Anime you "dislike" but can't stop watching

[zaldar]

So I'm addicted, again, to Lelouch. I really want to hate this show it is just to much...it reminds me of dirty sexy money in that the stakes are just increased to crazy levels in each episode then to just be increased to even crasier levels in the next one. Just finished watching episode 25 where Lelouch is revealed as zero trying to save his sister. The three way stand off at the end of this episode is just crazy and I love orange boy what a great crazy villian in a show with so many of them (including in some ways lelouch).

So what shows do you want to hate but can't bring your self to do so, for what ever reason (feel free to talk about Lelouch as well)

[something]

If you were going to make this a general topic and not just about Code Geass, you should really have spoiler tagged the specifics. I've seen the whole show, but not everyone has. I'd recommend tagging the spoilers as soon as possible.

Anyway, I kept watching To Love-Ru, hoping, hoping, hoping that it would live up to its potential. Some episodes I just flat out hated, a number of others I was disappointed in. But I watched the whole damn stupid thing, always hooked by one little shred of hope here or there, only for the show to remain a shadow of what it should have been, all the way to the end. Argh. I refuse to let myself watch the inevitable sequel.

That's one of very few examples, though. I just don't finish shows I don't like, 99.9% of the time. That's not to say I haven't finished a show and wound up disliking it, but that's generally because it ad a bad ending, not because it was bad throughout.

[Ty]

Funny you should mention To Love-Ru. That was the show that finally broke me. I have always been stubborn about watching a show to its end even if I'm not liking it that much. I really really liked Haruna, but there was just something about the show that bugged me to death. Maybe it was the unrealized potential. The show could have been really good if handled just a little differently. I dropped it at episode 9 and since then my attitude towards dropping anything I'm not really into has gotten a lot easier than it ever has been in the past.

[a fist of JUSTICE!!]

Nothing. If I dislike a show, I simply stop watching it.

[Nork22]

That would be Rosario+Vampire Capu2. I hated how they (read Gonzo) made a trainwreck out of the first season, but for some odd reason, despite disliking it, I found that I couldn't pull away from season 2. I blame pink haired, Nana Mizuki voiced vampire to be worth watching.

[Dack Ralter]

Considering I just finished episode 17 of Code Geass, I'm going to second the spoiler tags. Thanks a heap.

Otherwise, only fan-service fests like Magikano and Maburaho. They're terrible shows, but I found myself watching the whole things anyway (fun dubs helped, but only somewhat). I guess I just kept hoping that something more substative would come along. Silly me. :sweat:

[lesterf1020]

For me it would be Kanokon. I hate excessive fan service but I am the kind of person who will watch the first episode of anything so that I will have a frame of reference. Well Kanokon was pretty bad but it was so outrageously ecchi that I actually found it funny. I kept watching to see just how much more outrageous the show could possibly get. I think I hit my limit with "cake". However at that point there were only a few more episodes left so I finished it. A truly embarrasing experience for me.

[Njr Scrawl]

I would have to say Zeta Gundam was one, at first. Camille & Fa are not really likeable, Quattro & Bright were hard military. Four was pitiable but unlikeable. Emma & Reccoa were the only really human characters at first, just barely. But the story & what happened was compelling.

When Amauro entered the story, & later Irma, it became more involving for its characters. Which was needed to counter the Katz & Sarah thorn in the story. Not enough Hamann & Paptimus!

[ZacksAwesome]

I can only think of one, and that would be Last Exile.
I didn't hate it though, I just found it a bit uninteresting.

[Shinmaru]

Akane-iro ni Somaru Saka. I don't even know why I kept watching, although I know how it kept me in the fold -- every time I thought about dropping it, there would conveniently be a good episode, and, like an idiot, I thought the show was finally on the upswing. That ... never happened. Ugh.

[GundamWingMan]

Nothing. If I dislike a show, I simply stop watching it.

That makes two of us. If I'm not hooked on a show after the first volume, I kick it to the curb. It makes no sense whatsoever to waste time or money watching something I don't like.

[Buckeye]

Unless it is a long series (>52 episodes) or something I absolutely can't stand, I usually finish everything that I started to watch. With that said, Girls Bravo would be the first series that comes to mind since it's fan service gone overboard. But I continued to watch it because of the stellar dub.

