Anime you hate but everyone seems to like?

[Ashiyama]

As of right now there are only three I can think of: Bleach, One Piece, and Naruto.

These shows I know of and have seen (to an extent). I'll start with Naruto (including Shippuden); its a great concept, good show up to a point. With my brand of otakudom rooted in such shows like DBZ I'm not very fond of the action/drama series that goes on, and on and on and on. There's a joke about DBZ that goes like this: "How many Super Saiyans does it take to screw in a lightbulb? 1, but it takes seven episodes to do it." Stretching out the battles/confrontations for several episodes just annoys the crap out of me. I easily dealt with it, though was still annoyed, during the first Naruto series but once I got into the first arc of the Shippuden series I pretty much had enough. The plot took forever to really get going and by the start of the second arc I was fed up with the pace and the sporadic viewpoints. After that, I read up on the series and the manga to find out what happens in the end. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the Naruto characters and much of its in-world history and character development. But the filler arcs and back-to-back episodes for one fight could only be tolerated for so long by a DBZ veteran (I watched every rerun of each episode while waiting for each new batch of translated episodes on Toonami).

Next is Bleach. Another well done anime show, again based on a manga like Naruto. And again, a very long one at that. Nothing wrong with that, but when you translate it into a television show it just wears a viewer out. I really loved the concept behind the initial plot when the show first starts, leading up to the arc where Ichigo goes to the Soul Society to rescue Rukia. But that's the arc that did it in for me. And once more this has to do with my teen years watching DBZ... I can only take multiple episodes for the same fight/battle so much. And even then, Bleach made some of them too complex or so convoluted from my point of view that it was no longer worth watching or even trying to get back into after missing the entire arc after Rukia got rescued. I enjoy the animation and really liked the jokes and silliness in the first arc but then the introduction of SO MANY characters (i.e. the 13 Divisions) and groups of characters like the Espada just really ruins it for someone like me. There's too much to process. With Bleach my distaste also stems from the fact that so many people like characters I can't imagine any reason to be a fan of, emulate, or admire because of how deplorable they are to me (or convoluted, as with some characters in Naruto).

Finally, there's One Piece. I won't deny that there is a part of me that dislikes this show because its seems to be liked by "everyone else" (as with Bleach). I watched the first arc of this show as well. What killed it for me, really, was the poor/childish dubbing of the characters, the dumbing down of the plot, and the ridiculous (and Americanized) theme song. The final killing blow was the resulting new dub that replaced it. My number one reason, like the last two shows mentioned, is the long and drawn-out fight scenes and battles. No doubt this show, like Naruto, has plenty of themes I can admire and be a fan of but I ain't interested in sitting through something I haven't watched and just being forced to wait and wait and wait before finding out what was anticipated all along. And I'm pretty good at anticipating/predicting certain outcomes (not that I'm bragging). However, you will quite often see me sitting down watching a One Piece amv to a great song (i.e. "Sail On" by Masterplan).

Granted, if you sit me down in a room with a bunch of other otaku (perhaps people who really enjoy these shows and wanna share their passion and fandom with others such as myself) then yeah I'll watch them, and may even enjoy them. And I won't deny that there's a really good chance that I'd end up liking them afterwards. I just ain't interested in watching them (by myself) and putting up with the things shows like these make me endure just to see if the hero comes out on top. Its frustrating! But hey, to each their own, right? ^_^

And I won't lie, even though I don't watch these shows, I know of them fairly well and can recognize almost any cosplay or character.

[Dhomochevsky]

There is only one way to enjoy this kind of show:

You stack up on unwatched episodes until you have at least 50 of them (or one complete arc, if you bothered to keep track of that).
Then you skip the OP, ED, previous episode recap and any kind of recycling of old material while watching. This will cut down a typical episode length to about 10 minutes.
Also don't hesitate to skip filler episodes as soon as you feel a slight attack of boredom.

By doing this, you might transform them into decent shows, if you like that genre to begin with.

[Sheba]

I need to get this one off my chest, so here I'll say it.

Dog Days.

