Crunchyroll Awards for the Anime of 2021 - How Did You Vote?

Anime of the Year

  • Total voters
    11
  • Poll closed .
For anime of the year I had to go for ODD TAXI, although it'll probably go to Jujutsu Kaisen or Attack on Titan unless they split the popular vote enough. Like last year there's one I can't understand in 86, just too much of it was stupid to me or just poorly written. Sonny Boy I dropped and I didn't watch Ranking of Kings.

As for the rest I tried to spread things out a bit and also not vote for the popular stuff (unless it was unavoidable like Fight Scene). I struggled with 3 which were; English VA, I only saw 1 and that was Laura Bailey in the original version of Fruits Basket!, Fantasy as I only saw 2 of the nominations and one wasn't fantasy in the traditional sense (neither was the other one thinking about it, but had a more fantastical air to it) and Film, again I only saw 2, and 1 was a bit of a light fluff piece, so only left Demon Slayer: Mugen Train. One of the nominations, Belle, isn't even out yet here! and only just came out in the States and really should have been kept back till next year.

Best Boy - Izumi Miyamura (Horimiya)

Best Girl - Sarasa Watanabe (Kageki Shoujo!!)

Best Protagonist - Odokawa (ODD TAXI)

Best Antagonist - Echidna (Re:ZERO s2 p2)

Fight Scene - Yuji Itadori & Aoi Todo vs. Hanami (Jujutsu Kaisen c2)

Director - Yo Moriyama (MEGALOBOX 2: NOMAD)

Animation - Wonder Egg Priority

Character Design - Saki Takahashi (Wonder Egg Priority)

Score - Yuki Kajiura and ‎Go Shiina (Demon Slayer: Mugen Train Arc)

VA (Jap) - Natsuki Hanae (Odokawa, ODD TAXI)

VA (Eng) - Laura Bailey (Tohru Honda, Fruits Basket Final Season)

OP - Ai no Supreme! – Fhána (Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S)

ED - Nai Nai – ReoNA (Shadows House)

Action - Attack on Titan Final Season Part 1

Comedy - Don't Toy With Me, Miss Nagatoro

Drama - Kageki Shoujo!!

Romance - Horimiya

Fantasy - The Case Study of Vanitas

Film - Demon Slayer: Mugen Train
 
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You know your taste in anime is niche when you only watched 3 of the nominees which have a combined total of 7 nominations. Think I'll sit this one out lol.
 
It would be ridiculous if Jujutsu won it again for the same season! Personally I thought the first half was much better anyway.

I barely watched anything last year so I don't have much else to say.
 
I am not at all voting in this, but I cannot help but laugh at the category choices. For instance a protagonist who starts acting in a villainess way does not make them into the antagonist, it seems that Crunchyroll often doesn't understand what an antagonist is. See for instance 2019 where they had Momonga from Overlord in the best antagonist category...

Also an anime having occasional funny scenes doesn't make it a comedy anime, what are you doing there Oddtaxi?
 
Yeah. I watched Glass Reflection's video on the nominations and he said that there were so many judges this year, himself included, that it just ended up like a mini public vote rather than a bunch of experts picking stuff that were a) actually worthy and b) in the right category. He agreed ODD TAXI shouldn't have been in the Comedy category. He went for Dragon Maid for the final vote.
 
Also they seem to continue to keep up their bizarre avoidance of the slice of life genre. Such as the following that released in 2021 Restaurant to Another World 2, Laid-Back Camp, Non Non Biyori Nonstop, Super Cub, Slimes 300 Years isekai, etc many of which could have easily been included in Comedy genre instead.
 
A SoL category would be good for a bit more of a wider representation of shows out there.
I noticed they've dropped Best Couple this year after only having 1 legit couple out of the 6 nominations last, except there's almost enough couples this year to have 12 nominations with some shows having multiple couples like Horimiya, My Senpai is Annoying and Fruits Basket Final Season. Other shows with couples include Duke of Death and His Maid, and Taisho Otome Fairy Tale, plus another which might be a bit spoilery.
 
I Feel like once again I have not seen enough of these shows to be sure, so I may not vote on every category.

Pleased that the English VA category isn't as bad as it was last year (Nominating Crispin Freeman for his very brief role in Fate/Grand Order Babylonia was pretty much a poor decision as he's barely even in it) even if I think the way they choose this category is fundamentally flawed given many of the judges will not be aware of what is even out there (or, frankly, not watch for a variety of reasons) from their panel.

From that list of 6, Laura Bailey and Anairis Quiñones are two excellent choices and while I have no major beef with the others; SK8's dub is terrific though Daman Mills as Cherry Blossom was perhaps who I'd suggest over those 2 (though David Wald as ADAM is a very funny choice and a dark horse as a winner, certainly made waves for an ad lib in that show), Fena turned out well in general, the one that is a bit odd in my mind is Adam McArthur as Yuji Itadori as, while he's fine, the rest of the main cast of 4 made more of a impression, particularly Robbie Daymond's Megumi, to me. Knowing these awards though, Adam McArthur will likely win unless Laura's celebrity is enough to carry it (certainly deserving to win in my mind anyway).
 
I still enjoy Attack on Titan but I wouldn't call its last season anime of the year. Didn't care about 86, dropped Jujutsu Kaisen for getting boring and Sonny Boy for being too much of a headache. ODDTAXI wasn't to my taste but it was at least interesting, and Ranking of Kings is absolutely charming, so that's where my AOTY vote went here and on the site.

Best Boy - Doraken (Tokyo Revengers)

Best Girl - Sarasa Watanabe (Kageki Shoujo!!)

