Top 50 Anime – 20 through 11

20. Steins;Gate

Like I said, this is one that was on the top of the list for me for a long time. I still love it and have fond memories of staying up late and binging it because it’s that good. It’s one of the best time travel shows I’ve ever seen and one of the best time travel things period. It’s up there with something like Primer in terms of time travel.

But to do it that well, you need part of it to be that time travel goes wrong. And it does in this show, and because it does, there are some heavier moments with it. One that I probably should watch again, it’s not that long, but it’s that good.

19. Kaguya-Sama: Love is War

Now for one of them that I watched the most recently, this one is amazing. It’s a super fast paced comedy that I love. I saw the first episode or maybe two, in Japanese a bit ago. And I thought it was great, but it’s a lot of reading. Well, turns out that he dubbed version is amazing as well. Ian Sinclair is able to overact in it as the narrator and it really sets the tone for this fast, smart, and absurd romance. The two characters who should fall in love and do love the other can’t admit it because it would be losing. So it becomes a battle to get the other to admit their feelings.

The reason it didn’t work for me in Japanese is that there is so much reading, like I said. This reminds me of witty slapstick comedies where it is a mile a minute dialog. Bringing up Baby is a great example of that. This is way more sarcastic and still as over the top. One that I really think will appeal to a lot of people, even if you don’t like romance anime.

18. Ghost Hunt

I like to find horror anime to watch, from time to time. You’ll notice not a ton on my list, though. Mainly because a lot of them are just okay. Ghost Hunt, however, really was a ton of fun. And I like how it worked as well. It didn’t do the thing where it was one massive horror/ghost hunt that happens. But it’s also not monster of the week. Each case that the team investigates takes a few episodes. That time to breath lets them build up the horror and build up the lore. Each case wraps up quickly enough though so it doesn’t drag.

17. Mashle

I expect Mashle to move higher over time. It’s an anime that doesn’t set itself apart as something that is completely unique. In fact, a lot of what Mashle does, the main character who is the chosen one to bring balance to a corrupt world that looks down on those who can’t cast magic, it’s pretty normal. It’s set in a school, also normal. But it then makes fun of those tropes.

The main character, Mash Deadburn is a moron, how he will bring balance who knows. He also is insanely strong, that’s how he makes up for not being able to do magic. But it’s not that he overpowers everyone, he has to use it to pretend to be doing magic because otherwise he’d be cast out from society. This is a good action and comedy anime storyline.

16. Bofuri

We’ll see were this one lands, I need to watch the second season of Bofuri. But the premise is a fun one. A girl takes up playing an RPG. But she’s afraid of dying and getting hurt in the RPG. It’s her first time playing one. So she maxes out her defense, that’s part of the long title. And as she does that, this sweet RPG player comes up against more powerful, more cutthroat players, but can she overcome them just with her defense? And will she lose her sweetness? That’s the biggest part of this pretty wholesome feeling anime.

15. Assassination Classroom

Assassination Classroom is another one that was higher on my list, and it’s dropped some. This is an absurd anime again. The main character is an “alien” who needs to be killed before they destroy the world. Well, they take up teaching a remedial class of students who need to learn but also are tasked with coming up with a creative way to take him out. Because he knows he needs to die, but he’s not going to make it easy.

The whole thing is really built around the emotional stories and growth of the students. But it’s done with one of the weirdest backdrops ever. Assassinate your alien teacher is not where you’d expect to get character development and growth stories from.

14. A Returners Magic Should Be Special

I’ve found a trope that I really like which A Returners Magic Should Be Special is one of. What do you do when you know how everything ends. You know that in the end, everything is for not because you fail. But now you’ve been sent back to where you started at, how do you do it differently. That’s the question that is being asked in this action and adventure anime. Where there are portals opening up and a dragon at the end of them destructs and destroys the world. The main character’s mind is thrown back into his body when he started out training. So what is he going to do different.

I like the story, I like the overpowered nature. And I really appreciate that it is a fun character as well. This could be dark, and there are some elements or some ways where it feel like it is. But overall the story is handled pretty lightly, there are fun moments, and I want more of it.

