top ten anime! i feel like i remember the last one and im curious to see how things have or haven't shaken up
idk if I ever did a last one, but fine jeez enough people asked.
My criteria changes with these every time. I'm trying to go with what shows had the most impact on me or were the most memorable, regardless of objective quality. A lot of these aren't even rated 10/10 on my MAL. Any show with multiple seasons I'm just listing as a combined whole.
I have complicated feelings about this show. I don't think I've changed my number rating on anything else as often as I have with YZQ. There are objectively bad things about this show, and they apply to the manga as well. The fanservice is almost utterly needless and distracting. The story is on a time limit yet things constantly meander and detour into filler.
Yet despite all that, it's a show I can't stop thinking about. I'm not one to be taken in by flashy animation. Good animation does not equate a good show, it just means a good budget. Yet YZQ is one of the few shows that just stunned me over and over with the smoothness of the animation and smartness of the direction. The last episode of the Tsuki ni Naku OVA is still one of the most jaw dropping episodes of anything I've ever watched in my life, and that was years ago.
It's Suzuhito Yasuda's passion project more or less, even though it doesn't sell very well, and I can't help but respect that. The characters are cute and all likable. Even the villains turned good guys just always fit snugly into the cast perfectly. The powers and fights are fun and I hope Tatsunoko gets off their ass and adapts more of it. Message me if you ever want to check it out, the viewing order is a bit odd (or check it here).
There's a lot in Haruchika that you can find in plenty of other shows. A loud excitable protagonist, a snarky deuteragonist at her side, a high school setting, and a concert band. A lot of people actually tried to put Haruchika in competition with Hibike Euphonium when they both aired. But they're completely different shows.
It's hard to describe the charm of this show without just using the word charming again. Chika is just one of those characters that I could watch all day long. She's more than just energetic and a little dumb. The show goes out of its way to establish a dichotomy between her and Haru. He's extremely smart but has trouble getting along with others, while she's pretty brash but has just immense emotional intelligence. She's always kind, comforting, and ready to be there for her friends. One of the best lines in the show is Haru telling Chika that he may have solved all their friends' problems, but she "worked out everyone's hearts." They're a good duo and the chemistry between her and all the new friends she makes is fantastic.
Beyond that, some of the topics this show covers with grace are just, almost unmatched for something of this genre and lightheartedness. Being adopted, loss of a loved one, disabilities, PTSD, unrequited love, depression, and isolation. It's just one of many shows everyone should check out and give an honest chance.
I'll try not to rehash all the stuff I posted about before but, Bubuki Buranki is just a fun, earnest, and enjoyable show. It was SANZIGEN's 10th anniversary show, so it was made without money in mind and just the raw passion and love of creativity on display warms my heart. The studio brought on some really big industry names and I can't imagine it was produced at anything but a loss. Yet they made 2 seasons despite financial setbacks, simply because they promised themselves and everyone watching that they would. So much about it inspires me, from the actual content of the show to its production.
There's some clunky humor at times and some of the ideas can feel half-finished and get discarded over time. But there's so much it does right that every time I dredge up my old posts with like 20 notes I just wanna grab all my followers and tell them, just check it out, please.
The action is stellar, the setpieces and backdrops are phenomenal, the music is incredible, the voice acting performances are masterful, the mech designs are so fuckin cool, the characters are diverse and come from all over the globe, they're lovable in their own ways, and even some of the villains make you want to care about them. This was the best-looking CG animated show before Houseki no Kuni aired. Some of you reading might not have even realized it was CG based on that gif, because it's so smooth that I didn't even realized until partway through the first episode. Give it a try, cause I'm never going to shut up about it.
This may come as a surprise to some people, but I'm not really that much of a fan of idol shows. I have tried but cannot get myself invested in big name classics like Love Live or idolm@ster. Music shows just need that extra bit of spice for me, and Macross Delta brings it.
Macross is obviously known for this, but the blend of music and space fighter jet mechs just works extremely well. Delta respects both premises equally, giving equal weight to a performer's power to touch hearts and minds that it does to a soldier's power to both hurt and protect. Freyja and Hayate respect each other and everything that makes the other who they are.
As you might expect, Macross Delta's music is extremely high tier and for myself, there was not a single song I didn't immediately love. I have not stopped listening to the music since the show first aired until today.
Beyond that, the characters are extremely good. Freyja is easily one of the most charming and lovable female leads in all of anime, complete with lovingly crafted expression work that brings her to life. The animation is very well-done from simple conversations to dance numbers. Check it out if you want a wonderfully entertaining scifi music adventure.
Re:Creators is another show with flaws. I don't agree with everything the story does. Some things I actually really dislike. Yet, when I started it while it was airing, the premise grabbed me. I told myself that there were several things I wanted the show to do with it, and sure enough, it hit every single one of those marks like it was reading my mind.
