were truly after. So I rewatched Dynazenon and... it holds up. I'm convinced. Not only did I see where the actual plane of conflict lay, but also what the trap laid out for our protagonists was, what the actual goal of (at least one of) the villains was, and just how close said villains were to winning. And that, if the villains had won, maybe SSSS.Dynazenon would've come to resemble the show described in my first paragraph. I'm not going to go into what that theory was here, since I can't do that without heavy spoilers, and I believe that the purpose of the AOTY thread is to sell new anime to people who haven't seen them. But know this: Dynazenon is a very coy show. It never tells you outright what the answer is, to any of the questions it raises; that you have to find for yourself. But it does sprinkle enough "coincidences" and other details throughout for you to realize that those aren't coincidences after all. I strongly recommend watching it twice. Going into it the second time, here are some questions I'd like you, the potential viewer, to think about : 1) What's the theme of the anime? Especially considering episode ten. Why was that the capstone moment? 2) Who was the highest ranking villain, and what was (s)he paying special attention to? 3) What was special about the main lead? What were the "coincidences"? 4) Given your answer to #1, what would've been the gravest trap the main characters could have fallen into? Maybe I'm wrong. Perhaps I'm just a tin-foiled loony connecting pictures on a dimly-lit basement wall with tacks and yarn. But even if I'm right, the amount of digging and research this show asks is honestly too much for most. For that reason, I probably will never recommend it. But also for that reason, it is special to me, and for those willing to dig into the discussions surrounding the anime: it might be special for you, too. That makes it my anime of the year. *The only mystery still left a mystery for me that I have yet to see a good explanation for was: whose hand was it scattering the seeds in the very beginning? I suspect that will be the subject of the upcoming movie. And I'll be there watching closely. Malsangoroth fucked around with this message at 05:53 on Jan 3, 2022 |
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Jan 1, 2022 02:23
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My choices for 2-5 were pretty boilerplate: Vivy, Megalobox, 86, Oddtaxi, but I had to give #1 to Gintama: the Final. The perfect ending that only exists because Sorachi forgot to give JUMP the required 6 months notice he was going to end Gintama which mandated he write more story.
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Jan 1, 2022 02:35
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Malsangoroth posted:Honorable Mentions I agree.
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Jan 1, 2022 02:54
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10. Josee, The Tiger and The Fish: Standard sweetheart shoujo stuff w a beating heart of empathy helps the smaller moments stand out where they need to, tho really I include this here to give props to what a massive aesthetic flex the film is. Owing a clear debt to Naoko Yamada/KyoAni, the movie tells a story of teenage emotions mainly thru precise character acting and a pitch-perfect realization of inner city photorealistic Tokyo and is just a dazzle to watch. Had a good time w it 9. Wonder Egg Priority: Shame about the ending and the road leading up to it, but for awhile, this was one bracing little underdog of a show. Nevermind how good it looks for so long(bless those overworked animators), the character building bits in between all the dreamworld fighting, where the cast just sorta pull together into a much-needed support group for one another were much appreciated. Say what you will about the racier material the story tried to hook you w, but the bracing way the characters are slowly introduced as the show uses its formula to explore their issues early on, that's why we were all glued to our monitors those early episodes. Under all the obfuscation, there was a cutting empathy at the heart of it all, and I gotta give respect for that. For the majority of its run, this was the series I most looked forward to week to week. 8. Odd Taxi : The way it all shakes out in the end for Odokawa is too corny and lame too not slide ODDTAXI a few places from where it wold be, and it's a shame bc nearly all of it up to that point is aces. A wry, compelling modern neo-noir w animal ppl, some of the best dialogue of any show this year, wonderful voice work, a driving narrative starring a great cast, and a character who speaks nearly always in rapping couplets. Banger OP. Looking forward to basically anything this crew handles next. Shame it couldn't stick the landing. 7. Heike Monogatari : Naoko Yamada brought her touch to probably the most absorbing series of the year next to Sonny Boy. It's not unlike a historical Scorsece flick for awhile, watching one fool's hubris and flaws create ripples thruout his immediate surroundings and his family, but thru the addition of a new original protagonist, we are grounded closer to that family and their struggles, and gain a clearer picture of the emotional cost of Kiyomori's actions. Character acting and animation are used to tell this story w acute emotional precision and just basking in it all is its own reward. 