Last week, we ran a poll for the worst anime adaptations (thank you for all of your replies!), and the results are in! Hopefully, this puts to rest (at least for now) the great debate among what many considered the absolute worst of the genre.
We’ll review each, highlight some opinions, if any, and skim through some personal thoughts about each.
Worst Anime Adaptations – Death Note
According to our audience, this show is the least offensive of the bunch. Death Note came from such an esteemed pedigree – its manga is considered one of the best and most unique crime thrillers of all time and paved the way for darker and more mature themes for a Shounen series. The anime, depending on how you look at it, is an equally compelling source and a great way to introduce anyone to the medium.
There were other live-action adaptations of the series – and they’re quite bad, but nothing has prepared everyone when the Netflix adaptation came out with its character and world overhauls. It was a complete departure from the Death Note everyone grew up with and loved, and the change isn’t necessarily for the better. This drastic shift left many of us feeling disappointed and disconnected from the original story we cherished.
The irony of the whole thing is that it would have worked a lot better if it had been an entirely independent Death Note story set in that very same world. It could have played to its strengths and demonstrated what happens when the same death-dealing notebook gets dropped in another part of the world with an entirely different time, culture, and context, and we’d end up with a better film.
But they just had to try to force the familiar names of Light, L, and Misa onto it.
Worst Anime Adaptations – The Last Airbender
While there was a live-action adaptation of the beloved Franchise recently by Netflix (which was kinda alright). “Live Action Avatar” will always conjure up the sad image of multiple Earthbenders making a concerted effort to throw one measly rock at their enemy in the M. Night Shyamalan film.
Allegedly, the reason for it being one of the worst anime adaptations was a lot of meddling from the studio and producers, as well as good ‘ol Hollywood nepotism. Syamalan’s initial script for the movie was actually so good that it earned the producers’ approval of the original Nickelodeon animation.
Ultimately, all the friction and loss of creative freedom on-set during production were too much, and everyone who used to care about making a good film eventually gave up to collect their paychecks. The rest is history—criticism came in, Shyamalan was thrown under the bus, and from then on, he decided to fund his own movies.
If all these were true, then The Last Airbender would be a tragic tale that gave us a glimpse of the actual systems that govern our consumption of entertainment—where artistry goes to die, money talks, and we, the audience, end up getting a bad movie.
Worst Anime Adaptations – Attack On Titan
Okay so you’ve heard about the lack of creative freedom in the last Airbender, now get ready for the opposite!
The divisiveness of the live-action adaptation of Attack On Titan comes from the liberties the producers and director took when creating the show. From major changes in the story and in the roles and appearances of different characters, vehicles replacing the iconic horseback, to rocket launchers and machine guns being the norm, it was quite a deviation from the Attack on Titan that viewers knew at that time.
It’s not all bad, though. The CGI is really good, the fights are fine, and at its core it’s an enjoyable and interesting film. Their biggest thing going against this adaptation though, is that the far-superior anime is still ongoing and will always be a better watch. Just like Death Note, this would have been better as a stand-alone film or even an original one—replace the Titans with something like… I don’t know; maybe dragons will work better.
Worst Anime Adaptations – Dragon Ball Evolution
Finally, the big bad. It’s one thing to adapt an anime poorly, but it’s an entirely different matter to desecrate a fundamental part of one’s childhood – and for many of us, that’s Dragon Ball.
When you boil down all of the criticisms about DBE, most viewers feel it disrespects the beloved source material. Seeing Goku be this teenager who asks his grandpa how to pick up girls, go to high school on a bike, and experience a bunch of teen fiction tropes is horrifying, to say the least. Repeat a form of this butchery for the other beloved characters, and it becomes very easy to tell our brains that this isn’t Dragon Ball at all.
Maybe the story can save it? Well, no. The original Dragon Ball’s story might not always be deep, but it has great character moments that we’ll always remember. DBE has none of those… well, maybe that one emotional sacrifice towards the end might be it, but they kinda took it back and cheapened the moment.
Okay, maybe the battles are worth watching? Well, I’m sure some of them entertain us, but the big battles aren’t as epic, fast-paced, or brutal as the Dragon Ball we’re used to. Plus, context is important – the more we care about the characters, the more we care about their struggles. When DBE lost us in that aspect, we also stopped caring about their battles.
And here’s the nail in the coffin. They even teased a sequel.
In an interview, the Dragon Ball series creator Akira Toriyama (may he rest in power) said he suggested changes to the script since it didn’t capture the essence of his work. As expected, the Hollywood producers didn’t listen to this advice.
“And just as I thought, the result was a movie I cannot call Dragon Ball.”, Toriyama said.
And I believed he spoke for the rest of us when we saw DBE.
Repeat after me: anime adaptations are bad, and movie sequels are pointless. Didn’t get that last part? Read on below!
