Overall 2015 was a very good year for anime as there was lots of shows that I found enjoyable and more importantly, the amount of whiny, weak, wuss main characters were kept to a minimum.

To be on this list means that I fully finished the show, none of this watch half way and still rank it high bullshit because of hive mind and popular opinion, I don’t do that. Sure there is a lot of great shows that I missed or didn’t finish yet but the fact that I didn’t finish them yet means that it was not worthy of my immediate attention, which is unfortunate, but I only have so much time.

The criteria for mai ranking is based on a variety of factors which I deem of importance such as: quality of animation, character design, waifu material, levels of epic manliness, opening introduction sequence, effect on popular anime culture, long term fandom, artsy quality, meta jokes, original concept, watch-ability, background history etc.

Shows that might have started in 2014 but finished in 2015 will be counted as a 2015 show. 2 Lists, one for Top Mini Shows and Top Full Shows.

Top Mini Shows (10minutes or less):

6. Bikini Warriors

As a mini show in association with Hobby Japan and various other figure manufactures, the purpose of this anime is to basically create an excuse to design some girls in bikini’s with weapons and sell figures. For what it is, it does a pretty good job; mildly funny with obvious fan service and good character designs about the fantasy/RPG cliche that has been done to death. Wished it was longer though.

5. Ani Tore! EX

This mini show is basically an excuse to draw cute girls in usual moe character archetypes and have them exercise and position themselves in mildly erotic/weird poses and talk about girly stupid random stuff. Not bad. They have a pretty good ending song and the animation and characters are pretty attractive. One of mai biggest complaints midway was when they started dancing in groups and shit using very poor 3d cg, it just looked plain stiff and bad. Luckily near the end they didn’t use it anymore.

4. Wakaba Girl

Mini show about rich girl who is in a normal school because she is dumb. Pretty standard slice of life fare but it was done fairly well. All of Wakaba’s friends are colorful (literally) and provided enough mildly entertaining jokes and daily ho-hums to get me through this without much complaint or improvement other than I wished it was longer. Good stuff, nice ending.

3. Komori-san wa Kotowarenai!

Tall girl with big boobs that can’t refuse to help people; this is good. I really like Komori’s design and uniform design, nice touch with the arm selves and bright pink-blackish thigh-highs (not pictured). Her friends provide a good lazy ass bitch contrast too, which makes it funny. Once again, I really wish this was longer, I think they could have enough material although no doubt original material is probably a 4-koma or something. Nice ending song.

2. Hackadoll the Animation

I honestly wasn’t expecting much out of this mini show but it turned out a lot more entertaining than expected. All 3(4) hackadoll characters are well designed and remind me kinda of like vocaloids which is good and have arch-typical humorous personalities. The best part of the show is that fact that it is aware of the popular trends/cliches of anime and pretty much try to parody all of them. Mai favorite being from an episode where they parody top anime 2015 contender, Shirobako, pretty damn well (pictured above). Great show.

1. Wakakao Zake

Basically a show about a women going and eating at bars and izakaya alone and talking about how good the food is. Sounds good to me and unique enough to rank 1. Man this should be longer, it’s so relaxing and chill I watched each 2-minute episode like 5 times. Fuck.

Top Full Shows:

21. Young Black Jack

I don’t think the original Black Jack was supposed to be this handsome or mildly gay but this show certainly is both. Disregarding Black Jack’s modern good looks, this was a fairly entertaining show where I learned that the system is bullshit and you should always go for money because that’s what really matters and if it helps people, then that’s just a bonus. Wait what? Yea, I’m not really entirely sure what the purpose of this show was other than to make Black Jack younger and show him getting pro and surgeon and shit but yea, that’s what it is I guess. Good enough.

20. Denpa Kyoushi

I considered at one point dropping this show because the quality of the animation drastically decreased around like what…episode 4 or 5? Not sure but the character started looking really derp and shit but then I realized, I actually like watching bad animation because it’s so jokes and laughable; so I continued. I was rewarded with gloriously derp animation and faces so I was entertained. The show and story itself is kind of episodic with a larger story at play which is not bad and the main guy, the “Ultimate Teacher” was voiced by a voice actor I liked so I continued. Decent Fun. Fucking “Options”.

19. Assassination Classroom

This show was alright, with nice good lessons in life and the such and moderately interesting plans to kill the main alien teacher. The first opening was good but the second was kind of lazy since they just reused footage. As from my understanding, this is going to be a long running show since I see that another season is coming up so yea, I’ll see if I can keep up with it. Moderate funny, ok action, decent character designs, good concept. Alright.

