10 S-Tier Anime With F-Tier Fan Bases
Anime began spreading its worldwide wings in the 1990s, with early successes like Dragon Ball and Sailor Moon earning global levels of popularity. Iconic series like the Shonen Big 3 paved the path forward for the medium, whose pinnacle hasn’t been reached yet. Based on responses to modern series — from Demon Slayer and Jujutsu Kaisen to the remake of Fruits Basket — it’s clear that anime is here to stay.
There are thriving fandoms for even the most inconsequential anime shows, yet another testament to the medium’s legacy. Online fan culture can be traced back to the 2000s, when debates, discussions, and memes were dispersed across the internet. Unfortunately, there has always been a vocal minority negatively impacting several anime, many of which are unquestionable masterpieces. While fanbases are generally well-behaved, a few factions tend to drive potential fans away from their so-called favorite anime.
Attack on Titan Has One of the Worst Anime Fandoms
Hajime Isayama’s Attack on Titan was immensely popular during the late 2010s, eventually coming to a close in 2023. The series received acclaim for its delicately nuanced portrayal of politics and war, highlighting a single common thread that has often separated humanity from itself: us vs them. It doesn’t matter if the members of either faction share genes, values, or legacies. The point is that there is no tangible difference between different people.
The us vs. them trope was unfortunately reflected in Attack on Titan‘s fandom, transforming a complex exploration of nationalism and morality into a warzone. A group of fans were literally worshipping Eren Jeager as some sort of anime savior, creating a subreddit that was later banned “for violating Reddit’s rule against promoting hate.” Meanwhile, other fans criticized Eren as being a pure villain, apparently oblivious to the protagonist’s flawed character arc. Attack on Titan may have a few issues, but it’s also genuinely profound.
Violet Evergarden Is Great Even When Viewers Don’t Cry
The poignant intricacy of Violet Evergarden renders it an ode to grief and tenderness, with each episode waxing eloquent about the inscrutability of the human condition. The eponymous Violet is an incarnation of post-war trauma, being forced to learn empathy after spending a lifetime as a war machine. Violet Evergarden takes the epistolary approach, splitting its narrative based on the letters written by the protagonist. The anime is more than a simple tearjerker — not only does it pull at the heartstrings, but also makes music from them.
Unfortunately, some fans have been judging others’ love for the series through the singular optics of crying. Refusing to acknowledge fans because they didn’t shed tears reduced Violet Evergarden to an emotion that many people genuinely find tough to get in touch with. Most importantly, there are many, many kinds of emotional anime — the assertion that Violet Evergarden is the only acceptable benchmark fails to hold up under scrutiny.
Bleach Has Been Idolized to Heaven and Back
Many anime fans might wonder why Bleach is even considered an S-tier anime, and that’s because of its origins. While the story veered problematically off course during the Fullbring arc, not to mention the oversaturation of filler episodes, Bleach was included in the Shonen Big 3 because it was just that great. Tite Kubo’s worldbuilding may not be as complex as One Piece, but he managed to produce a unique anime universe that remains as influential today. And the ongoing Thousand-Year Blood War adaptation only strengthens Bleach‘s claim to fame.
When some viewers correctly criticized minor issues like power creep and tonal whiplash, other fans overcorrected by idolizing the anime. There have been endless arrays of power rankings, with many debates soon turning harsh because of mutually exclusive opinions. For example, Aizen, one of the greatest villains in anime history, was minimized by memes. And the mixing of older and newer (TYBW) fandoms did little more than stir the already boiling pot.
Sword Art Online Has Its Share of Blindly Loyal Fans
Sword Art Online is not an S-tier anime because it’s flawless; on the contrary, a few of the series’ own fans have complained about its pacing. And yet, it captured the imagination of an entire generation with its depiction of digital freedom, elevating the isekai genre to new heights. Sword Art Online played an instrumental role in popularizing the trapped-in-a-game premise, showcasing difficult concepts through the psychological transformations of its main characters.
Sword Art Online is emotionally accessible, whether it’s Asuna’s meaningful courage or Kirito’s detached demeanor. Everything makes sense about the anime’s world and its characters. That said, select fans began promoting the show as the “peak of anime,” embodying a blind loyalty that refused to even recognize Sword Art Online‘s occasional failings. Kirito also experienced deification much like Attack on Titan‘s Eren, albeit at a much lower level.
Steins;Gate Is Brilliant and Deserves a Wider Audience
Time travel is already a confusing genre, resulting in very few truly breathtaking stories. Among them is Steins;Gate, a slice-of-life comedy that unravels to reveal its truly tragic colors. The anime’s narrative shape takes both emotional arcs and time travel mechanics into account, seamlessly blending them into a streamlined meditation on choice and regret. Despite the despair, Steins;Gate maintains a beacon of hope shining behind all the gloomy darkness.
