My Favorite Anime of 2018

In the final installment of my 2018 entertainment round-up, let's cover my favorite TV anime of 2018, restricted to a list of my Top 10. I didn't watch any sequels this year, surprisingly enough, but there are spin-offs.

Unless mentioned otherwise, all series completed their runs in 2016. Anime listed are not ranked, but presented in the order I watched them. My top three picks of the year are marked with an asterisk (*).

Hakata Tonkatsu Ramens

In a city where organized murder is so prevalent that everybody seems to have a hand in it, a group of criminals themselves are just doing their jobs as they get pulled into various cases, usually involving the hitman, Lin. Despite their grisly line of work, most of the ensemble cast is upbeat and fun to be around. Don't go looking for an overarching plot, but each of the mini-arcs is well done.

Real Girl *

I thought I would dislike the idea of a nerd who prefers 2D women to meet a fashionable real girl who wants to date him, because it smacks of wish fulfillment, but this series isn't that kind of show at all. Rather, Iroha is an outcast in her own way (everyone assumes that with her looks she must have slept around) and Hikari is an outcast because he kept liking comics and children's anime long after it was socially acceptable to do so. The series is mostly about them learning how to date each other, and all the highs and lows that come with this being the first serious relationship for both of them. (Edit: I forgot that Real Girl got a second season this year! So it's still going.)

The Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Die Neue These

This series ends at a really uncomfortable spot, being that it's in the middle of a major battle. Unlike most anime where a battle is a one and done affair, this is "battle" on the scale of a war so it's the kind that lasts for weeks. If you like your space opera, this is a remake of the ten ton gorilla of anime space opera, but oddly doesn't finish covering the first book of the source material. It's supposed to wrap up in a trio of movies later this year, but I can't imagine how they'll cover all ten books when the TV series didn't cover one. It's an excellent appetizer, and the updated designs are really nice, but it can't stand on its own. Fortunately for the curious, the books are being translated.

Caligula

Caligula is a bit of a hot mess, but it's the rare RPG-to-anime adaptation that completely throws out the concept of watching the storyline of the game. You still have students trapped in a VR world trying to get home, but the series makes a lot of smart decisions in breaking up when everyone gets their powers and how Ritsu gets involved with the Go Home Club. Though I haven't played the game, I know enough about RPG tropes to realize where some of the changes had to have been, and I think more adaptations need to take those kinds of chances. Unfortunately, the second half of the series turns into a mess right up until a better than expected finale.

Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku *
This is a total guilty pleasure series. If you are a geek of some kind and have similarly geeky friends, you will probably see yourselves in this series. Narumi wants to start dating again, after getting dumped by a boyfriend who discovered her nerd life as a fujoshi. Fortunately she's reunited with her childhood friend Hirotaka at her new job, and he puts himself out there as a potential boyfriend, because he's a fellow nerd who is sympathetic to all the nerd problems she has (like helping her with a special event in an online game before it goes away).

Darling in the Franxx

I wanted to like Darling in the Franxx, and for the first half I really did. I liked the idea of mecha that had to be piloted in pairs, and the interesting worldbuilding where children didn't seem to exist outside of the pilots. It even raised the issue of what happens when the pilots aren't necessarily straight, but have to partner with the opposite sex (though it could have handled it much better). It was good, cheesy fun, especially since all the kids are on the verge of puberty with puberty problems, but aren't equipped to handle them. Unfortunately the tail end of the series gets really rushed and ends with more of a whimper than a bang.

Violet Evergarden

This was probably the most gorgeous animated series I saw all year. At its heart, it's a tale about an emotionally damaged girl learning how to grieve, but after a strong beginning, it sags in the middle, before coming back for a solid ending. I wanted to like it more, but I found the middle to be pretty forgettable and Violet's adjustment to normal life to be a little too easy from where she started in the beginning.

Persona 5: The Animation

I debated whether or not to include this since the series properly ends with the second TV special in March of this year, but I probably won't remember to include the series in next year's round-up. This is an adaptation of the Persona 5 video game and largely follows an identical plot. Some condensation is done where it makes sense, and Akechi's role in the story has been amped up. The TV series itself ends at a shocking point in the game (I'll refrain from spoilers), which I applaud since it could be an ending to someone who doesn't know better, but obviously the story continues. As an adaptation it's pretty vanilla and doesn't take too many risks. If you like the game you'll probably like the anime.

Today's Menu for the Emiya Family *

This series would make me hungry, so clearly the only solution was to watch it while I was already eating. It's a pretty fun short anime (each episode is less than 15 minutes) set in an alternate universe of Fate/stay night where masters and servants live relatively peacefully together and most of the characters are friendly if not actually friends. Each episode features a recipe that viewers can make at home, either by extrapolating from the instructions in episode or by following the directions on the series' web page (unfortunately only in Japanese).

Boarding School Juliet

Boarding School Juliet is unusual for a romantic comedy because Romio and Juliet get together in the first episode, but after that they need to hide their relationship from all the other kids at their school since they hail from rival nations and their campus is similarly fractured. There are one too many boob jokes, but I really like a teenage comedy where the fun isn't in seeing how the couple come together, so much as seeing how they learn to date each other. The fact that Juliet can more than hold her own against Romio and the rest of Black Doggy House is also a plus.

Darling in the Franxx and Becoming More Like Your Partner

One of my friends asked me when I was going to write another Darling in the Franxx post and I wasn't really planning to, except maybe at the end of the series. We're now about seven episodes until the end, but something did happen that I think is worth posting about.

This episode just aired this Saturday, so if you're wary of spoilers, stop here!

