So it is probably a little weird watching Super and continually being told the visuals get better, so I thought I'd whip up a spoiler-free guide to the improvements as well as the preaks and valleys the show has that don't represent the overall quality of the show after that episode.
This is all as of episode 106.
Arc 3
Currently Super's English dub is in the 3rd arc which you can probably all tell is an improvement over the 2nd arc. The most recent episode that has aired is #32.
- Valley - #33. Yep the first episode of the tournament is a big drop in quality, but it gets better after that, so don't worry.
The arc ends at 41 and then 42-46 are some inbetween episodes.
- Peak - #44. No really noteworthy animation, but what is there is done really well and the art is very consistent and on top of that the direction is really good.
- Valley - #45. Yep, a valley right after a peak, this episode is pretty ugly.
Arc 4
The 4th arc sees a nice improvement over the previous ones, art can still be pretty inconsistent, but the quality of the animation and direction sees a nice bump and this is the arc where animation god Naotoshi starts to do some animation for the series. This arc runs from episode 47 to 67. It may seem like there are quite a few valleys compared to arc 3, but keep in mind that those valleys are still better than the ones that came before and of course there are way more peaks as well.
- Peak - #56. Another episode that isn't a peak because of animation, but because of the art and direction.
- Peak - #57. This is kind of the reverse of 56, the art isn't bad, but it isn't the most consistent thing in the world, but this episode is packed to the gills with tons of action animation and sees Naotoshi Shida's debut on the series as an animator, proving some awesome stuff.
- Valley - First half of #62. The first half of this episode is a pretty big step down from what you will come to expect from this arc, but at least the second half is totally passable.
- Valley - #64. This isn't the worst thing in the world, but the art is fairly inconsistent and there is very little animation, outside of a little but of nice action at the start this episode relies mostly on stills the pretend that there is action going on. I wasn't sure if I'd add this one, the episodes that surround it kinda make it seem like it's worse than it is, but it's still not very good so I decided to include it.
- Peak - #66. Some consider this one of the best looking episodes in the franchise, this is an over the top action filled episode with some pretty solid art throughout. This is the second episode that Shida animates on, providing around a minute of big action.
- Valley - The first half of 67. Sadly 66's bombastic animation is followed up by the wet fart that is 67's first half, luckily the episode really pulls itself together for the second half providing some nice art.
After this point there was a pretty sizable gap between arcs, episodes 68-76. I have a hard time rating these since they were pretty conservative on the whole and the staff was gearing up for the next arc, which is a big one. I'll just say that I do expect there to be some complaints on the second half of 72 and 76 is similar to 64 in that it has very little animation despite there being action.
Arc 5
This is the current arc of the show and it's a long one, it started on episode #77 and still hasn't ended yet. This arc saw the most significant improvement to the show's visuals. While many episodes still have ugly moments, they are generally tiny parts of episodes that overall have pretty consistent art and on top of that the animation itself generally achieves what it's trying to do far more often.
Honestly at this point I have are hard time picking out episodes that I would consider peaks and valleys since the show has gotten so consistent. There are still episodes that are better or worse than others, but the gap between the best and the worst looking episodes is honestly not that huge for the most part. On top of the art and animation getting more consistent this arc also introduces a suite of post production additions, including some post lighting, color filtering and a filter that gives more variance to the thickness of line art.
As I mentioned in my previous post the show still has a ways to go before it's totally normal, but as of the current arc in the Japanese broadcast they are doing a good job of tricking people into think it's normal on a fairly regular basis.
I hope this is useful to some of you.