I decided to start doing a list of my favorite games each year for 2022, so why not do the same for anime? After all, looking back, I watched 12 anime series to completion, and 7 anime movies in 2022. So once again, I will reflect and give a brief blurb on each anime I watched in 2022.
Once again, I should set aside a few rules before getting into my Top 20 anime. These aren't anime I watched that released in 2022, just anime that I watched in 2022. So the date of these anime will vary.
That being said, I watched more 2022 anime then I did play 2022 games. In addition, I watched many 2021 anime that I caught up on in 2022, so it should be a little more relevant than my video game list.
For an anime to make this list, I must not have seen the season before, and must have watched it to completion. Naturally there were a couple anime I watched that I had already seen, and some that I never finished. So here are those, the honorable mentions:
My Roommate is a Cat - I decided to rewatch this 2019 classic with my partner when searching for anime she might like, and I struck gold with it. We both adored it, and I was reminded how sweet and wholesome this show is. Had a lovely time, and it's still one I'd recommend to all.
The Digimon Movie - Ah Digimon, what used to be my favorite show as a kid. I had the random urge to go back and rewatch this movie, specifically the second part, Our War Game. Honestly it was incredible, all the nostalgia, but I also genuinely enjoyed it a lot. The action scenes were as amazing as I remembered, and while some of my rose tinted glasses were dispelled when rewatching this, I still loved it to bits. A true staple of my childhood.
Princess Connect! Re:Dive - To celebrate the release of the second season I went back and rewatched the first season of Princess Connect from 2020. I'm very glad I did, as it made the second season more enjoyable, but I also found myself appreciating the first season more. The comfyness and fun of this isekai is unmatched, and it remains one of my favorite series in the past few years.
Cowboy Bebop - The classic show from 1998, a show acclaimed as one of the greats, I went back to watch this for the first time and......got 7 episodes in before dropping it. I enjoyed what I saw, but it wasn't really grabbing me, and with so much else going on I ended up dropping it. Maybe I'll get back to it, but it's not high on my to do list.
To Your Eternity - Another highly regarded show, To Your Eternity, by the creator of A Slient Voice, falls into the same category as the author's other work for me, in which I enjoyed it but........it lost me the more it went on. I got 10 episodes into this show before dropping it. I was really into the first episode, it was a beautiful watch I'd recommend to all. But the longer it went on, the less interested I became in its cast and found its progression rather predictable. Maybe I'll get back to it at some point, but I'm not optimistic given how much anime there is to watch.
Parallel World Pharmacy - Sometimes when you want to relax you just need a chill isekai. These are a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine, so during the latter months of the year I watched this show on and off during my tired nights. While I had a nice time with it initially, the more I watched it, the less interested I became. I found myself only loving one of its characters, so I dropped it after 7 episodes. Maybe I'll go back and finish it at some point, but I'm skeptical.
Call of the Night - Ah Call of the Night. You were the most talked about anime of the summer season, and one I was excited to watch. And when I started, I loved you. You were a fun relaxing anime set in night that had some great shots and a cool aesthetic. And I loved the two main characters and their dynamic. Yet the more I watched, the more other characters were introduced, characters I cared less about, and the more focus they got, the less I found myself interested in the show. I got 10 episodes in, with only 3 left, so I'd like to go back and finish it. But the show started to lose me, so I wasn't able to finish it by the end of the year. Maybe in 2023 it'll appear on that list.
With those out of the way let's get to it. Here are my Top 19 anime I watched in 2022, movies and seasons, from least favorite to favorite:
Coming in at 19, my least favorite anime of the year, there's no choice I can think of other then the 2021 hit, Mushoku Tensei. This was an anime adored by many, all my friends that recommended it loved it to death, saying it was one of their favorite anime. Even big youtubers I follow like gigguk and mother's basement were singing its endless praises. Yet when I watched it, it was nothing like that, and proved to be the most frustrating anime I watched this year.
Without going into a rant, my many issues with the show stemmed from the belief that this was a realistic isekai, not like the many power fantasy isekais you see. And that's where I disagreed with everyone and found the show so frustrating. Because it tries so hard to be realistic, to be better then the other isekai. And it was frustrating that every time it tried, it tripped on itself and refused to fully commit, only going halfway and being realistic merely on a surface level.
