1.) Hyouka ; Hyouka made me endure a couple of painfully boring episodes, but the incredible production values, intriguing story premise and mostly enjoyable story arcs made that totally worth it. Ultimately, it may have been the OST that stuck out to me the most, though. It's rather subtle for the most part, but it somehow managed to create a very convincing mystery atmosphere for things that really aren't mysterious at all. Good stuff.
2.) JoJo's Bizarre Adventure ; Praise the 80's.
3.) Chihayafuru ; The biggest eye opener was watching a real karuta match on YouTube after seeing the show and realizing that you really play this game by tossing your cards through the room. That looked like total anime bullshit to me. Wonderful show, though. Likable cast of characters and solid execution of friendship themes.
4.) Kids on the Slope ; A little underwhelming in the end, but still easily above most shows I've seen this year. The rotoscoping is not okay, though. Looked weird.
5.) Kuroko's Basketball ; One of the better sports animes I've seen in a while. The pacing got a little out of control towards the end, but that didn't hurt my enjoyment too much.
6.) Nisemonogatari ; It's like Bakemono. Pretty good, but not quite as good.
7.) Chuunibyou demo Koi ga Shitai! ; Eh, I
really would have liked this show more if the second half didn't suddenly take itself so seriously. I don't think KyoAni pulled that off very well and it was just kind of boring and awkward. It was a pretty great show when it was just funny and cute, though.
8.) Psycho-Pass ; It bothers me how every futuristic thing in anime always has to have a dumb name. Calling your space pew-pew's DOMINATORS is not okay. The way holograms work is also very questionable and makes me wonder all the time, but whatever. It's a well produced SciFi show with a dumb idea of how things are going to be in the future and it's mostly a good time watching it.
9.) Lupin III: Mine Fujiko to Iu Onna ; Never fully clicked with me, but it definitely had style.
10.) Upotte!! ; Guilty pleasure. Never understood the basic premise of girls being guns, but it was fun to watch. Also surprisingly inoffensive considering the distinctive Xebec art sytle.
Worst anything of the forever: Sword Art Online ; Now I watch quite a bit of anime, but I only barely participate in any anime communities. That leaves me very ignorant when it comes to understanding which shows are generally liked or disliked by anime watching folks and what their reasons are. Which is totally okay since it allows me to watch any show more or less completely uninfluenced by opinions of others and I wont be affect by the typical cynicism, hyperbolic praise and whatever else message boards are plagued by. I have to deal with that sort of thing on the gaming side plenty already.
That said, I watched SOA to its completion, because I was only aware of its unexplainable popularity but not of its complete and utter AWFULNESS. Nobody warned me!
I initially dropped the show after three episodes, but the buzz surrounding it never went away and it eventually made me curious to see if I was just missing something and I've been avoiding a gem all this time. Well, I haven't! I realized that after another 22 awful, awful episodes.
I could only describe SOA as the most shameless pandering to pathetic nerd fantasies I've seen in a long while. It doesn't help that nothing about it makes any sense. No sort of consistency and constant bending of the rules for convenient and lazy story telling. Honestly one of the worst shows I've ever seen. Just painful.
