Monday, July 03, 2006

Top 5 Worst Anime Endings

Alright I was watching the ending of Cowboy Bebop the other day and thought "Man they hardly wrapped up anything. It seems like the Japanese just can't come up with a good ending for their shows." Maybe it was because of that thought, or because it was about 2:00 in the morning, but all of a sudden I was inspired to write a list of the worst anime endings I had seen. Eventually I got about seven, and I realized that I must have ten, so I tried to think up three more, and eventually I gave up, so I decided to just have 5. So I proudly present the top 5 worst anime endings.
(Warning this has spoilers)

ESCAFLOWNE- Man if there is one ending I hate, it is one that is rushed, and completly misses the point of the whole series, and guess what Escaflowne has both of those. Now I realize that this is probably blasphemy to many of you anime lovers, but I'm going to come out and say it. Escaflowne does not merit the high praise you people give it. The main character was annoying, the auxilary characters were largely ignored, the villains were ludicrous (The main one was freaking Isaac Newton, and another one turned out to be one of the main character's sisters, but she was a DUDE. WTF!!!!!), and the music was not that great. The ending just completely ignored the little love story that was the backbone of the series, and basically restored things to the status quo, making most of the happenings in the story pointless.

COWBOY BEBOP- Sure it had a great fight scene, but the finale left the viewer hanging, and was not a satisfying conclusion to the series. The final scene is basically the main character collapsing, leaving the viewer wondering whether he was alive or dead, and some plot points were left unanswered. I can respect an ending that is purposely vague to set up a planned movie or something, but this is ridiculous, and as of this writing there is no sequel or movie being planned for Bebop.

Wolf's Rain- Now I didn't really like this series, but I always had a little interest in finding out if the wolves would make it to paradise, and, much like escaflowne, the ending basically forgot the entire point of the show and reverted everything to the status quo, which basically made the series pointless. I mean they could have at least killed off all the main characters, or had the world end, but no this anime decided to have everything go back to status quo, by replaying the beginning of the series. Darn lazy writting.

BIG O- I am including the entire first and second season in this. The first ending to Big O was bad, but the second was worse. Basically it was like Wolf's Rain in that the ending was a replay of the first scene of the series, implying that time was reversed, making the whole series pointless. The reason why Big O is behind Wolf's Rain is that the story is unfinished, and this is not the ending the creators had intended for it. Apparently a third season was planned to wrap up the story of Roger Smith, and the ending of the Second season would lead to the third, meaning that the events of the series may not have been in vain. However we will never know because Big O has been canceled again.

RAHXEPHON-Man I can't really tell you what happened here, but it looked alot like two giant robots having sex. I had watched this series under the assumption that it was better than evangelion, but the only thing it was better at was having a weirder ending. The whole series was just weird, and I think the creators must have eaten some of the brownies that were being served to the writers of Bobobo-bo bo-bobo prior to writing the ending, because the Rahxephon finale made absolutely no sense whatsoever.

20 Comments:

At December 17, 2007 10:28 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

One of the best things about anime is that the endings ARENT all, "happy ending, everything is resolved at the end", anime is made to make you think for yourself, to understand the author's intent, even if it isnt spelled out....for instance, Van and Hitomi don't get together at the end, but, that was never the real point of the story.
People who diss anime either dont understand it, or never even tried it, i have to give you points though, for actually watching it before dissing it. MK

 
At December 17, 2007 10:28 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

One of the best things about anime is that the endings ARENT all, "happy ending, everything is resolved at the end", anime is made to make you think for yourself, to understand the author's intent, even if it isnt spelled out....for instance, Van and Hitomi don't get together at the end, but, that was never the real point of the story.
People who diss anime either dont understand it, or never even tried it, i have to give you points though, for actually watching it before dissing it. MK

 
At December 17, 2007 10:29 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

oops sorry about the double post, my connection is bad tonight

 
At July 06, 2008 10:28 AM, Blogger Siouxsie said...

Van and Hitomi can see each other when ever they want, because if they wish it it will come true..that's what the story was all about! She had to go back to settle her stuff..and when she said that she will never forget him, well...she just wasen't thinking sraight. I am sure she went back to Gaia...

 
At July 13, 2008 12:16 AM, Blogger Rabbit-man said...

Ok I think I was still pissed off about the ending to the "His Dark Materials" trilogy of books, and since the ending was actually very similar to the whole Vaan-Hitomi situation I just transferred my hatred to Escaflowne.

Besides the fact that Dilandau turned out to be a girl is still pretty darn bad in my opinion. I mean WTF was that about anyway?

I will concede to the anonymous the point that anime are good because of their ambiguity, and maybe I should take the Cowboy bebop ending off the list, but Big O and Wolf's Rain just had terrible endings.

Also I like how nobody objected to my critique of the Rahxephon ending.

 
At July 14, 2008 11:44 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Also I like how nobody objected to my critique of the Rahxephon ending."

http://objection.mrdictionary.net/go.php?n=2658802

 
At August 01, 2008 2:12 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ooo God, you are so right on with these choices. For one, I have just started watching Escaflowne, attracted as I was by the high praise heaped upon it, and I am already dissapointed. I expected better villians, better plotlines, BETTER MUSIC. Maybe modern anime has spoiled me, but it just doesn't deserve what they say about it.

