2019 Moeronpan Anime Awards

Sorry for the wait on this one! Unfortunately, I didn’t have a lot of time this year so there’s a bunch of shows I didn’t get to see – and stuff like Beastars which was being held hostage by Netflix and not legally simulcast. But we did still get through a decent amount of the year’s offerings, so it’s time for the 2019 autopsy!

Before we start, here’s the usual set of disclaimers:
Disclaimer 1: Again, none of us watched everything that aired this year, so bear in mind that our individual picks are more drawing from the pool of ‘what 2019 anime I watched this year’ rather than ‘what 2019 anime aired this year’. It’s entirely possible that there are a number of fantastic  (and terrible) shows we never got the chance to see that deserved awards in one or more category.
Disclaimer 2: These are the opinions of the reviewers and some of these opinions may only be based on the first episode of each show.
Disclaimer 3: This feature is purely for fun and if you disagree with any of the views of any of the reviewers that’s perfectly fine, and you’re even welcome to voice your disagreement for the sake of discussion in the comments…just don’t be a moron about it.
Disclaimer 4: There’s spoilers, it’s kind of hard to avoid it – particularly for ‘best scene/episode’. Because of this, we’ve decided that from 2019 onwards the ‘Best scene/episode’ reviews will be at the end of the feature, so anyone wanting to avoid the spoilers can read the rest first and stop there if they want to.

So without further ado, let us begin the Moeronpan Anime Awards, 2019 edition!

Best Anime Overall

This should need no explanation – what did we decide was the best new shows of 2019? Here are the shows that reminded us just how great anime can be.

Moeronpan

The Case Files of Lord El Melloi II – {Rail Zeppelin} Grace Note (Lord el Melloi II no Jikenbo – Rail Zeppelin Grace Note). This is possibly the most biased winner of Best Anime I have ever done – and also possibly the only time where I cannot easily recommend the winner (and not just because of its ridiculously long title). Case Files is a show that requires not only prior Fate series knowledge but a huge love for Waver Velvet and his relationship with Iskandar to appreciate. So, being an anime that was made for me, I think I’m allowed to be a little biased. Waver Velvet is my favourite fictional character, and even after it’s all over I -still- can’t believe we really got an entire anime about him this year – let alone one made with so much love and enthusiasm. I got to watch characters I love animated beautifully with incredible music, and even got new content I never would have expected to see in official material. I laughed, I cried, I preordered a whole lot of merchandise. Here’s to hoping for more! Junko and I reviewed all of Case Files here.

Runner up:
Sarazanmai. I had to think long and hard about the runner up this year because while I saw some decent shows, most still had some kind of flaw that hindered them from being truly great or rising above the ‘most fun’ category for me. So I decided to give the award to the not-Case Files show I looked forward to the most every week, and that was undoubtedly Sarazanmai. And not just because of all the cliffhangers, either! Sarazanmai was a truly unique, indescribable experience of a show that managed to make up for its pacing flaws and many superfluous details with its astonishingly beautiful visuals. Underneath all the weirdness and visual mayhem was a compelling coming of age story, something I can always appreciate. It was one of the most polarizing shows of the year, but even Ikuhara’s most fervent detractors would have to admit there’s nothing else quite like Sarazanmai. I reviewed all of it here.

Ariana

My personal pick for best anime of the year is Mob Psycho 100 (season 2); and I don’t think I’m alone in that opinion. The show had astounding animation, was a great follow-up to the first season, and was able to expertly juggle tear-jerking drama with gut-busting comedy. Rarely have I seen a series that is so strong in every regard. Also the characters (Shigeo/Mob and Reigen especially) were great.

Runner up:

Sarazanmai only came in as a runner-up due to having such a rushed ending, as well as some other flaws. But like the second season of Mob Psycho 100, the series had a great story, great characters, and some of the best animation/visuals I’ve seen this year.

Special mention:

The first half of Dororo (2019) was so incredibly well-written and animated, with some really heavy-hitting emotional episodes. It’s a shame that this quality couldn’t last for the rest of the season, otherwise it would have ended up higher on the list.

Junko

OK, I admit it, this nomination doesn’t come without at least a little bit of bias. Lord El-Melloi II Case Files was both the show I was most excited for this year and the one I wound up awarding Best Overall for the year. However, this is mainly because it totally surpassed my expectations. I was expecting an average to decent plot carried along by characters I liked – instead, I got a genuinely fascinating mystery set in a rich, well-detailed world AND beautiful, heart-wrenching character moments. An extremely enjoyable watch each and every episode, and I am fervently hoping they make even more seasons in the coming years!

Runner up:

As for my runner up, well, let’s just say it’s extremely hard to talk about Babylon in any detail without spoiling anything. I’ve been reviewing here on Moeronpan for several years, and I’m pretty sure that it’s the first show to ever earn a “SPOILER warning” – in my First Impression review! Mixing and matching genres effortlessly, Babylon is a combination dark psychological mystery and crime thriller dealing with one of my favorite topics, the Japanese legal system and the questions of whether justice can exist within it, as well as moral quandaries about the very nature of life and death. I really can’t say anything else except, if you want a show that will make you think, go watch Babylon now and you definitely will not regret it!

Best Character (Female)

Every year we’re given more new anime girls than we know what to do with, so which ones did we enjoy the company of the most?

