The “B List” for any given year is usually as interesting as the Top 10 – both in its own terms, and for the context it provides for the year as a whole.

Truly, one of the most interesting parts of this process for me is seeing where the relative strengths and weaknesses of a year fall, based on the rankings.  As you know 2018 was a definitely sub-par anime year for my tastes (yours may vary, obviously).  However, if I had to pick a relatively strong section it would not be the top or bottom of these lists. but the middle.  There weren’t many outright classics that demanded to be ranked at the top, and it was a struggle to come up with 20 series I really felt deserved to be ranked at all.  The toughest spots for me in a sense were #1 and #20, because I had to stretch to name shows that belonged there.

However, where 2018 was stronger was in the #5-15 range, more or less.  The #11 spot was just as difficult as the above but for a totally different reason – the series I placed there really felt like it should have been included in the Top 10.  And the next three weren’t tremendously far off, either.  It’s not a bad second 10 on the whole for that reason, but it’s definitely a top-heavy one.  I suppose 2018 was weak both for elite quality and quantity of good shows, but kind of decent for those in the “Very Good” to “Excellent” categories.

11. Gakuen Babysitters – I wish I could just call this spot 10-A, because there’s no way Gakuen Babysitters should have been left out of the top 10.  Sadly there was just a clumping effect around that part of the list, and something had to go – though I agonized over that decision longer than any other this year.  At least it gets a frontpage screencap out of the deal.

Gakuen Babysitters is not a flawless series by any means – at times it could be a bit too sentimental for its own good (though that sentimentality is one of its strengths) and a few of chapters didn’t contribute much to the larger story or character development.  But on the whole it was a really warm, emotionally powerful show that pondered on the power of love and the difficulty in moving on when those we love leave us behind.  I hope we see more series like it produced in future, but the production committee system is making shows like this more and more rare – a popular source material just isn’t enough anymore when disc sales are likely to be minimal.

12. Hinamatsuri – Here was a case when I should have listened more closely to the manga readers.  If I had I wouldn’t have been surprised by how much I liked Hinamatsuri, another series that didn’t miss the top 10 by much.  In contrast with Gakuen Babysitters I’m surprised this show tanked on disc – I would have thought it had enough elements prized by the Blu-ray buying community to do pretty well.  Consistently very funny and occasionally quite heartwarming (being moved to tears by an Anzu chapter was totally out of left field for me), Hitomimatsuri was a real winner – and interestingly most of the best moments came courtesy the supporting cast.  One (Anzu) became the emotional heart of the series while another (Hitomi) became its comic engine.

13. Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii – Wotakoi was kind of an odd case – a romantic comedy with almost no romance which worked extremely well in spite of that.  Maybe there’s something intentional to that given the social issues facing Japan’s younger generations these days.  It was a good year for NoitaminA, delivering two of its best romances, and Wotakoi provided a really interesting sense of contrast with its two main couples.  It was also a case of truth in advertising, because the title really does tell you the raison d’etre for this series.  Young people trying to figure out how to have meaningful romantic relationships – what could be a more universal theme than that?

14. Kokkoku – Probably 2018’s best straight thriller, Kokkoku was part of a very good year for the young studio Geno.  Adept at studying family dynamics, suspenseful, not a mass-produced model in any sense – Kokkoku stands out among 2018 anime in every way.  It’s also a resolutely progressive thriller in that its strongest characters are women – tough and resourceful women who deal with a lot of pride and poor judgment from most of the men around them.  I also thought the world-building and mythology were quite well-crafted and elegant.  This series was a real pleasant surprise given how little-known the source material was.

15. Gurazeni – I’m mostly on an island here, but I really enjoyed Watanabe Ayumu’s other baseball show (and his third series in the Top 20).  It certainly helps if you’re a sports fan and if it’s baseball so much the better, but Bonda Natsunosuke provides a great center for this story even if the sports side doesn’t interest you that much.  It’s pretty rare that we see anime which seriously dive into the business of professional sports (Giant Killing is the only one which springs immediately to mind which does it better), but it’s a fascinating topic worthy of exploration.

16. Hoozuki no Reitetsu 2nd Season: Sono Ni – After two seasons solidly in the Top 10 (truthfully this one should have counted as the second of a split-cour, but the announcement came after I’d already posted the 2017 list), Hoozuki no Reitetsu slipped a bit in its third cour.  There’s no rocket science here – “Sono Ni” simply wasn’t as consistently funny as what came before it.  My sense is that there just weren’t as many really elite chapters left to adapt, but whatever the reason, the relative paucity of the series’ best side characters (Enma-sama, Nasubi and Karauri, the Zashiki Warashi) in this cour was the main reason why it slipped a few spots.  Hoozuki was still a wonderful series, as good as anime comedy gets at its best, and as ever finely-tuned to my particular comic sensibility.

17. Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san – I feel very strongly that we’re going to see a sequel to Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san at some point when the source has more material – the manga sales continue to be strong (including two spinoff series which I don’t like as much as the parent story), and the series did quite well on disc.  Karakai Jouzu is a bit of an odd duck – it treads a very fine line between being sweet and mean-spirited, but manages to do so adeptly most of the time.  Make no mistake, as cute as it is this middle school romcom has an edge, and there are times when Takagi-san’s prescience is almost alien in a rather annoying way.  And Nishikata-kun, for all that he brings his woes upon himself, is a good boy who deserves better treatment.  Yet still, somehow, it works as both comedy and romance – and that’s a tribute to the writing (both of the manga and Yokote Michiko’s artfully-finessed adaptation).

18. Kyoto Teramachi Sanjou no Holmes – Yeah, this choice is as personal as it gets – but as I’ve noted, the nature of 2018 in anime makes this my most personal year-end totting-up so far.  I love Kyoto and I love it when anime exploits the city’s fabulous atmosphere, and Kyoto Teramachi Sanjou no Holmes certainly does that.  In its unassuming way this little series works on many levels – travelogue, mystery, and sneaky-good romance.  It also gets major bonus points for all the excellent day trip ideas it’s given me.

19. Tada-kun wa Koi wo Shinai – Another personal choice, no question.  But I love romantic comedy and anime throws me so few bones, and one that’s specifically a homage to Hollywood romances of the golden age is especially welcome.  The Roman Holiday connection became obvious pretty early on (the credits sequences alone tip that off) but it shouldn’t be taken too literally – and the ending, controversial as it was, bears that out.  Tada-kun was inconsistent and ultimately probably falls short of being an unqualified success, but I appreciate both what it was trying to do and what it was able to accomplish.

20. Double Decker! Doug & Kirill – Like its spiritual predecessor Tiger & Bunny, Double Decker winds up in the 2nd 10 after looking for a while like it might place higher.  In the end Doug & Kirill seems to have had no direct relationship to Tiger & Bunny at all, but that’s not really a problem for me.  This series simply didn’t finish at its best – the final arc was rushed and featured some pretty dodgy CGI character animation.  The sci-fi elements were interesting, but I liked Double Decker better as an anime riff on an American buddy cop story, both when it played up its satirical side and went for gritty and realistic crime drama.  Overall still a very good show, with an excellent cast of characters, and I’m pleased that it has a three-episode OVA “extra” story on the way.

In case you’re curious, the last show I cut from the list was Osomatsu-san Season 2.