18. Joukamachi no Dandelion

This show started out kind of slow, like they had to introduce all of the main girl’s royal family and dedicate like half an episode or so to each showing off their powers and such but aside from the slow start was enjoyable to watch. Not the greatest of anything by any means but the animation quality was solid and character designs are good. Mild funny but at times gets a bit too serious than what i would expect for a semi-slice of life show. Solid.

17. Ranpo Kitan – Game of Laplace

Ranpo Kitan started off really strong but as the show went on it’s power weakened and it’s plot lines became somewhat predictable and more bullshit/bait. The introduction op and song is really cool and unique, very artsy and hipster, good shit. It’s kind of funny how the main guy is such a girly pretty boy easily mistaken for a girl and the show makes good use of it many a time, even giving him a useless gay bro. Pro detective guy kind of one dimensional and could have been fleshed out much more. Animation pretty good and concept good but I think there was a few missteps in pacing and character development which prevent it from being great. They seem to solve murders just way to easy… still pretty good.

16. OverLord

Being based off a light novel I already knew from the get go that probably nothing would be resolved in this show and I was right, basically nothing was resolved. With that said, I have to give lots of points to this show for it’s main character, Lord Momoga or whatever he calls himself for being a skull wizard and not being a total wuss. The characters are all very enjoyable but I thought the pacing was horrendous, so slow; like 80% of the show can be summed up with “Hmm…so that’s how it is in this world. Gotta prepare cause I don’t wanna get owned” or some shit like that. The character designs were alright but could have been done much better. For instance,  the image above is actually an official illustration used for the light novel and promotional material; like fuck, just look at this shit, so epic and stylized. While the whole “yo the game is real world” thing has been done to death, Overlord pulls it off decently to be pretty entertaining. Opening sequence has hype song too.

15. Death Parade

Pictured above is the main character of Death Parade, Ginko I mean Decim, one of several other bartender kind of ghost people which passes judgement to those who have died in the afterlife. Other than obvious similarities with many other white haired guys, the character designs are pretty decent and the concept is very good. While the show has ended, more of this show can be made if the demand calls for it due to it’s somewhat episodic nature and no lack of sad death stories that can be told. It’s basically the new Jigoku Shoujo which I watched a lot of back in the day and enjoyed. The ending was good enough but leaves a lot more to be desired, maybe S2? The opening sequence is really fun and has a good hype song despite the actual premise of the show; serious moral/life choices being analyzed. Good show.

14. Gakkou Gurashi!

Top headfake moe slice of life show of the year no doubt. Wins hands down in the category of “character most likely to have a mental disability” department from me; however, because they are still cute girls in a post-apocalyptic world, still good waifu potential here. Basically, this show is a master of the oh shit and oh man moments where you are not sure what is going to happen and it kind of makes you a bit scared of watching the next episode because you knoe; your waifu could be dead or worse. Amazingly done introduction headfake sequence and song, good animation/character design and solid slice of life elements with moe girls, intense thriller moments. Best headfake show of the year.

13. Sore ga Seiyuu!

I wasn’t sure what to expect from a show about the lives of voice actors, the concept was good but there was always a possibility of failing for a variety of reasons. Luckily, it didn’t’ fail and turned out pretty good, solid animation, ok character designs and a great array of cameo anime version of real life popular voice actors, which is why you would watch this anyways. One of my problems with this show is that the main girl kind of sucks, basically it’s a story about her trying to survive in the seiyuu business but well, she does kind of suck compared to her 2 other main friends. Other than that, it has a really nice opening and ending song and moderately funny slice of life moment. Not the best take it easy out there, but the pull of it being about voice actors is the major plus.

12.THE iDOLM@STER CINDERELLA GIRLS

I never really got into the original Idolmaster franchise, I knew of it but just ignored it, mainly because I didn’t like the way the girls looked. For Cinderella girls, I thought all of the girls were cute so I decided to check it out. What I got in return was a great show with excellent animation, beautiful character designs and an actual story filled with IDOL DRAMA and some slice of life. While the main thing you get from this is IDOL DRAMA and cute anime girls singing and dancing, you also get one of the most hardcore serious/badass casual male characters, Producer. Man, Producer is so chill, always getting into trouble with the police because people report him for thinking he’s a Yakuza or pimp when trying to recruit the girls, so jokes. What’s even more jokes is his reasoning when all of the girls ask him why did you want to recruit them to be an idol; his answer: “Your Smile™”. Fuckkkkk so jokes. 60% fun take it easy, 40% hardcore IDOL DRAMA but I am glad at how the show ended, with the main girl having her problems resolved. Good Idol shit.