Moeronpan

Gray – The Case Files of Lord el Melloi II (Lord el Melloi II no Jikenbo):  It’s too hard to resist Gray – she’s a very empathetic and earnest character despite her layer of melancholy, and it makes me sad to see so many people dismiss her as just another Saber-face. (It’s ironic, of course, that the character with actual lore reasons for having Saber’s (ie Artoria’s) face is only recognizable as such due to her hair style.) Filling the role of both apprentice and daughter figure for Waver, she compliments him extremely well. Descriptions of her character make her seem far more edgey than she actually is, because her real appeal is her wonder and confusion at so many mundane things that she simply isn’t used to encountering after being raised in a small village, and the extremely appealing way in which she emotes. I do wish she could love herself more, though.

Runner up:
Emma – The Promised Neverland (Yakusuko no Neverland): It’s always nice to see a female protagonist in a shonen manga, especially one like Emma. The Promised Neverland really wouldn’t be half as good as it is without its central trio carrying it, and although I really like Ray and Norman as well, Emma is truly the glue that holds everything together. For a kid in a horrifying situation, she’s extremely competent and strong-willed. She’s brave and she gets stuff done. Most importantly, she’s extremely kind even in the face of terrible odds, immediately shutting down any idea that would result in the loss of any child, even at the cost of her own chances at escape. I would love to see more girls like Emma in anime.

Ariana

Nancy Schaal Bancroft – To the Abandoned Sacred Beasts. It’s sad to me that Nancy’s not too popular, because people apparently dislike her character design a lot. I personally think her design is charming in an unconventional way. More than her design, however; I like her so much because she goes through a great deal of character development over the course of the series. She grows from a normal girl into someone who can take down Incarnates (transformed humans) on her own. I would love to see more “strong female characters” like this. She’s not a badass right off the bat, and she struggles a lot to come to terms with her own emotional issues. But this makes her a much more compelling character than other stereotypical “strong female characters” in media.

Runner Up:

Homare Onishima – Are You Lost? She’s a hardened survival expert despite being just a high-school girl. What more is there to say?

Junko

I agonized over this for a long time, but this year, I couldn’t give the award to a single character. I felt the entire female cast of Fate Grand Order: Absolute Demonic Front Babylonia was just so strong. From the loyal Mash to the temperamental Ishtar to exuberant Quetzalcoatl and hard-working Siduri…not to mention Ana and Gorgon and Jaguar Warrior and Ereshkigal and well basically I could just go on and on. There’s absolutely no way I could pick just one! Babylonia will be receiving its second cour of episodes in 2020, and I simply can’t wait to see more of this absolutely fabulous cast.

Runner up:

I also liked Chika Fujiwara, the cheerful student council secretary from Kaguya-sama: Love is War. The ever-happy Chika is the “normal girl” caught up in the intense storm of flirting and feelings and denial that is Kaguya and Miyuki’s courtship. Usually, I don’t like this type of character, but Chika is something different. From coaching one or the other (usually Miyuki) on basic life skills to accidentally suffering due to the fallout of their disastrous flirting attempts, she somehow manages to remain positive and upbeat throughout. Stay strong, Chika!

Best Character (Male)

We also keep getting more and more male characters to choose from, so who was best boy this year?

Moeronpan

Waver Velvet/Lord el Melloi II – The Case Files of Lord el Melloi II (Lord el Melloi II no Jikenbo): Absolutely the easiest choice I’ve ever had to make in one of these posts, because Waver is just best boy in general, not just in 2019. And this version of him – stressed, depressed, painfully aware of his own inadequacy but still doing his best for the people he cares about – was relateable and touching. I did enough gushing about what a great character he is in my Case Files reviews, but he’s a very atypical character, especially for a protagonist (and especially for a Type Moon work) and that’s part of what makes him so special.

Runner up:
Arataka Reigen – Mob Psycho 100 2: is a great character who would have easily stolen the top slot if he wasn’t unlucky enough to feature in the same year as Waver. While I did like him enough in season one, I found a whole new appreciation for him in season 2 when it really hammers home that he’s an adult who doesn’t seem to have any idea what he’s doing in life. While he kind of became popular as a joke/meme character, he does have a surprising depth and humanity behind his conman exterior. It’s always difficult to get that balance right, but it works seamlessly in Mob Psycho 100. I really felt for this idiot.

Ariana

Shigeo Kageyama/Mob – Mob Psycho 100 (seasons 1 and 2). I love Shigeo’s character and I love him AS a character. …Let me back up a bit to explain. I really like Shigeo’s personality: he’s a somewhat awkward kid, and he sometimes get bullied or teased because of this; but yet he never fails to be kind and compassionate to people around him. He is also incredibly humble—which ties into why I also like him so much as the main character of the Mob Psycho series. He’s basically outright stated to be the most powerful Esper in existence. BUT despite this he doesn’t think that his powers make him “better” than normal people, and strives to become “stronger” without using his powers. In the realm of anime, the typical shonen story generally features an underdog protagonist who has to fight his way to the top. In Mob Psycho 100, this situation is reversed and Shigeo is actually an already pretty powerful Esper who just wants to be normal. I’ve rarely seen this type of story done so well, and I’ve rarely seen a youngish male protag written in such a complex way.

Junko

This year’s best male character actually isn’t a human – since there’s no “Best Animal” or “Best Creature” category, I absolutely had to give this award to Fou, the lovable mascot of Chaldea from Fate Grand Order: Absolute Demonic Front Babylonia. The rabbit-cat-dog-thing is an agent of chaos who loves food, tagging along on missions, and annoying the crap out of Merlin. Plus, despite his cute nature and “team pet” status, Fou actually manages to save the day in a number of surprising ways. I wish I had a real Fou in my life – even if he’d probably get annoyed with how much I would want to pet him all the time!