13. Horimiya

This is one that we, both my wife and I, read first before watching. I think that helps build it up some as an anime and as a romance. The books are great, and the anime, while it bounces around and basically wraps up the whole story in a season, and then goes back, it’s weird. But the heart of the story is great. Two highschoolers fall for each other, but both of them kind of live a different life in and outside of school. It’s just a good heartfelt and funny romance anime.

12. Spy X Family

The biggest hit in the past few years. I mean, you can say Attack on Titan, but that had it’s start before the past few years. Spy X Family is about a spy who needs to set-up a family to get close to a political leader. Turns out, you can lie about that, and he creates a fake family. It has some spy stuff, it has some assassin stuff. But it’s really about that family element. How does the spy, and their fake spouse an assassin, keep their hidden lives hidden from each other? Plus, how do they actually act like a family?

11. Komi Can’t Communicate

This anime is just adorable. Komi Can’t Communicate is about Komi, a girl who has severe social anxiety and can’t communicate with anyone. She comes off as cold and aloof because of that. But when one of her classmates actually spends the time to reach out to her in a way that she can handle, they start to form a bond. And she doesn’t want to be cold and aloof, but wants to make 100 friends. So how can he help her do that when she can’t talk. The anime is adorable, and it’s a good romance, and there are a lot of funny moments. It’s one that is just easy watching in the best way possible.

Final Thoughts

There it is, the penultimate last. Next week, and I will remember to write it for next week, the Top 10 Anime for me. Don’t expect a ton of heavy hitters on the list, though a number of them are quite popular. I have my type of anime that I like, though I will watch most.

Based off of what I’ve written about thus far, which anime do you think will make the top of the list? And which anime do you think I should continue to checkout that maybe I haven’t. Let me know down in the comment section below.

Top 15 Anime

HM: Fruits Basket, The Disastrous Life of Saiki K, Restaurant to Another World, After School Dice Club

These were all close. Fruits Basket is so heartfelt. The Disastrous Life of Saiki K is really funny. And Restaurant to Another World is a lot of fun with great food. After School Dice Club is about board games, and it’s good but not as great as it could have been so just misses as well. All of these, probably, could have made it only my list.

15. Ghost Hunt

Oddly enough, this is the only horror one on my list. Ghost Hunt is about a kid who can deal with ghosts who has his own agency. But he’s not the main character, the main character is a girl who gets roped into being his assistant and might be better at the job than he is. He knows how all the things work but is too cold and calculating. It’s a nice balance of everything for an older anime.

14. BOFURI: I Don’t Want to Get Hurt, so I’ll Max Out My Defense

There are some premises for anime that just get me. BOFURI is one of them. A girl joins an MMORPG and she’s worried about it. What will it be like to die, will it hurt, and she really doesn’t want to die. So instead of leveling up by going out on epic adventures, she levels up by grinding and focusing only on her defensive stats. It’s a fun play on the genre with a character getting really over powered, but in such an odd way.

13. Gamers!

This follows another trope that I really enjoy. A main character who maybe is a bit out there, they have their own nerdy hobby or odd thing that they do that makes them not quite fit in. Gamers! follows that character who loves video games, into finding out that there are more people like them in the world directly around them. It’s cute and heartfelt and just works well.

12. Dagashi Kashi

Dagashi Kashi is all about yummy snacks, their history and eating them. Mixed in with all of that is a slice of life show that is a lot of fun. You might notice there are a few shows on the list about food. Anime tells a lot of really enjoyable stories about food and Dagashi Kashi gives more of a unique flare to it than some. While not the highest on my list, it is very realistic and focused on tradition of these snacks and shops.

11. Is It Wrong To Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?

Is It Wrong To Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? does some of my favorite anime tropes. Mainly the clueless main character so focused on one goal he doesn’t notice the group forming around them. This isn’t the best I’ve seen of that, but Is It Wrong to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? works well and especially for the first season gives a fun romp. I don’t like season two nearly as much, but it is an anime that I keep on coming back to. There is just something wholesome about the main character that makes this fantasy, and fairly standard fantasy, but with good twists, fun to watch.

10. The Devil is a Part-Timer

This Isekai really handles the genre differently. Most Isekai a character gets pulled out the real world and into a crazy world. In this case, the Devil is pulled out or leaves their own world and ends up on Earth without enough power to go back. So now he needs a part time job. This is another one that I need to watch again, I started the 1st season because a 2nd season just came out. But it’s fun and well done.