11. Gochuumon wa Usagi Desu ka S2

Second season of Is the Order a Rabbit? continues with the hijinks of take it easy life in a small ass European looking/Japanese town that doesn’t really exist. More of the same good slice of life moments and cute anime girl’s doing cute things, good shit. This season is even better than the first because they introduce more characters and backstory, such as Chino’s school friends, Cocoa’s Sister/Mother/family bakery, Rize’s rich military father and many more, meaning many more tales of take it easy stories to be expanded on in future material/sequels. This anime always has guest art at the end of each episode, for instance, the above image is by yaegashi nan, one of several illustrators responsible for the Senran Kagura (aka Boob Ninjas) game/media franchise. Excellent coffee slice of life.

10. Prison School

Prison—–School; is a fucking hardcore jokes perversion anime that pulls no punches in it’s intensity with lewd hyperbole that gets more stronger and stronger with each passing episode. Just from the get go you are thrown into a world full of tits and ass and intense serious faces such as the one pictured above, absolutely hilarious for what it is. The main guy, while a verified wuss, get’s his shit together and becomes a respectable hero for himself and the rest of the guys locked in the Prison School, but if there is one guy that must be named as a Savior, it has to be Gakuto, fuck; the things that this man has done for his people and his beliefs, he’s basically Jesus. Aside for the guys themselves, which are all very entertaining with their own weird quirks, the 3-4 main girls part of the underground student counsil are all very watchable and attractive, in a masochist kind of way. Best part is that the story isn’t over and there is bound to continue for a second season sometime in the future. Excellent animation and character design, excellent pacing and story/concept. So jokes, so intense, good shit.

9. Hello!! Kiniro Mosaic

Top anime about English speaking Japanese girls that loves England/Japan maintains it’s place as the best show to watch for some seriously good slice of life content with the added bonus of occasional use of English words. The second season of Kiniro Mosaic continues the legacy with further backstory for the 4 main girls’s with additional characters added such as another female teacher and Karen’s other school friends. While the intro sequence and song wasn’t as good as the first season, what really won me over some of the other slice of life anime mentioned previously was one of the episodes where a good chunk of the episode Karen and Alice only speak in English; which is a pretty impressive watching experience and you actually get to hear Nao Toyama and Manami Tanaka speak in full sentences, not just the usual one liners that you usually hear. Excellent British slice of life.

8. Non Non Biyori Repeat

Return of the King, King of slice of life, top show about nothing, Seinfeld anime re-incarnate, call it what you want but Non Non Biyori delivers what it does best, slice of life living in the country. I didn’t expect the second season to take place in the same timeframe as the original, which means there is slight overlap of content and story but from different character perspectives. The level of artsy hipster quality and nothingness is elevated to new levels but also provides new backstory for Candy Store and focuses more on Renge instead of Hotaru, which is cool. I dunno what to say, this is the best literal defination of slice of life anime, the perfect base example which all strive for. Excellent country slice of life.

7. Koufuku Graffiti

This show is so good. Why is it so good? Fucking slice of life show about cooking and eating food. Nuff said. The niche level of this show is so high I can’t believe it actually exists. We got cute girls, we good cooking, we got eating, we got art school, we got nostalgia grandma moments, we got archetype moe characters, we got funny moments, we got forever alone moments, we got apartment fat ass eating alone moments, waifu moments, drama no friends moments, festival moments, winter moments, summer moments etc the list goes on. All of the 3 main girls are very likable and verifiable waifus in their own rights. The show does a very good job at drawing food and the moments when the girls eat, going into a more realistic style of art with lips and normal proportions. The opening sequence is excellent with a very catchy song and the ending song it great as well, very cute. Excellent food slice of life.