[Mank]

The closest thing would be Lucky Star, I suppose, although that was more of a love-hate relationship, in which I'd swing from "Why am I watching this?" to cracking up. Actually, I saw this before Azumanga Daioh, which Lucky Star almost made me question the purchase of (glad I did, though. I absolutely loved Azumanga)

[Quarkboy]

The only series I could say this for was Kirarin Revolution. It was a horrible useless waste of time and the writers were clearly paid very poorly and/or drunk.
Entire episodes consist of various colored "cat"-like things going "Na!" at each other.
Other episodes are designed purely as guest star spots for random television celebrity personalities or morning musume compatriots... And it's now on like its 150 episode or so...

And yet... I'm smiling the entire time I'm watching it. Involuntarily.

[Herron]

.
Entire episodes consist of various colored "cat"-like things going "Na!" at each other.


Now I want to see this! But only this/these episodes... I don't know exactly why... and that worries me. :sweat:

[djanss]

Yes, yes, I KNOW Welcome to the NHK is a mean-spirited nyah-nyah straw-geek attempt to socially "punish" The Hikkikomori Phenomenon personally, in as schoolyard a manner as possible, and that's why it's been such a chore to get past five or six episodes...

But darnit, people keep saying something interesting keeps happening in it, down the road! :depressed:

[Talyn]

The second I saw the words "episode 25" I clicked on page 2 of this thread. I just finished episode 17 literally an hour ago...I don't watch Geass on tv or subbed, so.... ya.... tags please.... :sd:

However, for this thread.... two shows, because I always finish what I start...

Mirage of Blaze, the bane of my existence. I have referenced this as the worst show I have ever seen multiple times in posts for the last couple years I've been here.

Kannazuki no Miko.... I watched one volume, and thought about tossing it in an ebay pile. I watched the rest hoping it would eventually become coherent or atleast fun to watch... It's a complete trainwreck but for some reason, like a trainwreck, I couldn't stop watching. I had to know if it was really not going to get any better.

[Herron]

The second I saw the words "episode 25" I clicked on page 2 of this thread. I just finished episode 17 literally an hour ago...I don't watch Geass on tv or subbed, so.... ya.... tags please.... :sd:

However, for this thread.... two shows, because I always finish what I start...

Yeah I haven't even started collecting Geass, so I saw episode 25... and something about saving... something.. and shut my mind off and moved to the next post. So I should be pretty safe, by the time I get around to Geass.

Kannazuki no Miko.... I watched one volume, and thought about tossing it in an ebay pile. I watched the rest hoping it would eventually become coherent or atleast fun to watch... It's a complete trainwreck but for some reason, like a trainwreck, I couldn't stop watching. I had to know if it was really not going to get any better.

I'm going to be watching this pretty soon. I keep hearing mixed things. I just have a gut feeling I'm going to like it though.. I'll just have to see.

[Fencedude]

When Amauro

You know you aren't spelling that name right, right?

[HitokiriShadow]

Anyway, I kept watching To Love-Ru, hoping, hoping, hoping that it would live up to its potential. Some episodes I just flat out hated, a number of others I was disappointed in. But I watched the whole damn stupid thing, always hooked by one little shred of hope here or there, only for the show to remain a shadow of what it should have been, all the way to the end. Argh. I refuse to let myself watch the inevitable sequel.


That was the first show to come to mind when I saw this topic. That show was terrible simply because it stubbornly refused to actually use the goddamn cast it had and kept trying to be something other than a harem-esque fanservice comedy. The director had a hardon for those stupid aliens and simply couldn't let the series be what it was suppose to be. It was unlikely to ever be a particularly good series but it could have at least been decent.

I realized fairly early that the series had deep-rooted problems that were not going to improve but I kept hoping and watched 12 or 13 episodes until I finally decided I was done torturing myself.

[dragonrider_cody]

I will throw Negima out there. I didn't really enjoy the first few episodes I saw on Anime Selects, but for some reason I grabbed the first disc when it came out. It was fairly uninteresting, I didn't really like many of the characters, but for some reason I kept buying the discs. Though I have to admit the last two discs were actually watchable, but I don't think that makes up for the money I spent on it. My best friend loved this show, so it probably contributed to my purchases.

Magikano and Ultra Maniac were others too. They weren't terrible, but I can't say I liked them. And for some reason I kept buying the discs, though I still have yet to finish Ultra Maniac.