9. Cowboy Bebop

Used to be higher on my list. And in terms of technical, this is probably the best anime on the list. An anime that tells interesting stories and all set to different types of music, it’s just fascinating. But it also falls into that category of an anime that I’ve watched, and I’d watch again, but I’m less likely to pick it myself. Still, the music in it is so good and just the story that it weaves, it’s done so well.

8. Space Dandy

Space Dandy is another anime set in space and this one is easier to watch again, mainly because it’s such a comedy. The main character, Space Dandy, is not a competent character at all. But through dumb luck he somehow survives. He doesn’t do so well, but with a cat and a robot he somehow makes it work. Just well done comedy throughout this series.

7. Food Wars!

Food Wars is odd to me that it’s so high. Mainly because it can be a bit inconsistent. There are some arcs in the show that are amazing. It is also one of the highest on the list that has this amount of fan service. But it’s generally fan service overall and played for a very specific reason. But the whole concept of the show is about being the best chef that you can be, and the enjoyment that can come from food.

6. Assassination Classroom

Assassination Classroom might push Food Wars! for the weirdest anime on the list. Part of the moon is destroyed and an alien decides to become a teacher of students who are poor students so that they can try and assassinate the alien. That sounds so crazy, but what worked for me with it is that it tells a good story of the characters coming together. Yes, it is an completely absurd situation and setup, but somehow it manages to work.

5. My Senpai Is Annoying

Now we hit a few that fall more into that slice of life category. My Senpai Is Annoying is about an office worker who has an annoying senpai that she is under. Well, maybe he’s not quite as annoying as she thought. It’s really a romantic comedy of characters liking each other but not knowing how the other character likes them back. Plus a whole lot of fun and crazy situations to get into revolving around work. I think the whole work setting is a lot of fun and works really well for this type of story to make it feel different than high school.

4. Komi Can’t Communicate

But speaking of high school and romance we have Komi Can’t Communicate. It’s about Komi who is the prettiest girl in the class and seems aloof. But really she just has crippling anxiety when talking to people and can’t for the most part and it is a lot of effort for her when she does. Tadano, new to the class ends up making friends with her through writing and agrees to help her with her goal of making 100 friends. This is a sweet show with a lot of weird characters.

3. Bottom-Tier Character Tomozaki

And then another high school series. This one again about a nerdy character who loves the game TakFam, think Smash Bros sort of game. To him, it’s the best game ever, much better than life. When he finds out that the #2 player of the game in Japan is in his town too, he’s #1, they decide to meet up. It turns out to be a classmate, but not one who is a bottom-tier character like him, someone who doesn’t think that life is a lousy game. Can she convince him and level him up so that he’s not a Bottom-Tier character anymore?

2. Steins;Gate

Constantly a high one on my favorites list. And it’s also one that I probably would watch again, but man, would it be hard to watch again. There is so much depth in this time travel story with tragedy and distress. But the story is told and woven together so well that it just stands out. While Cowboy Bebop can be heavy and gorgeous, Stiens;Gate for heavier anime on my list, just tells such a good complete story. And it handles time travel in such a good way.

1. Sword Art Online

Finally, and I know this one bounces around a lot for me, we have Sword Art Online (SAO). SAO is just comfort food of an anime for me. It gives me big adventure, romance, comedy, all wrapped up in one. But it is mainly about that adventure and how the characters are navigating different worlds, of computer games, as they go. And the craziness that can end up following from these games into the real world or the other way around. Plus, there is just so much story and so much work done on developing the characters, you care for them as you go through it.

Final Thoughts

It’s tough to do a Top 10, it’s even tough to do a Top 15. I’ve really found myself gravitating towards watching anime a lot. It used to be and it does happen in certain time periods, of throwing on a cooking show or some house remodeling show. But there is just so much anime out there that I need to checkout still and want to checkout. I actually went through recently and created a massive list, I just don’t know when I’ll have time.

And I am guessing that I’ll think about it and come up with a show that I missed that I really enjoyed. And for as many good or great anime as I watch, there are a lot that are just fine. Pretty rarely do I end up sticking with and watching one that is bad. But if it’s short enough I might power through it. I can think of one example which just went from being okay starting out to so bad at the end.

What are your top anime?

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What is Anime?

