Top 10 YouTube Anime Reviewer Channels - TopX Ep.24

- Kicking off our list is someone who pulls no punches – ThatAnimeSnob, also know as Rorico. - I mentioned that Rorico pulls no punches, and this is a bit of an understatement. If you can concentrate hard enough to follow his non-stop stream of words, you’ll notice that he’s pretty harsh in his opinions. In fact, this is what he had to say when he got wind of this list. - Rorico’s just starting out – so while his views or subscriber numbers are nothing to write home about, if there’s one genre where strong opinions can really flourish, it’s anime, so this harsh style has quickly found a fan base that’s growing every day.

#9: 42's Anime Reviews youtube.com/42believers

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- Coming up next is the only female reviewer on this list, a demographic that’s sorely underrepresented in the anime department. At #9 is 42’s Anime Reviews. - Right off the bat, I gotta say that it’s unfortunate that we don’t see a lot more from this channel. The host gives very funny and insightful reviews, but unfortunately doesn’t upload very often – which is why we can’t really place her any higher. - That said, what she does upload is generally really thoughtful and balanced. Those of you that are worried that she’s disregarded anything with fan service because of her gender might be surprised to hear that she has a pretty ambivalent attitude towards that sorta thing. - That’s not to say she’s completely blind to some of the…recent patterns in certain anime. One fun thing that she does on her channel is list off the …uh…issues with certain anime series, much in the same style of CinemaSins “Everything Wrong With” Videos. She does have a point of view.

- Snappy dressers are common in Anime, but for Anime reviewers? Not so much. Well, here to buck that trend is Bob Samurai, also known as Bob. - Bob’s clearly put a fair amount of effort into the presentation department. His videos are always nicely put together, and so is he, often sporting a vest and tie in his more recent videos. Another good thing for newbies is that Bob will often give you a brief introduction to the series he’s reviewing – whereas a lot of reviewers just like to jump in and assume their audience is already familiar with the topic. You might not need this for every show in question, but it’s a nice way to learn about stuff you might not know about yet. - One thing I noticed while watching Bob’s videos is that he’s acutely aware of the sort of vitriol that the various anime communities seem to bring out, and he seems to actively try to cool these tensions. While guys like Rorico seem to like to stoke the flames, Bob likes to go the other way. Passion is good, but it’s clear that Bob puts a fair amount of effort into keeping things civil. Or at least trying to.

- Next up is an unassuming channel with an ostentatious name – King of Lightning. - Christopher, who runs this channel, does pretty bare bones videos, as far as production value goes. It’s just him in front of his webcam for the most part, sometimes with a picture in picture feed of the show he’s talking about. However, he’s also very thorough, charismatic and knowledgeable, so there’s plenty to like from his reviews. His live reactions are also hilarious. - I mentioned he’s thorough, and this carries over into how he reviews. He generally reviews shows episode-by-episode, breaking down shows like One Piece, Death Parade, Kuroko and HunterXHunter. - One funny thing about his videos, is that the theme or thesis of his opinion on whatever he’s talking about is often emblazoned in red writing at the top of the screen – good for a quick check on his opinion.

- Sawyer’s is another channel that we’d probably describe as pretty bare bones, with the notable exception that he uses a green screen to super-impose a fitting background. Much like King of Lighting and a few of the others we’ll see today, he also reviews episode by episode, and it’s clear from his video that he’s very, very familiar with the content and heavily invested in the characters. - As is the case with a lot of these channels, the host’s personality is what’s gonna make or break it for you, in terms of enjoyment. Sawyer, as an example, is a bit more restrained than other hosts, using a clear and intelligent tone – while still mixing in a fair bit of snarky-ness for flavor. - It’s also worth mentioning that Sawyer uses his channel as a sort of vlog as well, often discussing issues that are bothering him but not entirely linked to anime. While this doesn’t really get him any points for this countdown, its worth noting as it helps to round out his content and humanize him as a reviewer.

- Next up is another channel that’s unfortunately not been updating that much recently, but still deserves a mention for its great content. At #5 is Gigguk. - Remember the editing style I mentioned for DouchebagChocolat? Well Gigguk does this too – with a slight spin on the style in so much that he often breaks character or changes his tone to deliver a joke. - This channel has 2 main “pillar” shows, Anime Zone and EvAbridged. Anime zone is your standard reviews – well, they’re not standard as in boring, but they’re the standard reviews for this channel. EvAbridged is a parody redub of EvAngelion, where Gigguk and his buddys revoice the characters in funny ways – sort of a mix of making fun of the show, and anime in general, while still sorta paying homage to it.