I had to keep buying Tsubasa for my boyfriend, but likely I didn't have to keep watching it :)

[meganly_chan]

The only series I could say this for was Kirarin Revolution. It was a horrible useless waste of time and the writers were clearly paid very poorly and/or drunk.
Entire episodes consist of various colored "cat"-like things going "Na!" at each other.
Other episodes are designed purely as guest star spots for random television celebrity personalities or morning musume compatriots... And it's now on like its 150 episode or so...

And yet... I'm smiling the entire time I'm watching it. Involuntarily.

Oh man, I know. I'm up to episode 90 now, and likely won't stop until it's over. And it's such an average, fluffy show! Don't even get me started on the obviously outsourced animation.

[joelgundam01]

Nothing. If I dislike a show, I simply stop watching it.

That makes two of us. If I'm not hooked on a show after the first volume, I kick it to the curb. It makes no sense whatsoever to waste time or money watching something I don't like.

That makes three of us. Granted it's a rarity that I pick up a title, that I don't like. :sd:

[gnikdrazil]

A current title that I'm suffering would be Coyote Ragtime. It really tries to be a fun. style-over-substance series, but it is still boring me. I think it's trying too hard. Heck, I even have a friend watching it with me, and we can only do 2 episodes at a time. As soon as the Graceland Treasure adventure is done, it going to be sold.

[Prede]

zaldar : You should probally put a spoiler on the first post about the Code Geass thing. I just saw that episode last night (I haven't really been following the series), and it seemed like something really important that shouldn't just be written out like that. Spoiler be good there...

Anyway as for shows I dislike but can't stop watching. I watched the first 52 episodes of Naruto(when they played on Cartoon Network), while hateing it the whole way. I kept saying "it has to get better, it has to get better", and it just never did. I really dislike that show, more then I probally should, because I forced myself to watch it too long. It really started to bother me. By episosde 52 I was like "why am I even watching this anyway, I really am hateing this". So after that I just stopped watching it.

I also watched about half of Scryed (when it played on Adult Swim). I liked the whole idea about the city behind the wall, but disliked the rest of it pretty much. I couldn't stop watching it for awhile, even though I disliked it. Not the wrost thing sense MD Geist, but I didn't enjoy much of it.

[something]

zaldar : You should probally put a spoiler on the first post about the Code Geass thing. I just saw that episode last night (I haven't really been following the series), and it seemed like something really important that shouldn't just be written out like that. Spoiler be good there...
I said that in the very first reply and even PM'd him about it, and I guess he hasn't been around. :relief: Guess I have to ask a mod to tag it now.

[Suwako Moriya]

Interesting to see multiple people mention "To Love Ru". A good example of a series where I kept deciding to give it one more chance. However after about 12 chances, I decided that I no longer hated myself and gave up on the series. It was clear the series wanted to be as bad as possible.

In general my hope is to be more willing to just simply drop series rather than keep giving them way more chances than they deserve. That being said there are some series where I don't realize I should have dropped them until after I finish them.

Still perhaps the most evil series are the ones that are ones that start off awesome, but at a certain point start going downhill. It causes a conflict. Do you keep hoping for a return to glory or do you decide it's no longer worthy of you?

As contradictory as it may sound, one thing that can help with dropping series is the realization that I can always give a series a second chance later if comments I read from those who finished the series convince me it's worth trying the series again. Same goes for reading up on the episodes. Yes sometimes I spoil myself to see if I should bother watching anymore, I'll admit that.

This is good not just for dropped series, but series I end up putting on hold for awhile. I'll either be convinced the time is right to start back up the series again or I will be given enough information to know I'm better off just giving up on the series.

[Draneor]

Interesting to see multiple people mention "To Love Ru". A good example of a series where I kept deciding to give it one more chance. However after about 12 chances, I decided that I no longer hated myself and gave up on the series. It was clear the series wanted to be as bad as possible.

I really don't get the To-LOVEる hate. I enjoyed what I saw. And if sales are anything to go by, so did everyone else. Maybe people went into the show with the wrong expectations? It's a shounen harem. There are a lot of girls and fan service. That's about it.

At this point, I'd say this situation applies to every Gainax anime except He Is My Master. While Gainax makes likable shows and characters, they will inevitably find a way to fuck it up by the end. Really, I just need to never start watching anything Gainax touches. The same thing applies to CLAMP, incidentally. Card Captor Sakura excluded.

