Never mind the bollocks, here’s the top anime of 2018
Before it’s time to stare into the abyss of a new season once more, it’s maybe time to be a little more… positive. I’m not getting around to writing reviews much anymore, anyway.
Beatless is, by most definitions, not a good show. It’s full of terrible light novel tropes, has atrocious pacing most of the time, is riddled with dead-end subplots, and it doesn’t look very good. However, it also happens to be one of the most thoughtful speculative fiction anime in a long time; since GitS:SAC, I’d say. I really can’t excuse its LN nonsense completely, but this isn’t simply an anime with robot waifus, or an anime that winks at you over how silly robot waifus are (and does them anyway), this is legitimately an anime that explores why robot waifus are a thing - amongst other things. And while you can find more concise or better looking shows pretty easily, an anime with the strengths of Beatless is a rare find.
There’s been a lot of vaguely slice of life/cgdct/iyashikei shows this year as usual, and some of them were even quite good: Yuru Camp, Rokuhoudou and Harukana Receive come to mind. But the one that sticks with me the most is this show about a bunch of tiny Brooklyn hipster lesbians that try to get their artisanal soap/carpentry business off the ground while also consuming prodigious amounts of organic Limoncello. Less vapid than Kyampu, better looking than Rokuhoudou, gayer than Harukana Catcher, and it has one of the best OPs plus the best ED of the year on top of it.
3. Emiya-san Chi no Kyou no Gohan
They just announced like another half dozen or so Fate anime (and even released a prologue for Case Files, which is boring to a quite frankly embarrassing degree), so it’s safe to assume that we’re not done with this franchise any time soon. What’s really surprising though is that out of all this shit, the one that turns out to be great is the irreverent short where Shirou feeds his harem. First of all, this is a top-tier production; cooking shorts are not usually known to be a Sakugabooru staple, but this one has lunacy like individually hand-animated grains of rice and the best action scene of the year - and yes, I did watch that one Boruto episode, and presage flower too. Secondly, the classic F/sn cast feels as comfortable as an old pair of shoes compared to the horrors that is basically anything else that came after. And releasing 12 minutes every month for a year is the perfect pace. It’s full of fateservice, of course, but it’s all done in subtle ways that won’t get in the way for those that don’t recognize it; it also doesn’t drown in exposition. Those two things alone make it the best Fate anime of all times.
Speaking of works on top of their respective genres, Bloom Into You is likely the best yuri anime of all time (read: it’s better than Aoi Hana, which it beats on everything but character design). Most obviously, it’s a great production package: It’s visually reminiscent of KyoAni’s latest efforts, if a little less plush. But unlike the sub-Lifetime movie writing that’s pretty much just there to make things happen in the likes of Violet Evergarden, it’s backed by some excellent ideas here. The characters are fleshed out and act fairly mature, so what drama there is is relatable and understated. It’s still taking place in yuritopia, but it’s self-aware enough to acknowledge on the fringes that reality is something else. And the most impressive thing is that the romance isn’t really the core of the show’s narrative, it’s actually about fiction and how people act out roles. Really good stuff, and it would have been a shoe-in for AOTY if it had an ending. Yeeeeah, it’s pretty much Aoi Hana all over again, please read the manga. It even ends on a great episode, just not one that supplies any narrative closure, not even to the subplot currently taking place. This will be fine should they ever make a sequel, but they didn’t announce one right away so that’s a real bummer. Still a great show though.
1. A Place Further Than The Universe
With Bloom Into you just abruptly stopping, the title falls back to the show that seemed sure to win it all year. Plafuni’s a more standard coming of age story, which is less impressive on an intellectual level, but makes more than up for it by having an intensely satisfying ending. The characters are just as strong, it’s really funny at points, has much more variety than usual by being half a road movie and it has great style, direction and production values. Coming-of-age has been done before in anime (like, in 80% of anime), but rarely in a close-to-perfect total package like this one. It’s notable that both of the top shows had Jukki Hanada as series comp, and the one that is his original wins. Well, Hanada also comped the biggest stinker I’ve seen all year (Steins;Gate Nothing), so let’s just say we’re even.
0. Thunderbolt Fantasy: Sword Seekers 2
Yeah this isn’t an anime, but it IS the most entertaining anime-adjacent thing I’ve seen this year so you can either count it as a honorable mention or a surprise upset winner. Thunderbolt Fantasy is, at this point, the single best thing Urobuchi has ever written and the puppet stylings soften a lot of his mannerisms. I really liked season 1 and while season 2 never quite reaches the levels of the predecessor’s magnificent ending, it gets going much faster and for a longer time so it’s overall better. So what it it actually? Well, it’s a droll wuxia puppet show with hot takes on heroism, and it’s carried mostly by said hot takes actually being of interest to anyone over the mental age of 12 (fuck off, MHA), and by being full of gigantic hams. The leads have the sort of effortless chemistry long running shows wish they had after dozens of seasons, and now we add Akira Ishida having an evil sword affair with his thirsty swaifu Aoi Yuuki. Suwabe somehow keeps getting cooler and congratulations Enigmatic Gale, you played yourself. Again. It’s just a great time, 100% of the time, and I wish it never ends. Thankfully, it looks like it won’t, at least for the time being.
