{"id":8276,"date":"2012-12-31T22:27:09","date_gmt":"2013-01-01T03:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/?p=8276"},"modified":"2012-12-31T22:27:09","modified_gmt":"2013-01-01T03:27:09","slug":"2012-the-anime-year-in-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/2012\/12\/31\/2012-the-anime-year-in-review\/","title":{"rendered":"2012: The Anime Year in Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s time once again to look back on the good, the bad and the #$%$#@%#@??? in anime<\/a> this year. Actually I think this has been a pretty good year with more than the average number of entertaining shows. (Except in the shoujo<\/a> category, but I’m not the biggest fan of those stories anyway.)<\/p>\n

Outstanding Anime of 2012<\/h1>\n

Chuunibyou Demo Koi ga Shitai<\/em><\/a> is the perfect anime comedy: tightly written, superbly animated, hilarious and ultimately heartwarming. Who could be against it? Apparently a number of people, but I suspect most of the complainers are those whose memories of their own Eight-Grade Syndrome are still to painful.<\/p>\n

Natsuyuki Rendezvous<\/em><\/a> is a smart josei<\/a> supernatural romance. A class act all around.
\n<\/p>\n

Notable Anime of 2012<\/h1>\n

Accel World<\/em><\/a> is a refreshingly original take on the fighting anime genre, based on a light novels<\/a> by Reki Kawahara.<\/p>\n

Binbougami ga!<\/em><\/a> is low comedy and proud of it, but this story about a conflict between a lucky girl and a goddess of misfortune is unusually funny and genuinely cares about its characters.<\/p>\n

Bodacious Space Pirates<\/em><\/a> starts with a ridiculous premise about schoolgirls who get part-time jobs as space pirates and plays it totally straight, with nary a wink or a leer. The energy, enthusiasm and high production values make this show a joy to watch.<\/p>\n

Chihayafuru<\/em><\/a> (started Fall 2011) was by far the best actual shoujo anime of the year. Granted, a sports anime in which the “sport” is based on medieval Japanese poetry is not going to be for everyone, but I found it pretty entertaining. (A new season starts in Winter 2013.)<\/p>\n

Dusk Maiden of Amnesia<\/em><\/a>, a shonen supernatural horror\/romance, suffers by comparison with Natsuyuki Rendezvous<\/em>, a much classier josei anime with a similar theme. However the comparison is somewhat unfair since Dusk Maiden<\/em> is aiming at a different target (less romance, more horror and a bit more titillation.) Judged on its own terms Dusk Maiden<\/em> is pretty entertaining. Unfortunately a good ending is rather spoiled by a final 30-second add-on obviously demanded by clueless marketroids from the production company.<\/p>\n

Fate\/Zero<\/em><\/a> (started Fall 2011). Dark, bloody and totally exhilarating.<\/p>\n

What can I say about Humanity Has Declined<\/em><\/a>, a post-apocalyptic social satire with fairies? Only that it is very weird, disturbing and funny.<\/p>\n

Hyouka<\/em><\/a> is a cleverly written and beautifully animated story about young detectives who solve unimportant crimes. If it were not for the weak ending I would put this in the “Outstanding” category.<\/p>\n

Inu x Boku SS<\/em><\/a> is a first-rate shoujo anime. Oh wait, it’s based on a shounen<\/a> manga<\/a>, which makes it rather disturbing. Still this story about the frustrations of a socially awkward oni<\/a> girl is pretty amusing.<\/p>\n

Shakugan no Shana Final<\/em><\/a> (started Fall 2011). This series has had its ups and downs but the final season was a blast, raising the whole story to a higher level.<\/p>\n

Space Brothers<\/em><\/a> is an oddity, a kids show with a distinctively adult sensibility. It also has the slowest-moving story ever, but I like its strong characterizations and wry sense of humor.<\/p>\n

Sword Art Online<\/em><\/a>, based on an earlier work by Reki Kawahara, is not on the same level as Accel World<\/em> but still much better than the usual fighting anime.<\/p>\n

Reserving Judgement<\/h1>\n

I haven’t listed Shin Sekai Yori<\/em><\/a> as “Outstanding” only because it is only half over and I have been disappointed by endings too often in the past. So far it has been a weekly serving of awesomeness so I may well be putting it at the top of the list next year.<\/p>\n

Disappointing Anime of 2012<\/h1>\n

Kids on the Slope<\/em><\/a>. This looked like such a high-class show. How did it end up being such a dreary story about the minor disappointments of a spoiled, self-centered rich kid?<\/p>\n

Little Busters<\/em><\/a> is not the worst anime of the year. The competition for that title is pretty fierce. Still I doubt that there has ever been an anime that attracted so much anticipation from so many people that turned out to be such a tedious, unfunny, uninvolving and badly animated mess. Maybe they will continue this for 100 or 200 episodes. They are certainly putting in enough filler. But if they do I won’t be watching.<\/p>\n

Polar Bear Cafe<\/em><\/a> initially was absolutely hilarious. (To me. Some people couldn’t stand it. Mr. Polar Bear is basically a big white troll.) Unfortunately it overstayed its welcome, eventually running out of energy and ideas.<\/p>\n

Interesting But Not to My Taste<\/h1>\n

Nisemonogatari<\/em><\/a>. OK, granted, director Akiyuki Shinbo is a genius, but I still end up disliking a lot of what he does. This one started out pretty well but in the end the creepy sex stuff got to be too much for me.<\/p>\n

Odds and Ends<\/h1>\n

Folktales from Japan<\/em><\/a> is not for everyone but it could be a valuable resource for students of Japanese culture.<\/p>\n

Similarly I can’t give a general recommendation to Utakoi<\/em><\/a> but this somewhat cheesy takeoff on medieval Japanese poetry is bound to interest some fans of Japanese culture.<\/p>\n

This has been a pretty bad year for shoujo anime. Aside from Chihayafuru<\/em>, the only one I found at all watchable was Kamisama Hajimemashita<\/em>, a comedy\/adventure\/romance about a homeless girl who becomes a goddess. Good points: The heroine is brave and resourceful. Bad points: there’s a bit too much shoujo angst for my taste. In particular I think the heroine could do better than chase after a moody fox spirit who is about 500 years too old for her.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s time once again to look back on the good, the bad and the #$%$#@%#@??? in anime<\/a> this year. Actually I think this has been a pretty good year with… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[548],"class_list":["post-8276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anime","tag-year-in-review"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8276"}],"version-history":[{"count":36,"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8276\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8312,"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8276\/revisions\/8312"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugfox.net\/fun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}