Death Note is a popular answer, and I also agree that its ideal stopping point is…
Death Note
L’s death
Bocchi the Rock is another show that I felt would be at its best if it stopped at episode eight. If the upcoming compilation movie stops there, I may consider it superior to the TV series. It’s not unheard-of. Violet Evergarden’s film-length recap stopped at Episode 10.
I want to see more of Bocchi-chan's rock!
The title drop + roll credits is its peak and climax. I hoped its finale would be amazing. However, episode eight overshadowed episode 12. Everything after E8 felt like a lede for an S2.
What are yours?
One Piece
Incorrect.
Do the constant camera panning and characters looking angry at each other add anything of value to you?
Uhhh either your describing dragon ball, or are you referring to character development?
This comment puts the fear of Oda in me. How? that series episode count is in the quadruple digits
Regarding Bocchi the Rock I have to disagree, all I want is more of that show beamed straight into my eyeballs!
I can’t think of any anime that could be improved with less episodes, because I only continue watching something if I actually like it, and I can’t remember anything I just walked away from. Maybe one of the two versions of Fullmetal Alchemist? That show really didn’t impress me much at the time though, really only watched as much of it as I did because friends were so into it at the time.
Non-anime wise, Dexter, Weeds and Supernatural all should’ve ended wayyy earlier and were kept in life support because of prior successful ratings, off the top of my head.
I want is more of that show beamed straight into my eyeballs!
I can’t complain on more Bocchi content. It’s the presentation that I’m wondering in retrospect. I wonder how would it be like if Bocchi S1 ended in episode eight and the rest becomes something like “Bocchi -piece-” Horimiya style.
I wouldn’t mind 8 episodes less of Haruhi.
Personally, while it’s not my cup of mugicha, the Endless Eight are there for a reason
spoiler
tasting a little of the ordeal that Nagato was under at the time
I am currently on episode 25 of Death Note, and I’m unsure about why I should continue. This is why I agree with you.
The same goes for SAO. After watching the first season, I don’t see any reason to continue. It has a perfectly fine plot, which, in my opinion, doesn’t need any extension.
However, I’m still happy for fans of both of these shows that they got more. At the moment, I’m content with not continuing either. They may not have a proper ending for me, but it’s not like I’m unsatisfied.
SAO is the worst fucking offender. The first half of the first season is top tier, but then the fairy shit is almost unwatchable. And then they keep going back to the awful fucking fairy world in every sequel. It almost felt like it was done out of spite.
One piece
Pretty much every shonen jump series, but One Piece above all.
Promised Neverland. End the whole thing at s1.
Hot take time?
The Office.
I enjoyed the first few seasons immensely, but at some point the characters felt off to me. It’s been a while since I watched it, so I can’t pinpoint when exactly it started to change anymore.
Yeah, assuming you’re talking about the US one, I have to agree it definitely loses itself towards the end. It just starts bringing in crazy caricatures instead of fully formed relatable characters because the goofier parts of the established cast were received well. Once Catherine Tate shows up, I’m eyeing the exits.
I just binged it for the first time recently.
It fell flat for me when Michael left. The Office without Michael sort of feels like Scrubs without J.D. or Turk, it just doesn’t work as well. I still enjoyed the rest but it got noticeable weaker.
Rurouni kenshin
Filler arcs, such a common cause of show death.
Naruto (before the time skip) could have just ended after
spoiler
Sasuke left the village and joined Orochimaru
but noooooo, they had to make almost 100 episodes of pure filler…
EDIT: Bleach could also be cut in half and be better off. On second thought, almost all shonen seems to be like this
There are a bunch of long-running series that make (or made) heavy use of filler content of, let’s say, variable quality (Naruto, Bleach, etc.). Other than those, I have a couple that spring to mind:
- Recency bias might be factoring into this one but Ryza no Atelier. I just watched the final episode literally within the past hour and it feels like such a let down compared to the penultimate episode. We go from a huge boss battle to a peaceful scavenger hunt. It just seems like you had an obvious place to end the show on a climactic moment in which the protagonists overcome adversity and realize the beginning of their heroic ambitions; but instead we devote the entire final episode for some kind of moral lesson about farming and friends? Don’t get me wrong, just cutting the final episode won’t make this show actually good, but it would at least be improved; meeting the requirements of the post.
- Carole and Tuesday: I really liked this show, but I feel like the story could have been more focused. In the final third or so of this series, I feel like it rapidly expanded the scope of the show to the detriment of being able to focus on the main cast’s story.
- Planetes: I might make some people mad with this one, but I really liked this show when it focused on the space garbage disposal bits and much less so when it forced a romantic relationship between two main characters. It didn’t really feel earned and, frankly, the relationship focused a lot on reinforcing traditional Japanese gender stereotypes and left a bad taste in my mouth.
- Clannad: If I didn’t make people mad with Planetes, I have certainly made some mad with this one. Full disclosure up front, I have not fully watched this series, so if some Steins;Gate level twist makes all the rest of the show great, then so be it. I just felt like the story would focus entire episodes on people/things that just ended up never mattering again going forward. I remember after a couple episodes just thinking, “What was the point of all that?”. It has been a couple years since I gave it a shot, so I don’t really remember specifics, but this one could really have used some editing. I imagine the movie version helps this problem, but I haven’t seen that after what I experienced with the show.
I loved Clannad, but I do tend to enjoy slower shows quite a lot, I see clannad as a sort of protoype of Bunny Girl Senpai, they’re extremely similar if you think about it.
Afterstory is a totally different beast and more or less comes out of nowhere to hurt you, but only if you actually connected with the characters in S1.
The comparison to Bunny Girl Senpai is a really, really good one actually since they do have an extremely similar storytelling structure. I watched that show+movie just recently, so it is fresh in my mind. I think the main thing that kept me engaged with Bunny Girl as opposed to Clannad is the characters. I really enjoyed the characters in Bunny Girl whereas in Clannad, whenever certain characters showed up (iirc, mainly the guy friend that keeps challenging a girl to a fight), I just found it annoying and took me out of it.
I think there is a lot you could compare/contrast between these two shows and it is making me think critically about what made one work for me and the other very much not work. Thanks for the food for thought!
Kimi no Todoke
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This might be a hot take, but Samurai Champloo. A lot of the show was just filler, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing but I think having a few less episodes would’ve made the show feel tighter.
Boku no Pico should have stopped at episode -1
