Best Anime of 2010 2: 2011

[Mr. Hat'n'Clogs]

<まどまぎ>

I thought I wasn't going to vote now that my own pick has lost, but Madoka really was a fantastic show and a worthy runner-up against Penguindrum. I've been a little harsh on it in this thread, but it was a fantastic ride and I really did love the entire thing. It also wins points for being original(in spite of the fact that it apparently took a lot of Kamen Rider Ryuki), and I'm extremely happy that it sold as well as it did. If Shaft can make things this good with some regularity, they will be on my must-watch list every season, even though they already are.

[MasterDias]

<まどまぎ>

Well, what can I say? Everything about Madoka was such a great combination; the writing, the animation, the characters, the dialogue. As good as Disappearance was, I have to give the edge to Madoka here. Also, it has to be doing something right if someone like me, who is not especially a huge fan of the magical girl genre or...well...Shinbo's directing style, to like it a lot.

[blkmage]

Once again, CAA speaks, and declares the best anime of 2011 to be



[font="Times New Roman"][SIZE="7"]PUELLA MAGI MADOKA☆MAGICA
魔法少女まどか☆マギカ[/SIZE][/font]

Puella Magi Madoka Magica: 9
The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya: 4

Don't ditch this thread too quickly. Celebrate this victory and the triumph of democracy. Or don't. Because here is where you get a chance to celebrate your highlights of the year. What do you think is the best anime of 2011? The worst? Best/worst OP/ED? Best seiyuu? Best characters? Best music? Most disappointing? Or something else?

Basically, what was anime in 2011 like for you?

Less importantly, I'm not going to be doing this again next year (because it'll be thesis crunch time for me), so if you've ever had questions about the tournament itself, like weird decisions or how it came to be, now's your chance to ask and get an answer.

[Neane]

Best Anime: Mawaru-Penguindrum
Worst Anime: Maria†Holic Alive [Alive utterly sucked and I loved the First Season and I got the manga because of the first season.]
Best OP: Mirai Nikki
Best ED: Dantalian no Shoka

Best Seiyuu: I don't really care about that.
Best characters: Daikichi & Rin [That is all I can think of at this moment.]

And now, I will enjoy 2012 to the fullest.

[Maokun]

Great job blkmage, thanks for making this

[A_Yellow_Dress]

Thank you for running this blkmage!

As for the best series this year.... I would probably still vote Madoka Magica. Then Penguindrum, Usagi Drop, AnoHana and Disappearance for my top 5.

My fave opening: AnoHana (which was surprisingly hard to find the OP on youtube, so excuse the low quality)
My fave ending: Hourou Musuko(Simple animation, I know.... but the song is so pretty.....)

I am limited to what little I have seen.

I think it was a good year for anime... But I only really started getting into airing anime or recently aired anime over the 2011 year. (Didn't watch much for subs). And before that, really I have only been into anime since summer 2010.... so.......

[Atria35]

This was fun!

Favorite anime was Usagi Drop. It may not be groundbreaking or anything like that, but it's a solid show that is far from traditional in terms of storyline, with lovely characters and a terrific story.

Least Favorite- Fractale. Oh, what a mess that was! Nessa kept me going, but overall just terrible.

Favorite OP- I really like Fate/Zero's OP. Really good.
Favorite ED- Tie. I like Hourou Musuko's for the music, and Fate/Zero's for the intensity.

[AnimeGirl]

Aw, Haruhi lost! Oh well. This was fun!!! For me, the best anime was between the Haruhi movie and Steins;Gate. I haven't watched much of 2011's anime, so I can't say much other than that.

[Mr. Hat'n'Clogs]

blkmage, you are awesome and I am ever grateful that you organized this tourney.

2011 was a fantastic year, both personally and on a production front. I got back into anime right around this time last year, with Birdy the Mighty, and I am so deep I hardly believe I could get out now. I caught up on a great deal of things(my MAL was at 45 items when I started Birdy, and is now at 130 as of yesterday) and I got pretty deep into watching things as they air. My favorite anime of the year, as previously mentioned, was easily Mawaru Penguindrum, though the best movie was definitely the second Macross Frontier film. Some other favorite things of the year include Nichijou, Usagi Drop, Fate/Zero, Chihayafuru, and Madoka.

As for some of the other questions, the best character of the year was pretty easily Sheryl Nome in Sayonara no Tsubasa, where she is incredibly awesome. The best OP is another Penguindrum choice, for either of the OPs, though the Madoka and F/Z OPs were also great. As for EDs, I think the best will have to go to Fate/Zero, which has a very awesome ED. Best music was Macross, for obvious reasons, and I can't think of too many shows I was disappointed by, except NO. 6, but that disappointment also got me to watch Xam'd, so I can't even hate the show itself.

I think 2011 was a fantastic year, and it's good to see that three of the biggest hits were Madoka, Tiger and Bunny, and Ano Hana, all of which were original shows. I eagerly await more(and apparently Urubochi is giving us another anime later in the year).

