"You've grown up so much, you know that?"

Anime Oscars 2019 (pt. I)

A Year in Review

It’s awards season baby.

This year I decided to do challenge myself.

Halfway through the winter season, when the only show I was watching on a weekly basis was the second season of Mob Psycho 100, I decided - quite impulsively - that I was going finish every single anime that vaguely interested me in the year 2019. Despite having a terrible track record with seasonal anime, I buckled down, determined to see this through to the end.

Twelve months later, I’ve more or less accomplished said goal.

At the time of writing, I have completed 45 anime series that aired in 2019. That number goes up to 56 when also considering the anime I tried and dropped. Additionally, this number does not include the backlog anime I was watching on the side, nor does it include the seasons I re-watched in preparation for their sequels.

For some fans, 45 may seem like a lot of anime, while others might still have me beat. Personally, however, 2019 marked the most anime I’ve ever watched in a single year since I first started in 2009, a whole ass decade ago.

Having sampled more or less everything 2019 had to offer (that I cared about, at least), I’ve found myself at an impasse. How to best commemorate this accomplishment? Personally, a top ten list didn’t feel like it would be enough. Simply counting down my ten favorite shows would be such a poor reflection of my experiences. There were so many anime I enjoyed, but for very different reasons.

Rather than try to cram as many opinions into a “best of, worst of” post, I decided to go a little further. In the same vain as the Crunchyroll Awards (but better, because it’s my opinion), I want to commemorate the anime year through recognizing everything it had to offer, from all angles. 

I plan to make several different posts, with each one tackling a different topic. The first couple of posts will approach all the series I watched from the angle of music. Of course, I’ll be starting things off with everyone’s favorite part: the openings. In order to acknowledge all my favorites, I’ll be counting down my top five favorite OPs from each season, beginning of course with winter. (Gentle reminder that I’ll only be including the OPs of the anime I’ve seen).

Top Five Winter OPs

Upon reflection, 2019 was a pretty great year for OP tracks, and winter has some of it’s strongest contenders for the entire year. 

5.) “Unknown World” by Schrodinger’s Cat, My Roommate is a Cat

As one of the sweetest anime to come out this year, My Roommate is a Cat had an equally endearing opening to match it’s soft sentimentality. The story follows a socially-awkward mystery novelist and his new pet cat as the two attempt to understand one another. Each episode is split down the middle, showing the same events twice, first from the human’s view, and then the cat’s. In that sense, an upbeat duet perfectly fits the contrasting nature of our two main character’s perspectives. Fitting this bouncy song to equally bouncy visuals only serves to enhance this opening, solidifying it as one of the catchiest of year. Though I cannot claim this show is a masterpiece or anything truly remarkable, I fully enjoyed my time with it, and it’s energetic introduction is a huge reason why.

4.) “Love Dramatic” by Masayuki Suzuki, Kaguya-sama: Love is War

Speaking of catchy openings...though I cannot pretend to love this show (I know, I’m sorry) I absolutely adore it’s opening theme. If there is one thing that Kaguya-sama: Love is War definitely nails, it’s creating an unforgettable introduction. The visuals are great and perfectly capture the comedic, over-the-top tone that the show is going for. Now whether or not this series actually delivers on that comedy...well that’s up for you to decide. Personally, I was not a fan. But hey, comedy is subjective and therefore the show’s quality is up for debate. What’s not up for debate, however, is how much I love this song.

3.) “Wagamama de Gomakasanaide” by THE ORAL CIGARETTES, Revisions

Revisions more or less passed under the radar in winter 2019...and that might be for the best. Though there is nothing abhorrent to be found in this short little show, there’s also not much keeping you coming back for more. While the concept was intriguing, its execution was filled with melodrama and fairly unlikable (not to mention unoriginal) characters. There were precisely two reasons I kept watching until the end: the batshit crazy main character and this opening. THE ORAL CIGARETTES already won pretty much everyone over after doing both openings for Noragami and Noragami Aragoto, so it’s nice to see them make a return with an equally catchy song. While I may not have been Revisions biggest fan, it’s bangin’ opening definitely earned a place in my heart.

2.) “Kaen” by ziyoou-vachi, Dororo

I think most people saw this one coming. As a remake of the 1969 anime, based on the classic 1968 manga by Osamu Tezuka, Dororo was a refreshing, albeit heartbreaking way to start off this year. The series explores life in feudal Japan and it’s hardships through the eyes of Hyakkimaru, a man who has literally lost everything, and our titular character Dororo, the young orphan thief. Watching the two of them on their journey throughout the war-torn country side, trying desperately to reclaim what they’ve lost, was incredibly compelling. This fantastic opening served as a mere bonus to an already engaging viewing experience.

1.) “99.9” by Mob Choir, Mob Psycho 100 II

I’m not going to lie, this is one of my favorite openings ever. The second season of Mob Psycho 100 took the anime to places I did not expect and fully solidified it as an all time favorite. Simply put, this show’s animation is a feast for the eyes. Beyond that, it features one of the most compelling character studies I’ve seen in recent years. I’ll be talking a lot more about MP100 later, when I eventually get to genre awards. For now, I’ll just say that this opening and this anime were a big reason why I wanted to begin this project back in January. If a single opening can get me sit through countless hours of anime, then you know it’s a force of nature.

5, 13 & 37

5. Share one of your strengths.I think I’m good at getting feelings across to the audience? How a character feels, or reacts to things. Making characters Relatable ™

13. What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?There’s probably so many I don’t think of because I’ve taken them to heart, but the best one I can think of right now is “said isn’t dead”. Using too many action-y based words during dialogue can upset the flow, and it’s ok to use ‘said’ because its accurate, and not at all distracted.  I’m glad I was taught this after middle school tried to convince me otherwise.