6. Himouto! Umaru-chan

Himouto is one of those shows which panders to it’s target demographic, and does it extremely well. I wouldn’t call it a full on slice of life show but a hybrid with harem imouto elements similar to Oreimo and others of that vein but I find the characters far more likable and funny than the former. The titular main character, Umaru is the typical perfect girl char but goes insane chibi lazy bitch otaku personality when at home, playing games, watching anime, collecting stuff; something I think everyone experiences to some degree which is very amusing. Her big brother closely walks the fine line near wuss and decent human being but luckily is mostly a cool good guy, someone I can get behind. Not a Wuss. All of Umaru’s friends are colorful and funny in their own right and can have entire episodes dedicated to themselves alone. Amazingly hype animu level opening sequence and song sung by Umaru’s voice actor, really fun and high energy; excellent. While there are occasional moments of serious backstory about Umaru and her brother, they are done well and are never really cringe worthy as other shows try to force. Excellent lazy bitch slice of life.

5. Shokugeki no Soma

Where to begin with this no doubt amazingly entertaining food battle show. It’s basically every cooking competition show ever set to a school setting with insane hyperbole when eating food, far above the levels seen in fellow food animes; Wakozake and Koufuku Graffiti. This is not slice of life, it’s Shonen battle anime style format and it does it extremely well, making you want to see what happens next in the story a la DBZ and shit. All of the girls in the show are very likable and attractive, verified waifu material although some far better than others; Erina, Alice and Niku are clearly far superior in both character and design/boob size than everyone else and are likewise far more liked than everyone else. The guys in the show are also pretty good if your a girl/gay and provide a suitable background/structure for that kind of thing. My main gripes with the show at first was the clearly evident undesirable qualities of the titular main character, Soma; verifiable faggot and try hard for the good first half of the show. However, he slowly got redeemed after he got owned numerous times and I think they actually started to draw him more mature/bishonen looking in the later phases of the show, especially after the second opening was set in. Because of this, he has been moved from status as faggot to, mildly undesirable, maybe even alright guy. Overall excellent food battle show; definitely looking forward to more in the future.

4. Kantai Collection

Boat waifus finally make their appearance in anime after the browser game first started in mid-late 2013 and I thoroughly enjoyed it. All of the characters are faithfully reproduced in this show and look great, with fluid animation and a great all-star cast of voice actors, same as the game. The opening introduction is very well done with an excellent song that I think captures the overall feel of the media franchise, same for the ending as well. As for the actual show itself, it has been somewhat divisive for fans, some love it, others hate it; for a variety of reasons. Some say they would have preferred a full on serious action-drama serious show that followed history, others wanted full on slice of life take it easy daily fare with boats doing cute things. I personally found it as a pretty good balance of slice of life and action/drama but in all honestly, I would have preferred a full on slice of life with boat waifus because seriously, who gives a shit about story for this kind of thing being historically accurate. The very concept of anthropomorphized ships as cute girls is so niche and jokes that you’d have to be a full on douchbag history prick if you wanted a accurate historical account of the war in Pacific via this show; and this is coming from a guy who Majored in American History. Aside from that, other criticisms lie in the use of 3d CG for action sequences during battle, which I didn’t find it too bad but it is to be expected if they wanted action. The best episodes are the slice of life funny ones such as the curry episode and the Kongo sister’s introduction. Overall, excellent boat waifu action drama/slice of life, what I wanted/needed.

3. Shirobako

Shirobako is one of those rare shows that only comes once every generation or so, a fully original anime that is so meta and categorized to a very specialized niche, in this case, anime fans and those in the anime production industry which encompasses animators, character designers, artists in general and even production staff, managers and the like. I found this show so entertaining on so many levels I can’t really sum them up with a paragraph. Basically, this is the “how it’s made” of anime about anime with some slice of life material, drama and real world struggle of those in the industry. The first episode did it for me already with the Initial D racing sequence, and what’s better yet, is that it’s not just pandering, it’s an actual aspect of the show, for production staff and 3D CG artists like those who create the cars in Initial D. The choice for Miyamori Aoi , the production assistant girl to be the main character set a perfect backdrop for introducing all of her friends and other characters in the industry plus how chaotic the anime workflow really is. The first half of the show focuses on original anime creation while the second half they take on light novel-adaptation into anime and the problems that come with it, amazingly realistic and legit. Better yet is that all of the main characters are cute girls, actually all of the girls in the show are fairly attractive while all the guys are all true to life looking characters, some being actual real world people. Excellent animation, character designs, concept, flow, story, humor, drama, it’s got everything. If you like anime, you should probably watch this shit.