The examples are many. At one point a main character cheats on his partner. That's a step up, you don't see that in isekai. What will they do with that? Absolutely nothing, it gets resolved minutes after its brought up and never causes issue again. At another point the show explores a camp of animal people that are brought up in human trafficking, trafficking that we have previously seen allies take advantage of. That's certainly realistic, nice to show this dark side of the isekai fantasy, again, not something you'll see in your typical isekai. Now what will the show do with that? Yep, absolutely nothing, no character in the show even makes the connection between the camp and our allies save for the main character, and he does nothing with the knowledge. It seems like it wants to be a realistic isekai but is afraid to go all the way, and it never worked for me.
This is what made the show so frustrating, because it came so close to actually being great and having an interesting world, but its depth never went farther then basic. I went into it hoping for a protagonist that isn't overpowered....only to get a protgaonist that befriends a god, is granted super magical powers, given demon eyes without having to do anything, and feeling more overpowered then the protagonists of most isekai I've seen. Every time he made a mistake, like leading to someone dying or meeting someone super powerful, I thought he might suffer some consequence. But nope, he always got off without any scars, easily moving on without a care.
I hoped for a show in which the main character wouldn't get their own harem like that, but actually have to grow and change. By the end of the first season, the protagonist has a harem of characters all in love with them, and hardly changed from their first episode, development kept to a minimum. In the end it was another power fantasy isekai, and my disappointment was immeasurable. From the small tidbits of spoilers I've read, it will only continue to be more of a harem power fantasy, so I am jumping ship, and hope to never touch this show again. No hard feelings towards the people who love this show, but I'm out.
Coming in at number 18 is the studio trigger classic from 2013: Kill la Kill. I had never watched this show, I actually avoid most shows by studio trigger because they don't seem like my style. I watched this because it's one of my partner's favorite anime, maybe her favorite. And well, it was nice to see and understand why she loves it so much, she clearly got a lot out of it.
But for me it was confirmation of why I stay away from studio trigger shows. The show was so fast paced, so full of action and comedy that I couldn't keep up with anything that was going on. So much disbelief had to be suspended to believe some of the crazy stuff and twists that went on during this show, and in the end it's amazing I was able to watch the whole thing. I'm glad I did, if only to know more of this classic and understand why so many love it. But for me personally, it left no feeling other then confusion. Am I getting old? Yep.
Coming in at number 17 is Zombie Land Saga season 1, from 2018. This was a show I decided to check out due to some friends' recommendation. I was skeptical if I'd enjoy it, never being the biggest fan of idol shows, and well....that belief was only further confirmed after watching this. As with the other sports and idol shows I've seen, my issues with them remained here, the big one being that the main characters progress way too fast, and succeed way too quickly for my liking. I don't doubt there are idol/sports shows out there I could enjoy, but I really want to see the characters work for their success. I want to see them fail, not once but many times, before they get a victory. Zombie Land Saga does the thing I dislike about these kind of shows, where in all the shows they put on, I don't think a single one went badly. They progressed on a neat linear line of getting better and better, no hiccups, no issues in their progression as a great idol band, and that just doesn't feel realistic to me, so it was hard for me to get all that invested in the show.
Still, it was nice to learn more about the characters and why some of them are so popular. It had its good moments and was a fun watch overall, but I probably won't continue to the second season.
Number 16 is Ganbare Doukichan from 2021. This show is uh..........a guilty pleasure show, and there's really not much more to say about it. Let's uh, just move on from this and not say any more about it.
Number 15 is Weathering With You, the hit movie released by the director of Your Name in 2019. It also marks the first movie on this list. I wasn't the biggest fan of Your Name, I found the story and characters rather simple, though I enjoyed the animation a lot. That's mostly true of this film, it was a fun ride and boy there were some pretty moments. But the story and characters once again didn't really grab me. At the very least I enjoyed it slightly more than Your Name.
If there's one thing I'll remember about this film, it's a running joke it created between my partner and I about a large issue we both had with this film. You see, key to the protagonist of this film is that he is on his own because he ran away from home and struggles to live on his own.........and my partner and I frequently asked "why did he run away?" The film never goes into this or anything relating to the main character's family life, and we both found it so baffling to not be mentioned at all that it became a running joke among us. Here's to more fun movies like it.
Number 14 is Garden of Words, released way back in 2013. This was a movie I checked out from recommendation of my partner, and I fear how well she already knows my tastes. I enjoyed this movie a lot, though I hate to say I can't recall much of it. It was a nice sweet ride, but nothing about it really stuck with me. Maybe I'll rewatch it as a refresher, I recall it being a sweet slow time.
