Sun Tzu’s Picks: Top 10 Anime of 2011

2011 has ended, as years often do.  Soon the new year’s anime will be starting; I haven’t taken a close look at them, but I’ve heard there isn’t much to be excited about.  So rather than worry about the upcoming year right now, let’s take a moment to stop and reflect on the year that has passed, and rank the ten best anime of the year.

Some rules regarding what I consider eligible to receive a ranking: I’m counting anime (so no J-Dramas or My Little Pony) that aired on TV (so no movies or OVA) starting in 2011 (so no Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu for #1 anime five years running).  I’m also excluding any anime that were just continuations of a series that began prior to 2011.  There were a few good second seasons that aired this year, like Ika Musume 2 and TWGOK 2, but those shows have already received consideration during their original airing years, and it’s time for them to step aside and make room for new blood.  Shows that aren’t done airing or shows that I haven’t finished watching are fine, though, so long as I’ve seen enough of them to have an opinion.  All the descriptions below are going to contain spoilers, so maybe you should just read the titles and then go off and watch all of them?

The Top 10 Anime of 2011, in Ascending Order (the last shall be first and the first shall be last)

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 9

It’s technically July 1 now, even if it doesn’t seem like it because of my shattered sleep schedule, and I really need to be thinking about starting Summer Anime Season 2011 soon. Unfortunately, I’ve been following GotWoot for Denpa Onna, and they’ve been pretty slow at putting out subs. I dunno if I should keep blogging it even simultaneously with summer shows, or I should just give up and finish it alone, because nobody wants to read about the middle of a show they’ve already seen the end of. I guess blogging is as much for my benefit as for anybody’s, so maybe I’ll keep blogging it and pretend anyone cares. “Dance like someone’s watching”, they say. Speaking of watching, let’s watch episode 9 of Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko.

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 8

At the end of the last episode of Denpa Onna, they had made a bunch of handicraft model rockets, and were planning to shoot them off at the beach with some creepy man.  He was paying well above the market rate for handicraft model rockets, he must have some sinister motive IMO.  And what happened to Ryuushi’s objection to mixed-gender visits to the beach, anyway?  Is it all okay now because the creepy man counts as adult supervision?  Maybe I’m missing some sort of important context here, or I missed something earlier in the show.  Maybe they’re going with or without her, and so she can’t be left out, in a “race to the bottom” scenario.  (Race to the bikini bottom.)  Maybe we’ll find out by watching episode 8 of Denpa Onna!

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 7

The last episode of Denpa Onna ended on a sort of a cliffhanger.  The various members of the protagonist’s harem had all converged on his house, and his hot aunt had stepped out on a pretext so that they could have their privacy!  I think they were going to battle for him with their cookery?  I dunno how Erio is gonna participate.  I mean, she can summon pizza from the aether, but I’m pretty sure that’s considered cheating.  In fact, I’m not sure there’s any contest Erio could successfully participate in to earn the protagonist’s affection.  A beauty contest, maybe.  I don’t see it personally, but the characters in the show consider her beautiful, and it’s their opinion that counts.  Well, perhaps she’ll surprise me in episode 7 of Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko.

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 6

Of the six shows I’m currently watching, Denpa Onna is the one I’m least excited about by a fair margin. I’ve mentioned this before, but Touwa Erio just leaves me completely cold. I see people across the internet say she’s cute, or more likely “kawaii”, and I sort of tilt my head and narrow my eyes in a gesture of exaggerated skepticism. Well, clearly Shaft have a target audience, and they’re pleasing them, so it’s not my place to complain. And the show’s technically well executed, I have no complaints on that score. And the rest of the characters are fine, some are even great, like the dude’s hot aunt, or his actually cute friend Ryuushi. I wonder what it says about me that I find Ryuushi’s intentional, affected innocence cuter than Erio’s actual, naive innocence.  Maybe it says that behavior that has been optimized to have an effect on others has more of that effect on others than behavior that just sort of purposelessly occurs?  Possibly.  Let’s hope Ryuushi puts on a good show for us in episode 6 of Denpa Onna.

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 5

I don’t remember anything really important happening at the end of the last episode of Denpa Onna. I think they were going out to dinner at Applebees-equivalent to celebrate the protagonist being released from the hospital, or possibly jail. I know this show is based on a light novel series, so I’m thinking probably we are somewhere near a novel boundary. Which means that something important is probably about to happen! I dunno, they lost their “raisin detour” when they got Erio to admit she wasn’t an alien, now it’s just another show about redeeming a hikkikomori. Let’s see if they can rise above that in episode 5 of Denpa Onna.

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 4

Last episode on Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko, we saw the protagonist shake Erio out of her delusions of aliens. Good work, the protagonist! But don’t stop there! Now you have to cure her of her other ridiculous beliefs, like belief in love, or honesty, or moral behavior! Or are you not really concerned with the accuracy of her beliefs at all? You only care about her beliefs inasmuch as they interfere with you getting her into bed, and if the obstacular beliefs happen to be demonstrably false, then so much the better! You can destroy them, and then she will be all yours. I dunno that he’s really engaging in strong play here, though. She had been in a situation where she would only go out wrapped in a futon (acting as burqa), but she was willing to take it off for him. She was, to her, a special existence! He had her in his pocket and threw her away. Maybe somebody needs to cure him of his belief in love, honesty and moral behavior.

… Uh, you should probably disregard everything I just wrote and enjoy the pure, idealized romance of Denpa Onna episode 4.

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 3

Let’s keep up the Denpa Onna pace.  We’re about to see if this show is going to take a turn for the serious and hard-to-watch, although I’m sure Shaft could make it interesting even if it did.  This is nothing like the cool and funny Arakawa Under the Bridge-alike I expected going into the season.  Why can’t we focus more on the aunt?  She seems cool and fun.  And she’s only thirty-nine years old, which if I am doing the math correctly means she had Erio when she was 13?  No wonder she’s so screwed up.  You can choose either salient female referent there, I am not picky.  Rather than resolve our anaphora, let’s watch episode 3 of Denpa Onna!

…thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 2

So I waited a while hoping that someone would come along to do a good job on Denpa Onna.  GotWoot is almost there, they provided a solid list of translator notes at the end of episode 1, but even they didn’t manage to appropriately translate the rapid-fire verbal battle between the dude and his aunt over dinner.  When I can sit down with a Japanese-English dictionary and work out what went wrong with your translation, I begin to wonder why your editor can’t do the same, and I begin to wonder how many errors there were that I didn’t catch, as I have only had a year’s worth of Japanese.  But GotWoot is the best out there for this show, and nobody better seems to be picking it up, and I can live with one or two major errors per episode,  I guess.  So when we left off, the alien chick had just cast off her futon and was going to share a secret with the protagonist.  Let’s see where that goes in episode 2 of Denpa Onna! …thirty minutes pass…

Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko – Episode 1

Well, here I sit again with no internet. Don’t choose Comcast, folks. May as well get some anime watched. I can’t check what is next up, or check any descriptions whatsoever, but I have a show here called “Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko”, which I recall as being a Shaft show about a weird girl? Here goes nothing, or more accurately episode 1 of Denpa Onna to Seishun Otoko.

…thirty minutes pass…