6. Vlad Love: Seems to be divisive, but I always had a good time w this one, never ever bored. It's the type of show that's not that funny on its own, like, thru its own jokes or attempts at making you laugh, but the all the weird lil ways that it is very weird add up to a strangely hilarious experience in the moment. The casualness w which not a gently caress is given about vampire rules, the lil questions about Mai's lore that could easily get brought up in a S2, or not at all! The glorious play/movie episodes. The loving banger OPs. The weird vocal performances. Really hope there's a S2 5. SK8 : Such bright, enjoyable TV. Reki/Langa a million years. Let's go bro 4. Sonny Boy: Not even gonna pretend I got everything going on here, but god it's so wild seeing a show this confidently heady and Big Brain this devoted to conveying its concepts and ideas thru animation. Its not even particularly less talky than other such series about murky scientific concepts or anything, just incredibly and consistently compelling visually, always looking for a fun way to use the medium's strengths to tell its story and pull you a lil closer to its characters. It's enough of a miracle that Shingo Natsume and co were able to conceptualize and create this, and a greater one they worked this hard to share it w us. 3. JoJo: Stone Ocean: The first lil batch of eps they dropped feels just enough like an arc on its own that I feel like counting it. gently caress it. Jolyne immediately owns, and her story has a dramatic thrust that gets you pumped real easy. Hermes owns. The villain owns, he has things set up and enjoys a level of privilege at Green Dolphin over the protags that gives this wonderfully slimy edge to his every scene. There have been complaints about the show's look or animation quality, but can't really relate maself beyond the usual noticeable tv show weirdness. I'm reminded generally of CloverWorks' effort on s1 of Promised Neverland, all the work done on the art direction end to make an exciting show out of a largely cg set. It worked out! The layouts, dramatic angles, sound design and just the baseline quality of Araki's art cohere to make a forbidding and creepy place out of Green Dolphin, a character in its own right. Truly cannot wait to see ppl's reactions to all that comes next. 2. SSSS Dynazenon: I didn't like GRIDMAN much, but was delighted to find this psuedo-sequel to be a marked improvement from the jump on basically all the merits. An evocatively human cast of teenage losers who don't comprise a cast that feels like 90% walking plot devices(now its more like 20%!), creepy vibe, fun action, a fun sense of humor. It all worked so much better this go around, good poo poo. 1. Pokemon: Koko / Journeys: Pokemon is 100% an animation thing to me these days. The way they be having these anime/movies/shorts/webtoons lookin for the last decade and change honestly makes the games look like the cheapo tie-in arm of the franchise, and the writing's been catching up too. Just consistently very high quality kid's cartooning. All of which is to say Journeys continues to be AOTY for three years running, not particularly close. Pack em up, your faves could never. Go is the revelation of the series for me, his relationships w his starters(which is to say, the Sw/Sh starters) have had parent/child themes weaved thu them since the start and their growth together is adorable and rewarding to watch as ever. Team Rocket is great, returning and new characters are great and the pokemon designs look and animate better than ever for TV. Koko/Secrets of the Jungle is the big one, tho. The Power of Us, it still surprises me sometimes how much I love it, and the same team went on to do this sans-Wit Studio apperantly. Koko and Eva 3.0+1.0 premiered in Japan very close and were the two anime films I was most looking forward to in the new year of 2021. Subs for both hit the web even closer, and after taking both in, yeah, Pokemon was the better time. It's on Netflix as Secrets of the Jungle and if you ever had a pokemon fan phase I highly reccomend it, or even if you didn't. A very cute, heartfelt and efficiently told take on Tarzan and The Jungle Book that makes eye-popping use of the jungle setting. Had me cryin at the end. Zarude > Rillaboom a 1000 years. Pokemon anime owns. Honorable mentions for Jujutsu Kaisen, Beastars, Aggretsuko, Godzilla: Singular Priority, Eva 3.0+1.0, Baki, Megalobox S2, 86, Yuru Camp and Tokyo Revengers Pootybutt fucked around with this message at 03:26 on Jan 1, 2022 |
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Jan 1, 2022 03:09
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Just a reminder:Strange Quark posted:
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Jan 1, 2022 03:13
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Endorph posted:oh my god i forgot to vote for blue reflection ray
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Jan 1, 2022 03:28
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GorfZaplen posted:I agree. 
Malsangoroth fucked around with this message at 04:10 on Jan 1, 2022 |
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Jan 1, 2022 04:06
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Between work, family matters, and other hobbies, I haven't been watching a lot of anime lately, but I've seen enough this year for a full list. Here goes: Honorable mention: Sonny Boy and The Case Study of Vanitas. I can't actually rank them in my top 5 because I haven't gotten around to watching either beyond the first few episodes, but I'll try to finish them soon, and it's quite plausible they'll turn out to be better than #4 and #5. 5. So I'm a Spider, So What?: I was interested in this because I read the first few chapters of the WN (translated by blastr0n). Some of the criticisms people have of the adaptation are probably correct; there are some parts near the end where background art and to some extent clear storyboarding in battle scenes are obviously being sacrificed due to time crunch, and even just from what I've read of the WN it seems that some nuances of characterization of Shun and his friends were sacrificed for the sake of pacing. But the show's sense of humor (in the Kumoko segments) shines through, and I was fairly invested in the mysteries set up by the juxtaposition of the Kumoko segments and the Shun segments. (Yes, there's some occasional cheap misleading of the viewer, but never on the level of something like Another or, to use an example from this season, Jouran.) I normally don't like video-game elements in fantasy settings, but they work here because the characters notice how bizarre they are, and there is eventually some explanation for them. 4. Heaven's Design Team: A mildly funny show full of weird animal facts. Relaxing, but also has the "wait, what animal will this turn out to be?" mystery element to keep it engaging. There's also some interesting ideas about the creative process in here, I think. It feels too...slight to rank higher, though; as I said, it's only mildly funny. 