I’ve had bad luck with anime lately. I haven’t seen many series, or movies for that matter, in the past few months which make me sit up and pay attention. The anime I have seen have been disappointing and generally a waste of my time. Some were merely boring, some were bad in terms of overall quality, some were too depressing, and some were so obnoxious, I’ve stopped watching them.
I don’t normally do that- drop an anime. I can usually soldier through some heavy garbage to the end of a series and have put up with a lot of suck-tacular anime. But every now and then, a series comes along which pushes my buttons and gets under my skin in such a way, it’s no longer physically possible for me to watch it. It’s like I’m struck by a sudden illness and the only cure is to eject the DVD and bury it somewhere. The symptoms of this malady are irritability, unpredictable shouting jags, elevated blood pressure, random and effusive cursing, and a general felling of disgust. I’ve dubbed this Dropitnomea from the latin: Dropit- (drop it) -nomea (it is crap).
What usually brings on Dropitnomea is excessive moe, shotacon, lolicon, bathroom humor or any combination thereof. If I even smell a serious or comedic overuse of shotacon or lolicon in a series, I refuse to watch it. A tiny hint, no problem, but if it pops up more than twice within the first episode, buh-bye. Same goes for truly lowbrow humor. I don’t mind boob jokes or fanservice, but if the jokes seem like they were written by a fifth grader who’s gotten his hands on a naughty thesaurus, Flush!, the anime is gone.
I usually get another member of the team who’s immune to my anime allergies, so to say, to review the series I can’t. We all have something we can’t deal with in anime, and I’m very aware of what I’m allergic to in the medium. Do you have any anime allergies which flare up and make it impossible to watch a series? Have you stopped watching a series because of something in the anime that rubbed you the wrong way or made you ill? Do you drop anime or are you a trooper who makes it through even the worst anime? What’s it take for you to drop an anime?
Please tell us your thoughts in the comment section below on dropping an anime series!
Well, excessive fanservice would probably make me drop an anime.
I usually drop every anime that doesn’t have interesting first 2 episodes (then if there is manga I read the next 2 chapters and check if it’s worth watching). So if there is nothing interesting in the first 4 episodes or if they are ridiculously stupid I’m almost always dropping thiskinda show.
if i hear whiny high pitched girl voices in an anime particularly in the first two episodes i usually drop it.
Cheap water color backgrounds, ugly characters and annoying voices usually make me drop a show. let me elaborate:
cheap watercolor backgrounds are those one that looks like the artist gave up on it after 1 coat of color like simoun (after hearing so much good things about it I decided to watch it. It looked and sounded so bad I regret it ever since. Oh, and I don’t think the story was all that great either) and kimikiss. On the otherhand I LOVE the bg in true tears and mushishi.
ugly characters are those that are cheap looking ones like strawberry panic and melody of obvilion. Pretty characters would be like those in Code geass. I don’t mind is the design is simple if effort was put into it, for instance, Manabi straight.
Annoying voices: Need I say more?
I don’t mind fanservice unless it’s at Kanokon standards.
Oh, one thing that really bugs me is when a character makes a little mistake and endes up suffering a lot for it, then turns really pathetic. I really hate survival stories since they always look patheic.
I also don’t like slow shows all that much. I love Aria, but only the manga, the pace of the anime was 3 steps too slow for me.
Oh, I also don’t like shops that are werid or overly philosophical. Like Eureka seven (love the manga though, but I just couldn’t keep watching the anime anymore, it was too random, werid and confusing) and Ergo Proxy.
Wow, I’m more critical than I though.
Due to my morals I usually drop a show for sex, excessive blood, and excessiv swearing, like Hellsing…dropped it for all of those.
Suprisingly I usually make it past fanservice and continue watching the show. The Meloncholy of Haruhi Suzumiya for example was full of boob gropage but I didn’t drop it…I can usually take pervy characters too.
but if its borderline soft porn then its an instant drop. I Also HATE girl Harems, guy harems are okay because they usually arn’t…well soft porn
In other words Love Hina or Magikano= Yuck
While Fruits basket anime or Wallflower manga (though in some parts a little risque)=WIN!!!
Yoai and Yuri are no no’s too. Don’t mind cross dressing if the guy is straight though…still hesistant to watch PrincessPrincess
After reading everyone’s comments, I feel like everyone here is an anime critic.