Nanoha and My-Hime were also this way for me. It took me five tries over two and a half years to get past episode six in Nanoha and three tries to get past episode three in My-Hime. Nanoha actually did get good and, although My-Hime was saved by the ending, I only watched it to get to My-Otome, to be honest.

Canvas2 looked like I would end up hating it so I stopped watching. However, a friend encouraged me to resume it, which I did. He was right. I actually did stop watching AkaSaka out of pure depression only to later find out I probably shouldn't have. So I guess as long as there is a thread of hope, it's possible things may go the way I want them. But the last thing I want is to endure through another Suzuka, Strawberry Panic, KimiNozo, or Shuffle. Still, I think it's paid of more than not to keep watching shows I think I may end up disliking.

[something]

I really don't get the To-LOVEる hate. I enjoyed what I saw.
You say that about a lot of things you later admit you didn't watch much of. How much of this did you watch?

Maybe people went into the show with the wrong expectations? It's a shounen harem. There are a lot of girls and fan service. That's about it.
I highly doubt anyone could have gone into To Love-Ru expecting anything else. The problem is that it's a really regrettable example of that genre. Shounen fanservice rom-coms can be great, but To Love-Ru had no idea what greatness (or even being half-decent) was. It spent a horrendous amount of time on uninteresting, unfunny, juvenile or downright disgusting alien suitors for Lala that paraded on and on and failed in every possible way. It seemed like something that we maybe just had to suffer through at first before the real story began, but instead it continued on until essentially the end of the show.

A huge shame, because the show was so clearly at its best when no aliens were landing on earth and the established characters could just be themselves. They had a cast of diverse and generally pretty likable characters (Haruna is loooove, so are her friends, and Mikan, and Yami, and even Lala was generally tolerable) and proceeded to waste them at every opportunity (Yami was so wasted that someone should be pressing criminal charges). Nobody was holding To Love-Ru to especially high standards, but it still couldn't deliver. It was a show that was terrified of its own potential.

[Suwako Moriya]

I really don't get the To-LOVEる hate. I enjoyed what I saw. And if sales are anything to go by, so did everyone else. Maybe people went into the show with the wrong expectations? It's a shounen harem. There are a lot of girls and fan service. That's about it.

My expectation for the series was that it would be one to watch for the fun of it. That some of the fanservice would be enjoyable and that I'd get attached to a few of the girls. The problem is the negative factors drowned out the positive stuff. A few of the girls did interest me, but none did so enough to get me to stick with it.

I guess another way to put it this. Obviously, I should understand that bread is still bread no matter what's on it. However it shouldn't be too much to ask for that bread to be fresh. If the said bread is moldy then I'm going to throw it away. Sadly, To Love Ru ended up being that moldy bread for me.

[Draneor]

You say that about a lot of things you later admit you didn't watch much of. How much of this did you watch?

A little more than half of it. I also have all eleven volumes of the manga. From what I gather it more or less continues the way it started. Hence, if I liked the first half, I should like the second half. I can't think of one way they could reasonably end the show that would make me dislike it.

It seemed like something that we maybe just had to suffer through at first before the real story began, but instead it continued on until essentially the end of the show.

I'm not sure there is a "real story" though. The appeal of To-LOVEる is largely "oh, look there are nipples." Censored in serialization /broadcast but uncensored in the tankoubons/DVDs.

[maehara]

Kannazuki no Miko.... I watched one volume, and thought about tossing it in an ebay pile. I watched the rest hoping it would eventually become coherent or atleast fun to watch... It's a complete trainwreck but for some reason, like a trainwreck, I couldn't stop watching. I had to know if it was really not going to get any better.

I'm going to be watching this pretty soon. I keep hearing mixed things. I just have a gut feeling I'm going to like it though.. I'll just have to see.
Episodes 1-7: so bad it's good. Episodes 8+: genuinely good, although the plot event that kicks off that change is kinda on the borderline of good taste and has been known to put people right off the show. One of my favourite series.

[something]

A little more than half of it. I also have all eleven volumes of the manga. From what I gather it more or less continues the way it started. Hence, if I liked the first half, I should like the second half. I can't think of one way they could reasonably end the show that would make me dislike it.
I was mostly positive on the show initially too, but the utterly juvenile parade of aliens just destroyed any shot the show had at realizing its potential. Unless you actually liked the aliens and the time they took away from the main cast, there's a good chance it'd wear thin for you too.