3. Re: Zero season 2: Aside from One Piece, this is probably the ongoing work of Japanese fiction I'm most invested in the overall narrative of. It's only number 3 on this list because of its overreliance on long and often somewhat vague speeches. 2: Jujutsu Kaisen: I've written about why the manga is great before. The anime is faithful, well-paced, well-animated, and has funny omakes. It's good. 1: Odd Taxi: It's funny how I always seem to have more to say about my number 5 show than my number 1 show. Partly this is probably a matter of using up energy writing about my number 5, but partly it's because writing about something really good (or really bad, for that matter) is harder for me than writing about something interestingly flawed. Fortunately, Odd Taxi's greatness is widely recognized enough that other posters in this thread have already written about why it's good. Silver2195 fucked around with this message at 04:25 on Jan 1, 2022 |
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Jan 1, 2022 04:14
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Jan 1, 2022 04:27
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Honorable Mentions SK8: The arc about intrepid teen protagonist learning how to deal with his inadequacy and lack of inherent talent is well done and all, but it's straightforward and narratively simple. SK8 sets itself apart with its primary antagonist, who struggles with having skateboarding as his only escape and also having it as a pivotal point of trauma, where it invited greater censure from his over controlling aunts and cutting down his first real friendship. It's the kind of situation with no easy solutions, so it's a shame they dropped the plot thread they gradually set up about his political enemies trying to sabotage him to speedrun a redemption arc for him in the literal last ten minutes of the show. 2.43: Seiin High School Boys Volleyball Team: The messy bitch gay drama of Battery but now in a form that isn't in danger of putting someone into a coma out of sheer boredom. They skipped around a lot as far as volleyball action goes, but what they did show looked pretty nice, and they did a great job making you want the main rival team to win too. So be the limitations of a one cours sports anime. Bonus shoutout to the simulcast subs for actually using the volleyball lingo English speaking players say (e.g., hitters instead of "spikers") which not even Commie got right for Haikyuu. Visual Prison: The finale was rather lackluster (the Utapri director can go way harder than this, man), but this is basically the uncontested 2021 pick for gay yearning. The quirky character traits in the secondary cast that might come as poor substitution for proper characterization are better realized here. This is in part in thanks to the setting, because these dudes who are hundreds years old vampires are obviously too old to care. Even so, the jokes themselves feel more natural, like when they show Dimitri lounging around at home completely naked and letting it go by uncommented on instead of doing some wacky manzai routine. 5. Build Divide has the same issue of later Vanguard where the card games aren't very followable with how much they skip, but it knows how to spotlight moments like the protagonist going all in on a turn where he explicitly mathed out the probability of him instantly winning that turn, so it feels like there's more strategy going on than your average card game anime. Where the show really shines though is in its setting, which draws in the audience with a meta-narrative that's never directly addressed until the end of the season. The world constantly feels slightly off. Society literally runs on succeeding in the card game which was introduced during the Sengoku era, but also the world outside the city quite literally does not exist. Flashbacks to the characters' childhoods are shown exclusively in a 4:3 aspect ratio. Being the first half of an unproven split cour it could very well not deliver on anything, but at least it'd probably still be funny. And hell, it's always refreshing to see a card game show not go down the same old save the world route. 4. Re-Main is ultimately a story about learning how to get over yourself and becoming a better person, which is not the most unique thing in the world for a sports narrative, but the particular struggle here feels fresh because of how it hides behind and interacts with the amnesia element. It's a convoluted as hell setup of 1. Getting amnesia and forgetting you were an rear end in a top hat, 2. Finding out you were an rear end in a top hat and then getting your memories back, and 3. Getting amnesia again but this time forgetting everything since getting amnesia 1, so you're an rear end in a top hat again. A wild ride I loved every second of. This is the one show where I really wish they had twice as many episodes to flesh things out. 3. I won't dwell too much on Odd Taxi as it's the most mainstream pick on my list, but it's got superb execution and ticks many of my favorite drama checkboxes: murder, deep-seated psychological trauma, and bricking your phone as soon as you roll the chase SSR in your longtime mobage. Easily one of the best mystery series of the past few years and my pick for favorite show that made me lose faith in my fellow anime fans. 2. Yeah, that's right. I'm putting a second card game anime in here. People dumped on Shadowverse for not being an adaptation of the game's story mode, but I'm very glad they didn't go for the generic fantasy setting. What we got instead is the classic mix of Saturday morning cartoon antics, hype shounen moments, and parental abandonment and child abuse flavored melodrama. Sometimes the most important fight of the day is helping your mom stop your dad from destroying the world after they both mysteriously vanished ten years ago, and sometimes it's teaching your rival who only started playing the card game to win money to pay for treatment for his sister's crippling illness how to love the game. Most card game anime tend to be best received by children and fujo audiences, and yeah, they definitely play into that angle. A solid contender for straight up one of the best card game anime out there. 