This sounds like a very productive area of discussion.

Bleach thread?

SAGE has been used.

Naruto, Bleach, One Piece, take your pick.

SAGE has been used.

Now thats not really fair. Bleach, naruto, one piece and all that other mindless slam bam pow stuff isn't high art but its not terrible. It's the same as any other examples of its genre, you're all probably just pissed off and annoyed because of its level of saturation and the fact that anime is often judged with shows like it as the example.

Naruto, bleach, one piece, claymore, Dragon ball z, Fullmetal Alchemist, etc, most Shōnen stuff is the equivalent of a summer blockbuster; it's big and dumb and formulaic and aimed at teenage boys but it still has levels of good and bad. And, while I can't speak with much certainty, Bleach, Naruto and One Piece seem to be nothing more then reasonably good representatives of that genre.

Hell, If you want to complain about the genre why not complain about DBZ? It's stupidly long running, needlessly padded, increasingly stupid and often poorly animated.

>>342

It was a joke.

Anyway, this is the worst rated anime on MyAnimeList:
http://myanimelist.net/anime/413/Mars_of_Destruction

SAGE has been used.

>>342

Also, I object to you calling Fullmetal Alchemist (particularly if you were referring to Brotherhood) "big and dumb and formulaic".

SAGE has been used.

>>344

>Main protagonist is a teen age boy

>Blond

>Easily angered: check

>Prone to fighting to solve his problems

>Develops a close knit group of friends

>Who fight together against a great and sinister force

>That force has some sort of weird metaphysical goal and is usually omnicidal

>Enemies and friends alike are prone to monologuing and flashing back either as a fight begins, as they die or both.

>Hero has some sort of super powers

>His powers or his use of his powers are better then
anyone else

>His father is also very powerful, probably the genetic source of a lot of the hero's powers.


Now, here's the question, which anime am I describing? Naruto, Beach or FMA:B? Trick question, it's all of them.
Don't get me wrong, I like FMA:B a lot, King Bradley's final fights were the epitome of badass, but it does stay true to a lot of the broad generalities and conventions of the genre.

>>346

You seem to be unable (or perhaps unwilling) to differentiate between things which are formulaic and things which are necessary for telling a good story and plot progression, and some of the points you made were overly vague/general or wrong.
>Prone to fighting to solve his problems
If the protagonist didn't fight, then the story wouldn't go anywhere. We'd be watching an entire anime where the protagonist thinks about saving the world but decides it's too much effort so he doesn't bother. Would that be an interesting story? Of course not.

>Who fight together against a great and sinister force
>That force has some sort of weird metaphysical goal and is usually omnicidal
Again, this is the basis for telling an interesting story. You can't have a story where nothing happens, the characters have to have something to do or fight against.

>Develops a close knit group of friends
It's been a long time since I've watched FMA, but IIRC the only two constant "party members" (if you will) are Ed and Alphonse. They travel all over the world constantly meeting new people and leaving others behind as they continue their journey (though of course reunite with some of these characters in later episodes).

The reason for having a close knit group of characters though is because having a few characters who are well developed is much better than having a shit load of shallow characters that you know nothing about (a good example of this is the lieutenants/vice-captains in Bleach - there are lots of them, and even though we're told that they're powerful and important, we never see most of them or learn anything about them).

>Enemies and friends alike are prone to monologuing and flashing back either as a fight begins, as they die or both.
This is character development.

>Hero has some sort of super powers
They're hardly "super powers" in FMA, there are specific conditions for the use of alchemy.

>His powers or his use of his powers are better then anyone else
I remember quite a few times where Ed nearly got killed because he wasn't as strong as who he was fighting (a good example is in his fights with Scar). Also, Ed isn't strong just because he's the protagonist (like in Bleach, and I'm guessing Naruto too); he lost his arm, and his brother lost his body in exchange, which is a big disadvantage for him several times throughout the story when his prosthetic arm is damaged or destroyed.

Also:
>Blond [protagonist]
Ichigo (Bleach) has orange hair. Also, the reason for Ed in FMA having blonde hair is because Japanese people often use blonde hair to characterise foreigners. I haven't watched Naruto, so I don't know for sure, but I'm guessing the protagonist in that anime isn't Japanese/Asian. This isn't formulaic, it's just a cliché.

SAGE has been used.

>>346
>>347
No story is original. All of them require some sort of structure that ultimately makes them similar to some other story. The only thing that really separates the good and the bad is how they are executed.

Back to OP's topic, the worst I've watched is probably Needless. The manga's enjoyable enough, but the anime is just terrible IMO.

Chaos;Head was pretty fucking awful, definitely the worst I've ever watched, but I'm sure there are worse.

>>347
>>f the protagonist didn't fight, then the story wouldn't go anywhere
Well, firstly thats wrong, there are plenty of stories in which the hero doesn't fight once. Also you seem to be confusing "struggling against adversity" and "Punching people in the face". When I say "prone to fighting" I mean prone to using physical violence to solve their problems.

>Again, this is the basis for telling an interesting story. You can't have a story where nothing happens, the characters have to have something to do or fight against.

There's a difference between "Nothing happening" and "fighting against a large, shadowy, ominous force with a metaphysical and omnicidal goal" . Having a conflict is needed for the story, that specific kind of conflict is not. There are plenty of other possible conflicts, yet pretty much every series in this genre using that particular trope. Thats what we call "formula"

As per the friends, did you forget that a large part of FMA:B was inadvertently gathering allies for their final attack on the capital? About the huge group of allies they had in the end? All the guys from the north, the hybrid animal people, the guys from the "Not china" place etc? And you're going to say that they didn't gather a group of close knit friends? I didn't say they all traveled in a group, just that they had them.

>This is character development.
Yes, yes it is. It's also a very specific way of providing character development, one that pretty much every series in that genre uses. There are lots of other ways to do it, more organic ways, but doing it this way is a trope common in that genre. It's done for expediency and to allow the main character to continue to move around and meet new people without having to stop and slowly develop each area and character in the way other genre's might. It's formula by necessity.

>Hero has some sort of super powers
>They're hardly "super powers" in FMA, there are specific conditions for the use of alchemy.

Just because it has conditions doesn't mean it's not a super power. Perhaps I should have said "Powers beyond that of a normal human". So yeah, you can call it a "science" or "alchemy" or "magic" whatever but when it comes right down to it he's using powers that the average man does not posses.

Also yes, blond/orange/light hair is a cliche. It is also endemic to this genre, hence it follows a common formula.

I haven't seen it in forever, but I remember seeing a couple episodes of Knights of the Zodiac that were just terrible. "I Ran" as the intro was a hilariously effective way of preventing me from taking it seriously.

Rozario+Vampire. That was just awful. Awful characters, painful dialogue, crappy fanservice, atrocious direction. Almost nothing about that show was redeeming. Manga, on the other hand, is all in all decent.

>>353
i kinda enjoy it that show

I'm going to go one record and declare Garzey's Wing and Gun-do Mushashi the Room and Birdemic (respectively) of anime.

Any moe shit I wasted my time to watch. (Like K-ON)

anything where main characters are supposed to be in the army or police force but wear stupidly revealing clothes for no reason and no one says a single word about dress code

>>402
You sound like a barrel of fun.