Let’s start out by talking about what anime is. Anime is a Japanese style of animation that is extremely popular over there. Think kind of how classic Disney has a certain style, so you can tell when something is a classic Disney film. When you see something that is anime, it generally has a somewhat unique style.

I think the best way to talk about anime is to give examples. The best known anime is probably Pokemon or Dragonball Z. These have specific looks to them and a lot of it is setting up for fighting and then fighting. Now, you might think that anime then equates to a kids cartoon. That isn’t really the case, though. There are a lot of anime that delay with much more mature themes. A lot of them fall more into the adult animated or at least teen category. Think something that’d be on Adult Swim, they do have an anime block, but often less goofy.

So, what are some hallmarks of anime. The first is over the top plots. Chasing down magical dragonballs to then get a wish, that’s pretty normal for anime. You might have mechs fighting giant kaiju or an anime about the worlds best cooking school and the craziness that happens there. But it can be over the top in a much more serious way. Stiens;Gate is an anime about time travel that doesn’t pull it’s punches.

What Do I Look For In An Anime?

This is a bit more like my campaign game one. I look at a lot of factors but I’ll care less about certain factors if others are good. I will spoil my first one is going to be plot. If the plot is amazing, I can put up with a lot of other things.

1. Plot
2. Amount of Filler
3. Quality of Dub
4. Amount of Fan Service
5. Animation Style

Plot

Like I said, plot is always going to be the first thing that I look at. Why, because there are a lot of anime with similar plots. I don’t mind at all if an anime has a goofy plot, but I want it to be interesting. Some of my favorite anime, the likes of Stiens;Gate and Cowboy Bebop are quite serious. Others, like Food Wars and Assassination Classroom are not nearly as serious.

Amount of Filler

So this is a term that I’ll define quickly. Filler is basically anime episodes that are used to pad out the length of anime either because they have caught up to the manga it is based off of, or to get more episodes into a season. Basically, episodes that don’t have anything to do with the main plot and are added in there to fill out the out the amount of content. Clearly, I don’t want a ton of those.

There are some anime, Bleach being an example, where around half the episodes in the whole series are filler. Oddly enough that’s better than the anime where 20% are filler. Why, because when half are filler it’s easier to skip those large chunks. When it’s less you might have every third episode is filler and that’s hard to skip them when you don’t know if it’s filler or not.

Quality of Dub

Now, this one some anime fans will say is sacrilege. Anime should be watched in Japanese with subtitles according to them. And some anime are definitely better that way. In fact, ones with poor quality dubs into English or another language, do watch with subtitles. But I sometimes want it on to only half watch. If I half watch with subtitles I miss most of what happens in the anime. So having a quality dub in terms of the voice acting is very important.

Amount of Fan Service

Another term to define, what is fan service. This is basically when a movie has some nudity to make it edgier, that’s the best American comparison I can think of. Basically nudity, or scantily clad characters, for the sake of the audience not for the sake of the story. And while American shows and movies might slip in a little bit, anime can put in a lot.

Now, this doesn’t rule out an anime for me, Food Wars has a lot of this in it. It kind of makes sense for the plot of the show. But there are other anime, A Wise Mans Grandchild for example, where it is just added in for no reason. And in particular it starts to show up a lot in the middle of that show and just doesn’t make any sense. So it depends on the anime for sure, but generally too much fan service and I’m less interested in the anime.

Animation Style

Finally, we have animation style. Now, this one is very subjective. There are some styles that I think are pretty fun, there are others that don’t work well for me. Some are more cartoony while others try and draw their anime more realistically or with more detail. But the animation style can make a difference, it if it doesn’t look as smooth in terms of movement then I’ll be less interested. And generally older animation can be harder to get through in animes.

Are All Criteria Equally Important

I think you can already tell how I’ve written, the answer is no. Now, plot is always going to be important. If the plot isn’t engaging I’m not going to stay interested. Blue Exorcist is a great example of this, the plot started out interesting and then it just dragged on and on. Eventually I wasn’t interested anymore so I stopped watching it because there was just too much left before the payoff.

Other than that, I can work through most things, fan service might be the next one where if it’s just too much, then that might get me to stop watching an anime. For the fan service, at least, you can checkout IMDb and see the parental ratings on a lot of them to get an idea of the level. Granted, I’ve watched some with severe amounts of fan service, I’m looking at you Food Wars, and it was still worth watching.

