Autumn 2018 End of Season Rankings

There’s not much time left this year, but I guess I should share my thoughts on the Autumn season before my Top 12 series of 2018, to avoid potential spoilers. 😛 I can’t guarantee I’ll have the time to put that list together tomorrow, but I’ll try my best~

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8: RErideD: Tokigoe no Derrida

A dystopian sci-fi series with time travel elements and character designs by ABe Yoshitoshi should have been at the top of my list! The other top, that is, the one at the bottom of this post? You know what I mean. 😛 Literally everything about RerideD appealed to me before the start of the season, so perhaps the disappointment at how it turned out might have led to me being unfairly harsh on it.

However, compared with everything else I watched this season, the writing is just so bad. In RErideD, a person can accidentally cryogenically freeze themselves for a decade, and that’s just the introductory episode. In addition to this, the animation quality was not great, and most of the characters lacked meaningful development. Still, at least the music was good!

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7: Seishun Buta Yarou wa Bunny Girl-senpai no Yume wo Minai

One of the two late additions to my lineup, though unlike with RErideD, it would seem the majority don’t agree with my low rating for this one! Before isekai series were the in-thing, adaptations of light novels with needlessly long names dominated each anime season; it felt like a long time since I last watched one, and I did find it surprisingly enjoyable.

But… as with a lot of these light novel adaptations, the dialogue felt far too wordy. From Sakuta and Mai’s playfully perverse conversations, to Rio’s lessons in theoretical physics, it took them about five times as many words to say anything than you’d find in anime based on manga or games. I don’t know why, but I’m not a fan of those long rambles. Aside from that though, all the arcs were decent enough!

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6: Double Decker! Doug & Kirill

Dropping from #3, I still have a soft spot Double Decker. I liked the style, the music, the ludicrous plot twists, and appreciated the diversity of the cast. As with a lot of series that start off with a focus on comedy but try to turn serious later, however, I ended up preferring the earlier episodes where Kirill would get a new nickname each week, and when the narrator had more lines. 😦

The whole ‘second sun is a colony’ plot revelation felt a bit rushed (though to be fair, it was all hinted at in episode 6 by that drunk guy!), after all the buildup and secrecy about Kirill’s past, I had hoped it would be handled better. I think this is a series that would definitely have benefited from another 12 eps or so, allowing for more development of the rest of SEVEN-O, and for more encounters with Zabel’s Esperanza.

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5: Goblin Slayer

Once the ambitious-but-lacking anime have dropped a few places, shows that have simpler plots but that executed them well rise up – a regular trend I’ve noticed in these end of season posts. I like action and fantasy, and Goblin Slayer delivered, with great battle scenes and decent production values. I said before that the series relied more on shock factor than anything else; while still true, it was an effective tactic nonetheless!

I was worried that the novelty of only fighting goblins would wear off eventually, but there was sufficient variation in their opponents – we got to see hobgoblins, goblin shamans, goblin champions, goblin lords, goblins on boats… and even the occasional foe who wasn’t a goblin! 😮 There weren’t any grand plot twists, but the addition of extra party members helped liven things up in the second half~

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4: Yagate Kimi ni Naru

Words cannot describe how much better Yagate Kimi ni Naru was than the other shoujo-ai series I watched this year, the Winter season’s Citrus. For starters, how many romance anime are there which have an aromantic main character? Rather than the more common ‘I’m not gay’ or sex at first sight scenarios, Yuu is genuinely incapable of feeling anything special for anyone, much as she’d like to.

I also liked that the series had a large cast of side characters who weren’t just introduced one after another to force drama between Yuu and Nanami; some had more development than others, but they all felt a lot more like actual people, and not just plot devices, which is helpful in a series focused on human relationships! I was surprised that we didn’t get to see the final play script or the performance itself in the end, though. 😮

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3: Zombieland Saga

Not only did Zombieland Saga switch places with Double Decker! in my rankings, but it also delivered where the latter was lacking. It remained funny until the end, and (due to the lack of any real plot) was able to put more time into developing its characters. The fact that a whole load of questions went unanswered, such as how the members of Franchoucou were resurrected to begin with, and everything about Yamada Tae, seemed unimportant by the end.

Of course, there were some more sombre parts, as we learned of all the girls’ past lives, and the impacts that their deaths had on both those they left behind, and on their own afterlives as idols – those were also spectacular. Definitely a series that grew on me the longer I watched it.

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2: Thunderbolt Fantasy: Touri-ken Yuuki 2

I came VERY close to giving this the #1 spot! I don’t know whether this sequel was just better than the original series, or whether I just enjoyed it more because I was more used to the style and knew the main characters, but either way I’m now a lot more hyped for a third series than I ever expected I would be.

One thing I definitely did prefer was the villains: the poisoner Xie Yingluo seemed like your typical evil underling, except she couldn’t catch a single break, you couldn’t help but feel sorry for her (also, she’s really pretty). Di Kong and Seven Blasphemous Deaths were a great pairing, with the former monk’s power and loyalty proving too much even for the cursed sword to bear… and then there was the so-called fugitive hunter Xiao Kuang Juan, who was too much of a jerk even for The Enigmatic Gale to have fun with!

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1: Golden Kamuy S2

Though a lot of other series this season had great action scenes and/or comedy, none could deliver both at once so frequently, so spectacularly or so bizarrely as Golden Kamuy, which maintains its #1 spot. To my knowledge, a third series hasn’t been confirmed at the time of writing, but it had better be getting one! 😮

So much happened over the course of just 12 episodes; so many alliances formed and broken, so many betrayals… and despite it all, Ogata is just too attractive to hate. 😛 Tsurumi is always hilarious, his lines and voice acting are on point. It seems like good action, good comedy and especially good villains are the easiest way to win me over~

Given that its first series also topped my Spring rankings, will Golden Kamuy as a franchise be my anime of the year? Check back soon™ to find out!