As a long time fan of the fantasy genre, I have become increasingly demanding toward that genre. And know what? Dog Days is that fantasy fanfic written by a 12 years old who just watched The Gummi Bears and decided to pour some Squarenix brand of fantasy in here.

It's saccharine to the point I am puking from my eyes, my ears and my nostrils. It screams naive to the point of inducing seizures. It's so unambitious that it makes K-On look like Cecile B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments. It trivialize the concept of war WORSE than Meyer did it with vampirism. I mean, damn, if there was one plot device that showcase the worst and the best of the humankind, it is war. And here we have it turned into a fucking Takeshi Castle game.
The characters may be salvageable, but the lack of ambition (I repeat), gravitas, lack of consequences for a lot of things is a crime against storytelling.

I can enjoy shows with people with animal ears, I thought Utawarerumono delivered with a likeable lead and support cast, as well as an intriguing world and story. I can enjoy shows where there are no war or no death, I loved Spice & Wolf. I grew up with this, was nurtured with that, and I have been able to enjoy it. But I just cannot like Dog Days, and the noise around it makes me all the more irritable because I see no merits in it.

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by Sheba

I need to get this one off my chest, so here I'll say it.

Dog Days.

As a long time fan of the fantasy genre, I have become increasingly demanding toward that genre. And know what? Dog Days is that fantasy fanfic written by a 12 years old who just watched The Gummi Bears and decided to pour some Squarenix brand of fantasy in here.

It's saccharine to the point I am puking from my eyes, my ears and my nostrils. It screams naive to the point of inducing seizures. It's so unambitious that it makes K-On look like Cecile B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments. It trivialize the concept of war WORSE than Meyer did it with vampirism. I mean, damn, if there was one plot device that showcase the worst and the best of the humankind, it is war. And here we have it turned into a fucking Takeshi Castle game.
The characters may be salvageable, but the lack of ambition (I repeat), gravitas, lack of consequences for a lot of things is a crime against storytelling.

I can enjoy shows with people with animal ears, I thought Utawarerumono delivered with a likeable lead and support cast, as well as an intriguing world and story. I can enjoy shows where there are no war or no death, I loved Spice & Wolf. I grew up with this, was nurtured with that, and I have been able to enjoy it. But I just cannot like Dog Days, and the noise around it makes me all the more irritable because I see no merits in it.

Hmm, it is hard to come across a good sci-fi or fantasy these days.

Although I think Tsuzuki is a mediocre writer who really hasn't done anything remotely considered acceptable writing for quite a few years, I'm not sure Dog Days is really that popular. It did start out not too badly, with the super enthusiastic leads that the writer seems to like so much but dissolved into well, dog poop I guess.

[Sheba]

I had the misfortune to stumble upon that one girl's transformation scene. That was much more a violation of my senses than every QUALITY moments of Total Eclipse put together. And God knows that those are terrible and rage-inducing.

[sudolicious]

Originally Posted by Sheba

Spoiler for quote:

I need to get this one off my chest, so here I'll say it.

Dog Days.

As a long time fan of the fantasy genre, I have become increasingly demanding toward that genre. And know what? Dog Days is that fantasy fanfic written by a 12 years old who just watched The Gummi Bears and decided to pour some Squarenix brand of fantasy in here.

It's saccharine to the point I am puking from my eyes, my ears and my nostrils. It screams naive to the point of inducing seizures. It's so unambitious that it makes K-On look like Cecile B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments. It trivialize the concept of war WORSE than Meyer did it with vampirism. I mean, damn, if there was one plot device that showcase the worst and the best of the humankind, it is war. And here we have it turned into a fucking Takeshi Castle game.
The characters may be salvageable, but the lack of ambition (I repeat), gravitas, lack of consequences for a lot of things is a crime against storytelling.

I can enjoy shows with people with animal ears, I thought Utawarerumono delivered with a likeable lead and support cast, as well as an intriguing world and story. I can enjoy shows where there are no war or no death, I loved Spice & Wolf. I grew up with this, was nurtured with that, and I have been able to enjoy it. But I just cannot like Dog Days, and the noise around it makes me all the more irritable because I see no merits in it.