What I'd like to talk about in today's post is what's happening with Hiro.

It's very common to have inter-species relationships in fiction. Sometimes they're very different species, but usually they're between a human and a character who has a human-ish form. Also, if one of them is to cross the species barrier to become more like the other, they overwhelmingly feature the inhuman female becoming human to be with her male human love. The reverse option is rarely considered.

The Little Mermaid serves as the model for a children's tale Zero Two learned as a child. A princess of beasts falls in love with a human prince at a distance, and sees a witch to have her wings removed so she can become human and be with the man loves. However, the princess is unable to remain a human forever because that is not what she truly is, so she is given the choice to kill the prince and live, or to spare the prince and die. Like the Hans Christian Andersen mermaid, she chooses death.

Though Zero Two does not seem to be overly concerned that she is the princess of her own tale, she likewise met a human, Hiro, when they both were children. He was nice to her when everyone else treated her like a test experiment, and she recognized that they were fundamentally different. Though the series hasn't explained how Zero Two lost her scaly red skin (yet), she files down her horns to the nubs they usually are and presumably does the same with her teeth and nails.

Zero Two's driving motivation for much of the series has been to become human so she can be with her childhood darling, and she's been fighting the alien klaxosaurs because she was told that eventually if she killed enough she would become human. (I have to ask why she would believe anything the military told her, considering how she otherwise behaves around them, but I guess that's a question for another day.)

Now Zero Two and Hiro have been reunited, they remember their shared past, and something is happening to Hiro as well. The reason he's able to partner with her, and can only partner with her, is due to him having ingested her blood when they were children (he was trying to clean a scrape on her knee by licking the wound). This also has the effect of increasing his "saurification."

The series hasn't fully explained the link between humans and their klaxosaur enemies yet, but Zero is somehow a hybrid of the two and we see the results of her own saurification after she devours a few dozen more partners. Her horns grow into antlers, she has fangs and claws, and her mind is almost completely feral.

Until this Saturday's episode, Hiro looked fine, though he was briefly hospitalized. He has heavy bangs though, and in Episode 17: Eden, Zero Two brushes them back to reveal that he appears to be growing horns as well, currently small enough that they haven't broken the skin.

Zero Two seems to be saddened by the fact his fate has changed due to meeting her, but Hiro does not seem to be bothered at all. He's never been put off by her appearance (not even when she was a feral little girl with red scales), nor has he ever asked Zero Two to become human like him.

I was really afraid that this series would end with Zero Two becoming human in some fashion so she could be with Hiro (assuming she doesn't die due to the fairy tale motif), because that would be pointless when he never asked that of her. But I would be perfectly happy if Hiro continues transforming to be more like her. He didn't ask for it, but he's not doing it for her either. It just happened and he's okay with it.

Darling in the FRANXX's Zero Two

I started watching Darling in the FRANXX this weekend, even though it's not usually a series I would get into. I had heard that it was rather fanservicey and that it took a lot of inspiration from Neon Genesis Evangelion, which had left a bad taste in my mouth back in its hey-day. But despite that, I also heard it was good so I decided to give it a chance.

The best part, for where I am now, is the character Zero Two. Though I don't know the specifics of her creation yet, we know that FRANXX pilots are orphans who were raised for the sole purpose of piloting the FRANXX mecha. Zero Two is different from the others though for having klaxosaur blood (klaxosaurs being the giant monsters the FRANXX are intended to fight). This gives her small horns for a slightly inhuman look, though the opening credits suggest she might ultimately have a more monstrous appearance.

All FRANXX are piloted by heterosexual pairs in very suggestive roles (seriously, most of the series seems to be a giant sexual metaphor), but what stands out about Zero Two is just how badly her own desires are treated.

Zero Two is an incredibly accomplished pilot (the women seem to be the one who bond with the mecha and the men are interchangeable), but we're introduced to her as the Partner Killer. No man can survive more than three rides with her without dying.

When she meets the protagonist, Hiro, for the first time, she takes a shine to him, because he doesn't shy away from her horns. But Hiro is quickly put out of the picture by her current partner, who tells Hiro that he can't "handle" her. Zero Two and her mecha are special, and require an equally special partner.

After Zero Two and Hiro successfully pilot her FRANXX during an emergency in the first episode, she repeatedly asks to be paired with him, and the interest is mutual. Despite the fact that Hiro came out of her mecha intact (unlike the dead body he replaced), she is always denied. Hiro is deemed beneath her, they're part of different units, etc. I was incredulous that Zero Two, despite being at the top of her game was not allowed to choose her own partner. And yet, it feels like a very familiar female problem.

I'm not surprised that she lashes out by taking her unwanted partners on a ride they're unlikely to survive, because for her it's been a string of supposedly "good" male pilots who see her as a tool. And the military system is fine with fact she grinds up her partners as long as she keeps getting wins on the front lines.

Hiro works for her, because he's not trying to force himself on her, and he sees her as another human being rather than a monster, which she is utterly delighted by. Zero Two is a bit of a loose cannon, but she can, reluctantly, be brought into line if she no longer sees any reason to fight. Her life appears to be a sad sack of constant battle partnered with a string of jerks so I'm not surprised that she jumps (literally) at the chance of staying with Hiro when he similarly goes out on a limb to declare how much he wants to ride with her.

Seriously, watching them escape her escort while doing a running tango through all the security barriers to get to her mecha was a delight. I wasn't expecting to see anything that close to a commitment as early as the fourth episode.

There's still a chance it could all go downhill from here, but I hope not. I want Zero Two to keep her spirit and for Hiro to continues treating her as an equal rather than a tool or a conquest.