Let’s Do An Example

In fact, let’s do an example using Food Wars as to why I picked out that anime to watch. And how well it does on every scale in terms of being an anime that I would have picked. Some of why I picked it, I will say, is because it was recommended to me.

The Plot

So, the plot on this one is really weird. That generally interests me because there are some anime about food, but about food and a culinary school where they battle each other by cooking, that is different. A unique plot or an isekai plot will generally interest me, I’ll write about isekai later and what that is in the future.

Amount of Filler

I hadn’t heard that Food Wars had much filler. I won’t always look it up ahead of time. If I haven’t heard it has a lot of filler then I will assume that it hasn’t had a lot of filler. Watching it, I will say, not much filler in the show. For some other anime, like Bleach again as the example, if I’ve heard there is a lot of filler I’ll look up to see how much actual filler there is.

Quality of Dub

For the quality of the dub, I always test out the anime. If the voice work isn’t good I’ll stop watching it. It’s hard to know about the quality of the dub. Most of the time newer anime the dub is going to be pretty good. But some of the older dubs are going to be rough. And, I won’t lie, with something like Food Wars, I wouldn’t have watched it if it hadn’t been dubbed.

Amount of Fan Service

Now, this is there I’m fairly different from what I said, this anime has a ton of fan service. Is it needed for the plot, most certainly not. Does it enhance the plot, kind of. I think they could have gotten across how wonderful the food was without the fan service. But I will say, it matches the tone of the anime, this is not a serious anime. And while it is way over the top, especially in the first episode where it is almost done for the shock factor, it blends in better in the subsequent episodes.

Animation Style

This is an animation style that I like. I think I’d say it is what most modern anime’s look like in terms of animation. The design is nice and clean and it just works well. There’s nothing wrong about it, there’s nothing that makes it stand out. And while I’m watching an animated show, I want the plot to be the lead on it, so this work out well for me.

Will This Work For You?

Yes, I think that this will work for you. However, you can see a lot of them are subjective, what level of dub you’re willing to listen to. If you’ll like an animation style or if you’re willing to get around filler. And maybe you don’t like isekai or fantasy as much as I do, then you can find the sci-fi or slice of life plots instead. There’s probably an anime out there for everyone, just know that compared to some of the others topics I’ve done thus far, there is a ton of anime to sift through an with the varying taste, it can be a lot of work.

What is your favorite anime?

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10 – My Roommate is a Cat

This is just a really fun anime, slice of life story about a writer who has a cat adopt him. The writers life is hard, his parents have passed away and he’s living in the house he grew up in. But with the help of the cat, he’s able to start to reach back out into the world, though not always because he wanted to. The story does a great job with it being focused on what the human is doing, but then the second part of each episode gives you the cats perspective on everything that happened and what the cat is worried about with the human. It’s very adorable and just one of those anime that is relaxing to watch.

9 – Space Dandy

He’s a dandy guy in space. This anime is just a completely silly romp as you follow around crew of the Aloha Oe as they travel space looking for exotic and new monsters to bring back to the central processing agency in order to get a reward. Now, it would work better if he was even remotely competent at his job, but he’s not and his crew is even less competent than he is, possibly? All the while, well doing this, they are being chased by Dr. Gel who is out to get them. The whole thing is just absurd but such a good time.

8 – Dagashi Kashi

Another sillier and lighter anime, this one delves into the world of dagashi, cheap candy and snacks. The main character works at his families dagashi shop, Shikada Dagashi but doesn’t want to take it over. When someone from the Shidare corporation comes to try and get Shikada Dagashi to join them, the owner agrees but only if they can convince his son, the main character to take over the shop. The story is just little vignettes for the most part and stories about how certain dagashi came to be. It’s a lot of fun and has more energy than the previous two, but is still very relaxing to watch.

7 – The Devil is a Part-Timer

Another slice of life anime, I do like them quite well and they tend to run less into fan service, though, this one has it’s fair share, The Devil is a Part-Timer focuses on what happens to the devil when he ends up on Earth with no way to get back to his realm. That means that he has to take on a part time job and a lot of weird adventures ensue has he starts to figure out how to deal with the mortal world and maybe, it turns out, the Devil isn’t such a bad guy after all. Very much a slice of life, but has more of a full through storyline running along in the background than some others.