Runner up:

I didn’t start out as the biggest fan of Mirio Togata, aka “Lemillion,” from My Hero Academia. However, after seeing him stay strong and positive through the insane amount of suffering this past season put him through, I had to give him a nod with this award. Mirio’s life may have changed dramatically in a lot of spoiler-heavy ways, but he’s still a true hero to us all.

Special Mention:

My honorable mention…it feels kind of wrong putting this character here in this category, because they are technically intersex and consider themselves to be fairly genderfluid. I have to give props to Luca Esposito from Astra Lost in Space for being an amazingly positive representation of intersex characters and a source of both humor and pathos throughout the series. Luca’s story was unexpectedly emotional in so many ways, and I loved watching them.

Best Duo/Team

These are the characters who work better together than they do alone. Good teams are a joy to watch, and this year there were plenty.

Moeronpan
Carole and Tuesday – Carole and Tuesday:  While the show itself never quite reached the heights I hoped it would, it’s hard not to be charmed by its titular duo and their extremely cosy friendship. Two girls from extremely different walks of life – one the rich daughter of a politician and the other a space refugee, end up being so perfect for each other it’s difficult to think of them as separate characters. To be honest, that itself may be one of the series flaws, and their characterization could definitely be a lot deeper. But they’re just so much fun to watch, like personified sunbeams, that I’m giving them the award anyway. Thanks for cheering me up over and over, girls!
Runner-up:
Kazuki/Enta/Tooi – Sarazanmai: I actually debated a lot about including Tooi or Enta for best male runner-up, because I certainly do like them both a lot – so putting the trio here is my compromise. I’m a sucker for any group of friends that go through a coming of age story – especially if they’re thrown together by fate. But these three have the extra bonus of being able to turn into adorable kappas and perform a musical routine. It was charming, I miss watching them and I really hope I get to see them together again in some form.

Ariana

The Armed Detective Agency from Bungo Stray Dogs (season 3). Even though I wasn’t impressed with this season overall, I loved seeing all members of the ADA working so well together to get the job done. It’s a shame we don’t see more teamwork efforts from them in-series.

Junko

I’m a big fan of “found family” narratives, so it was no surprise that I absolutely fell in love with Group B-5 of Astra Lost in Space. This group of students is initially thrown together by coincidence, as they are assigned to the same group as part of a school trip / project, but gradually grow closer as they journey across the stars together. Each character gets their moment in the spotlight as their pasts and lives are examined in more detail. By the end of the show, they see each other as true friends and family and support one another in their future endeavors. From the first moment the characters held hands to form a “human chain” through space to the “where are they now” epilogue, it was wonderful to watch this group of characters learn and grow.

Runner up:

The relationship between Galo Thymos and Lio Fotia of PROMARE remains fairly ambiguous throughout the movie, with it unclear at the end if they have decided to act on what seem to be growing romantic feelings for one another. That being said, it was extremely enjoyable watching these two grow from rivals who snap at each other constantly to steadfast friends and possibly more. Plus, they make an absolutely amazing team on the battlefield – a fight scene featuring these two is always a treat to watch!

Most Fun/Feel-good

This is a separate category to ‘best’, because sometimes shows are just plain fun to watch despite whatever shortcomings may stop them from being an objectively flawless show. Here are the shows that we loved unwinding with or getting cheered up by.

Moeronpan
Like I said, Carole and Tuesday had its share of problems that prevent it from taking a Best Show award for me. I think it’s main problem is that it was too committed to being fun than anything else, so every attempt it made at inserting some kind of drama into its plot fell flat due to how ridiculously easy it would be smoothed over again, and it got pretty exasperating after a while. But in terms of being fun to watch, it was certainly one of the most fun ‘most fun’ shows I’ve seen in a while. Its heart lies in the various different musical performances it showcases, which covers an amazing amount of genres and styles and some truly impressive vocal talent! Have you ever heard a fusion of opera and rap sung in Latin? How about an a cappella string of obscenities? Just trying to guess what kind of performance I’d be treated to next with this oddball cast was fun enough, but the two leads, as I already said, were also a delight. I wish it had done more with its half-baked drama or gotten rid of it altogether, but I definitely enjoyed the time I spent on Mars.

Runner-up:
How Heavy Are The Dumbbells You Lift? (Dumbbell Nan Kilo Moteru?): I genuinely did not expect to enjoy Dumbbell as much as I did – so I would have given it the Pleasant Surprise award if there weren’t other things I wanted to talk about there too. A likeable cast, a great sense of comic timing, attractive art, and, most surprising of all, educational! Not only did it make me laugh in every episode, but I also learned some pretty good workout routines. It’s managed to be the biggest source of motivation for me to work out more, which is something of a miracle. The whole thing is extremely silly, but it was the definition of ‘dumb fun’. I pretty much always had a good time whenever I tuned in, and I’d gladly watch another season.

Ariana

Despite veering a bit too close to uncomfortable fanservice/fetish territory at some points, I do think Sewayaki Kitsune no Senko-san/The Helpful Fox Senko-san was one of the most feel-good shows I’ve watched this year. Every episode was relaxing to watch, with the entire series featuring a soft color palette and relatively calm storylines. Or maybe I just relate so much to this series as I’m now a working adult (lol). I reviewed all episodes from the Senko-san anime series, which you can read here!

