Welcome to my VERY late top anime of the fall season. I usually do this in the sixth or seventh episode mark. In fact, the rankings here are based on seventh episode viewings. In spite of that, I’m sticking to my guns with this list. So let’s begin so I can start writing my best anime of 2022 soon after.
At number ten I have ‘Legend of the Galactic Heroes’ from Production IG. This is a remake of one of the best space opera anime of all time. Personally, I prefer ‘Space Battleship Yamato’ over this. But, this doesn’t discount the fact that this is a pretty good anime. Good enough to make my top ten list for the fall season. I’ve always liked how General Yang and Emperor Reinhard do everything that they can to outwit each other in the galactic combat arena. Each is an excellent strategist in his own right. There will be more of this coming in the future. So if you like space operas without the mecha, you should look into this anime.
At number nine I have ‘Reincarnated as a Sword’. This is my father-daughter anime of the season with Shisou the intelligent teacher sword playing protective doting father to Fran, the black cat with a dream of evolving. This is a stereotypical isekai with Shishou being the overpowered reincarnated character. This anime is fun to watch, and Fran is just such a cute character to root for. Second season is already in the works. More of Fran, and Shishou is good.
At number eight I have ‘Urusei Yatsura’. I have a hidden agenda for supporting this anime. Sure it’s a Rumiko Takahashi classic. Sure it’s a remake. Because of this, I’m hoping that this will open the door for a remake of Ranma 1/2. This is no discredit to ‘Urusei Yatsura’. This is the root of all the wackiness that all other Takahashi works have to offer. Seriously though Ataru should open his eyes. Lum is easily the most attractive character in the series. That’s partly what makes this anime so funny. It’s got a full year cour as well so expect this anime to be around for a while. There’s only one other anime on my list that will be around as long. I’ll get to that much later.
At number seven I have ‘The Eminence in Shadow’. Shadow/Cid reminds me of what would happen if you combined Batman with the Venom Symbiote. The result is a VERY overpowered isekai character who creates two sets of harems for himself. One comes from the organization he helped create: Shadow Garden. The other harem comes from the group of fangirls who fall for poor ‘weakling’ Cid. This is an anime worth watching if only to hear the line: ‘I am atomic’. I also watch this anime all the way to the end because of the puzzle images of the female characters in the story. This anime shouldn’t be in the shadow of your anime list.
At number six I have ‘Mob Psycho’. This is the last season of this anime, and it is a fitting end to the adventures of Shigeo Kagayama aka Mob. I’m wondering who will take the banner of representing Studio Bones with ‘Mob Psycho’ ending. There’s a lot of drama here, and confessions from many characters. It’s hard to see such a great anime end, but it couldn’t have ended any better. Still, it wasn’t enough for ‘Mob Psycho’ to break into my top five. Primarily because of the anime at number five…
At number five I have ‘Bocchi the Rock’. When I first heard about this anime from Cloverworks, it radiated so much ‘K-On!’ vibes. True to form, ‘Bocchi the Rock’ is the second coming of ‘K-On!’ This might be sacrilege, and I do love ‘K-On!’, but it even does so many things a lot better. I ended up cheering for Bocchi aka Hitori Gotou to overcome her social anxiety. And she overcomes her difficulty a lot earlier than Komi. ‘Bocchi the Rock’ also has an excellent set of anime music that I love to listen to again, and again. This is one of the surprise anime of the fall season for me. I didn’t expect it to make my top ten yet here it is.
At number four I have ‘Golden Kamuy’. This is also the last season of ‘Golden Kamuy’, and it joins ‘Mob Psycho’ in waving goodbye. I’m not a big fan of historical fiction, but ‘Golden Kamuy’ is an exception to that. Never underrated but sorely underappreciated, the factual elements mixed with the quest of Asirpa, and Sugimoto to find the lost gold make this anime rank high on my list. Note that this is a mature viewer anime with some adult themes. Regardless, this is one of my favorite anime to watch whenever it’s around. Sadly, the anime got delayed mid-season because of the death of one of the production staff members. The silver (golden?) lining there is that I get to enjoy this anime a bit longer before it ends.
At number three I have ‘Spy Family’. My pick for anime of the year when it came out falls short of number one for the fall season. The entertainment value of ‘Spy Family’ has plateaued, and the reason why I could not put it at number one for the fall season. It’s still pretty good, and funny nonetheless. How could you not adore the Forger Family? This is a masterpiece by Wit Studio and Cloverworks. There’s already news of a new season coming in 2023, and a movie. If you aren’t watching this anime yet, it’s high time you join the peanut gallery. Anya would even join you.
At number two I have ‘Chainsaw Man’. This was a much heralded, and anticipated anime of the fall season. It didn’t disappoint. Studio MAPPA has another winner here on the heels of ‘Jujutsu Kaizen‘. There are a lot of similarities between ‘Chainsaw Man’ and ‘Jujutsu Kaizen’. The big difference is the mature content, and dark comedy that you find in ‘Chainsaw Man’. MAPPA pulled out all stops with ‘Chainsaw Man’ providing it with a different ending song for each of its episodes. That’s not to say the opening song is nothing to crow about. I keep saying this…Denji reminds me of Pepe Samson from the novel, ‘Mass’ by F. Sionil Jose. His needs are very basic. He’s your heroic anti-hero if that makes any sense. This would’ve been my number one anime of the fall season if not for a surprising returning anime…
At number one I have ‘Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War’. I was happy to see the return of ‘Bleach’ after a loooong hiatus. Whatever it looked like, I was going to watch it. Imagine my surprise when studioe Pierrot apparently pulled out all the stops to provide us a cinematic masterpiece for EACH of the episodes that have come out. WOW. If you’re worried that there are too many episodes to jump into this anime, don’t worry. You can start watching form the first episode of ‘Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War’, and not worry about what came before. It’s also going to be sticking around a while with a set year cour episode list. Ichigo and the rest of Soul Society are back; and back with a vengeance.
Agree with my list? Disagree? Let me know in the comments.