6 – The Disastrous Life of Saiki K

Saiki K has special powers. He can teleport objects, read minds, and do many amazing crazy things. But for the most part, he just wants to be left alone. Of course, he can’t be, and it’s even a bigger issue because he doesn’t notice the pretty girl who everyone notices, so she wants him to notice her, he can’t read the mind of an idiot so he can sneak up on him and wants to be Saiki’s friend, and of course, there are the evil forces of Dark Reunion, a completely made up organization. It’s completely absurd and just little vignettes into Saiki’s life but very much worth checking out.

5 – Sword Art Online

SAO, one of those classic anime that really isn’t that old but has gotten a huge following and even a spin off show, which I didn’t like. Sword Art Online is the story of what happens when full dive MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role playing games) go wrong and everyone becomes stuck on it. The only way to get out of the game is to clear the game and if you die in the game you die in real life. This could have been a massive hack and slash adventure type of game, but instead we get an interesting look into the minds of those trapped in there, those who want to survive, and those who have something to fight for, and those who let them game twist them.

4 – Assassination Classroom

An alien has landed on earth after destroying half the moon, and what he really wants is to die. But he won’t go easily and he won’t let just anyone kill him, because most normal methods of death, he can avoid. Instead, he wants to teach a class, and those students, through training, will be the ones who will be creative enough how to kill them, plus, they just might learn something along the way. A completely absurd premise, but they do a really good job with the anime and with the students. It’s less about assassination and more about how he ends up helping all the students in some way. Also, he’s a human size yellow tentacle monster, so there’s that weirdness going on as well.

3 – Is It Wrong To Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon

It’s a long title and one that seems like it should just be a dumb fantasy anime, and in some ways it is, but it is really entertaining. There’s some fan service in it and falls into the trope known as a harem anime, but it feels different, probably because the main character never puts together that hes the person the harem is forming around, he is too innocent and pure. All he cares about is becoming strong enough to be worthy of the girl, Aiz Wallenstein who saved him from a Minotaur in the dungeon. It’s a lot of fun, and it takes something that you see a lot in anime, leveling up, and codifies it into the story so that while it is silly that it’s in the world, it makes a lot of sense. A light hearted fantasy anime that’s definitely worth checking out.

2 – Cowboy Bebop

Now if we’re talking revered anime, Cowboy Bebop has to be up there. This space opera follows a group of bounty hunters as they travel around to different planets, meet different people and tell their story. However, what really makes this anime work is the music. The music is just amazing and it’s a new for each episode. And each episode has it’s one distinct style and feel to it because of the music, the story was woven into the music, not the music put around the story. It’s just so well done and while it might not tell some massively epic tale throughout everything, it creates a mood that just works so well and you care about the characters.

1 – Steins;Gate

I don’t thin there will be many surprises with my #1, I’m pretty sure every time I do a top five, it’s my number one as well. But Steins;Gate is just so good. It’s a time travel story, which generally I’m a sucker for, and it tells it really well. The characters are so sympathetic and what seems like just a silly quirk early on ends up revealing way more about the character than you’d think later in the show. The time travel aspect is well done and while there are some completely implausible things, overall, I think it works really well. There’s just a sense of the conspiracy around it and the story just speaks so much into the characters and the world. Clearly I highly recommend this one, it can be intense and times, but so very good.

There are a few that just missed the list that I wanted to mention as well. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, I need to finish watching it, but I did enjoy it. Ghost Story, just a really enjoyable anime and something different in how it told it’s stories. After School Dice Club which is about board game. There’s so much out there that’s good that I probably could have done a top twenty, also a lot that is pretty crappy, so hopefully this’ll give you some new shows to checkout.