37. Talk about your current wips. Oh boy…Uhm! Lemme scroll through my googledoc and see what I even have started hah!Ok so there are a lot more than I realized, and some I haven’t worked on in ages, but I’ll put ‘em here anyways! I’ll organize them by how much I have written for them. (it’ll be “title (as they are in google docs. probs wont be actual title for most)”. fandom. description.)Just a rough idea (no words, only outline)(most ones here were thought up as me and @pundeserving​ texted):1. “Disney”. Mp100. Where Teru just really loves Disney movies and gets Mob to watch Bambi with him but its Sad so Teru has to help Mob not reach 100% sadness. It would be real cute n kinda gay2. “Emojis” Mp100. A short hc based piece about how Teru would use So Many Emojis and Mob would only really use ascii emotes (teru: 😎😆😭 mob:  :) :0 ).  He basically uses them as punctuation at this point. After his Gay Awakening he gets worried that it seems too extra or flirty so he tries to cut back on using them but Mob picks up on that and gets worried like “why isn’t hanazawa-kun using as many smilies? is he sick? is he mad at me?” He mentions it to teru and teru is like crying internally cause holy fuck?? he noticed smth so small like that???3. “ritsu is an ok mom friend” Mp100. Spawned from that “when a group of friends is formed, the mom friend emerges” post. It was decided that Ritsu would try to be the most responsible of them all and thus the mom friend. (Teru does his own thing, Mob wouldn’t wanna ruin the others’ fun, and Shou…is Shou). Also spawned from a hc that, in short, is Teru and Shou would be Those Friends who would be real competitive and egg each other on and, if unsupervised, would be Bringers of Destruction). He has confiscated many “Bad Idea Materials “.The story would just be Ritsu tryin to keep his friends safe heh. Direct quote from outline “”ritsus always like! how the fuck! my guy! just stop this it’s like ur trying to get urself killed!!teru and shou just “we are” simultaneously and ritsu rly cant tell if its a joke but hes mildly concerned for a week after”“. I think the part I really wanted to write is Shou sayin he had a Good Idea (read: bad idea) and then stops texting and Ritsus like “holy fuck did he die” and panics and Mob helps him calm down and they go check on him together and it turns out Shou just passed tf out because he is bad at sleeping like a normal human at normal human hours.4. WoY. I don’t speak of it to anyone and therefore it doesn’t exist. What fic? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 5. One that i have only written in my head, not even in googledocs yet. Mp100. Ritsu trying to be there for his bro throughout the arcs. After the teru fight, the mogami incident, etc.6. I also have a few in-my-head Mp100 ones based on the sexuality headcanons of mine I posted about the the other day. Really wanna write those tooPartially written ones:1. Su. It was gonna be one where Steven went to Centi and ranted to her about all the Shit that has gone down. That was a few steven bombs ago tho I could make him rant about Even More.2. “possible sewuel to long fic“. UT. A sequel to ‘There Are Worse Things Than Being Alone, Like Being A Little Too Late”. It is a whopping 3 paragraphs, compared to its prequel’s 30 pages (20,000 words). I lost motivation, although I still do have scenes of it written in my brain.3. “pidge post season“. VLD. My idea of where Pidge may have ended up after S1. Completely pointless now, although I’m still wondering if it would be something interesting to post as a ‘what if’. I’d have to finish it though and I am not particularly motivated since S2 came out. I just kinda wanted to make a cool fic about Pidge being lost on a water-based planet and trying to get their lion functional again with whatever was around so they could meet back up with the rest of voltron (also I wanted to make another nonbinary pidge fic for the tag cause those fics Give Me Life)4. “shou u little fucker open up“. Mp100.  A loose sequel to “My Parents Should Have Taken Me Back for Repairs Before the Warranty Ran Out”. Snippets of Shou bein relatable and Depressed and Ritsu helpin him out as he can. Written so far: depression meals aka being too down to go to the kitchen for food let alone going to the petstore to get your hamster more food so you text your best bro to get hamster food for you and tell him to feed ur pet for you and bein discrete enough that he thinks youre out of the house otherwise he might not do it cause theres no way in hell youre telling him you didnt do it yourself cause you didnt have the energy to get off the couch for like 20 hours5. “Awakening“. Mp100. I realllly wanna finish and post this one. Its based on those lines those claw guys said. “HQ sent an awakened brat” “What? A kid went though that?”. Shou doesn’t know how bad his dad is, he is young and loves his parents. He admired his dads powers. He wants to be like his dad. He doesn’t know what it costs. (He is weak in power, and his dad wants him to be strong, an heir, so he takes him to a branch and has him tortirued to awaken his powers fully).Fully written (but in need of revision/I’m uncertain of whether or not to actually post it):1. “Ritsu worries for Shigeo, Shigeo worries for the cats“. Mp100. A post Mogami arc fic. Ritsu knows nothing of what his bro went through, but Mob has a new habit of feeding any and all cats on their way to school. One day two of the cats are fighting and mob stops responding and goes to break up the fight but he’s already losing himself to his powers so Ritsu has to help him back down. He is more confused than ever.2.”Instinct, and the Training of“. Mp100. A fic about ???%, or about Mob’s powers, personified. Whichever the viewer themself wants to read it as, I left it ambiguous on purpose. Personally I like to think of it as ???% but I won’t make others read it as that. Every time ???% happens, or nearly happens, or is implied to have happened, from the pov of itself. Written in such a weird style, I just need to reread it and see if it sounds ok and other last review things before publishing. I’ve been too lazy to reread it and post it though.aaand thats it! hooo, that was a lot sorry hah! Thank you for the ask!