At number 13 comes the anime that has taken the world by storm, Japan in particular. Yes, it's Demon Slayer, specifically, the first season from 2019. I decided to give this a go despite my falling off of shonen. After all, with how big it was I couldn't ignore it, and a part of me was curious to see if I'd enjoy it more than the last shonen I watched: My Hero Academia.
I can say that I did in fact get more enjoyment from it then I did My Hero. I liked the aesthetic and setting of the show a lot, and the characters and story seemed decent enough. But of course, when it's shonen, you go for the battles, and Demon Slayer had some fun ones. The famous episode 19 ended up living to its hype, and was easily my favorite part of the season.
Watching this show did make me realize something about shonen and why I don't enjoy them as much as I used to. Shonen stories at their core, are those in which the story and characters exist as a reason for many cool battles to occur. Having cool fights takes precedent to everything, the story and characters all exist to serve the battles. This was true of Demon Slayer, but is even more true of My Hero.
And there's nothing wrong with that. I loved Naruto back in the day because of its battles and how cool and creative they were. But as I've gotten older they don't hold my attention as much, so Demon Slayer falls into number 13 on my list. I hope to check out the second season in 2023, so look forward to that.
Number 12 is Komi San Can't Communicate, specifically the first half of season 1, which released in 2021. I, like many started this show excited, the first episode was breathtaking and promised a fun deep show about overcoming ones anxiety, making friends, and the beautiful relationship between Komi and Tadano.
Yet like many, I was disappointed to learn that the first episode was a bit of a bait, because the show ends up being more of a lighthearted comedy with a few rare dramatic moments. And yes it was a good comedy, I had fun with it. But after finishing it I have no motivation to watch the rest of its first season. Like shonen, comedy is a genre I used to really enjoy, but now don't get much out of. So Komi sits here, at number 12.
Number 11 is Belle, the hot movie that made a stir in the anime community in 2021. Like many, there were things I liked about this, and things I disliked. Overall however, it left a strong impression on me thanks to its powerful ending and singing moments, and I remember it more positively then negatively. It's a fun film about the internet and the beauty it can hold, and well, as someone who's lived in the internet for much of my life, I couldn't help but feel touched by its themes and conclusion.
We're in the top 10, and are starting with Vampire Knight. This show from 2008 was brought to my attention by my partner. Alongside Kill la Kill it was one of her favorite anime, and the more I learned of it the more curious I became. I've wanted to watch shoujo shows more, it's a genre I've seen very little of, and it sounds like something I might enjoy.
So I watched both seasons of Vampire Knight, and I gotta say, overall I had a fun time with it. It has some of the tropes typically associated with your vampire young adult story for women, but I thought it did some fun things with them. There were a couple plot twists that genuinely caught me off guard, and by the end I was quite invested in the story and its characters. Overall it was quite good, and I'm glad to have checked it out.
But what I'll really remember about this show is the memes. My partner and I got a lot of fun moments from this that we often joke about together. We reference the show maybe more then any anime we've seen, and for good reason. It's tropey, but also quite good, and a showcase of why many vampire esque tropes exist. I see why many female anime fans hold the show dearly, and look forward to watching more like it.
Despite how old the series is, I hadn't watched the famous Evangelion until 2021. So in 2022 I made a point of continuing that watch of the legendary series by watching its famous movie: End of Evangelion, where it lands in the number 9 spot.
This movie was.....unbelievable. I can't believe it released in 1997, because just like the Evangelion series it feels unlike anything I've seen in anime. It is madness, bonkers, and incredibly emotional. The movie is famous in anime history for just how raw and crazy of a film it is, and even 25 years later it still holds up to that reputation. It's a powerful film that left me with so much to process, both good and bad. It is absolutely a must watch after watching the original series from 1996. But boy if I had to choose, I prefer the TV show ending to the alternate one here. While the crazyness and spectacle of it all made a memorable experience, parts of it were so raw and emotional I'm not sure I can confidently recommend it to others. But let the legend rest, the fact it holds up 25 years later says it all.
At number 8 comes the first show from 2022, and easily the biggest show this year. No show made a splash like Spy x Family, and no show did I have so many friends, even those that don't normally watch anime, checking it out. The hype was unbelievable, and it mostly lived up to it....mostly.