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5 – Sword Art Online
#5 was actually the hardest spot to fill, because I have a number of anime that I want to put here after a definite few that are some of my top ones. But Sword Art Online (SAO) is just a solid anime that has had multiple stories through it, regular SAO, Gun Gale Online, Ordinal Scale, and they are all solid. It tells an interesting story in the first season as well, where you have the main character (and a lot more people) who are going into a full immersion video game, like they’ve done before, but the creator of the game is making his masterpiece and legacy and traps them all in the game. And, if you die in the game, you die in real life, but if you can beat the final boss of the game, you can escape the game and free everyone from it. But that means clearing a lot of levels. SAO isn’t a show about clearing levels, though, it’s about how people adjust to living in this digital world and the problems that arise from it. Then the other seasons deal with more virtual reality or augmented reality, but not in the same way as the first season. There’s definitely fan service in this show, but not a ton, and the story can be simplistic at times, but the premise was interesting to me.

4 – Assassination Classroom
A silly anime, it actually ended up having more heart to it than I expected, which I enjoyed. Assassination Classroom is an insane premise, which most anime area, and from the sounds of it should be about a classroom full of assassins, instead, it’s about a class of middle school (maybe junior high) age kids who have been tasked by the government to kill their teacher, a weird yellow tentacle monster. That is an insane premise, but what you get is a classroom of misfits who eventually have to start working together and growing after getting in trouble previously, all of this being led by their weird yellow tentacle monster teacher. I don’t think this anime is for everyone, but I think it did a good job of doing what it was trying to do and tell a compelling story of the growth of the kids.

3 – Is It Wrong to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?
Long title, good fantasy anime. This is one of the things that really got me checking out LitRPG on Audible, for better or worse (fairly often they were worse), but in Is It Wrong to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeons (IIWTPUGIAD (not catchy)), it does a good job of creating an interesting world and an interesting story. And it does a trope that I enjoy, the clueless hero, he’s very earnest, and he wants to do the best possible after being rescued from this magical resetting dungeon by Aiz Wallenstein, this extremely talent female dungeon delver. Then there are a bunch of other characters who may or may not be interested in the main character. It has some of the harem anime feel to it, which isn’t a genre that I care about, but the main character is so earnest and caring that it doesn’t feel as gazy as some of them, but it does still have fan service in it. I also like how it ties in real world pantheons in an interesting way, so it’s not just a generic fantasy setting.

2 – Cowboy Bebop
Cowboy Bebop is a very immersive space opera that pulls you in not just through the story telling, which is well done, but so much through the music. The music of each episode helps inform the story that is being told and draws you further into what you are watching. It also is really well done and the variety of music throughout the show, because each episode has it’s own feel, is really impressive. This is an anime that has good character depth as well, even with being thrown into the middle of their story, you start to get an idea of who the characters are, and what they have gone through in their lives.

1 – Steins;Gate
This has been #1 for me for a while, this time travel anime is just well put together with a good cast of characters. I really feel like they do a good job of developing those characters as well. And while there are definitely characters that can fall into various anime tropes, they do a really good job of keeping most characters out of them and even the tropy characters end up having more depth than it seems. The time travel is also really well done. Time travel is one of those things that I generally like in concept, but too many shows and movies end up having time travel become so convoluted that it doesn’t work, or too simple that you can poke holes in how they are doing things. Steins;Gate does a good job of making something simple enough that you can generally understand the concept of it, but complicated enough that it doesn’t feel like time travel can be easily solved.

As always there are some honorable mentions that I need to add in as well.

Honorable Mention:
Ghost Story
Fruits Basket
The Devil is a Part-Timer
The Disastrous Life of Saiki K
My Hero Academia
My Roommate is a Cat
Dagashi Kashi

There are a lot of anime out there that I want to watch more of that I either can’t easily find on Funimation or just haven’t had the time for yet. But Ancient Magus Bride, Fairie Gone, and Afterschool Dice Club are all that I’ve watched a chunk of and want to watch more that could make it to my list eventually.

What are some of your favorite anime? Do any of the ones I’ve listed here sound interesting to you?

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1 Steins;Gate
I love this anime. It’s smart with well written and developing characters throughout the story. It’s also one of the few stories that gets time travel right. Too often you just end up with a convoluted mess, but Steins;Gate turns that mess into artwork. We’ve talked about it before, so go check out those articles if you are curious about it.

2 Cowboy Bebop
This anime is close to being number one with as much as I love Steins;Gate. Cowboy Bebop just has this lyrical beauty to it from the animation of the world and characters to the actual music which really drives the show. I feel like I’m about ready to go back and watch it again because of how well put together it is. It came out the same year as Firefly and in some ways I feel like there are a few similarities with them. But the show is just amazing and the music is the best use of music in any media that I can think of.