Runner up:

My Roomate is a Cat. This series is a runner up because it’s not always a “feel-good” series. The show actually deals a lot with Subaru’s issues; namely his anxiety, depression, and sorrow (over his parents’ deaths). A lot of the early episodes actually made me cringe… because I could relate to the Subaru’s situation a little too much. But this series is certainly heartwarming when it counts, and I loved it whenever the episode switched over to Haru’s point of view. Her perspective makes the episodes a lot more amusing. I also reviewed all episodes of this series here!

Junko

Studio Trigger’s 2019 feature film PROMARE was a fun-filled romp from start to finish. A bit low on plot, but extremely heavy on well-animated fight scenes, excellent music, really cool powers, ships and mech, and of course plenty of explosions, it was a thoroughly enjoyable two hours. (Getting to see it live at the movie theater certainly didn’t hurt either!) I’m actually embarrassed how many times I went to see this film. Nothing else could take the crown for “Most Fun” of 2019 – it’s gotta be Trigger’s latest high-energy creation!

Runner up:

Watching Carole & Tuesday wasn’t always a “happy” or “fun-filled” experience, but I had to put it in this category solely for the amazing music. The beautiful music alone made this show lovely to watch, from the calm and peaceful tracks to the…more unusual offerings. Also, while the LGBTQ+ representation in this show was far from perfect, it was still affirming to watch a show which included asexual and nonbinary characters as part of the main cast.

Pleasant Surprise Award

These are the shows that surprised us in a good way. It’s easy to build up expectations and make assumptions, but every now and then there’s a show that turned out way better than we could have predicted.

Moeronpan
Stars Align (Hoshiai no Sora): I’ve said many times that I just can’t do sport anime no matter how many times people insist that sports anime are always more about the characters and their relationships. So far, absolutely no sport anime I have ever watched has had characters that interested me enough to be able to overlook the fact that the sport segments put me to sleep. Because of that, I nearly skipped Stars Align, which would have been a huge mistake as it was one of the most surprising shows of the year to me. In it’s case it really -is- about the characters, a group of teenagers dealing with things that do happen in real life, few of them happy. As well as all its hard-hitting themes of family abuse and PTSD I really did not expect canon transgender and non-binary characters, and I certainly didn’t expect to grow so attached to everyone.

Runner-up:

Given: I also didn’t really know what to make of this one – after watching the first episode I actually forgot the show existed and then decided to revisit it on a whim at the end of the year…and ended up binging the whole thing in two days. What I thought was going to be just some boys in a band who may or may not be gay turned out to be a very frank, very down to earth and very raw exploration of grief and loss (with multiple boys who turn out to be gay). The drawback is that it seemed to end as soon as it really got started, but with an ongoing manga and a film apparently in the works, it’s clearly not over yet.

Ariana

Endro (it’s supposed to be a play on the term “End Roll”). Although I heavily criticized the first episode of this anime in my first impression review, this show proved that it had more substance to it than first meets the eye. I became more attached to the characters than I realized, and there are actually some serious plot-twists later down the line. While it never made me laugh out loud, most episodes did at least manage to make me smile. Overall, it’s a pretty fun and inoffensive anime.

Runner up:

Bermuda Triangle: Colorful Pastrale. Maybe I am secretly still a six-year old girl, as I really enjoyed this slice-of-life show about mermaids. It’s a runner-up for this category because it sadly never improved much in terms of animation or story quality. However, there were still some surprising episodes scattered throughout, and the world-building was pretty good whenever it was addressed. I know this show is probably on a lot of peoples’ “worst anime of the 2019 year” list, and I do understand why. Personally, I appreciated that the show featured a mostly female cast and yet never resorted to cheap gimmicks like having tons of fanservice. If you watch Colorful Pastrale simply because you enjoy colorful mermaid girls doing rather mundane things in a fantastical setting, then you won’t be disappointed.

Junko

While Mayonaka Occult Koumuin / Midnight Occult Civil Services wasn’t a perfect show (in particular, it was hamstrung by its seeming inability to rise above an “incident of the week” type plot even as the show went on) I really ended up enjoying it a lot more than I initially thought I would. I especially liked the show’s inclusion of a wide variety of supernatural creatures, from Japanese yokai to European mythical figures to Aztec deities. This variety made Mayonaka consistently enjoyable to watch despite not being anything new or groundbreaking.

Runner up:

Senryuu Shoujo / Senryu Girl. “Pleasant” is absolutely the perfect word to describe this series. A short that doesn’t overstay its welcome with an interesting concept based around traditional Japanese poetry and a pair of main characters which were certainly quite fun to watch. It’s a perfect choice if you’re looking for a show that won’t have you thinking deeply or needing to focus on complex plots but simply want to enjoy some peaceful daily life stories featuring added poetry.

Best Adaptation:

Adapting manga/games/novels/etc into animation can be a tricky business with wildly varying results – but some studios and directors have this down to an art. Here are the anime we thought did best by their source material.

Moeronpan

Demon Slayer (Kimetsu no Yaiba): Maybe it feels like cheating because its Ufotable and all but…damn does Demon Slayer look good. I’ll admit, I never got around to watching past the first cour because I really don’t think the show was for me after all, as much as I wanted to like it. I’ve said plenty of times its rare to have a decent anime based on a Jump property, so Demon Slayer fans are very lucky to be getting the red carpet ufotable treatment. The art direction is phenomenal, but the choreography in the fight scenes is where it truly shines. It’s polished enough to still manage to be engaging despite my low level of interest in the story, so I wouldn’t mind trying to catch up on it some other time – at the very least, it certainly looks gorgeous.