My time with the first half of Season 1 was a fun one, the setup was creative and fun, the setting unique, and all in all made for a really fun series. Really, if there's any anime from this list I'd recommend to anyone, it's this one. It hits all the right notes, has everything you'd want from a show for everyone, and you can see why its found such mainstream success in a way no other anime has.
That being said, while the show does wonders at introducing others to anime, for myself personally, I was losing interest the longer it went on. There's a reason I haven't checked out the second half of season one yet. I plan to, and will in 2023. But the longer the show went on, the less I found myself invested in two of the three main characters: Loid and Yor. The former because I found him generic and uninteresting, and the latter because the show seemed uninterested in doing anything with her character. I went into this hoping to love all three characters, but can't help but feel disappointed that I walked away only loving one of them. That being said, Anya is amazing and I am absolutely returning for her, and hey, number 8 is a good point to be on this list. We'll see where it falls on my 2023 list when I watch the second half of season 1.
One of the most tragic events to hit fans of Japanese culture this year was the death of the creator of Yugioh. It's always sad when those that created something you love dies, and I was hit by it. Yu-Gi-Oh was one of my favorite shows growing up, I watched so much of it. And Yu-Gi-Oh is the only card game I got extremely into, collecting cards, battling friends, and even going to a couple tournaments with my deck. I have nothing but fond memories with the game and show.
So when the news hit and I wondered what to do as tribute, a good friend of mine who also loves Yu-Gi-Oh and even still plays the card game recommended I check out The Dark Side of Dimensions. The movie serves as an epilogue to the original Yu-Gi-Oh series, which was the one I watched endlessly growing up. It's one of the few long running series I actually watched to completion, though I did skip the filler arcs, and didn't watch the final season until many years later when I was in college.
Still, the thought of returning to Yugi, Joey, Kaiba, and the gang one last time for one last story was tempting, and the news meant there was no better time. So I watched the film and.....thoroughly enjoyed it.
I can't recommend it to others, because all my enjoyment came from my personal connection with the Yu-Gi-Oh series, but boy was it special to me. Set one year after the series has ended, and the pharaoh spirit inside the Millennium puzzle has passed on to the next life, the stories features the gang and how they're doing in the aftermath. Yugi and friends have moved on and are about to graduate, while Kaiba is still stuck in the past, obsessively trying to get back to the pharaoh despite him being dead for a year now. A new villain appears with a connection to the pharaoh, and the main cast must reunite and play Duel Monsters one last time to defeat him.
It was a very special film, and one I'm glad I watched. There were so many references to the main series that hit the nostalgia buttons for me. Characters I remembered, cards from the dueling, even songs such as Kaiba's theme hit me hard in the nostalgia, and it was awesome. The card battles were so much fun and reminded me why I loved Yu-Gi-Oh so much: it took card games seriously and showed how fun and creative they could be.
But I also loved that this film wasn't simply indulging in its legacy. A strong theme of the show was that no matter how much the characters wanted to go back, they couldn't. The pharaoh was dead, the series was over, and it was time for them all to move on. It couldn't help but feel even more impactful due to the passing of the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh, and it really made this movie special to me. I had much to think about with regards to the passage of time, and it's thanks to this wonderful conclusion to one of my favorite anime series.
Coming in at Number 6 is Fruits Basket. This one's a little strange. Technically this isn't my first exposure to the series, over 10 years ago I read the whole manga. But I'd never watched the anime, and it has been so long that I've forgotten nearly everything in this series, so I'm letting it on the list.
Fruits Basket is the only shoujo series I got super into, so when I found out it got an updated Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood esque adaption, I dived into the first season of this series from 2019.
It was fantastic, and I was surprised how much it held up. A lot of old series I were into I can't really get invested in, but Fruits Basket ranks as one that I still love. The drama was excellent, characters well written, oh I love Tohru to bits, and the overall progression and backstories and everything was great. I had a wonderful time with this, and can't wait to dive into Season 2.
I saw some spectacular movies in 2022, one of them being Josee, the Tiger, and the Fish. This movie follows a similar format to a lot of recent anime films such as Your Name, Weathering With You, A Silent Voice, and I Want to Eat Your Pancreas. They are all stories about a middle aged boy and girl and their journey to grow closer and grow up.