Knowing your taste is great, but I try to be way more open-minded than simply dropping something after two episodes. Taking everything at face value will only get you so far and end with you hating everything. In that case you shouldn’t be watching at all…
traditionally for me it has to cross some kind of moral line in my brain (Kodomo no Jikan rings a bell,) has to be uninteresting, or just does what it does badly (Rosario + Vampire, anyone?) As for fanservice, one of my favorite series is kamen no maid guy, where they love fanservice, but I’d stop with anything past kanokon level (I still watch that, but it’s getting annoying. Like I said, that’s the very border of my fanservice handlings, so it’s kind of a drag to watch.)
What excellent timing; I found this site and this particular post just after I had uploaded a list of animé series I dropped (for my reference, really).
In general, I go through the first disc’s worth of episodes before I come to a decision about staying with or dropping a series. I’m using very tolerant of the visuals and audio aspects (even though high-pitched female voices can get on my nerves). What I tend to avoid, though, are the hackneyed themes (subjective, I know!), repetition which doesn’t add value (another subjective view), and violence –especially the hyper-bloodthirsty, torture-loving sociopathic characters; they just end up seeming shallow (boring!), not to mention crossing the line for me.
I don’t mind cross-dressing, unusual lifestyles, homosexual/bisexual themes, cutsey-ness (in moderation), or even some violence (if relevant to the plot). But what matters to me, of course, is that the story and characters work out overall to something which satisfies me.
Addendum: I admit that I’m still learning the various terms of animé (that’s part of the fun for me). Thanks to your definition of “fan service,” I can also add that some aspects of that could also annoy. Again, with the subjective crossing of the line in my head, if there’s far too much fan service (especially if it feels nasty, not funny, or just plain insulting), I’m less likely to stick with a series.
As I always give a manga two volumes to impress me, I generally give an anime two episodes. I base my ‘dropping’ of a series to how much it keeps my attention. If I’m engaged enough to give it the majority of my attention (be it for curiousity, laughs or edge of my seat-suspense), then I keep watching. Simple as that.
Just about any genre or style can be interesting to me if done in a way I find entertaining when the time comes to watch it, so I give shows the benefit of a doubt. If there’s an aspect of a series that I think is so unappealing I never want to see the thing again (art style, types of humour, etc.), usually I’ll know beforehand and not play it in the first place.
So if I’m watching something and by episode two and I find myself still looking away to do other things, engaging in unreleated conversations with fellow watchers or staring blankly at something that’s supposedly meant to make me laugh, I drop it.
Excessive fanservice is my first filter, especially loli fanservice. Shallow characters, plot holes, and sometimes the artwork is my second filter. After that, my final filter is where the stories don’t seem to be making a point.
I can usually use my first filter to drop an anime before the first ep even ends. My second filter usually kicks in by around the 3-6 ep range, depending on if its a 13 or 26 ep series.
The final filter of having a point to the story often requires waiting until the entire anime is complete. The episode bloggers really help here; I can sit back and wait for them to finish before deciding whether to see the entire show or not.
Overall, this set of filters doesn’t leave much anime worth watching. That’s fine with me, though. Nothing worse than watching something then asking yourself why you bothered to waste your time like that.
Usually, I’ll watch 5 episodes and if it’s not gotten my interest by then, I’ll drop it. Things like plot and character are important; music, animation style, and voice acting are less important.
I don’t usually drop animes, but if I do, it’ll be for these reasons.
Ridiculously long – I can stand just over 100 episodes, but for the love of all that’s holy and sacred don’t keep dragging it on in a never ending story. Bleach and Naruto are prime examples of this. A 5 minute battle takes 3-4 episodes and the anime is over 200 episodes long with the end nowhere in sight. It’s a hot potato.
Excessive stupidity – I really don’t mind cute animes that touch on ridiculous every once in a while but animes that seem to defy common sense altogether and I don’t mean all the sci-fi/fantasy genre) are off my book. Excel Saga and High School Rumble are just a few that I’ve dropped in the first couple of episodes because my brain can’t handle that much dumbing down.
Serviced Fanservice – Touches of crossdressing, yaoi, yuri, shotacon and lolicon to make the plot or characters more interesting are alright by my book. Make a plot out of it and I’ll run away screaming like I’ve been scalded with hot water. Aishiteruze Baby had me going that way. There is a cure for it however. Whenever I see things like that, I’ll watch Ouran High School Host Club and all the evil fanservice thoughts will go away.
No originality No Attempt – Yes, we’ve seen mecha genres plenty of times after what Gundam came out but surprisingly a lot of it are pretty good. It’s when people decide to rip off other animes and make no attempt to create some sort of originality on their part. The worst culprit Trinity Blood (merging the Trigun and Hellsing into a half assed show). Awesome crappage.