Runner-up:

Fruits Basket 2019: And now for a bit of controversy because this opinion is apparently very polarizing, but…I absolutely think the new Fruits Basket blows the old one out of the water completely. I don’t think the old one was -bad-, but…I’m a little skeptical how many people genuinely preferred it, and how much of the complaints I see are just rose-coloured nostalgia goggles. I much prefer the newer, less bug-eyed character designs for one, but the whole thing has this super cosy and warm feel that took me right back to when I read the manga in high school. That’s not to say its completely cosy – the genuine unsettling and sad moments are also done well. The most important aspect of Fruits Basket is its emotional core, and this remake really delivers on that. I’m looking forward to season 2.

Ariana

N/A. I sadly I didn’t have the time this year to read many of the manga/light novels for the anime I watched, so I don’t think I can fairly pick a winner for this category.

Junko

I decided to give this award to Fate Grand Order: Absolute Demonic Front Babylonia...well, essentially for existing. Mostly, I never thought that a mobile game like Fate/grand order would get a full season adaptation like this. (Previously, it had gotten some one-off OVAs for earlier chapters in the plot). Although it did decide to start very late in the game (the Babylonia chapter being the second-to-last major plot event of Part 1 of the app’s story) and the animation had some moments of…dubious quality…I did thoroughly enjoy this adaptation. The characters were just as over the top as they are in-game, the fight scenes were fun to watch, and the likes of Gilgamesh, Ishtar and even mascot Fou stole every scene they were in. A fun watching experience from start to finish!

Runner up:

I debated a long time before nominating Boogiepop and Others as my runner-up, because it definitely got mixed reviews…and believe me, I totally understand why. It’s slow-paced and a bit confusing, and you really have to watch the entire series to get what’s going on with the mysterious “shinigami” Boogiepop. But seeing the Boogiepop franchise get another anime for the 20th anniversary of the original novel’s release, and one adapting some stuff that hadn’t been seen on screen before…it was a pretty magical experience. So I had to at least give it a nod as runner-up for this award.

Best Opening:

2019 also saw a whole load of new super catchy anime theme songs. We judged them on both the song and the accompanying visuals…good openings, after all, are the type you don’t mind sitting through every time. (Note: Due to the nature of copyrighted songs, its likely that the vids could be pulled eventually so enjoy them while you can)

Moeronpan

Dororo – Kaen by Queen Bee: I had a hard time skipping the first Dororo opening because, to use the vernacular, it slaps. It has a slow start, but once it kicks in it gets you absolutely pumped for the show. Plus, I really love the more classic-Tezuka Dororo that appears multiple times in it.

Runner-up:

Carole and Tuesday – Kiss Me by Carole and Tuesday by Nai Br.XX and Celeina Ann w/ Nulbarich: Carole and Tuesday’s first opening, on the other hand, is just cute. It fits the cosy mood of the show perfectly, and I really dig the visual style used.

Special Mention:

How Heavy Are The Dumbbells You Lift – Onegai Muscle: Onegai Muscle is both catchy and hilarious, and also makes me want to drop everything and do 20 situps. MITENASAI! SAI! SAI! SAI! HAI! SAAAAIDO CHESUTO!

Ariana

For this category, I have to nominate Mob Psycho 100 season 2’s OP, “99.9” by Mob Choir. It’s snappy, it’s catchy, and the animation is great as usual for the Mob Psycho 100 series. I liked it a whole lot more after seeing My Mother’s Basement’s analysis of the OP. Unsurprisingly, there’s a lot of depth to this opening. But mainly I just like that it looks really cool.

Runner up:

For the runner-up place, I nominate Colorful Pastrale’s OP, “Wonderland Girl” by Pastel*Palettes. The OP for this series is so stylish, cute and colorful. It makes me sad that the production quality for the rest of the episodes’ run-time aren’t as high. There’s not much for me to say here. The song is pretty standard “idol-like” fare, but the visuals are neat.

Junko

So I didn’t actually like Domestic Kanojo. I found it absolutely not my type of show, and didn’t watch beyond the first episode or two. But I LOVE the OP, “Kawaki wo Ameku”. An amazing song with a fantastic beat that seems to fluctuate between two different styles of music (while still remaining one coherent song), which makes the perfect representation for the two very different female leads. I found myself listening to the song a lot when I wanted some good anime music. It’s very rare that I’ve found an OP that I like when I dislike the show so much, let alone one I loved enough to nominate it for the Best Of award, but…here we are, I guess? Even if you dropped the series like a hot potato, I strongly recommend giving this OP a listen.

Best Ending:

Ending themes can be just as good as openings – in some cases even better! Here’s our picks for 2019.

Moeronpan

Sarazanmai – Stand by Me by the peggies: I think Stand By Me is not only this year’s bet ED, but this year’s best anime song period. It’s super, SUPER catchy, it’s super, SUPER hard to not yell ONEEEEEGAIIIII along with it, and the boys standing in various Asakusa locations gives it a really mysterious mood.

Runner-up:

Carole and Tuesday – Not Afraid by Angela (Alisa, w/Lido): Unlike the first ending of Carole and Tuesday’s, which focuses on the titular girls, the second ending, ‘Not Afraid’ features on Angela. It has a very, very different feel, directly mirroring Angela’s growing unease and sadness in the second series. And like almost every song to feature in the show, it’s a great piece of music.

Ariana

Damn it, I try not to pick both the OP and the ED from just one series for these two awards, but nothing this year has stood out to me more than Mob Pyscho’s second season ED, “Memosepia” by Sanjou no Hana. I love the use of a more picture book-like style (it’s cute), and I love how it contrasts with the OP. “99.9” is very serious, fast-paced, and action-packed; while “Memosepia” has a much more calm/relaxed tone. There’s also a touch of melancholy to the song, as this ED foreshadows some events towards the end of the Mob Psycho 100 manga.