Josee however is possibly my favorite iteration of this formula. The girl is a tragic one, being disabled and having to roam around in a wheelchair. What I really liked about this one was that both main characters had dreams they wished to pursue, and the story was as much about their relationship as it was the struggle of pursuing what you love and the obstacles you run into. It made for some of the most emotionally satisfying moments I've seen in anime, and overall it was a beautiful film. I'd love to watch it again, it is the first item on this list that I would rate very highly, and is more then deserving of the Number 5 spot.
The anime that swept the community in 2022 with Marin Kitagawa, who I'd call waifu of the year, My Dress Up Darling was a storm of a great show, and exposed me to the magic of the shonen romance genre. Gojo was an incredible character whom I related much to, Marin was unbelievable, and the relationship between the two was so much fun to watch I was delighted the whole way through. It deserves every award and recognition it gets for being a fantastic romance anime, especially for boys.
Granted, I put it at number 4 because while I loved the show, I did find myself slightly less invested by the end, as if it was losing me. I will still watch a Season 2 in a heartbeat, but I worry a bit for where the series is heading. For now however, it is a fantastic show, and it will be hard for a waifu to live up to Marin in 2023. She's just that good.
Every now and then an anime comes along that seems so different to anything I normally watch, but in a way that immediately grabs and excites me. That anime in 2022 was Blue Period. A thrilling tale about a boy who discovers his passion for art, and the struggle in pursuing that passion. As someone with his own passions who seems to gravitate towards stories like this (see my love for New Game), this story resonated deeply with me, and it was incredibly exciting to see the difficulties of competing with your peers in the stressful school and work systems we must all go through to grow. I had an incredible time with it and would highly recommend it to anyone in a similar position.
My favorite anime movie of 2022 was Maquia: When the Promised Flower Blooms from 2018. I like movies that have an emotional element, that are about humans being human, and the relationships they can form with each other.
But never have I seen the position of being a mother and her relationship with her son explored so well as in Maquia. I've felt like too often stories are about fathers and their child, and not enough feature the role of mothers. So Maquia was not only a breath of fresh air, but a brilliant powerful experience about being a mom, the limitations and struggles, and then so much more given the grand scope of this story.
Because to say this is only a story about a mother is a massive understatement. It's set in a medieval fantasy world with immortal beings, there's a strong theme of colonialism, displacement, genocide. There's strong political battles going on in the background of everything. There's so much to digest, so much to talk about, but what really makes this movie so high for me is how fantastic it showcases the role of being a mother, and the relationship between mom and son. It was beautiful, and the ending left me crying like nothing else this year, I was a complete broken mess.
I cannot recommend it enough, it is a dark yet beautiful tale that will leave you shaking as it did me, and boy, what a film. It's more then deserving of being my number 2 anime of the year.
If there's one anime that defined 2022 for me, I am surprised to say that, in the end, it is season 2 of Princess Connect Re:Dive. I started the year looking forward to its second season, though not super excited. I rewatched the first season in preparation and was surprised at how much more I enjoyed it. It has easily my favorite cast of main characters from any isekai I've seen, maybe even any anime. They're such sweet, kind, likable, and fun characters, and I can't get enough of them. The first season was fun and lighthearted, with some moments of drama, and I wondered if Season 2 would take that drama further, take this fun innocent cast and put them through a tough time.
And that's exactly what happened. More fun new characters were introduced, but the main group, their drama, internal struggles, and character arcs were all brought to the forefront in some of my favorite episodes of anime.
But in spite of the greater stakes in season 2, the series retained what makes it such a special show for me. It embraces everything an isekai should be and is the comfiest, most relaxing isekai I've seen, and makes me feel like I'm going to a nice warm home in a way no other anime made me feel. The surest sign of this is the ending. Princess Connect has without a doubt my favorite ending from any anime. It's the most relaxing warm "feels like home" ending ever, and the very first time I saw it at the end of episode 2 of Season 2, I actually cried from all the warm feelings it made me feel. It epitomized everything I love about this show, it creates a comfy world where you can go to have fun, forget life's troubles, and have a nice time, and every time I watched an episode I felt a joy like no other. Princess Connect's second season caused the series to go from a show I really like to one of my favorite series. It's the anime I still think about the most from 2022, and the one I want to go back to the most.
While there are many reasons I love anime, the most important for me has always been the characters, and my favorite cast of characters this year was those of Princess Connect. Yuuki, Kokkoro, Pecorine, and Kyaru....god I'm happy I got to see your journeys. For that reason, there's no title more deserving of my anime of the year. Congratulations to this beautiful comfy show. I really hope it gets a third season, because there's really nothing like it.
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