1. IDOLiSH7 distinguished itself in its first season by allowing its characters to fail and allowing those failures to have actual consequences. Failure as a real possibility should be a key trait of any competition based story, but it feels increasingly rare in idol anime, particularly in 2021. At best you'd see the sports anime cliche of losing at the last minute in the first competition to go on to win the next one later in the year. Aside from that though, IDOLiSH7 S1 more or less followed the same plot beats as the original iDOLM@STER series, albeit in a more cohesive realization. A fun show to be sure, but nothing groundbreaking. Season 2 changed the game by elevating the character writing to highs we rarely see in the medium. The main developments in the plot continue to be characterized by soap opera esque elements, but how characters respond to events feels very natural and grounded. Conflict can crop up even between people who care about each other deeply without hinging on simple misunderstandings. Deep-seated doubts aren't going to be cleared by a pep talk and soft assurances. Sometimes there is no easy solution to public ridicule. IDOLiSH7 has from the beginning always been good at balancing its humor and drama, but the frankness to the writing is what sets its second season apart. There's realistic depictions of how support structures can help someone deal with trauma but also how they might fall through even so. As the first half of a split cour, IDOLiSH7: Third Beat! is mostly setup for the new antagonists (led by one delightfully hammy piece of poo poo), but S2's character writing strengths continue to shine, and the storyboarding grows more inspired in concert with the drama ramping up. The confrontations we've avoided and deflected from in the previous seasons come to a head here, even spilling over into bouts of physical assault. The tension is palpable in each scene and the dialogue equally sharp, with one standout line meant as encouragement in an earlier season getting recontextualized into something decisively bitter. Even through it all, the raw feelings of frustration, self-hatred, concern, and love bubbling underneath it all are no less clearly conveyed. It's a show unafraid of being open and honest in its portrayal of the human condition warts and all while still deftly avoiding slipping into nihilism. A breath of fresh air in a year otherwise so often dogged by narrative cowardice. tl;dr: idol show turns local fans into emotional masochists 
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Jan 1, 2022 04:47
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Don't really have any order to this so here's the poo poo I liked this year: 1. 86 - I thought the first cour of 86 was a really nice self-contained story. If I had to describe it, it's something like an "anti-mecha" show. Describing it like that is probably going to annoy people but that's the best way I know how to put it for a show that spends more of its time exploring things like dealing with hopelessness and inevitability than watching how cool the robots are as they slice each other apart. Lena is a great inversion of a classical mecha protagonist in the sense that she needs to get over herself and recognize that she's not really helping with all the speeches and ideals while not actually doing anything practical. Losing her is one of the reasons I think the 2nd cour was a big downgrade over the first. 2. ODD TAXI - An obvious contender for AOTY for reasons I think most people have already covered better than i could. It's refreshing to see a show that actually manages to coordinate so many plot threads without it turning into a real mess. 3. Love Live! Superstar: I debated putting this one here because it's a show that starts really strong, then turns into a dumb plot mess for what I can only guess is an unnecessary return to tradition, before getting better again once the plot is resolved with a song and dance (as is customary in Idol shows). Reducing the character count to 5 definitely helped develop the characters more, but stupid motivations dragged some of them *cough*Ren*cough* back down. However, It's still a show that i was hyped for and actually delivered. Superstar dodged the Sunshine S1 problem of "HAVE I MENTIONED HOW MUCH I LOVE MU'S IN THE LAST 5 MINUTES." I wish they would drop the stupid "school might be closing" plot because the stakes are already high enough without needing to drag back the same plot from the last two shows. I did appreciate that each of the idols had a real (if short) character arc, something i found lacking for a few of the idols in OG and Sunshine. Cutting the character list to something more manageable for a single season was a good call. I know, so far I haven't really been selling it, but Love Live! has always been a series that relied on the strength of its character interactions and performances , and Superstar has some real bangers. I appreciate it for that even if the plot can get dumb at times. 4. Idolish7 Third Beat: The Joker from batman is here to destroy your puny idol group. 5. Kageki Shoujo: Here's another one I debated putting here because there are some weird choices for the earlier plots where the show is so consumed with the dark side of showbusiness (specifically critiquing Takarazuka Revue) that it forgets that it's supposed to be a comedy. The show steadily gets better over the 2nd half as it starts to, well, enjoy acting. It felt like a much more grounded take on showbusiness than the melodrama of shows where you magically gain acting ability by being locked in the shed and nearly freezing to death. The show had some really good comedic timing, too. Also the EDs own. Honorable mention: Jaku-chara Tomozaki. The first part of the series was kinda stock LN business but I did like where the show seemed to be going when it ran out of episodes as it started to pry off Aoi's veneer and set up what I assume is going to be the main moral conflict in the LN series.