I'm not sure there is a "real story" though. The appeal of To-LOVEる is largely "oh, look there are nipples."
The "real story" is the main love triangle. More broadly, the appeal for me was the characters and their interactions, and those were all tossed aside repeatedly. The fanservice was never very appealing because it's just not done well at all, even though the characters are extremely attractive. That's definitely why it sold, sure, but I disagree that a focus on fanservice should come at the expense of other positive traits. Look at the even better selling Strike Witches - that sold on fanservice too, but I liked that a hell of a lot more for its infinitely superior handling of the characters. Hell, even Kanokon treated its characters better than To Love-Ru.

[Draneor]

I was mostly positive on the show initially too, but the utterly juvenile parade of aliens just destroyed any shot the show had at realizing its potential. Unless you actually liked the aliens and the time they took away from the main cast, there's a good chance it'd wear thin for you too.

I can't say I liked them. But I can say I didn't mind them, and found some of them pretty funny. I'm not sure I could watch hundreds of episodes, but two cour seems all right enough. If I could watch the latter half I would, but unless it gets licensed... it's in limbo.

The "real story" is the main love triangle. More broadly, the appeal for me was the characters and their interactions, and those were all tossed aside repeatedly. The fanservice was never very appealing because it's just not done well at all, even though the characters are extremely attractive.

I don't know. To me, I think watching To-LOVEる for the main love triangle is like watching Ranma 1/2 for romance development. It’s just not going to happen. Both are episodical and repetitive and do not focus on the growth of the relationships between the characters. Although I suppose it's more proper to say To-LOVEる is like Ranma 1/2 (and UY). I like Takahashi's stuff more, to be honest. Anyway, I guess I don't see the difference between To-LOVEる and any other true harem. It follows the formulae to the letter, with the plus of having a very high percentage of characters I like. Usually, only one or two connect with me.

For the latter, the DVDs improve this. I thought the fanservice in To-LOVEる was much better than Kanokon, which I found disgusting. I'll give you it's still Xebec though.

I suppose I can see where you're coming from if I think about how I felt about Ichigo 100%. Having read the manga, I did feel that way. But to me, that was more a case where everthing I found positive about the original was stripped out, leaving only the fanservice. I didn't exactly like the end product. Granted, I also didn't go into To-LOVEる with high expectations (unlike Kanokon) so it wasn't exactly hard to meet them.

[Ty]

Maybe people went into the show with the wrong expectations?

I don't think many people were expecting the almost monster-of-the-week-esque formula the show followed for far too long. Just because it's a harem style show doesn't mean the plot can't be intelligent or creative. This show just really drove home for me the point of how incredibly tired this specific harem show formula is now. Even arguably unsuccessful shows like H2O deserve credit for at least being unique and original in some way. To Love-Ru was designed by a committee that last convened in 2002.

[HitokiriShadow]

I really don't get the To-LOVEる hate. I enjoyed what I saw. And if sales are anything to go by, so did everyone else. Maybe people went into the show with the wrong expectations? It's a shounen harem. There are a lot of girls and fan service. That's about it.


Someone should have told the director that because that's exactly what it failed horribly at being. I was never expecting anything more than a decently fun, fanservicey shonen rom-com. And it utterly failed at delivering one. It introduced fun characters only to almost completely ignore them for the next five episodes in favor of rocket men (and he was actually one of the better ones and his episode was actually kind of amusing) and shrieking hellspawn.

[Draneor]

Just because it's a harem style show doesn't mean the plot can't be intelligent or creative. This show just really drove home for me the point of how incredibly tired this specific harem show formula is now.

Sales seem to indicate this formula isn't that tired. I think you may have just grown up. The property isn't exactly designed for adults anyway. There are plenty of intelligent and creative shows that bomb every year. Even ones I like (Kyouran comes to mind). Then there are shows I used to like, like One Piece or Evangelion, that I wouldn't dream of watching now because I'm not the same person I was when I watched them.

Even arguably unsuccessful shows like H2O deserve credit for at least being unique and original in some way.

Makura just makes weird games. The visual novel market is flooded, with sales lopsided in favor of the "big" publishers. Sometimes, I think small publishers try too hard to make their games stand out. Hence, Makura--not that I can blame them. But again, when you look at sales, the most generic game there is--ToHeart2--outsold all of them to date. Nothing came particularly close. Even Typemoon's and Key's work follows a formula. All in all, I think the Japanese market prefers familiarity over originality to a point. The early players set the formulas and everyone else more or less imitates them, while adding their own flavor.