2. One punch man

ONE PUNNNCHHHHHH!!!!! Fuck, this show man, it’s so hype I love it. I knew that this show was going to be amazing when I first read into it awhile back because I thought the origin of the original material was so fascinating. So we have a guy, named ONE, he can’t draw shit but decides to draw a web comic about a guy who kills everything in a single punch. Said web comic gains super popularity for it’s jokes humor, bad drawing and simple concept; he doesn’t get any money for it he just does it for fun, as a hobby. Said ONE gets approached by Yusuke Murata, professional manga artist that illustrated manly football manga/anime Eyeshield 21 to adapt his story into a stylized manga to sell to the masses, ONE agrees. Fast forward a few years later and here we are, One Punch Man anime. Fuck the origin story of ONE is basically the titular main character himself, Saitama, a hero; for fun as a hobby. Aside from the inspirational origins of One Punch Man, the show is just plain so fun and manly as fuck to watch. The fact that Saitama is such a normal lazy dumb kind of guy who just happens to be the strongest guy ever just makes you want to root him on even more. All of the other characters in the show are faithfully reproduced based on Murata’s renditions but still maintains the charm of ONE’S original derp drawings. Amazing introduction and hype song, extremely impressive animation quality and character design, pacing and flow, excellent. Overall, probably the best show this year, had it not been for…

1. Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure Stardust Crusaders

Yes, that’s right. The best show of 2015 is Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure Stardust Crusaders, Egypt Arc, a grand and epic manly conclusion that all started when Dio Brando fought Jotaro Kujo’s great-grandfather Jonathan Joestar, and ending probably one of most popular JoJo story arcs for the franchise. What else needs to be said, the remade JoJo anime brought new life and new fans to the series and has influenced countless others in the many years since it’s original manga story ended decades ago. While Stardust Crusaders was already made into a OVA in the 90’s, it didn’t really do it justice so this finally set things right. Everything about the JoJo series in general is so outrageous and “Bizarre” that you can not help but like it, there’s something for everyone. All of the characters in Stardust Crusaders are likable with appropriate manly as fuck moments and funny times. The animation and character design of the show is a faithful reproduction of the original work and captures the feel of the franchise as a whole perfectly. All of the voice acting is top notch, especially the voices for Jotaro, Joseph and Dio Brando, fucking Takehito Koyasu was born to voice Dio, it’s in his blood. The opening sequence to the Egypt Arc is amazingly well done 3d CG and extremely catchy hype song, sung by all of the main characters, the last episode’s version of the Op sequence is modified and with it increased hype levels and a insane “OH SHITTTTTTT!!!!” moment. This is just the last episode introduction sequence I am talking about here. The whole show, while episodic in nature just feels so grand and epic it’s exactly the kind of shit that I love.

Congratulations Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure Stardust Crusaders, you rightfully deserve the title of mai top anime of 2015.

Artwork Sources:

• Top Image (futaba anzu + shimakaze) – taiki ken – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=48179044
• Young Black Jack – s tanly – http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=189135
• Joukamachi no Dandelion – Unknown – http://pbs.twimg.com/media/CKBZPqHUYAAJVlI.jpg:orig
• OverLord – so-bin – http://so-bin.tumblr.com/
• Death Parade – jane mere – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=44091201
• Gakkou Gurashi! – mery (apfl0515) – http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=2750098
• Sore ga Seiyuu! – 5240mosu – https://twitter.com/mosu_g/status/635422585342136320
• THE iDOLM@STER CINDERELLA GIRLS – mizuki makoto – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=52847047
• Gochuumon wa Usagi Desu ka S2 – yaegashi nan – http://ww2.sinaimg.cn/large/6f250299gw1ey0vzf1h93j21kw0w0nfn.jpg
• Hello!! Kiniro Mosaic – bassa – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=48743274
• Non Non Biyori Repeat – faubynet – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=40873674
• Koufuku Graffiti – kawai makoto – https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CC8A4THUUAA9DU5.jpg:orig
• Himouto! Umaru-chan – tukisiro nao – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=52528612
• Shokugeki no Soma – mukunokino isshiki – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=51941816
• Kantai Collection – shirotaso0818 – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=54314324
• Shirobako – tsuzuri (itosousou) – http://www.pixiv.net/member_illust.php?mode=medium&illust_id=50134125
• One Punch Man – tai (nazutai) – http://seiga.nicovideo.jp/seiga/im5431058
• Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure Stardust Crusaders – ashiya kouhei – https://twitter.com/asikoh009/status/632205426793144321