Runner up:

For the runner-up position, I nominate the first ED for the Star Twinkle Precure series: “Papepipu Romantic”, sung by Chihaya Yoshitake. I was unfortunately unable to keep up Star Twinkle Precure due to a lack of time, so I wanted to at least mention it somewhere on this list. While not quite as catchy as Kira Precure a la Mode’s second ED (I honestly don’t think anything can beat THAT), it’s still pretty dang catchy. Toei’s 3D models for the Precure girls are as high quality as ever, and the retro style/space theme is a nice touch.

Junko

I really liked the first ending to Dororo, titled “Amazarashi – Sayonara Gokko”. Amazarashi means “beaten down by the weather” or “exposed to the rain,” which really is a perfect description for the feeling that listening to this song gives me. You really get an idea for how much of the characters have gone through over the course of the episode, and how many trials and tribulations are still waiting for them in the future. It’s a true masterpiece of a song which I could easily listen to over and over again – and this is rare for me, because I often skip right through EDs.

WTF Award

Self-explanatory, what was the most absurdly ridiculous thing we saw this year?

Moeronpan

Sarazanmai: Just like in 2015’s awards, once again the Ikuhara anime is unquestionably the winner here. A kappa sucks the metaphorical desire out of a kids bum, swallows him whole, transforms him into a kappa and then craps him out again -and that isnt even the weirdest part of the episode-, which would probably be when the kappa boy, along with other kappa boys, performs a musical dance routine and then has to dive into the anus of a zombie. But the true wtf part of the entire series is that any show could contain such things and be as good as it was. Just like in 2015, it ended up one of my favourite shows of the year, and just like in 2015 it remains insanely hard to recommend to people because…honestly, you try saying this paragraph out loud.

Runner-up:
The entire existence of W’z: just…really? a Handshakers sequel. why. One of the most universally panned anime of all time. A sequel. Who in the entire world asked for this?

Ariana

Ueno-san wa Bukiyou. It’s a really gross series (on multiple levels) that starts off with a middle school aged girl trying to get the boy she likes to drink her piss. What more do I have to say here? I’m amazed that this series has a still-running manga and an anime series since the content is really freaking questionable and seems to revolve around the sexualization of a 14 year old girl. Uhhh???? How is this even legal?

Junko

How could any other show take home this award? Sarazanmai is a show that’s a little bit about sex and sexuality, a little bit about friendship, a little bit about kappas, and a lot more about butts than I could have ever predicted. It almost feels like a cop-out to hand this award to a Kunihiko Ikuhara show – after all, his previous offering, Yuri Kuma Arashi, was also nominated here in the 2015 Moeronpan awards. But Sarazanmai had me saying “what the F” aloud more than once throughout its run, so I can’t pass it up. (This is not to say that it wasn’t enjoyable. Sarazanmai is a great show. You should watch it if you haven’t already. But you might want to watch it in small doses, because it sure is weird)

Runner up:

Dimension High School is about a group of live-action boys (and their teacher) who get transported to a different dimension where they become anime boys and have to answer questions posed by evil sphinxes, some of which have laser eyes. The questions typically have to do with what they’ve been studying in school. Also, the “mascot character” is an alien who looks like a rock. His name is “Spudio the 22nd”. I’m still not convinced Dimension High School isn’t somebody’s fanfiction that accidentally got an anime adaptation. Nor am I sure why it exists – but it certainly was an experience, and one more than deserving of the runner up spot for this year’s WTF Award.

Biggest Disappointment

And here we move into the negative awards, starting with 2019’s biggest letdowns.

Moeronpan
The treatment of Stars Align: My biggest disappoint this year is a little different to the norm, and it’s not the fault of the anime itself. This was a show that set out to do so much, with such a realistic and grounded cast of characters to explore, and was supposed to have at least 24 episodes to explore them and tell the entire story it wanted to. Instead, it was decided -at a point where it was probably too late to change things – that it would only be 12 episodes. I’m not a stranger to incomplete anime, but usually they’re based on ongoing manga and you get a ‘read the manga to see the rest of the story!’ type of ending. Stars Align is an original anime, and thanks to this change it literally ends with a cliffhanger – and a whole load of unresolved threads and characters. Given that the show also ended up associated with unfortunate controversy early into airing (it came out that whoever was in charge of animating the background had copied a bunch of original dance video without the dancers permission, and the reputation hung around even after the official apology), whether it was even successful enough to warrant a second season seems up in the air. The fact that this happened with a show with such genuine heart and soul is crushing. Here’s to hoping that, whether through a second season, movie, OVA or other means, Akane Kazuki gets to tell the whole story eventually somehow. If you’d like to read more about what happened with the show’s production, Sakuga Blog has a really good write-up.

Runner-up:

Dororo jumps the shark (literally):  Okay, so the ridiculous shark episode was somehow not the worst one in the mostly lacklustre second half of Dororo, but it did kind of mark the point where I realised I really wasn’t enjoying season 2 like I was season 1. The fact that I absolutely loved the first half just made this all the more disappointing. Reduced animation quality, the characters acting in explicably ridiculous ways, Dororo needing to be constantly rescued.. it’s good that in the end I did find the climax to be satisfying, but it certainly started to feel like a chore to get to it.