Problem with Dog Days isn't the writing per se, the setting is just ridiculously stupid to begin with. But that's no valid reason to hate on an anime imo, lots of Anime - no - lots of fictional works are based on settings that may seem off to the viewer at first. It's up to you to either constantly rant about how stupid the show is or to accept the setting and enjoy it. The show in itself is consistent after all and the general plot behind it isn't worse than with a lot of other shows, especially fantasy ones. I could understand hating the MC though, he almost seems like a parody.

That being said, I hated season 1. I had to force myself through every episode, there were like 5 enjoyable moments overall. Season 2 on the other hand is simply amazing. I don't know if it's because of the new director or something else, but it's highly enjoyable now. The OP, and especially the ED, got a great lot better too.


tt: There are a lot of popular shows I highly dislike, but one that I thought I would enjoy was Ika Musume. I'm a sucker for cute girls doing cute things and would watch anything based around that, especially if they're DFC/Lolis, but this show really bored me to death.
The humor wasn't just my cup of tea I guess and most of the cast was pretty annoying as well - apart from Ika herself maybe. But she alone doesn't justify watching the whole show for me, especially since I think she's not that great of a character to begin with.

[Vexx]

A *lot* of anime series have:
1) Great plot premise.
2) Great character design.
3) Lousy, incomplete, dysfunctional story that shows producers simply don't know how to execute, integrate plot threads, do story boarding, etc.

I get more angry at those than I do series that I simply know at the outset aren't going to fly for me. But ya gotta wade through those to find the occasional gem.

[paratroid]

For me there's 2: Gurren Lagann and Fate/Stay Night. I'd watched Diebuster (Gunbuster 2) and really liked it so I thought I'd enjoy Gurren Lagann, or at least somewhat like it... It really became a chore to watch so I stopped.

However I kept on watching Fate/Stay Night till the end. Literally everyone who had something to say about it said it was really good, amazing story, amazing characters etc. I loved the character designs (apart from Shirou, he really, REALLY annoyed me with his attitude and how he called Saber in that desperate voice of his UGH!) and the fight scenes were cool, but that was it for me. I found the story extremely bland and the ending unfulfilling. It felt like Fate/Stay Night had the potential to be good, but for me it fell extremely short.

[Archon_Wing]

Originally Posted by paratroid

It felt like Fate/Stay Night had the potential to be good, but for me it fell extremely short.

From what I gathered, the potential was already realized, however, the failure of a studio didn't adapt it properly, and as a result the anime gets complained about a lot by VN readers.

Oh, and don't watch the movie. It's trash.

Watch Fate/Zero for how it should have been.

[Obelisk ze Tormentor]

Just wanna let this off my chest.

Can’t say I hate the story or the anime in its entirety, but I just plain don’t like the concept of the “Mystic Eyes of Death Perception” in Kara no Kyoukai. I mean, an eye that can see the “death of things” is still acceptable to some extend. But, to be able to destroy almost anything by only stabbing it once in a certain spot by regular knife, swords, ruler is just plain ridiculous. To add insult to injury, stabbing the “death-dot” can even destroy the “concept of things”. In other words, it can destroy souls and bypass reincarnation. What? Seriously? And that can be done with one stab to the victim using ordinary weapon and ordinary body (not counting the eyes)? It doesn’t add up imo.

I love Fate series (the VN, LN, anime, etc), but I gotta admit that I plain don’t like some concept in Nasuverse. The main reason is, some of those concept feels really convoluted just because. It’s funny considering I can easily accept all the “death rules” in Death Note.

Saying this, I might got neg-repped by the Nasu fans. But hey, this is a thread to express your opinion and everybody can read the thread title, right?

[stormtrooper]

Originally Posted by NK_500

Another latest addition: Angel Beats

Maybe I'm too early to say this but I just don't see what makes it great as most people said. I think most people who loved it were fooled by its "rebellion against God and His angels" theme.