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Jan 1, 2022 06:57
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Honorable mentions:
kirtar fucked around with this message at 07:03 on Jan 1, 2022 |
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Jan 1, 2022 07:00
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3. Super Cub Lovely chill show about a depressed girl slowly expanding her horizons that can find earnest joy in her making it as far out as the local grocery store. The beautiful background art & character style elevate a limited production into something really nice to look at. 2. Uma Musume Season 2 As someone who strongly disliked what I saw of the first season, I was struck by how effectively S2 took a shaky foundation and built on it an amazing story about an athlete struggling with circumstances completely beyond her control. The Teioh/McQueen dynamic is wonderful, Twin Turbo's squad are a really fun comedy C-Team, but the best episode was the Rice Shower one which caught me completely off guard. 1. Blue Reflection Ray I can make no excuses here, this show is pretty ugly. It clearly wasn't given the resources it needed to succeed, so I think it says a lot that it managed to shoot up to my AOTY largely on the strength of its character writing. A cast full of sad gay messes each exploring their own unique self-loathing while everything gets continuously worse around them, even the increasingly off-the-rails plot enabling some really interesting and nuanced explorations of interpersonal dynamics. And when it does go for humor its jokes really land. The evil onee-sama gets symbolically married to her angry henchgirl causing a psychic shockwave powerful enough to almost knock out one of the heroes. Ash falls from the sky as the world slowly dies but we still have time for a chill dorm cleaning episode. One ep inexplicably goes full social satire? It's a show doomed to be adored by like 5 people but what can I say, I'm one of them. As a Blue Reflection thing to recommend I'd more easily go for the game BR Second Light which combines that solid grasp of social nuance with a consistently strong presentation, though it does go for a much softer and nicer sort of tone, which in turn makes the show an interesting contrast piece. You should play BR2, it's good!
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Jan 1, 2022 10:51
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1. Odd Taxi This came out of nowhere and I didn't watch it when it aired but all the positive word of mouth led to me binging it later in the year and I'm so glad they did, seeing all the plot threads come together was very satisfying. Also had my OP of the year. 2. SSSS Dynazenon Didn't quite reach the highs of Gridman but comes close. 3. Jujutsu Kaisen Very solid shonen. Doesn't do anything crazy but does what it does very well. 4. Godzilla: Singular Point I'm not a huge Godzilla fan but I found this engrossing. Plus the mascot character Pelops II was very cute. 5. Blue Reflection Ray I watched the first half and dropped it then watched the second half over a weekend just before the second game came out. I really enjoyed the second game so Ray benefits in my rankings from enjoying that so much. Still, it holds its own despite not looking the best. Honorable mentions There was a lot of sequels this year and for the most part I enjoyed them but for whatever reason I always find it difficult to include them on best of lists but Zombie Land Saga: Revenge, Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S, Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Season 2, Non Non Biyori: Nonstop, Beaststars Season 2, Aggretsuko Season 4 and Yuru Camp Season 2 were all varying degrees of good. Star Wars: Visions also had a few really good episodes.
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Jan 1, 2022 12:41
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Honourable mentions: Jujutsu Kaisen: Just an extremely solid, well-animated and fun to watch shounen. All of the main trio kick rear end in different ways and it's great. Sk8 the Infinity: Wild concept, very colourful, very gay. My memory is a sieve so I forgot what the rest of my HMs were but suffice it to say I enjoyed them. My top 5 are all generally stuff that I would consider beautiful in one form or another. I can't really describe why I think they are (and also I'm kinda lazy) so I'll just put them here. 5. Fruits Basket Final Season (and frankly all of FB as a whole) 4. Megalobox 2: Nomad 3. Oddtaxi 2. Heike Monogatari 1. SSSS.Dynazenon
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Jan 1, 2022 15:18
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1) Sonny Boy Just a very cool and stylish show, and rather unique too. 2) Odd Taxi Fun crime drama antics with lots of interesting characters. 3) Vivy The ending was a bit weak, but it was a really good sci-fi show. 4) Suppose a Kid from the Last Dungeon Boonies Moved to a Starter Town Just a pretty fun show that was way better than I expected it to be. 5)Kumoko Would've been higher, but the animation was pretty lackluster. Also, the human stuff is bad. I never got around to watching Jujutsu Kaisen otherwise it probably would have been on my list.
