A Dumb Rule

 There is this 3 episode rule, which I feel the established rule is meaningless, that is made by anitubers. I do not agree with the rule as some anime you typically have to regard all of it to in fact get the whole picture and there have been shows like Clannad or hack/sign where it becomes a masterpiece near the end, you can’t get nearly full enjoyment from just three episodes. There are many factors to why three episodes are not significant for making an opinion on a whole show as a lot of anime are slow burners and can take like five episodes; even hunter x hunter doesn’t pick up until episode 20 and at episode 70 onwards is where the most excellent arc in anime, realistically is because of this you should watch as much until you get what you want out of it.

As someone who has experience in many anime, you can tell if an anime is below average from the first episode like ousama game or bloodivores because it’s almost like a bad anime follows the script on how to ruin the show. I live by the creed that I need to finish what I started so three episodes is not enough for me and not finishing a show endures hell to me. Merely considering it dropped or on hold is worse than going through a terrible anime. Moreover, I prefer to finish bad anime so that I can up the number on my MAL. This is the enjoyment I get out of anime. Consider it whatever you want but I’m obsessed with numbers lol.

I barely grasp why this rule came to be and be followed by everyone for not a worthwhile reason, it was made by anitubers that think they have a better opinion than everyone. The episode rule depends on the person watching. Some people watch one episode, some do all of them. It seems excessive to police what people do when doing this act of being a weeb. Deciding if an anime is valuable to you depends more than the episode rule, as you watch more anime you will like certain genres more than others; you may despise ones with a passion, for example, I don't like isekai as you can see from my past blogs lmao, and ones you may love no matter what anyone says about them.

So, How should I know what to watch?

For me, slice of life is something I cannot get enough of and could watch forever so to speak, it is easy to watch; for example; I have seen 88 slice anime, and not one has provided a bad score. Genres are a tremendous way of finding out what type of anime you like before even starting it so it can save many time merely watching any old anime unless you want to watch everything then I pity your soul. (I am one. You shouldn’t rely on the genre for every choice as there are anomalies in picking just genres, some anime in a genre are not defined by it and transcend the genre into its one thing. For example; Gurren Lagann and Evangelion are more than just mecha anime, they remain brilliant works of art and make up their own thing.

On corroborating what to consider you should also take into account the quality of the character design, what I suggest by this is you can tell if the anime is terrible by how the characters look. Anime that typically includes a lot of work and quality put into it usually has good caliber art into it, if you look at any regular isekai and just skim through multiple, you can see that it is all copied from each other. From experience, anime that include generic or uninspired art is usually terribly bad, one example would be the smartphone isekai which was a very watered-down version of the genre; the only stick was his smartphone but yet was just a generic anime.

This should be taken as a rule to go by on every anime as anomalies are everywhere. Anime like Aku no Hana or ninja slayer's animation and art are subjectively unprofessional in the anime standard, and to many people but are actually very amazing shows because they utilize the disadvantage of the art into its strongest point to convey the whole tone of the anime. They use an unpolished art style to produce a unique show and make up for it with other aspects like comedy or a psychological story that employs the art to convey it. It goes beyond just an anime into its own show and is confident to step outside the box; what shines in these shows represent not the art but all the other aspects of the anime combined with enjoyment.

Ultimately, the purely genuine way of finding out if an anime is good is watching it and finding out for yourself because enjoyment should be the main focus if you enjoy a show; an anime could be bad in art, music, or others but your enjoyment can take over anything. No one shoe fits all to assess if something is superior, sometimes you have to waste time to enjoy or discover the cruel way. That's why many weebs get mad when a show ruins itself because they invested so much time and energy into a show that they wanted to enjoy all the way through. The primary purpose we adore anime always comes down to enjoyment as that's the number one priority that's needed to produce a good score, if you are not enjoying an anime then why watch??

At one point in any series, it cannot stay outstanding forever; as a show continues to be pumped for all the originality and money it can, eventually it will run out of any more to get out of it but because so many people like the anime it still goes on even though it’s not good anymore like any popular series. The best way of finding good anime is experimenting with different types of anime to witness what you relish which is an amazing discovery to witness new exciting cartoons. If you are stuck, maybe you can see a different thing. If you watch shounen jump maybe switch to something unfamiliar if you are bored of it like seinen or comedy shows.

Recommendations are, in addition, another valid way of finding what to watch as it conveys what you love and gives you similar anime to it. On myanimelist, it has a recommendation feature which I have used to find shows. It even gives details of how they compare; therefore, if you like just one thing of an anime, it’s an exceptionally easy method of saving time to encounter the right show. Mood can on top be put into account when finding what to watch. Every so often if you are feeling depressed you can find a sad anime to watch or want some comedy to laugh at or can discover niche shows that are about deep topics like psychological anime. In retrospect, there’s more than just one factor that can depend on what is good or not.

It altogether depends on the person so do what your heart tells you to do; we don’t need to be confined to meaningless rules, watch what you like or want.

Thanks for reading!