Ah, and there is nothing "arguable" about it. H2O bombed. I may have bought the DVDs, but almost no one else did, apparently.

[Isuzu Inugami]

Currently I find Rosario + Vampire in this category. The animation is cheap and for a fanservice show, there is no effort put into the fanservice--just an occasional poorly defined panty shot. Yet I am strangely hooked on it... I think mostly I just want to figure out what's going on with Mizore's leg accessories. Oh, and the opening is pretty good. I'm still hoping to quit before I get to Capu.

I used to feel this way about Kokoro Library, but being unable to stop watching it gradually transformed my dislike into love. An abusive, dysfunctional love, but love nonetheless.

[Ashyukun]

Rosario to Pantsu is the one that comes most readily to mind for me as well... where I finished watching the show out of sheer bloodymindedness and the hope that they'd do a decent job of what I'd read and enjoyed of the manga only to have it fail miserably on almost all counts. I watched the first two episodes of the sequel, but not even a Chiwa Saito-voiced loli-tsundere vampire-imouto and Mizore's shimapan & stockings could convince me to subject myself to more of it. With most other things, I just drop it if I start disliking it that much or get bored with it.

[Njr Scrawl]

When Amauro

You know you aren't spelling that name right, right?

Oops! One too many "a".

ANN http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=154

: Shuuichi Ikeda as Char Aznable / Casval Rem Daikun

Tohru Furuya as Amuro Ray.

Does the extra "a" affect pronunciation much?

[pathos]

I think To Love Ru is a pretty good example of this for me.

My reason for my dislike is actually pretty simple. I didn't find it funny.

I'd like to try out the manga, and see if this was just a case where it didnt translate well from the source material to tv. Perhaps I will one day.

With smoking character designs, no real animation issues (that I noticed, anyway), characters I really liked (Lala, Yui, Yami, the school nurse), with everyone else I was mostly neutral on, it seemed like this show would be a sure fire win.

Although I watched it till the end, I never felt rewarded for my efforts.

[Zalis]

For me, the main culprit would be Green Green. I outright hated it on many occasions, like the bear rape scene or the 3 cross-dressing guys almost getting it on while trapped in a closet, but I stuck with it only because I heard the ending was sad/dramatic. And the ending actually did pay off, but my hatred for episodes 7-10 or so still smolders. And then there was Maburaho, which seemed pretty stupid to begin with, got better, got worse, then got slightly better until finally crashing and burning at the end. After crossing the midpoint of the series, I had to know where it was all going to lead, so I couldn't give it a drop.

And then there was Jinki: Extend. As Bakura once said of Duel Masters, this show is a load of bollocks. I kept watching to see if events in the early or middle portions of the series would have their resolutions or at least their relevance explained. My perseverance was not rewarded.

[Yuriko]

Thanks for ruining Code Geass for me! Glad I hadn't bought it yet when I first read the untagged post. Now I won't bother.

Anyway, for me it would be Saiyuuki (specifically Reload and Gunlock). It alternates between interesting episodes which imply a plot will appear and absolute trash, and it makes me dizzy in the process. The ADV episodes were ok - some filler and some plot episodes, but after that it seemed to get worse and worse. Sadly I'm still missing the final disc of Gunlock and feel obliged to complete my collection after enduring this much wasted potential already, but I don't want to pay the inflated prices that last disc is fetching right now. Blah.

I only keep watching for Hakkai.

~Y

[bige]

For me it would have to be Gundam 00 and Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. I've been watching Gundam 00 since it began airing on Sci-fi and it just feels like the story isn't going anywhere. Every episode feels the same and some of the characters the show shifts its focus to, namely Saji and Louise, appear to be useless as far as furthering the story goes. I'll watch it until the end of this season, but I don't think I'll be watching season 2 when it gets licensed.

Ghost in the Shell I’ve been recording off Cartoon Network for the last 9 weeks and, while it gets a lot of praise on message boards, I personally just don’t find it very interesting. So far I have felt the episodes have been mediocre at best. I was going to give it until episode 13 before I decide weather or not to drop it, but after just watching episode 9 (Chat! Chat! Chat!) I’m not sure I want to even go that far.