3 My Hero Academia
I believe that this one is a new one to the list, but I really dig it. It’s a world where a lot of people have super powers, some use them for good and some use them for evil. The main character, however, has no powers and he wants powers more than anything, so he can be like his hero All Might. He has a chance meeting with All Might which leads to some major changes in his life. The story has emotion and a bit too much crying at times, but they delve into characters and create something that has those super hero moments but also has so much heart.

4 Space Dandy
He’s a Dandy guy, in space. Another anime that uses music well, Space Dandy is just an absurd romp with an incompetent creature hunter. This anime is completely over the top and quite pulp like in how it’s created. The characters are bumbling and arrogant, but generally end up having their heart in the right place. Each episode stands pretty much by itself, so what happens in one episode doesn’t matter for the next. This is by far the goofiest of all the animes on the list, but it is so great.

5 Assassination Classroom
This was really tough for the last one, and I think last year this was my #2 anime or #3. Assassination Classroom is not that accurate a title, because it makes you think of lots of violence, and this is a goofy junior high school anime about  a bunch of misfit students coming together. With their teacher being a crazy yellow tentacle monster who is going to blow up the earth unless they can kill him. They take the time and look at each character and you get to see how the teacher helps them grow into better people.

There are so many options for honorable mentions as well, and animes that I need to finish watching that might end up cracking the top 5, but who knows. Soon I’m going to have to do top 10’s just so that I don’t have 20 honorable mentions.

Honorable Mention:
Sword Art Online
Ancient Magus Bride
Blood Blockade Battlefront
The Devil is a Part-Timer
Is It Wrong to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon

What are some of your favorite animes? Are there any that you think I should watch?

The story is that the moon has been blown up and the crazy octopus like creature that caused it is threatening to blow up to the Earth in March. That means that he has time to teach a class of delinquent junior high kids because of a promise that he made. In turn, the government is using those kids to try and kill Korosensei, which is what they’ve named their teacher. The series follows their attempts to kill him, their attempts to improve their stock in the school, and mainly what they learn from his teaching and addressing issues that they have as students. The assassination aspect of the show quickly takes a back seat to the lessons learned.

Assassination Classroom, because of the lessons learned, is a very heartfelt anime. While it is more certainly goofy with an octopus teacher Korosensei and the assassination attempts, you quickly realize that the focus is on the students and the lessons that they learn through assassination attempts but also through the teaching and caring nature of Korosensei. There’s a ton of depth behind a lot of the episodes and the characters themselves. It builds well over time and it’s fun to see relationships grow with Kororsensei and the students and just the growth in the students themselves. The sub plots in the show are often very goofy, but there is something going on with The E Class (lowest lettered class for their grade) and the rest of the school that is often times compelling and unique with how it talks about education.

I honestly can’t say a ton more about it without giving away some of the story, but it goes in a way that you’d expect, especially through the first season. That isn’t a bad thing with this anime. There are parts of the basic story that are always going to go against standard tropes. It makes the story feel interesting, and the fact that an anime that sounds like it should be very violent and focused on that uses it as a backdrop is very nice. It’s also a fairly clean anime in terms of fan service and gore for that matter. It is also an anime that feels like it should have those things which helps subvert the expected tropes for it. The story has some violence to it and that’s always an aspect to it, however, it’s more funny, dramatic, and highly heartfelt. I think that’s some of the issue that other people who have watched it have had with it. They haven’t expected that from Assassination Classroom, and as I’ve said before, it goes against the expectations.

In the end, this an anime that I would highly recommend. As I watched more if it, the more I liked it. I thought there were a few rough sections in the second season, but everything that was rough about it came back and was properly landed as a good story element. Some of that is because some very absurd things happen, and some of it is because they tie in items that you don’t expect together. For me the one part that I didn’t love was the third act, though they did a better job than a lot of third acts that I’ve seen. Some of it was just that I hoped a few things would happen that didn’t happen. None of it was weak, it just felt like there was a little bit unneeded. I felt like a lot of it could easily be assumed from how things were left at the end of the previous episode and it would have carried more weight without the third act. It isn’t Harry Potter epilogue level of bad though (I can write about that and third acts later).

Have you seen this anime? What did you think of it?

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