Ariana

Wataten!: An Angel Flew Down to Me. It’s my own fault for having hope that this series wouldn’t be as creepy as it turned out to be. It’s infuriating to me because the non-creepy parts of the show are genuinely funny and heartwarming. (I.e. the screenshot above shows Miyako and Hinata, who are sisters and have a cute relationship.) Sadly, Miyako’s uncomfortable crush on a fifth grader permeates nearly every aspect of the show. The rise in these types of… creepy otaku ladies in anime is annoying and I hope it doesn’t become a trend. Miyako’s not as overtly predatory as some of the other “adult women obsessed with literal kids” I’ve seen in 2019, but she’s still trying to win over a little girl’s affections by essentially bribing her with sweets, which is messed up.

Junko

I think I set myself up for disappointment with this one. I expected way too much from If It’s For My Daughter, I Can Even Defeat a Demon Lord. And I guess I got some of it – there were definitely a few cute father-daughter moments, especially in the early episodes. But the show was slow-paced and mediocre overall. It began to drift into uncomfortable territory when the still-childlike and child-appearing Latina admitted that she had romantic feelings for her caretaker / father figure Dale. Dale himself seemed to become reduced from an interesting adventurer to a one-note character who did nothing but squeal over how cute Latina was. We saw little action and almost none of the world outside the small main town. The few interesting topics, like the xenophobia Latina encountered from a teacher, were brushed over quickly so the show could get back to “cute hijinks”. Overall, this show was just…so, so much less than it could have been.

Runner up:

I wanted to like Kabukicho Sherlock.I really did. I’m a huge fan of the Sherlock Holmes canon, after all, and have enjoyed several adaptations which have taken it into the modern world. But this show was just…none of that. It focused way too much on “goofy jokes” using a “lol-so-random” style of humor than on actual case solving. The potentially interesting setting of the Kabukicho district was portrayed in the most broad, stereotypical way possible (including some very uncomfortable treatment of women and LGBTQ characters). Just…a huge disappointment overall. I wish I could put Kabukicho Sherlock in any other category for this year’s awards, but I just can’t think of it as anything other than disappointing.

Worst Adaptation

Like I said before, adaptations are a tricky business, and every year we see a bunch of anime that end up being terrible regardless of the quality of their source material.

Moeronpan

Joushi Kausei: I didn’t see as much anime as I should have this year, but I do have a hard time believing there could be an adaptation this year that failed to capture the original manga more than Joshi Kausei didn’t. If you’re going to adapt a silent manga, maybe make the whole thing silent? Giving all the girls voice actors so they can just…make weird noises is bizarre. They’re not talking in the manga because it’s wordless comedy. By having them make weird noises, it creates the impression that they can’t actually speak and so resort to gasping and moaning at each other like some kind of high school cave girls. Much worse than this is the absolutely terrible animation and uninspired artwork, despite the manga being quite competent in that regard. I actually enjoyed the manga, so it’s almost impressive how genuinely not-charming the anime is. When the manga looks more animated than the anime, it might be time to question the point of the adaptation.

Ariana

Joshi Kausei. I already made a big rant about this series in my round-up review post for the Spring season, so I won’t ramble too much here. I’m mainly just angry that such a charming and inventive manga got reduced to being such a cheap and crappy anime. It’s so obvious that corners were cut as much as possible in the production of this anime. Even though each episode is only about 3 minutes long, it’s still a waste of time to watch. Seriously, just stick to the manga.

(Sort of) Special Mention:

I have heard from fans that the anime for To the Abandoned Sacred Beasts really deviated from the manga and the anime suffered as a result. Since I haven’t actually read the manga myself, I can’t fully nominate that series for this category, but I can at least mention it.

Junko

I didn’t absolutely love the first season of Kemono Friends, but I found it enjoyable enough. The second season…not so much. It looked downright terrible. It repeated plot beats from the first season almost scene for scene and word for word. It seemed to be aired at a much younger audience, with more juvenile “humor” and simpler, more repetitive stories. Any tiny bit of magic which might have been there in the first season was completely swept away. It was a chore to watch, and I’ll admit it – I wasn’t even able to get through the entire season. I don’t know how the rest of the Kemono Friends franchise is doing, but this horrible mess of an anime surely isn’t helping.

Worst Anime Overall

Finally, our personal absolute stinker awards. Because we know as much as anyone else that anime can be complete garbage when it wants to be, and so here is 2019’s cream of the crap.

Moeronpan

Val x Love. Honestly, this year I got pretty lucky in that at first thought I couldn’t actually recall anything shitty enough to win this award unquestionably, and then I remembered that I actually did watch Val x Love. Now, every now and then I watch something that I hate so much I can’t even be bothered to write the first impression review for it, and usually that either happens because it’s one of the last new shows to air and I’m tired of bad anime by that point, or because it was originally assigned to Junko or Ariana and they aren’t able to get around to it for whatever reason. I can’t remember which one of those Val x Love was, all I remember was that watching this show about some dude’s harem of girls who look like they were generated via this AI girl creator who gain super powers through getting aroused or whatever the hell was going on here put me in physical pain. 

Ariana

Nande koko ni Sensei ga!? It’s just thinly veiled porn that’s super uncomfortable to me because it features minors (high school students) being in very sexual situations with adult authority figures (their teachers). It also infuriates me because if the sexes were reversed, with female students being involved with adult male teachers, there would absolutely be an uproar about the whole thing. Double standards suck. Soapboxing aside, I know there’s an audience out there for this sort of stuff, but that doesn’t make me feel any less disturbed.