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Jan 1, 2022 19:21
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Get ready for the most normie top 5 in this thread: 5) Magia Record - Season 2 - The first season ended on a super high note despite being relatively medium throughout most of it. This season was a superb continuation. It was great to see the original team get more involved. The new characters really came into their own, and each fight had at least one eye-melting sakuga shot. It's a great spin off for anyone who liked Madoka Magic. Highly recommended! 4) Megalobox 2: Nomad - Just like almost everyone else listing this, I was pretty lukewarm on season 1. It was a good romp, but nothing special. And the "animation gimmick" didn't do it for me. Then comes along THIS rear end in a top hat, and now I have to recommend Megalobox to everyone even remotely interested in anime because season 2 was such an amazing exploration of...well...everyone's character. And really, this is where the more "grainy" animation clicked for me. It meshes so well with desert setting. And the latin influence on the soundtrack was spot on. I know a lot of people weren't feeling Sakuma as a villain, but I honestly think he's one of the most believably written Zuckerberg-esk sociopathic tech bros in media.  3) Re:Zero - Part 2 - So, overall, I rate this lower than part 1. (I am on Team Rem.) BUT, it had some of the single best episodes of anime I have ever seen (*cough*Subaru'sfamily*cough*), and this gave us #2 best girl, Echidna. Nearly everything added to the story was a slam dunk. Also, Long Shot is a banging loving OP. Too bad we only hear it like 3 times because White Fox crammed so much content into each episode! 2) Jujutsu Kaisen - gently caress HeroAca. This is how you do a loving battle shounen adaptation. No long form meandering bullshit. Get to the great characters. Get to the great fights. Let the great characters get even greater during the great fights.  Also, the ending theme slaps.TRUE 1) Odd Taxi - Surprising no one. Best show of the year. Great characters. Great dialogue. Great mysteries. Can't wait for the movie. Honorable Mentions: Komi-san Can't Communicate - Super cute. Does well considering it's coming from a text heavy manga. Attack on Titan - Final Season - I loved it. But I'm going to hold off giving this points until it is finally finally over in a few months. Kumo desu ga, Nani ka? - The animation fell apart so hard. I really liked the show and the mystery being built up, but god, it was terrible to look at half the time.  Vivy: Flourite Eye Song - I really enjoyed this, but the ending kind of fell flat. I would probably rank it equal to Magia Record, but I'm just more invested in the Madoka setting that a one shot like this. Shoujo☆Kageki Revue Starlight Movie - So, one of the things that secretly irks me about a lot of media revolving around relationships is that they almost universally cut off at the very convenient "happy ending." This movie asks the question, "Ok, what happens next?" and explores how stagnating in your "happy ending" can be harmful if you don't have any other goals to pursue. If you were a fan of the show, this is a direct continuation, and super highly recommended. It was a great movie,and would have made my top 5 in any year that wasn't as stacked as this one.
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Jan 1, 2022 23:02
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This year did not have an awful lot to offer me. My first two picks are the only anime I'd consider truly excellent from this year. The rest of the picks are lucky to be there, and Honourable Mentions is really just a list of anime I actually watched all the way through and didn't hate. I am hoping next year is better. 1. Odd Taxi Absolutely fantastic. It's unusual to get a complete story in an anime, so I always consider that a bonus, but this was an extremely well crafted mystery. A clear winner this year for me. I'm not big into animal people, but if you avoided it for that, I recommend giving it a try. 2. Megalo Box 2 Visually stunning, compelling characters, good plot. As others have mentioned, the second half features a severely undercooked villain, but the other characters make up for it. 3. 86 86 is a teen edgelord battle mech story. If you liked Gundam: Iron Blooded Orphans, you'll almost definitely like this. 4. SK8 This was a very silly show that didn't feel particularly ambitious, but managed to be dumb fun the entire way. 5. Heaven's Design Team This is low budget edu-tainment garbage, but the jokes about client work rang incredibly true for my own work, so it got lots of giggles out of me. Honourable Mentions Vivy Fluorite Eye's Song A fun scifi romp, but ultimately pretty nonsensical and derivative. Horimiya A romcom that blazes through the initial will-they/won't-they very quickly, and then loses all direction. Feels like it could've been a lot more interesting. Mieruko-chan Another show that felt like it had potential. The premise is intriguing and a good balance between scary and funny. However, its regular fan service was gross, and the main plot doesn't quite make it anywhere before the show runs out of episodes. Yuru Camp S2 I like this show but it's a screensaver.
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Jan 2, 2022 01:11
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honourable thoughts and critique of a high level: Pompo: Liked this one in the cinema, but forgot all about it so hard to put it in the top 5 really High-Rise Invasion: Surprisingly saucy for a netflix production Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time: good ending to the series Aria the Crepuscolo: I don't like the new girls Actual top 5 5 Ganbare Douki-Chan: It's a mystery how cuckqueens can be so epic while cuckolds are so fail 4 Super Cub: Intensely popular to the degree that Japanese politicians and national newspapers had to have their say about the series, understandably Super Cub also got plenty of attention in the west. For me however this series while reaching the fourth spot of this year in my ranking is also one of disappointment. This because of two main factors. The first of these is the censorship of Koguma and the series as a whole. The harsher aspects of it were removed from the series which meant we had to miss out on events such as Koguma beating up a boy, her evolution into a hired killer, Reiko's witchy ways, Shii-chan's little sister who is dedicated to the prepper lifestyle and of course the black widow that is Koguma's mother among many aspects. A bit baffling on one hand as of course the series was promotional from the start, but also understandable when you think of the fact that an act of speeding in the series caused national