Dragonball Z may fall into this category, which is unfortunate since it was my gateway anime and one of the first animes I ever watched. (How many people here remember when this was on ABC? That’s where I first saw it.) I watched it on Cartoon Network throughout high school, but stopped watching sometime during the Buu saga (It was the episode where Vegeta blew himself up trying to kill Buu. I think Cartoon Network started airing reruns the next day and I just forgot about it when the episodes caught up) and never went back to it until Funimation began releasing the season sets. I bought seasons 1 & 2 as soon as they were released, but for whatever reason (lack of money maybe?) I held off on buying season 3 until spring of last year and may have bought season 4 around the same time, I can’t remember. It started off fine, but I quickly became bored with the Freiza fight dragging out for the ENTIRE SEASON. I wanted the damn thing to end and started fast forwarding through everything that wasn’t the fight, which at times included skipping entire episodes. Season 4 was a bit of an improvement, but I am very reluctant to buy anymore of the season sets until i can rent them and evaluate weather or not they are worth purchasing.

[djanss]

I really don't get the To-LOVEる hate. I enjoyed what I saw. And if sales are anything to go by, so did everyone else. Maybe people went into the show with the wrong expectations? It's a shounen harem. There are a lot of girls and fan service. That's about it.


Someone should have told the director that because that's exactly what it failed horribly at being. I was never expecting anything more than a decently fun, fanservicey shonen rom-com. And it utterly failed at delivering one. It introduced fun characters only to almost completely ignore them for the next five episodes in favor of rocket men (and he was actually one of the better ones and his episode was actually kind of amusing) and shrieking hellspawn.

Also, it's arrogantly flounting its intention of being the self-appointed "Urusei Yatsura: the Next Generation" (given anime's current 25th-anniversary-nostalgia fascination at the moment with Why They Watched It Back Then)...Without the obvious qualities that made UY such a cultural icon, besides just having a horndog teen with an alien devil-girl "wife" in his bedroom closet.
Any show can think they're taking on UY (qv. "Inukami"), but if you're taking on one of the founding all-time champions of anime screwball-comedy, you'd better be pretty danged well prepared to do it...

(And frankly, Keronian frogs have done ten times better the UY imitation without an alien/demonic/soda-can freeloading bikini girl than half a dozen ecchi imitators have managed with one. :keroro: )

[Draneor]

Also, it's arrogantly flounting its intention of being the self-appointed "Urusei Yatsura: the Next Generation" [...]Any show can think they're taking on UY (qv. "Inukami") [...]


No it's not. Do you have any idea what you are talking about? I mean, jeez, it's one thing to not like the show. A lot of people don't like it (although sales indicate many do). But now you're just making shit up. And seriously. Inukami? Trying to be UY? At least have some sense of how the Japanese anime market works.


(And frankly, Keronian frogs have done ten times better the UY imitation without an alien/demonic/soda-can freeloading bikini girl than half a dozen ecchi imitators have managed with one. :keroro: )

Kid's show designed to sell cell phone straps and harem designed for teenage/young adult otaku to sell DVDs (along with a light novel for otaku). Perfectly alike.

[HitokiriShadow]

For me it would have to be Gundam 00 and Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. I've been watching Gundam 00 since it began airing on Sci-fi and it just feels like the story isn't going anywhere.

How far has Sci-Fi gotten? It takes a while to get going but it gets better (better as in more interesting, at least) around 14-15 when certain character show up and things start moving beyond CB simply intervening in every conflict that pops up. You may find your persistence rewarded if you stick with it.

[bige]

For me it would have to be Gundam 00 and Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. I've been watching Gundam 00 since it began airing on Sci-fi and it just feels like the story isn't going anywhere.

How far has Sci-Fi gotten? It takes a while to get going but it gets better (better as in more interesting, at least) around 14-15 when certain character show up and things start moving beyond CB simply intervening in every conflict that pops up. You may find your persistence rewarded if you stick with it.

I think they are showing episodes 13 & 14 tonight. While I may not be very impressed with the show right now, I hope it does well enough over here to allow Bandai to license some older Gundam series.