As for Big O, O My God (pun intended) that anime didn't even end, sort of like Rahxephon. It tried to make you think, get all philisophical and such, but in the end it just turned out convulted and unnessesary. At least Evangelion had great art design and interesting characters to cushion the shock of NOT HAVING AN ENDING. Big O had none of this. It simply turned into some sort of weird Truman Show thing in the end.

Much of the sam can be said for Rahxephon, which actually had a rather engaging storyline, but fell flat on it over-complicated face in the end.

As for Wolf's Rain, I can't comment because I never got passed the first couple episodes. I really should take the time because BONES did it, but now that I've heard about the ending, I really don't know.

And finally Cowboy Bebop. This one I really don't mind so much. Sure the ending was hurried and confusing, but the rest of the series is just so good. Really, you can just take Cowboy Bepop one episode at a time and enjoy the pacing and art. The anime didn't lead you on some huge quest so much as reveal the past too you slowly through the different encounters and happenings with each character. Yes, the ending was a bit of a cop out, but that dosen't detract from teh overall excellence of the Anime. Unlike with the some of the OTHER animes listed.

 
At August 08, 2008 3:17 AM, Blogger Rabbit-man said...

Sorry for ruining the ending of Wolf's rain for you, but you are better off not watching it (it's boring as hell).

Maybe I should add the ending for the fullmetal alchemist movie. I mean WTF Winry really got the short end of the stick there.

 
At August 08, 2008 3:24 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think its pretty obvious spike dies at the end of Cowboy Bebop. And by that i mean extremely obvious. I never wanted to finish wolf's rain personally i didnt like the entire first half of the series i forced myself to watch. Big O wasn't confusing because of the ending, it was confusing because the whole entire storyline was full of plot holes etc. Escaflowne's ending wasn't bad at all unless you really wanted a storybook happily ever after ending between them.

 
At August 11, 2008 9:41 PM, Blogger Rabbit-man said...

Anonymous:

Oh come on did you see what happened to spike at the end of episode 5 or so of cowboy bebop? He survived that, or how about the time when they all got infected by the space virus at the end of Toys in the attic, it seemed to me like they were all going to die there, but NOO they were just fine by the next episode. My point is, it was pretty obvious that spike was dead at least 5 times throughout cowboy bebop, and yet he still lived on.

As for the escaflowne ending, the ending of the second season of the revamped Doctor Who was incredibly similar... Also how can you like the ending of escaflowne? Dilandau was a girl the whole time? THAT'S STUPID!!

You made the right call on wolf's rain though.

 
At July 08, 2009 1:54 AM, Blogger Scott Blaydes said...

I thought the end of rahxephon was fine as it was. I mean he ended up retuning the world so that none of the horrible things that he saw happen would come to be.

 
At September 20, 2009 9:26 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

In Cowboy Bebop during the credits a star goes out, and at the beginning of the final episode the old sage type dude is talking about how a star dies with each life or something to that extent. Also the old guy said something to Spike about a woman being the death of him near the beginning of the series... also... it's like Spike goes out with a bang (in a literal sense as the last thing he says is bang), so I think it would make way more sense if he died then. Personally I really liked the ending to it... but that might just be me >_>

 
At October 01, 2009 11:07 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Cowboy Bebop, Escaflowne and RahXephon? FUCK YOU MAN

 
At October 03, 2009 8:49 PM, Blogger Rabbit-man said...

Anonymous from sept 20 I like what you said you made the ending better for me.
Also anonymous after that, I don't hate those animes I just put their endings here because at the time I thought they were the worst.
But anyway
FUCK YOU BACK ANONYMOUS!!!!!!!

 
At May 21, 2010 9:27 PM, Blogger Rabbit-man said...

I'm glad you came to me, Rabbit-man a random internet blogger looking for help. My first suggestion is to make your hand into a fist. Then punch a squirrel right in the face. Those things can't be trusted. Alright did you do that? It's important that you do that. Those squirrels are fast but the reward of punching the cute out of their beady little eyes is well worth it.

Alright now make your hand into a fist again and punch the shit out of your computer. It's got a virus it's dead to you now. Move on and buy a new computer from the computer store. After that head on over to the ice cream store and buy yourself all the ice cream so you can have a nice cry and watch Grey's Anatomy while eating ice cream. It's the only proper way to mourn your computer.

 
At June 24, 2010 11:18 PM, Blogger Siouxsie said...

escaflowne was the worst! Hitomi should have stayed with her true love!

 
At January 09, 2011 12:59 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

i think that death note should be on that list it is a good anime but the ending is horrible and the title of the last episode is misleading

 
At September 20, 2011 2:52 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

@January 09, 2011 Anon

Wow You took the words right out of my mouth ,i think it should be in the top 3 of this list For its down right awful ending. Though it did make up for that Super Horrible ending with 36.9 episodes of awesome and super compelling story (all the while keeping you on the very edge of your seat)(Kind of reminds me of code geass...no really reminds me of it...both endings where close to the same,ending in their death)

 
At July 08, 2013 7:45 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Tsubasa chronicles had the worst " nothing gets resolve ending". It didn't even HAVE an ending! They didn't even meet the villains!

 
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