[blkmage]

So I looked through my MAL sorted by date finished and was slightly horrified to find that I'd finished just over 100 entries. This of course doesn't include manga, visual novels, or anime I hadn't finished yet. Because seriously, that's a lot.

The other day on twitter, my timeline was filled with people giving their top ten for the year. Mine is as follows (with explanations that obviously weren't included in the original tweet).

10. The iDOLM@STER, which started like I expected, but quickly surpassed my expectations to be genuinely enjoyable. I really wanted to drop this show when I first started it, but now I feel bad for lampooning iM@S over the last few years.

9. Nichijou, which is the latest evolution of the four panel gag genre and which Kyoto Animation has adapted to animation absurdly well.

8. Wandering Son, which is about serious business but retains a light feel to it. I can't stress enough how much you should definitely read the manga if you enjoyed this anime.

7. Steins;Gate, which is a great time travel story on its own, but augments internet mythology and 2ch board culture extremely well.

6. Fate/zero, which is a fantastic light novel and a fantastic prequel for the Fate/stay night visual novel.

5. Natsume Yuujinchou San, which is the nicest.

4. Bunny Drop, which was a great adaptation of an adorable manga.

3. Star Driver, which is an awesome mecha anime that pilfers some great ideas from Utena.

2. Mawaru Penguindrum, which is an awesome Utena-esque anime that has penguins in it.

1. Madoka Magica for obvious reasons.

[Vii]

[color="PaleGreen"][SIZE="3"]Thanks for hosting this tournament blkmage![/SIZE][/color]

[TheSubtleDoctor]

You da man, blkmage.

2011 was a really good year. I think it may have been slightly better than the past couple of years, so I'm optimistic for what's coming down the pike in 2012.

Top Five of the Year

Honorable Mention: DD Hokuto no Ken
5. Tiger and Bunny
4. Chihayafuru
3. Madoka
2. Penguindrum
1. Macross Frontier: Wings of Goodbye (Sayonara no Tsubasa)

The worst show I've seen was defo Fractale with Sacred Seven and C distant runners up. Those shows are all terrible, but Fractale was an utter mess, and what puts it over the top is its creator's insistence that it is us who don't understand its complexities.

Sheryl Nome emerges as the clear winner for me in terms of a standout character for this year. She is simply amazing, and one of the strongest, if not the strongest, female character I've seen in anime. I have already gushed about her elsewhere.

Fate/Zero had some fantastic seiyuu.

My favorite pieces of music from anime this year are:

Penguindrum - DEAR FUTURE [ED 1] (sorry that this isn't the actual ED, couldn't locate it)
Penguindrum - Rock Over Japan
Wings of Goodbye - NIJI IRO KUMA KUMA
Wings of Goodbye - Seikan Hikou (LIVE in Alcatraz) (THIS SCENE!)
Wings of Goodbye - End of Triangle

[blkmage]

Penguindrum has the best music of the year solely because of the Triple H album. DEAR FUTURE and the full seven minute versions of the two Etsuko Yakushimaru OPs are also amazing.

[FllMtl Novelist]

[SIZE="1"](Blah, I've taken so long to post. D: I blame holidays and all the tasks that built up while I partied and was a general slob.)[/SIZE]

Good for Madoka. That was a fantastic anime and I really enjoyed it. (I guess since it put up such a fight, I should add the Haruhi Suzumiya franchise to my "check out someday" list.)

My 2011 is probably radically different from everyone else's here, since I didn't watch much anime online until June, and didn't start watching shows as they came out until much later (I think I started with Penguindrum, partway through the first cours). As such I didn't see a whole lot of anime that aired during 2011, but everything I saw I liked to some degree at least. (Well, I didn't like Nichijou at first because it hit me as extremely, intolerably cutesy, but since for various reasons I've been giving it another go I wonder how I let myself be so dumb.)

Favorite '11 anime is Penguindrum, which I like just a hair more than Madoka. Least favorite is now probably SKET Dance, which isn't to say it was actually 'bad'.

Favorite character would have to be (surprise) Shouma Takakura, followed by Homura Akemi. Madoka's mom and Natsume Takashi get honorable mentions. Maybe Funky Boy from Redline, too. I don't know why, but I really liked that strange little guy.

Penguindrum had the best music. All the time. I listened to the last five or ten minutes of episode 20 (since I my home internet prevents me from somehow finding a place to listen to that music without the dialogue) over and over until my sister made me stop.

Favorite OP is probably "Boys Come Back to Me" (or whatever the Japanese title I'm forgetting is), from Penguindrum. Favorite ED is either one of the Triple-H pieces, or Madoka's "Magia".

I don't really have any profound, sweeping statements to make for 2011 overall since not only did I acquire most of my knowledge just this past year, I only started learning it halfway through 2011. (I know names to go with some anime now, like Urobuchi Gen and Ikuhara and Yuasa and Hosada! And what a 'cours' is! And other stuff!)

It was a joy to participate in the tournament, though. Thanks again for setting this up, Blkmage!

[MomentOfInertia]

Thanks for managing this Blkmage.

[Neane]

Thanks blkmage for creating this thread and leading it. It was fun!