Best Protagonist - Joe (MEGALOBOX 2: NOMAD)

Best Antagonist - ADAM (SK8 the Infinity)

Fight Scene - skipped as I somehow missed all of these scenes other than two I didn't really care about

Director - Yo Moriyama (MEGALOBOX 2: NOMAD)

Animation - Demon Slayer: Mugen Train Arc

Character Design - Atsuko Nozaki (Ranking of Kings)

Score - Mabanua (MEGALOBOX 2: NOMAD)

VA (JP) - Yuki Kaji (Eren Jaeger/Attack on Titan)

VA (EN) - skipped as I don't watch dubs and didn't want to corruptly vote for the one person whose name I knew

OP - Boku no sensou (Attack on Titan)

ED - Infinity (SK8 the Infinity)

Action - Demon Slayer: Mugen Train Arc

Comedy - ODDTAXI

Drama - To Your Eternity

Romance - Horimiya

Fantasy - Ranking of Kings

Film - Demon Slayer: Mugen Train

I don't feel as though enough people watched SK8 the Infinity. And my vote for the film might change as I get to see the last few this year.

R
 
Ended up voting for 86 for Anime of the Year since even though it's not quite finished yet, it was certainly the strongest of the bunch for me. I might be a little biased since I adore the light novels though

Best boy - Bojji
Best girl - Vladilena Milizé (the girls category certainly had better choices overall, this was more difficult to pick from!)
Best protagonist - Yuji Itadori - Again not a huge fan of the choices here and Eren should not be included.
Best Antagonist - Tomura Shigaraki
Best Fight Scene - Elma vs Tohru - Another tough one, since I think the Jujutsu fights were genuinely great too as was Vivy.
Best Director - Shin Wakabayashi
Best Animation - Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid S
Best Character Design - Michinori Chiba
Best Score - Hiroyuki Sawano and Kohta Yamamoto
Best VA Performance (JP) - Aoi Yuki
Best Opening Sequence - Ai no Supreme!
Best Ending Sequence - Infinity
Best Action - Vivy
Best Comedy - Life LEssons with Uramichi Oniisan
Best Drama - 86
Best Romance - The Duke of Death and His Maid
Best Fantasy - Jobless Reincarnation
Best Film - Josee, the Tiger and the Fish - I suspect Belle or Shirobako may have won my vote had I had the chance to see either of them, but picking between Words Bubble Up Like Soda Pop, Demon Slayer and Josee alone leaves Josee a clear winner.
 
I haven't seen any of these series yet apart from the first half of Season 1 of Attack On Titan, even though I have heard of all of them, and do plan to watch most of them at some point, so I have not voted even though I do have a Crunchyroll Account and paid subscription :)
 
Invisible Crane said:
Dont anime fans lose their goshdarn minds everytime Crunchyroll does their Anime Awards or was that only when Yuri On Ice won everything years ago
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I think fans tend to lose their goshdarn minds about anything that doesn't align with their viewpoint, part of the job.

For example, I'm busy writing my letter of complaint that idaten deities isn't on any of these lists!

I did have a really good time with both ODD TAXI and Sonny Boy though, so at least some of my picks are represented.
 
Part of what used to annoy people was the bais toward shows Crunchyroll themselves streamed, but thankfully that got better in the last few years.

I see people saying none of the shows they liked got in, but personally, I don't have many complaints there. The biggest missing title is the Violet Evergarden movie (was that in the year before instead or something?). Villainess S2 probably deserved a nod for comedy and would have been nice to see Pretty Boy Detective Club somewhere, but beyond those, I'm not seeing a lot that I watched and absolutely knocked the socks off the stuff CR chose themselves.
 
I think the only truly bad thing Crunchyroll has done with these awards was give the industry icon award to Studio WIT president George Wada. Because after the year where KyoAni suffered a massive tragedy it was in pretty bad taste to award the guy who represents some of the worst parts of the industry.
 
I think Evangelion 3.0 + 1.0 is the only title I agree in its category, (but films should be allowed in Anime of the year and director as I think Eva and Anno are better then anything else in both for me)
I would have thought Fruits Basket would have been in best TV anime as I thought that was my second fav, SK8 is also what I would have thought and my alternative take which is Magia Record S2.
Invisible Crane said:
Dont anime fans lose their goshdarn minds everytime Crunchyroll does their Anime Awards or was that only when Yuri On Ice won everything years ago
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Yeah that was just the 2017 ones so we’ve had so many rule changes so that “injustice” can never happen again and it is funny it’s the only year I’ve agreed with the title that won, now it’s shonen like it is obviously gonna be JK or AoT which is weird as I do think final season what I saw was such a step down that I dropped it (esp as I don’t like the rest of the manga) but I do agree with antagonist and not protagonist but somehow doing both felt like sitting on the fence.
So honestly I haven’t voted as I would end up being for what I’ve seen on most categories so it was pointless.
 
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Demelza said:
I'm not seeing a lot that I watched and absolutely knocked the socks off the stuff CR chose themselves
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I think most is fine apart from the ones I mentioned in my post. Would have had Megalo Box: NOMAD in Best rather than 86 and instead of Belle in Film Violet Evergarden like you said as that only came to Netflix last year, but for some reason they're going with Japanese release dates which is why they've nominated Belle despite a large number of voters not even having the chance to see it! For whatever reason films still have massive delays compared to shows and games (I remember the days of waiting like a year for the next Final Fantasy to come out!)
Instead of ODD TAXI in Comedy I would have put Zombieland Saga: Revenge or My Senpai is Annoying, and again as mentioned a SoL category for the likes of Yuru Camp, Non Non Biyori and Super Cub.
 
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