Epic Fail Ending – Not exactly dropping, but I’d regret actually picking the anime up with bad endings and they go off my collection into the bin or I’ll sell it to someone. It doesn’t matter if you have an awesome plot. If you’ve got a bad ending, that’s going to ruin it for us all. Trinity Blood and Samurai Deeper Kyo are my main beef. Enough for me to pretend I’ve never watched it.
Responding to zqube’s comment …I would just like to say that I do reasearch before starting a show to see if I’m okay with the content before hand so I don’t have to worry about something pounching on me. In other words I read the Anime Blog, so I don’t have to start anime that I don’t think I would like, so I won’t have to drop them.
Also there have been plenty of times I pushed through unconfortable levels of fan service and was happy when it was over and was glad I held on because it was wrth it in the end (TMOHS for example).
But the reason most people drop a show is because they don’t think that certain thing that they don’t like will end. If a show doesn’t get over excessive fanservice (or what ever the annoyance is) and show something substantial then its not worth continuing.
Anime that are repetitive and of course, boring..
Those kind of anime will make me drop it..
Also, I don’t like animes that focuses on fanservice or have excessive fanservice..
Well, if I know that the anime is focused on fanservice, why would I watch it in the first place..
@ kamigoroshi: you skipped ashiteruze baby? I really loved the manga of that. Sweet, funny, yet heart warming, it is one of my favorite shoujo series of all time. I’m also pretty sure there’s no “crossdressing, yaoi, yuri, shotacon and lolicon” in there. Keppei cares for the little girl and takes care of her like a father, he is NOT a lolicon. In fact, he’s as much of a lolicon as Mori is.
@Ez, what kind of fanservice in particular?
@Would, I force myself to watch at least four episodes (as you mention) before deciding if an anime gets dropped. I would have missed out on some really cool anime if I hadn’t sucked it up in a few series which had really bad initial episodes.
@christi, are the voices still whiny if you switch the audio to Japanese? I notice I can’t discriminate whiny voices as well in Japanese as I can in English. Worth a shot.
@Choux, sounds like you have a low tolerance for BS. But one must consider most anime are about survival in one way or another, be it emotional, existential, or physical.
@Marie Turner, I love Hellsing for all those reasons ^^;;. I don’t like harem anime either, and dropped Negima after the first volume. The hints of shotacon made me queasy. Shotacon/ lolicon is an instant drop in my book.
@zqube, these days, there’s so much anime, people need to pick and choose what they watch, otherwise, we’d be spending waaay too much time watching something we despise. Let’s be thankful that this is an era we can be critics since it means there’s an abundance of anime.
@conankudo, yes, when an anime crosses that boundary in our heads, it’s definitely time to drop it.
@sairuh, I agree that too much fan service is annoying, but there are actually some really good comedies out there which poke fun at fan service. Ninja Nonsense is a raunchy comedy that crosses a bajillion lines yet is wildly hilarious. If you can stomach some truly bad “adult” humor, I highly recommend the series!
@Kuri, I usually watch anime with David, and he somehow manages to get me to watch past the two episode mark in anime. Thanks to him, I’ve seen some really good series, but I’ve also sat through some really bad ones as well….
@kdp, “Nothing worse than watching something then asking yourself why you bothered to waste your time like that. I second that!
@Caitlin, Yeah, it should be apparent after the first volume if an anime is worth the investment. And yet, somehow, I manage to end up watching all six volumes of a handful of bad series.
@Kamigoroshi, I wasn’t too thrilled with High School Rumble after the first volume, either. But after the second and third volume, I was hooked. It’s odd I liked it since I usually don’t go for something so simplistic.
@Setsukyie, Repetitiveness is repugnant, but I can usually stick with it if I do something else while watching an anime that repeats itself. Like working out, shelling peanuts, dusting, etc. I don’t really have to “be there” with an anime that does the same thing over, and over, and over, and over….
I usually can finish up anime series, no matter how bad they are but what really really turns me off and gets me bored is repetitiveness. If the anime cannot win me over with something else [like good graphics, interesting concept or potential to be good..eventually], I’ll drop the anime.
@witchstone, it’s the “eventually” which usually keeps me going, but hell hath no fury like an anime fan who’s watched 9 hours of a series with no payoff!
I’ll usually drop an anime series that comes across as slapstick humor, like School Rumble. I saw the first DVD, and I dropped it immediately.