outrage. The second factor for me is Shii-chan. While her inclusion in the series was obviously not the fault of the anime as she was also in the original novels, and obviously judging by her popularity the right choice I also felt it was a disappointing one. I view Shii-chan as a blocker in the developing relationship between Koguma and Reiko as well as any character development for either. While it was fine, good even, that she allowed Koguma to show her colder side, ultimately she served as a sudden stop for the evolution of Koguma's character. The gradual evolution of a sheltered poor girl afraid to interact with the world to a girl who is able to go anywhere as long as the has a Super Cub ended up largely repeating in the second half of the series. The first narrative arc culminated in Reiko and Koguma sneaking out from the School Excursion, breaking laws and all sense of common decency to go anywhere on their Super Cub, to taste the sweet taste of Freedom, to bathe in the delight of the open road and to also of course suffer the mild consequences of their daring actions. The latter half largely just seems this same narrative arc repeated, with them of course going anywhere as you can on a Super Cub, but without any added challenge. In fact, their second country tour despite the trepidation by Shii-chan's parents sees zero negative consequences. While this makes clear you can go anywhere on a Super Cub, it leads to a weaker storyline. In fact, the only negative event in the second half is a consequence of Shii-chan's own faulty actions, both by not riding a Super Cub and going anywhere outside of the lines allowed for those that are not on a Super Cub. Koguma's ticked off reaction to this is logical as she has to halt her own growth to save the life of a girl who breaks the primary rules of the world. She went anywhere, but without a Super Cub. 3 Girls und Panzer das Finale – Part 3 https://i.imgur.com/MATrSeM.mp4 It's been a long wait for the best movie of 2021 and it will be a long wait for the next one 2 Non Non Biyori Nonstop: Oft I have seen the phrase 'boring' used to describe Non Non Biyori. The world famous Animenewsnetwork was too scared to review season 3 as they lacked the intellectual capacity to understand its depths, writing it off as just another moe anime. But in fact, Non Non Biyori has the rare distinction of being one of the few actually intelligent anime out there, providing an ever engaging series for the high IQ viewer. In season 3, the long form and non-linear (as referenced in the title) narrative of the series reaches its apex. Jokes set up in season 1 get their resolution in season 3, and set ups in season 3 get their resolution in season 1. This creates an intensely rewarding experience for the attentive viewer, which unfortunately in this era of mobile phones is a rarity. Not just the joke department rewards the intellectual viewer, the themes the show has been setting up for seasons also fully reveal their depths. Running through season 3 are several intertwined themes, but some of these are more interesting to me then others. I'd say one of the primary themes of interest in the season is the interaction between rural and urban, which gets focus through the introduction of the new character Akane Shinoda. Her interactions, primarily with the monster Konomi Fujimiya portray a calm and peaceful rural world invaded by the outsider and city slicker Akane. Akane, who in typical city slicker fashion is a nervous insecure wreck more at home in a Woody Allen film or perhaps a Kirara manga, heaps destruction upon our independent and strong main cast. Her storyline, solely motivated by her isolation due to being caught up in the individualist and capitalist world of the city serves to show as a stark contrast to the collectivist nature of our rural cast. It is no coincidence that her scenes are directed not only to be different and unpleasant, but that her primary interactions are with the Monster and the already partially corrupted Hikage. This gets extra emphasis when the only ways she is able to receive positive feedback from our girls is by references to material things. Another primary storyline running through season 3 is that we finally get resolution to Renge's PTSD. I have seen many misinterpretations of Renge's character, for example calling her emotionless, but for those paying attention it is deeply obvious Renge is in fact a rather emotional and sensitive girl, who got her heart broken in season 1 due to the unexpected and heartless abandonment by her friend from the city (another reference to the cold ways of the city). While she never got to say farewell in that moment, her friend torn away from her by her fathers capitalist pursuits and her grandma slamming the door in her face, season 3 teaches not only Renge but also all of us to feel hope again as her friend comes back to make amends. At the same time, Renge had been learning herself how to get over the past and become a stronger person by taking the other new character Shiori under her wing. Shiori may have come from the city like Akane, but fully embraces the countryside, quickly integrating into it and becoming an essential part of its future. During her stay in the countryside she has discussions with Renge more on the level of the Solvay conferences then your common anime. Mind you, the resolution to her PTSD was not as simple as just meeting her old friend again and helping to raise Shiori. During the 3 seasons its constantly shown she has a fear of abandonment, for example by making sure to say goodbye multiple times to everyone she befriends, to looking back and regularly checking if they hadn't fully abandoned her. She also encourages her friends to make sure they have heartfelt farewells with others so they live without regret. This is a stark contrast to the scenes that show her younger, more careless and more outwardly emotional. All of this is of course shown in perfect detail in the visuals, with her reunion and flashback scenes having some of the only moments when she openly shows emotions after the abandonment, both showing her crying and laughing. As with any Iyashikei it of course not only has the earlier described themes of healing and the countryside, but there is also a more mature and realistic portrayal of growing up then most of the slice of life shows which purport to portray this but in all honesty never reach further then being a loose collection of scenes of girls that fail in the basic act of portraying life. Our series shows not just the growing of characters, with a new generation being born, raised and taken care of by the old, but also the failures of the girls as they run into the limitations of their abilities, whether this is in intellectual pursuits or other areas of prime