- If you’re the type of person that likes to get theoretical about your anime, our next pick is for you – coming in at #3 is Digibro. - Digibro doesn’t just review anime, he also really likes to discuss the genre as a whole in his videos. You can see this in clips like “what is anime” and “why good anime is hard to make”, in depth discussions that delve into the how and why, and not just the what. Those of you hoping to try to get away with doing a school project on Anime may have just found your new best friend. - One thing he does that’s rather unique, or at least unique to this list so far, is that he often will review a series as a whole. Rather than going into depth about a specific episode, he prefers to talk about his feelings about a series in its entirety – again, often analyzing the why as well as the what in a very academic fashion.

- Coming up next is a channel that’s described by it’s creator as 1 part comedy and 1 part abject spazeness. - A common adage in business and life in general is stick to what you know. Tekking, or Matt if you wanna get technical, clearly knows Bleach very well, cause that’s the main focus of his reviews – for every episode of Bleach that comes out, Matt’s got a review for it. - This is a channel that really rewards returning viewers. Matt puts a lot of effort into the ongoing storylines and characters he creates (and plays) on his show – which may seem confusing at first to newcomers, but turn into delightful inside jokes for those who remain faithful.

- Our runner up at #2, is another channel that features brutal honesty and eviscerating opinions – coming up next is DouchebagChocolate. - Demo, who runs the channel, uses what I call a super redundant editing style, quickly cutting to relevant images in a effort to squeeze more jokes into the visual presentation side of his videos. Those of you who watch a lot of let’s play or comedy vlog channels should be pretty familiar with this style, but it’s still easier to just show you what I mean here. - For a guy who’s self described as a douchebag, he actually has some of the best writing I’ve ever encountered on YouTube – and his delivery of that writing is totally on point as well. I straight up laughed out loud several times while doing the research for this entry. - Most importantly though, between all the jokes and irreverent humor, there’s some pretty strong analysis going on in a lot of these videos, making him informative as well as fun. In fact, if he published a bit more consistently, we would have easily placed him at #1. Before we get to our number one pick and our honorable mentions, we’d like to touch upon a delicate conundrum which occurred while we were putting this list together. Normally we LOOK AT subscriber numbers and views, and then factor in our users' votes and our own opinions to balance things out. However, the one suggestion that had the highest amount of subscribers and views basically set a record for downvotes on our suggest page. Misty/Cronexia had 126 upvotes and 437 downvotes, giving the channel an astounding score of -311. That piqued our interest, so we then wandered over to the Comments section, and... well, the rest as they say is history. Suffice to say, while these lists are neither popularity or unpopularity contests, they're also not immune or tone deaf to it. As such, we felt that including this channel on our list would be a… bad move to say the least, but his popularity means we had to mention them anyway. Désolé mon ami, c’est tous qu’on peu faire. With that said, here are our official Honorable Mentions. HM1: GoatJesus youtube.com/GoatJesus HM2: forneverworld youtube.com/ForneverWorld HM3: double4anime youtube.com/Double4anime HM4: Chibi Reviews youtube.com/ChibiReviews HM5: FightingforNippon youtube.com/FightingforNippon

#1: G.R Arkada a.k.a Glass Reflection youtube.com/GRArkada

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- Anime is often a very contentious topic, so it makes sense that our #1 pick would be a rather contentious channel. As is the case with most of the channels we’ve seen today, you either love em’ or you really, really hate em’, and here to exemplify that point is our #1 pick, Arkada. - Another thing that’s refreshing about his channel is his consistency of format. Many critics on YouTube claim to not be “reviewers” per say – and that is NOT the case with Arkada, who offers you a pros and cons breakdown/verdict at the end of each video. While some might not agree with the style, the methodology is pretty clear cut – which in turn makes for a more consistent package for return viewers. - Arkada definitely scores major points in the production department. While on the surface his style is rather similar to others we’ve seen today, he’s got himself a good mic, and good camera, a good mix of B-roll to break up his talking head and has a good grasp of editing – all things that helped him secure this top stop.