The Grand Search for the Best Anime of the 2000s

[blkmage]

Your bringing up Urobuchi actually reminded me of something that I missed, which is why Urobuchi's involvement excited people at the time. Unlike the names you mentioned, Urobuchi isn't a well-known mainstream writer. In fact, he was a relative unknown among anime fans, since Madoka is his first significant involvement in an anime. Urobuchi's claim to fame is as a visual novel writer, a scene even more niche than anime.

The same could be said for Shinbo and Shaft, who have a fairly devoted cult following. Other than Bakemonogatari, their works weren't exactly chart-toppers, but were more narrowly targeted for otaku. And even Bakemonogatari is a heavily otaku-pandering work that, like Madoka, was able to reach outside of its target audience.

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On pandering, well, for instance, people consider K-ON! emblematic of otaku pandering, and that has close to zero fanservice. It's not strictly necessary for the shows themselves to be full of fanservice to be pandering in this day and age. What's more representative of pandering is the idea of hitting buttons or including enough bits in your show to appeal to the audience. At its core, I'm sure there's a coherent thematic and narrative vision to it, but there's enough stuff here that's been finely tuned to particular sensibilities.

[mechana2015]

Ahh that's what you meant. Maybe you shouldn't have put so much emphasis on it being a magical girl show...

I can see what you mean by it being an otaku targeted show, that's most definitely true, and that it reached beyond that is pretty concrete as well, and also might have been what hurt it in the final polls here. The people that mentioned the characters flatness were quite correct and I do feel that characterization was sacrificed for pandering in some points of the show. This also may be due to this site being the home of a lot of writerly folks for whom the trappings of pandering can be appreciated if done well, but if they sacrifice another aspect of storytelling, people of CAA tend to be less interested.

The other question is if that 'otaku philosopher' target audience I mentioned just happens to be closer to the US fanbase's interests, since I've seen it mentioned many times that a large amount of the fan favorite US shows are late night timeblock shows in japan, targeted to the DVD/BluRay purchasing otaku. Might be something about the US audience that causes more gravitation to shows like this. I honestly hadn't really thought of it as a big otaku show until you mentioned it either, I had considered it an experemental show (like Tutu) that had hit the right notes to be successful in the otaku market rather than the other way around, but then again, Horizon is more what I think of when I think Otaku shows.

[blkmage]

Something like 90% of new stuff airing in a given season now is late night anime. We talk about these shows mostly because almost anything else is literally intended for children. The two broad target audiences for anime are either otaku or children. That's it. Like, K-ON! is a late night anime. noitaminA is a late night timeslot. And so on.

Now, obviously, there's a lot of granularity in what otaku enjoy, but they all fall under BD-purchasing otaku. And if we were suddenly transplanted in Japan, we'd fall under that umbrella.

So about those 'anime philosopher' otaku, I don't think that, as you've defined them, they constitute a large portion of the fanbase in Japan. That's because people who enjoy 'intellectual' anime in Japan also tend to enjoy the typical dreck that western fans associate with pandering. For them, it's not an either-or proposition and the two aren't in opposition.

If you ever get a chance, try reading some interviews with creators who work in this otaku-centric space, like Kinoko Nasu or Urobuchi Gen and others like them. You'll find that they really want to create deep, impactful works and are talking about the themes or significance of some work. And then they'll start talking about this one part of their work where a particular character was just so friggin moe and it was great.

[ClosetOtaku]

I wanted to thank Maokun for running this final contest. I know it can be a thankless job at times. This was fun, and I enjoyed the discussion. I appreciate the time and effort you put into this.

[airichan623]

I wanted to thank Maokun for running this final contest. I know it can be a thankless job at times. This was fun, and I enjoyed the discussion. I appreciate the time and effort you put into this.

hear hear!

[Maokun]

Thanks for the appreciation It was a lot of work but it was actually very fun! After running all these contests, I'm finding myself kind of lost now that they are over. I'd gladly do the 90s but I'm sure we'd get an average of 3 people voting XD

[skreyola]

Me, too. It was nice to come every day for the results.

I dunno... 90s might have good turn-out... and some of the stuff I've been watching is pretty old, so there might be more I've seen in the 90s... but on the other hand, I might not know they came out in the 90s unless someone else nominated them.

Anyway, thanks again for running the contest.

[Neane]

I'd gladly do the 90s but I'm sure we'd get an average of 3 people voting XD

Also add the fact that it will somewhat hard to vote for Evangelion or Revolutionary Girl Utena due to that "Do not discuss" thing.

[KnightOfFive]

Well i really couldn't care less about Utena but yeah, if we cannot discus Eva the whole contrast would be badly handicapped.

[skreyola]

*digs a foxhole*
Here we go...

[Kaori]

Although I wasn't around for the end of this contest, I did enjoy spectating on some of the days I wasn't able to vote. Thank you, Maokun, for running this contest; I imagine it must have taken a lot of work.

[Neane]

Well i really couldn't care less about Utena

[Yuki-Anne]

It might be a huge pain, but for those of us who didn't follow this thread while it was running... 20 pages is a lot to sift through. All I've been able to gather is that the top three ended up being Baccano, FMA:Brotherhood, and Maho Shoujo. Would some amazing person be willing to post a ranking of the anime that were voted on? *puppy dog eyes*

[FllMtl Novelist]

Well because of the way it's set up you can't derive individual rankings, but it'd be easy to give you the top 16 and say where they fell out of the race.

Didn't make it to top 8:
Ouran High School Host Club
Monster
Spice and Wolf
Tenga Toppa Gurren Lagann
Tokyo Godfathers
Durarara!!
Princess Tutu
Mawaru Penguindrum

Didn't make it to top 4:
Summer Wars
Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
Paprika
Spirited Away

Didn't make it to top 2:
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood
The Girl Who Leapt Through Time

Top 2:
Madoka Magica
Baccano!

...And then Baccano! won all of the things.

Is that enough, or did you want titles that were knocked out earlier, too?

[Yuki-Anne]

No, that's great. Thanks so much! I want to catch up on the best of the best anime.

[skreyola]

There were some really great ones that didn't make it into the ladder.