More like wasted potential. Art was nice and so is the music. The one that held this back is the story. There are still many questions left unanswered. There are still things left unexplained. To be honest I like the setup of rebellion against God and the angels.

I didn't get to see the past lives of the other members to know their motivation of joining the battlefront. The character development was hardly to be seen. I mean, if it happened, it might as well be off screen. The focal point is the rebellion and overcoming regrets. Maybe it's the lack of episodes and the original source material was done after the anime. So yeah, my sentiments.

[Fuyuno]

Project K @ K

Maybe not in English-speaking countries but in my country it much like a zombie apocalypse scenario except the zombies are K fanboys and fangirls(though mostly fangirls as they are the target audiences of the show). I'm also disappointed that it already plague Animesuki as well although this can be explained that some of the Southeast Asian members bragging about it.

I also hate when people categorize this show as "shounen" even it is clear who the target audience is. It also had too many bishies and lack of decent female characters.

[aly_angelflight]

Seto no Hanayome. The comedy fell down to the bottom of a deep sea trench very quickly, and I couldn't bring myself to continue watching it. Only thing I ever really did like about it was the music...

[KleenexGhost]

While but I didn't hate it, more like I didn't see what the big deal was, I didn't really care for Akira. I've seen three times. First time just stumbled across it while it was at the halfway point while channel surfing. Second time watched the whole thing still wasn't digging it. (Note first two times I went into it blind.) Third time was after I heard friends and reviews that were high on it, so I tried it again. Still didn't like it, but I respect the film for what it did. Don't hate it, but not in love with it.

Please don't hate me.

[Ichuki]

Sword Art Online its premise was interesting but I felt like it was executed awful and the side characters seemed more interesting than the main characters and Rosario Vampire and for that one let's just say it wasn't faithful to the manga.

[GDiddy]

Oh...I gots lots:

Akira,Ghost in the Shell: I fell asleep when I tried to watch these movies. Yet, I loved GitS TV series

Evangelion I despise this show so, so, SO much to the point where I actually got into an argument with someone about it years ago in a Suncoast. I got accused of 'HOW DARE YOU DISLIKE EVANGELION? YOU CALL YOURSELF AN ANIME FAN???"

Fate Stay Night I got thru most of it, but I hated Shiro to the point where I wanted him to die. Yet, I love Fate/Zero and even own the movie because...well, I like Rin and Archer the most.

One Piece: I actually do like OP, but I"m so tired of people telling me that Oda is the BESTEST WRITER EVER AND IS THE GOD OF MANGA AND EVERYONE ELSE SUXXXXXXXXXXXX. OP is well-written(at least from what I've seen) and the art is....unique....but it's not the greatest thing ever either.

[Traece]

FLCL. No matter how many times I watch FLCL I just can't find likable things. I feel like they're trying to both be serious and have a plot, but also be random and have all kinds of goofy and unexpected stuff happen. Honestly though, you can't do both. You can't try and skirt a line between being serious and being random. It felt to me like they were trying to run a 50/50 split, and it's just distracting. I also feel like a lot of the jokes and humor are just pointless as well. All of the dirty humor and the perverted jokes were almost too serious and thus kind of creepy. I feel like they forgot that a joke isn't a good joke if you hear or see it and can easily assume it to be completely true.

Also, a lot of people have been recommending Valkyria Chronicles lately. Valkyria Chronicles is the worst anime port I have ever seen in my life. It's one of the few anime that I couldn't finish because it just did no justice to the game whatsoever. The way it dramatized situations that were actually very nice and sweet was just despicable to me. The scene in the forest with the wounded soldier was where I just lost it. They turned a great and heartwarming scene into a dramatic and even somewhat unrealistic pile of crap. No. Just, no. Play the game. It's a fantastic game, and it has a better story than most things.

[Midnight Commander]

Originally Posted by Ashiyama

As of right now there are only three I can think of: Bleach, One Piece, and Naruto.

