What makes an Anime Great?

[PanzerJager]

the topic here should be evident..

what makes an anime great for you? is it the animation? the story? the characters?

for me it is the story, the characters, and the overall mood set by the anime.. I love the ones that make you laugh or cry.. or both.

because of this my favs have got to be Great Teacher Onizuka, Full Metal Panic and BECK..
yea.. and i like mine to have good openings and endings.. and a little music in between doesnt hurt..

[Bragi]

for me.. I first look at the quality of the animation. on how vivid the details and the quality of the action sequence. After which either I judge the character on my own criteria.

hmmm... pretty much if I'm bored the story doesn't matter but usually I really consider the content of the story.

Example: Comparing Deathnote (It has less action but good story plot) with Black Cat ( It has good Action sequences but I got bored on the story).

An anime for me to be great is the quality of its STORY PLOT.

[sa5m]

1. Plot-- it's the most important for me
2. Art-- But I won't watch an anime in the first place if the art or animation is terrible =P

[Kawairashii hikari]

i agree with jinglefox on both points, i also like the moods of anime the are similar to Fruits Basket and Ouran High School Host Club anawesum anime i just started watching

[Zantetsuken]

Characters, story, and uniqueness. If it reminds me of something else or seems like almost a duplicate, then I hate it.

[GrimStride™]

The story is most important for me.Then are the characters cuz i quit animes if there are too many characters that annoy me.And its a bonus if the OST is cool

[zyronet]

Simply because it makes the impossible, be possible even just for something animated. Having the wild and infinite imaginations of humans, be seen by naked eye. It makes dreams come true by art.
So does the story.. For me, i think some anime inspires people. And thats what makes it great. I think??

[Gizoku]

For me, the storyline and art. If its not so good I wont watch it.

[PanzerJager]

Simply because it makes the impossible, be possible even just for something animated. Having the wild and infinite imaginations of humans, be seen by naked eye. It makes dreams come true by art.
So does the story.. For me, i think some anime inspires people. And thats what makes it great. I think??

so true.. Anime stimulates my imagination and I can spend hours just making up storylines in my head, only if I have enough time though..

And as for anime being inspirational. It couldnt be more true.. After I watched BECK I was ready to start playing a guitar...... then I watched Wolfs Rain and I completly forgot about that..

[overwatch]

Just don't try living off the moon's energy - you need to eat!

[mr pantsu]

^hehe


what makes an anime good in my eyes is the caracters without a doubt, couse they run the show, and iv seen many series whit crappy story lines and so on but if it has great caracters, its still a great watch, but if a show has a great plot an story but the caracters sux, the series quickly starts to drag an its hard to keep the attention up, allso the balanse the caracters inbetween is important, couse if for exampel all the caracters are similare the show gets boring and repetetiv and if they have personalitys that dont go together its hard to get a feel to their relationship, rant rant rant , and thats my 5 cent

-d-

[Rem]

I could care less about an anime's story, since my favorite genres are shonen fighting and sports series, I don't really expect much plot. Howver I expect great action, if it doesn't have that, well quite frankly I don't care.

[VraieEsprit]

The characters. The characters and the story are actually interconnected though - if your characters suck, so does the story, and if the story sucks, the characters probably do too :S It's not always the rule, but the two do matter to one another.

But the care and attention that goes into characters is what generally attracts me. I prefer character interaction and development to multiple "kick the bad guy's butt" scenes...those latter become repetitive but gleaning details and secrets about individual characters is never boring

Or maybe I'm a geek

But my vote's with the characters for sure. S'why I'm so addicted to Fushigi Yuugi...

I also like animes that make you think. Full Metal Panic is actually a great one for that - the characters are great, the situation kinda makes you go "woah" but there's still a lot of laughs and down to earth moments too.

And then you remember what the theme of the story is...and it's "woah" all over again...

Vraie

[Shirai Ryu Scorpion]

Awesome thread to start-- Yes, Um, what's great in anime I believe it has to be the plot, and the characters (IE. Past, Powers, Or looks). The animation has to be good to, hmm...that's about it in anime.

