81Koyomi_Araragi said:It's just one of those popular anime I haven't watched and everyone seems to hate it. With a new season coming in fall this year I thought of giving it a try but a friend advised against it saying. "It's the worst anime ever". Now I can't really tell whether my friend really hates it or was just saying because it was popular thing to hate on SAO back when it aired. I've seen some clips and from that the animation and fights look good and calling it the worst ever seems to be an exaggeration. Is it something every anime fan should atleast give a try? It's certainly not "the worst anime ever".
If anything, hating SAO has become a meme in itself.
From what I can tell, the actual hate (and not the part that's the hate-meme) seems to mostly stem from the following:
1a. SAO became really popular, particularly amongst younger viewers, bringing them into the anime fandom.
1b. Naturally, not everyone likes it, but with its massive popularity their voices are kinda drowned out.
2. A popular youtuber makes a commentary about how show has this-or-that-or-other flaws.
3. People who dislike it then sorta jump on the bandwagon as said popular youtuber has just validated their opinion. Part of it is backlash against its popularity, part of it is backlash against its fans, part of it is legitimate opinions of dissatisfaction with the show.
And then, subsequently:
4. Other people started jumping on the hatedom bandwagon. This eventually became another branch of the whole "elitist" vs. "casual" fight with people simply using the pro-SAO/anti-SAO banners as a proxy war for that.
FWIW, the "flaws" all basically relate to the story, from what I've heard, particularly how certain events/characters are handled in it. Far as I can tell, people still generally praise other aspects, such as the music and the animation.
So...in conclusion:
I think you should give it a try if you are curious about it. Don't go in expecting to love or hate it. Don't even go in expecting to be some sort of judge. Just let it take you where it goes.
Then at the end of that, you can say genuinely whether you enjoyed it or not.
In fact, I would particularly encourage you to try to avoid spoilers for the show as much as possible before watching it, but by this point it's probably not possible anymore if you even hang out around anime fandom communities for a few hours. |