[Ty]

Sales seem to indicate this formula isn't that tired. I think you may have just grown up.
I know. I'm the one who's tired of it. There will always be a core demographic that drives sales of this type of show for better or worse. Maybe that's a good thing for the industry. It isn't about growing up (I did that too early as it was) but rather about simply expecting more. I have to say that I've always believed that in order to truly love anime there must be some part of you somewhere inside that doesn't grow up. Otherwise that sense of wonder doesn't work for the shows that rely on it. :)

[RayeKinezono]

As much as it pains me to say it, I'll have to say Strawberry Panic. It was good at first, but it seemed to degrade into "this person cries about this person, that person cries about that person," and then the cycle repeats itself. Damned depressing and hard to watch, IMO.

However, I still bought the whole series just so I could see the ending. And despite my "dislike" of sections of the series, I have no plans to get rid of it, and do plan to keep it for a long time. Rewatches will be slim to rare, though.

[djanss]

Also, (To-LOVE-Ru) arrogantly flounting its intention of being the self-appointed "Urusei Yatsura: the Next Generation" [...]Any show can think they're taking on UY (qv. "Inukami") [...]


No it's not. Do you have any idea what you are talking about?

Well, something in the general ten-mile ballpark of "Any ecchi series that sticks a teenager with an interchangeably identical magical/sci-fi-realm bikini girl who claims to be his 'wife' after a technicality, and who can zap him with some form of magical/elemental punishment on a jealous whim (but not anything resembling lightning, as that might be too suspect), is convinced that the very act of doing so will immediately invoke the spirit of Rumiko Takahashi, just on the basis what their own Japanese childhood overexposed-rerun 'boomer-nostalgia remembers"...
We've had a LOT of them just in the last few years, most of them missing their Ataru and/or Lum imitations by a four-lane highway, and believing that panty shots and nosebleeds will make up for the void. As the comic strips say, Somewhat Unclear On the Concept. :(

(To appease rabid fandom, I'll be generous and say that out of all the various clones, "Inukami"'s Keita probably came the closest to replicating the TRUE bold spirit of Ataru Moroboshi, as most of the other imitators fall back on the standard Timid Nosebleeders...)


(And frankly, Keronian frogs have done ten times better the UY imitation without an alien/demonic/soda-can freeloading bikini girl than half a dozen ecchi imitators have managed with one. :keroro: )

Kid's show designed to sell cell phone straps and harem designed for teenage/young adult otaku to sell DVDs (along with a light novel for otaku). Perfectly alike.

The imitators only look at the surface ingredients, and always try to make The Next Lum (and Ran, and Mendou, etc.)...
The secret is in making The Next Tomobiki, and let everything follow from there. :)

[Draneor]

We've had a LOT of them just in the last few years, most of them missing their Ataru and/or Lum imitations by a four-lane highway, and believing that panty shots and nosebleeds will make up for the void.

Like I said, sales seem to indicate otherwise. These kind of anime are made because some of them still sell well to their market. Anime companies are not interested in pleasing the hundred or so nostalgic-obsessed gaijin; they're interested in pleasing the 186.8 Billion Yen otaku market (2007). For that matter, Anime of the late 70s and early 80s was an entirely different market than today. This is precisely why I say you don’t know what you are talking about. Panty shots actually do help out for certain shows (recent Gonzo properties come to mind).

The imitators only look at the surface ingredients, and always try to make The Next Lum (and Ran, and Mendou, etc.)...
The secret is in making The Next Tomobiki, and let everything follow from there. :)

The vast majority of anime is not trying to become the next Rumiko Takahashi property. I have no idea where you got this idea. It's wrong. It's as wrong as saying Mahoraba was trying to be the next Maison Ikkoku. Or Kannaduki no Miko was trying to be the next Mobile Suit Gundam.

[nemesisenforcer]

Maybe Strike Witches, since I genuinely despised its use of that particular kind of fanservice but nevertheless somehow stuck around to see the show become decent, for what it was at least.

I've disliked small aspects of many other shows, but they were either far less prominent or never to the point of utter hatred. I'd usually prefer to drop the series instead and not keep watching.

[Garasharp K7]

There aren't many shows I'd keep up with if I didn't like 'em, but I ended up watching all of Kanokon out of some perverse sense of curiosity. I just wanted to see how far the show would go. :)
Then there was Steel Angel Kurumi Zero. The short little ova is absolutely nothing like the earlier series, and is just utterly dull and boring. It's just the girls sitting in an apartment talking while Kurumi mopes about in the background. And I still watched it all. Mind you, it was only three fifteen-minute episodes so it wasn't much of a chore to get through. Still didn't like it though.