What ultimately makes Steins;Gate a masterpiece is not the series’ brilliant science fiction, but the interlaced character arcs that converge into catharsis. Steins;Gate effectively proves that intelligence and emotion can work side by side. Then again, the intellect required to properly understand the anime has made a few fans into self-aggrandizing overexplainers. Although it deserves to be watched by everyone, Steins;Gate arguably suffers from some of the worst gatekeeping in the medium.
Chainsaw Man Ironically Mocks Several Fan Opinions
Chainsaw Man feels like the anime version of a Jackson Pollock painting — a relentless rampage with layers of meaning hidden behind the tempestuous darkness. Bloodshed isn’t really that prevalent in the medium, especially in a shonen anime, but Chainsaw Man proves that brutality can be art. In fact, the anime’s stylized violence serves as a metaphor for guilt, shame, loneliness, and exploitation. Denji is unique among shonen heroes in that he wants nothing more than a simple life for himself.
Watching Denji subvert a painfully common shonen trope was deeply refreshing, a sign that the most popular anime shows of the 2020s are taking a different direction. And then there’s Chainsaw Man‘s split fanbase, the overanalytical critics and the edgy memers. Ironically, the anime mocks both those perspectives by satirizing shonen excess. All things considered, Chainsaw Man is a spectacularly self-aware watch that’s severely hindered by thirst trap memes and “copium” debates.
Death Note Fans Mistook Their Fascination for Intelligence
Death Note can be described as a psychological opera, a dangerous duel between the staggering intellects of Light Yagami and L Lawliet. Although Light begins the story as the protagonist, Death Note quickly proves otherwise. Upon acquiring the godlike power of deciding another human’s fate, Light metamorphoses into Kira, a hateful monster who mirrors the potential for villainy in anyone, including the viewers. The core concept is exquisite — and aside from a couple of narrative impediments, carries the narrative to the end.
Meanwhile, Death Note also gained infamy for being simultaneously iconic and deeply misunderstood. It was the same problem as with Eren Jeager, with fans idealizing the power fantasy that turns Light into a monster worse than anyone he kills. Edgelord reverence has an instant expiration date, starting the second when certain fans conflated their fascination with proof of intelligence. Death Note is by no means a popcorn-view, but hearing self-titled aficionados bragging about their superiority complexes was a huge buzzkill.
Neon Genesis Evangelion Suffers from Petty Gatekeeping
Hideaki Anno’s Neon Genesis Evangelion is technically a mecha anime — the main characters pilot enormous robots against similar enemies. The real story, on the other hand, feels like an existential crisis for humanity as a whole. Neon Genesis Evangelion is never recommended to general mecha fans, as it takes darker and darker steps that leave viewers feeling frustrated, confused, and mysteriously miserable. This particularly bitter flavor works in the anime’s favor, though, even if most fans were annoyed by the last two episodes.
Today, female characters like Rei, Asuka, and Misato are icons of fanservice and fetishism rather than the nuanced psychological portraits they were designed to be. Pseudo-intellectualism has taken over a fraction of the fanbase, with a few claiming that it takes years of rewatches to even scratch the surface. While Neon Genesis Evangelion is far too sophisticated to be understood immediately, this level of gatekeeping comes across as petty rather than well-intentioned. And the less said about all the “Get in the robot, Shinji” memes, the better.
Puella Magi Madoka Magica Is Not Supposed to Glorify Tragedy
The foundations of the magical girl genre were established by Sailor Moon, which highlighted the power within shojo storylines. Meanwhile, Puella Magi Madoka Magica radically subverted the genre by exposing its deepest and darkest secret: the high price of hope. However, the series also showcases the selflessness and compassion of young girls forced into impossible burdens. Puella Magi Madoka Magica eventually transcends tragedy, with the titular protagonist earning her own salvation.
Deconstructing the magical girl genre turned Puella Magi Madoka Magica into a victim of its own fanbase. The anime’s ominous commentary on hope and sacrifice was reduced to a trauma competition, with fans arguing about who suffered the most. The anime clearly condemns this fetishization of their suffering, but reality isn’t enough sometimes to convince a vocal minority. Puella Magi Madoka Magica is a delicate masterpiece, not tragedy porn.
Cowboy Bebop Fans Overhype the Anime’s Coolness
Shinichiro Watanabe’s Cowboy Bebop holds the distinction of popularizing anime in the Anglosphere. Released in 1998, the series ran for 26 perfect episodes before its equally perfect conclusion. Spike Spiegel absorbs much of the limelight, but his character arc only makes sense when juxtaposed against his friends, allies, and even enemies. That said, the best feature of Cowboy Bebop remains the anime’s musical score, a jazz-blues hybrid that feels both timeless and relevant.
Cowboy Bebop might well be the most effortlessly cool anime in history, inevitably leading to a fandom that glorifies its cool factor beyond the levels of common sense. It’s not supposed to be a litmus test for “real anime enthusiasts,” whatever that means, let alone a reason to insult supposedly ignorant fans. Purism and gatekeeping will always turn people away from life-transforming experiences like Cowboy Bebop. Although it’s true that modern anime have struggled to keep up, nobody wants to be mocked for loving relatively simpler shows.