[VardomTheDark]

I agree with zyronet. A good anime has to spark your imagination. We are all human and cant bend the rules of the universe and anime does it for us.
Without that it cant be a good anime. The characters are the second most important thing. A good selection of different characters through out a anime lets all people enjoy it, even if there good or evil.

[Thousand Eyes]

For me, it's the story, animation, voice acting and music. If any one of those are lacking, one of the other three needs to be sole-focused in order to keep my attention, although I'm open to give various Anime styles chances.

[ichigosama72]

The characters. If i don't like them, i don't watch it. The story matters sometimes, but not often for me. Dirty Pair is a good example. Yuri and Kei worked well off each other, there was no real story, but it was entertaining. Yep, characters all the way for me.

[LiLi.]

Personal Opinion:
Interesting Story.
Characters good-looking. (well like for the main character)

[freakboi928]

For me, it's the story, animation, voice acting and music. If any one of those are lacking, one of the other three needs to be sole-focused in order to keep my attention, although I'm open to give various Anime styles chances.

same here

[Takatofan1986]

I say Humor. If i can laugh, its a good anime

[小美ドクロchan]

What I need are three things: Good art or likable style, characters, and voice actors. That is it. Of the most important though, characters are EVERYTHING to me.

I say Humor. If i can laugh, its a good anime

Heh, agreed. I always need a little bit. Unless you're planning to distract me with eyecandy. *cough xtv cough*

[Guerrera]

I've got a system for rating anime I like:

1. The art. Flawless drawings always capture our eyes. It's the first thing we notice, so the ideal anime should have good art. At the very least, it should look decent regardless of whether or not it's realistic.

2. The animation. Don't confuse art with animation. Art is the look, and animation is the movement. When I watch a certain show, I've noticed that one of the elements is usually sacrificed for the other. The art will look good, but there's barely any movement, or the animation is amazing but the characters look awful. A good anime should have both.

3. The story. Storylines will make or break an anime, so this is probably the most important factor in a show. The story SHOULD NOT repeat itself after every arc (-coughcough-DBZ!!!-cough!-).

4. The characters. Characters should bring life to the story. I hate it when two characters look or act the same. There should be variations in the characters in both looks and personality (funny, weird, evil, good, cute, ugly, down-to-earth, naive, etc.). Not having enough characters can make a show boring. Too many characters might ruin a good show. Every now and then, we need a break from the main character, and that's what the secondary characters are for. That's why a lot of main characters are despised and seen as "annoying." They're always around. Every second of every moment, in every single episode...

5. Humor. As Donald O'Connor says in Singin' in the Rain ... "Make 'em laugh! Make 'em laugh! Dontcha know everyone wants to laugh??"
Um... sorry about that. Point is, shows that don't have the slightest hint of humor can come across as uninteresting to most fans.

And overall...

5. ORIGINALITY. I'm tired of seeing the same thing being done over and over and over again. Enough with the harem stories, samurai/ninjas, vampires, and cat-girls. Let's move on to other things, please? There are plenty of good ideas that haven't been touched yet so there's no need to repeat-repeat-repeat the same hackneyed overused anecdotes we often see in several anime shows.

[Jose]

the art and voices

[buhbibutterfly]

for me...

1. the plot/storyline - i gotta be able to watch it and like it...it's gotta hook me in with the first episode and continue pulling me in till the end. It can't be redundant or has no plot going on watsoever.

2. characters - I just don't like weepy female characters and annoying one's too. there has to have character development in the series.

3. the drawing - as long as the characters and the storyline draws me in and keeps me hooked drawing doesn't usually matter to me...but i still love the colorful arts of certain series/artists. i love the art types for series such as Aria the animation and gakuen heaven.

[overwatch]

Well I'ss say that Mistress_of_Legacies sums up pretty much how I feel, however I would like to add one more factor:
Voice acting - whether its dubbed or not the voice actors for the characters should bring the character to life, not just speal off the words infront of them(I felt this happened a bit in Witch Hunter Robin). They should also (idealy) not be possessed of a voice that makes you want to strangle the life out of the character.