I think a pattern with a lot of anime I like is whether they feel confident in their premise. I think even a bad show can be elevated if it commits to what it wants to do. Re:Creators is about, well, creating. Everything that happens feels straight from the hearts of people that have put blood, sweat, and tears into creating art. The directions it goes with meta-commentary on creating just boggles my mind. So many episodes went in directions I've just never seen other anime even attempt. It's hard to explain without absolute spoiling the twists and turns.
The directing, music, acting, animation, and overall presentation of Re:Creators is really good, a show that honestly should be experienced in the highest resolution you can find. I also think it’s a must-watch for anyone that has ever wanted to write, draw, animate, or do anything of that nature.
Zombieland Saga is one of the funniest shows I’ve ever watched. It is one of the most entertaining shows I’ve ever watched. It’s rare that a show comes along that manages to continually exceed your expectations episode after episode.
As I mentioned, I don’t take to idol shows very easily. ZLS has tremendous strengths with its premise, characters, music, and humor that I think will make anyone enjoy it, even if they don’t like idol shows. It is first and foremost a very fun and enjoyable show. I have more trouble breaking down why comedies are great, so forgive me here, but, check it out with an open mind and I think you’ll have a fantastic time.
I’m thankful that DRRR’s strengths are so obvious because that makes this entry easy for me. DRRR is one of the best told stories I’ve ever watched. The ability to juggle dozens of individual characters with individual motivations, scatter their stories and daily lives across episodes and entire seasons, narrate them all from different perspectives, slowly weave them all back together again, and have it come out satisfying every. single. time. is nothing short of masterful. It’s a show difficult not to binge, because you always want more of the story, you always want to see how it all fits together, because it always will, and it’ll always satisfy you. It’s a long show but worth every single minute spent on it.
3) Chaika The Coffin Princess
Chaika is a show near and dear to my heart. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to find another fantasy show that would make me feel the same way. There have been gems, but there is only ever been one Chaika.
This show has everything I could ask for from an adventure anime: A cast of characters with incredible chemistry, thrilling action, interesting worldbuilding, a beautiful aesthetic, gorgeous music, really good humor, and an engaging story. It touches on deeper themes of war, peace, love, injustice, belonging, and friendship. But at the same time, the basic elements of the anime itself are so easy to enjoy without ever giving those themes any thought. It is simply fun and entertaining, but if you look for that depth, you will find it.
This is easily one of the best anime made by Studio Bones, and despite a forcibly shortened second season, it’s an absolute gem. Any fan of Chaika is a friend of mine.
Gatchaman Crowds is the greatest superhero story ever told. A show that has made me a better person, a person who wants to believe a better world is possible, we just need to take care of each other using things unique to each of us. Governments will not save humanity, superheroes will not save humanity, technology will not save humanity. Only by trusting in, loving, and helping one another will we ever survive. It all sounds too optimistic, but optimism is our only hope. You cannot try and make things better if you do not believe they can get better.
Hajime Ichinose is a wonderful, intelligent, unabashedly weird, incredibly loud, naive, and optimistic hero. She perfectly demonstrates that optimism isn’t simply sitting around and hoping things get better, it means taking action, breaking down barriers, acting unconventionally, ignoring precedent, and most of all, never losing hope. There will be setbacks, people will do bad things, you will fail sometimes, but do not let the world break you down and never lose sight of why you should help others: It’s the right thing to do
Gatchaman Crowds is a show worth watching, and worth watching again and again. It’s not only entertaining but fills me with happiness, determination, optimism, and motivation. Whether you check it out because of my mushy ramblings here, or because of the stellar characters, animation, music, and action, or you never check it out at all, always remember: When the time comes to help someone, just do it. That’s What Heroes Do.
The Monogatari Series is disgusting, perverted, violent, often triggering, verbose, extremely long, confusing, weird, difficult to watch, and difficult to recommend. It is also my favorite anime series of all time. It is both writer Nisio Isin’s and studio Shaft’s magnum opus. I have not seen an anime with so many serious flaws yet such powerful strengths that the good outweighs the bad so incredibly.
I don’t like all of Nisio’s works, I don’t think I even like most of them. I think some of his works are downright bad or boring. Yet the absolutely overwhelmingly excellent character writing on display in Monogatari has earned him my eternal respect. I struggle to find characters written with such weirdness and yet such depth and emotion. Every new arc brings out a new facet of every character involved.
The writing is highly elevated by Studio Shaft’s adaptation. If there is one anime you could call “weird,” this is it. It’s directing is almost nonsensical at times, interpretive, bizarre, unnecessarily complex, frankly hostile to the senses at points, and yet it makes for an entirely unique experience. There is frankly no other anime on Earth with the same feeling as Monogatari.
I already know Monogatari isn’t for everyone. There are parts I hate, parts I wish I could rip out or rewrite. There are parts that make me uncomfortable to think about. But I accept it for all its flaws. It’s made me laugh and cry and feel excited and think deeply about myself. I wouldn’t be the same person without it.
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Watching any one of these will make for a great experience. Any person at all that needs help with watch orders or getting into them can message me any time of day.