Runner up:

Do you love your mom and her two hit multi-target attacks? Yeah, I’m nominating this for the blatant ship-teasing between a mom and her own freaking son. The only reason it’s a runner-up, even though the implied subject matter (incest) is much more disturbing to me than the above anime’s dynamics, is because the first episode—which was what I personally had to watch—didn’t actually go full turbo fanservice mode. It apparently does in the second episode though, and I’m glad I noped out before the series went all the way downhill.

Junko

Oh, is it finally time to talk about the continued proliferation of terrible isekai anime which inexplicably continued in 2019? I think it is. Taking home this year’s number one stinker award is the stupidly titled Shinchou Yuusha: Kono Yuusha ga Ore TUEEE Kuse ni Shinchou Sugiru, aka “Cautious Hero”. And what made this one stand out (in a bad way) among so many other isekai offerings? For me, it was the fact that it was trying to parody common isekai tropes – but ended up playing most of them completely straight. It relied far too heavily on the not particularly funny gimmick of “the hero is extremely cautious and over-prepares for everything” while also featuring a parade of big-busted scantily-clad goddesses, demons and more who were all slavering over the titular Cautious Hero. It felt like the show wanted to have its cake and eat it too, giving isekai fans what they want to see (fanservice) while also trotting out endless repetitive “parody”. The result was, rather than a clever send-up of these tropes, an unwatchable mess. Absolutely the worst of the year.

Runner up:

I also strongly disliked The Rising of the Shield Hero, and not just because it is part of the isekai genre. I actually liked the initial conceit (multiple heroes with different weapons are all summoned at once, and are supposed to work together). However, this concept was ruined by a parade of utterly unlikable characters, from the titular hero to his sneering, down-talking “companions”. And don’t even get me started on the king or the grumpy princess or the female characters who seemed to be there for no reason other than to swoon over the various heroes…it really felt like there wasn’t a single likeable character in the entire show, and the “plot” had me cringing halfway through Episode 1. Can 2020 be the year we give up on bad isekai series with overly long titles? Can it? Please?

Best Scene/Episode (Spoiler Warning)

Anime is full of memorable moments, and these are the ones that will stay with us from this year.

 

Moeronpan
The Case Files of Lord El Melloi II, episode 13 (In particular, Waver’s Very Special Dream): I already gushed about episode 13 of Case Files in the review for it, where I declared it the winner already. So I don’t really have much else to say, but as a massive Team Rider fan I’m still giddy about it months later. Thank you so much, Troyca.

Runner-up:
Sarazanmai Episode 9: While a lot went down in this episode that’s worth being talked about, Kuji brothers parts wowed me more than almost anything else in the show. Their attempted escape from the city – even without all the emotional baggage it carries – is actually one of the most artfully directed, cinematic animation sequences I’ve seen in an anime in recent memory. Mappa’s use of colour, angles and music really sent it above and beyond, all the way up to Chikai’s eventual demise. And then they round it all off with the most painfully happy slideshow of memories while the credits roll. Bloody brutal.

Special Mention:

Carole and Tuesday Finale – ‘Mother Mother’ performance:  This one was extra special to me because, as luck would have it, I actually did watch it on New Year’s Eve – which is where it takes place in-universe. Yeah whatever, it’s cheesy, and the show’s constant hand-waving away the conflict it creates for itself with ‘but…the power of music!’ is also cheesy. But still, seeing everyone come together to sing this beautiful, stirring song still moved me. It was just so nice, and made for a fantastic final scene. You can see it here in a format to fool the copyright algorithm, but who knows how long the link will last.

Ariana

Episode 1 of Sarazanmai wins this award hands down for being the most memorable first episode of any anime series I have ever seen. Watching this episode unspoilt for the first time, I remember being so amazed and flabbergasted by every plot twist/reveal that I immediately wanted more. The entire episode has great animation paired with an off-the-rails plot. Leave it to Ikuhara to create a first episode that’s amusing, emotional, and terrifying all at once.

Special mention:

For this section, I’ve decided to nominate the first half of episode 12 of Wataten!: An Angel Flew Down to Me. I’m so mad that such an inventive finale episode was tacked onto such an uncomfortable series. In the finale of Wataten, we get to see an elementary school play, starring Hinata (the little sister of the protag, Miyako) and all of her classmates. What makes this episode so inventive is that we get to see Miyako’s imagined view of what the play looks like: a basic school play gets turned into a grandiose movie production. And the play itself is also a musical to boot! The entire thing hits just the right amount of cheesiness that it becomes charming. The story itself is admittedly pretty heavy for an elementary school play (it’s a tragic tale of an immortal angel who falls in love with a mortal human girl) but it’s also very touching.

Junko

I rarely nominate moments in the very first episode of a series, but I was absolutely awestruck by the scene in Episode 1 of Yakusoku no Neverland / The Promised Neverland when the characters Emma and Norman find out the true purpose of the orphanage “House” where they reside. It probably helped that I knew nothing about the series going in, and so was absolutely stunned by the tonal shift and all it meant for the characters. The whole show was…well, if not always ENJOYABLE to watch, then certainly interesting, and that moment in the first episode really solidified to me that this was a show worth watching.

Runner up:

The moment in the final episode of Lord El-Melloi II Case Files when Waver finally gets what he had been wishing for the entire season: a chance to once again speak to his lost love, Iskander. It was the moment myself and other Waver fans had been waiting for, and it absolutely delivered and exceeded expectations. I won’t say any more – just go and watch this scene (or better yet, this entire series) to see just how touching this beautiful moment is.

And there you have it! How about you? What were your best and worst shows of 2019?
Onwards to another year of anime!