interests to girls (and mute boy) of their age like fashion, homemaking, the creation of fully functional mecha and the hunt for the most dangerous prey of all, the weasel. In this season it not only shows the successes and failures of the girls, but it also juxtaposes this to the paths their failures could lead to by portraying the lazy teacher and stuck Candy Shop both in their more hopeful younger years and their older age, having fully given up and settled for a meek existence they will never be able to escape from. Besides its writing qualifications Non Non Biyori, from here on called the Non, also excels in other factors. The backgrounds, well known to be among the finest in the industry, continue to deliver us visuals that make you wonder whether one of the masters of the Dutch Golden Age survived in obscurity until choosing this as their venue for coming out to the wider world. Its water animation also remains exquisite, portraying the flow of natures most powerful element with all the awe and beauty it deserves. And of course, the subtle animation of the characters growth and emotions is still a treat to behold. 1 Odd Taxi: it was alright
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Jan 2, 2022 02:57
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https://twitter.com/daromeon/status/1476542426047463438
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Jan 2, 2022 04:00
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1) Odd Taxi - Odd Taxi has a ton of style, an interweaving narrative that it pulls off better than any other show I've seen attempt it, likeable characters, a neat twist, and idols. What's not to like? 2) IDOLiSH7: Third BEAT! - Idolish7 continues to be the acme of idol anime. This season didn't quite reach the high bar set by the previous, but it was still really, really good. I love these boys.  3) Mushoku Tensei - This is just a very well done adventure story. Yes, it's isekai, and yes, that's been overdone to hell and back, but with an interesting world, great characters, an engaging story, and beautiful visuals, I don't care. Also, Roxy is really cute.  4) Love Live! Superstar!! - This is by far the weakest entry in the franchise, but hell, I still love live. Having really good production values helps, too. As safe as the writing felt, the characters were still charming (not you, Ren), and Heanna and to a lesser extent Kanon had satisfying arcs. I hope the second season takes more risks. Oh, and Keke was good+fun enough to cause me to oshihen.  5) SSSS.DYNAZENON - While not as good as Gridman, Dynazenon was still great. Having been watching some toku shows in recent years, I enjoyed the anime take on various tropes of the genre, and it was fun and funny. The fights could have been more dynamic, but ultimately, I'm not Droyer: I was watching for the character dynamics, not the robots.  Honorable mentions to Jujutsu Kaisen for accomplishing the difficult task of making me enjoy fight shounen, and to A+ moe SoL shows Non Non Biyori and Yuru Camp for continuing to be top in class.
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Jan 2, 2022 07:14
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Oh poo poo, the Outy thread already. Uh, I watched a lot of anime this year, for some reason. Here are my extremely normie opinions. I'm just going to do this as a top 10, so the first five are honorable mentions or whatever 10.Re Zero 2: I voted for this last year, so I don't think it gets to score twice, and the second half of season two was maybe not quite as engaging as the first? It's been a while. 9.Shadows House: Wonderfully atmospheric, even if it's a merely good adaptation of an amazing manga. 8.Megalobox 2: Devastating, the only way a decent sequel to Megalobox could go. 7.Eighty-Six: (just season 1 if that's the ruling?) Not usually my sort of show, but this won me over pretty quickly. 6.Mushoku Tensei: mostly for season 2. Has nearly every problem the isekai genre ever has, but it's good enough that I don't really care. 5.Maidragon 2: Maybe better than season 1? 4.To Your Eternity: It's notable how rarely fantasy settings are used to tell genuinely strange stories. 3.Jujutsu Kaisen: extremely well-executed spoopy-flavoured shonen fighting thing. 2.Vivy: I don't think I liked the ending as much as some, but this was still a great bit of robottery. 1.Odd Taxi: I assume enough has been said about this by now. Near misses/ more interesting than good/ would be on the list were I in a slightly different mood: Pretty Boy Detectives, Dr Stone 2, Idaten Deities, Mars Red, Sonny Boy, Heaven's Design Team, Zombie Land Saga 2, Star Wars Visions, Yurucamp 2, Magia Record 2 That's more action-spectacle heavy than my usual top lists, guess I appreciated the distraction.
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Jan 2, 2022 17:24
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I didn't watch 5 2021 anime in FULL but I did watch -some- 2021 anime... I was mostly busy playing video games in my free time. 1) Sonny Boy - Like Kaiba, one of those shows where you don't understand how it got made and survived the many cooks in the production kitchen with its vision intact. A show that'll be remembered and dissected for a long time. 2) Link Click - Masterfully directed, makes you feel like the episodic characters involved are main characters you've known for years. Banger of an OP. 3) Vivy - Fun sci-fi action show with decent tension and good production values. The theme park carnage as a robot sings in front of corpses is maybe the most memorable prologue opener since Cowboy Bebop's flowers in the puddle. 4) Bakarina s2 - Still mostly fun but felt a bit pointless and slightly more hetero. I didn't really care much about the new characters.. also, the show already was kind of flanderizing its characters in the second half of the first season but it feels like they're just dialing that up more and more. 5) Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop - Charming slice of life movie at a mall with characters you want to root for... hits that nostalgia of mall life which is something I enjoy (earlier this year I also watched that documentary Jasper Mall and had some strong emotions about it). The only issue I had was the use of CG for the backgrounds.. I actually liked the overvibrance of it, had that tackiness that makes a lot of sense for malls, but I would've preferred more hand-painted backgrounds, especially for a film. e: updated list now that I had some time to watch a bit more anime. iirc this is what i voted on the form but maybe i'm mistaken! The 7th Guest fucked around with this message at 19:03 on Jan 15, 2022 |
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Jan 2, 2022 19:12
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