These shows I know of and have seen (to an extent). I'll start with Naruto (including Shippuden); its a great concept, good show up to a point. With my brand of otakudom rooted in such shows like DBZ I'm not very fond of the action/drama series that goes on, and on and on and on. There's a joke about DBZ that goes like this: "How many Super Saiyans does it take to screw in a lightbulb? 1, but it takes seven episodes to do it." Stretching out the battles/confrontations for several episodes just annoys the crap out of me. I easily dealt with it, though was still annoyed, during the first Naruto series but once I got into the first arc of the Shippuden series I pretty much had enough. The plot took forever to really get going and by the start of the second arc I was fed up with the pace and the sporadic viewpoints. After that, I read up on the series and the manga to find out what happens in the end. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the Naruto characters and much of its in-world history and character development. But the filler arcs and back-to-back episodes for one fight could only be tolerated for so long by a DBZ veteran (I watched every rerun of each episode while waiting for each new batch of translated episodes on Toonami).

This really resonated with me. I also really dislike anime and manga series that try to stretch everything out; and most of the time its just incredibly obvious as if the author simply doesn't care. I simply stopped watching the anime because of the filler episdoes, I mean it sometimes seems like they don't even try to make them entertaining; I only tune in to see fights or parts I am interested in : /

Though I still read the manga, the biggest problem I would say I have with Naruto is that it follows the shounen theme, which I find really annoying, and I'm honestly begining to despise. Its very annoying to read endless Naruto fan service and contrived plot developments that magically end up in his favor while the many other interesting characters in the story are simply there to display how strong he is. I don't see why the gap between his and his friends abilities/strength has to be as wide as a canyon; to me it makes things less interesting.

I first got into anime by watching anime movies like Ninja Scroll and Crying Freeman. Back then, there were many more anime movies being released than at present. Now, everything seems to be a series. I much rather anime movies because the artwork and animation are usually far superior, and you don't get these horribly stretched-out, substanceless episodes we are bombarded with to keep you trailing along like some horse chasing a carrot.

[SPARTAN 119]

Originally Posted by Obelisk ze Tormentor

Just wanna let this off my chest.

Can’t say I hate the story or the anime in its entirety, but I just plain don’t like the concept of the “Mystic Eyes of Death Perception” in Kara no Kyoukai. I mean, an eye that can see the “death of things” is still acceptable to some extend. But, to be able to destroy almost anything by only stabbing it once in a certain spot by regular knife, swords, ruler is just plain ridiculous. To add insult to injury, stabbing the “death-dot” can even destroy the “concept of things”. In other words, it can destroy souls and bypass reincarnation. What? Seriously? And that can be done with one stab to the victim using ordinary weapon and ordinary body (not counting the eyes)? It doesn’t add up imo.

Not to get into an argument here, but I find Kara No Kyoukai to be a much more interesting series than the other Nasuverse series precisely because Shiki is not stupidly overpowered on a Dragonball-level. Shiki's fights seem more exciting simply because there is a sense of danger. She is not immune to bullets, knives or other weapons (granted we never see her get shot with a gun, but I think we can assuming it would hurt her) etc. To put it in the words of Shirou of F/SN, she dies if she is killed.

Originally Posted by Ichuki

Sword Art Online its premise was interesting but I felt like it was executed awful and the side characters seemed more interesting than the main characters.

I'm not saying I hated SAO, but Ichuki hit the nail on the head here. The side characters are much more interesting than the protagonist or the main love interest. In particular, Sinon of the Phantom Bullet arc of the LN is a much more interesting character than Kirito will ever be (to say any more would entail spoilers).

[erneiz_hyde]

Originally Posted by Obelisk ze Tormentor

I love Fate series (the VN, LN, anime, etc), but I gotta admit that I plain don’t like some concept in Nasuverse. The main reason is, some of those concept feels really convoluted just because. It’s funny considering I can easily accept all the “death rules” in Death Note.

It's understandable. Nasuverse is chock full with convoluted, deeply chuu2 concepts which is probably hard to appreciate if you don't have that chuu2 switch on yourself. Death Note is indeed chuu2 to a degree, but tame compared to that of Nasuverse.