The beginning of a new anime season always brings forth waves of excitement and anticipation in the community. With anime being more plentiful than ever before, each anime season is guaranteed to have a handful of outstanding series fans will be eagerly discussing each week. The Summer 2024 season was no exception – from long-awaited continuations like Oshi no Ko Season 2 to novel smash hits like The Elusive Samurai, the last three months of anime were nothing short of incredible.
However, not every Summer 2024 premiere was a raging success. In the sea of titles that debuted this Summer, plenty stood out for all the wrong reasons, making up some of the worst series to have come out this year. As the summer season wraps up and makes way for October’s premieres, it’s becoming clear which shows from the past three months won’t be remembered as timeless classics or fan-favorite hits.
9. Quality Assurance in Another World
Hardly the worst anime of the Summer season, yet one most viewers finished disappointed and confused, Quality Assurance in Another World presents a rather unique isekai concept centered around a debugger and an NPC working side-by-side to fix the fantasy game world of Clayborne Island. Setting off as a fun, comical adventure, the series, however, swiftly withers down after its riveting first episode.
Between characters who lack any progression or development, poorly executed worldbuilding, and inconsistent animation, Quality Assurance does too much wrong to keep the momentum going. Yet, the most notable flaw of Quality Assurance lies in its jarring tonal shifts. A story that could never decide if it wanted to be a drama, a comedy, or a sincere adventure, this isekai flick topples between mindlessly engaging and frustratingly dreary.
8. A Nobody’s Way Up to an Exploration Hero
A Nobody’s Way Up to an Exploration Hero is a straightforward fantasy tale centered around Kaito, a low-level adventurer who, after stumbling upon a rare summoning card, finally has a chance to make it as a dungeon explorer. Unfortunately, the show chooses a route of mediocrity instead of working to set itself apart.
A forgettable “good guy” protagonist, a harem subplot with no tension due to Kaito being in love with his childhood friend, and unremarkable animation that often skimps on action—there’s nothing in Mobkara that would inspire viewers to keep watching. Not committing to any fan-favorite tropes like isekai or ecchi while doing little to distinguish its portal fantasy underdog narrative, Mobkara is not worth the time of even the genre’s most diehard fans.
7. Suicide Squad Isekai
With comic book adaptations dominating the movie scene for the past couple of decades, it’s not surprising to see Western superheroes make their way into anime. Suicide Squad was far from the last group of anti-hero misfits fans would enjoy seeing live through anime’s classic portal fantasy scenario, leading to considerable expectations rising around Suicide Squad Isekai on premise alone.
Nevertheless, the isekai portion is where this promising anime falters the most. A painfully generic another-world story with below-average worldbuilding and characterization, Suicide Squad Isekai was not able to pull through on the inventiveness of its gimmick alone, making it worth checking out only to diehard comic book fans or avid enjoyers of generic isekai fantasies.
6. Plus-Sized Elf
If one approaches Plus-Sized Elf expecting a fitness comedy akin to How Heavy Are the Dumbbells You Lift?, they would be sorely disappointed. A fantasy comedy following a group of elves who, upon falling in love with Earth’s fast food, cannot return to their realm due to their weight gain and now work to get back in shape, Plus-Sized Elf is an excessive fan service galore thinly disguised as healthy lifestyle infotainment.
In this series, elements like character development or realistic portrayal of the protagonist’s fitness journey exist as afterthoughts, while the show’s focus is glued to showcasing its busty heroines in as many compromising positions as possible. While conceptually unorthodox, Plus-Sized Elf wouldn’t appeal to anyone expecting more than a mediocre ecchi flick.
5. Love Is Indivisible by Twins
Romance is an anime genre that never loses its relevance, and the last few years have treated fans to plenty of outstanding and unique love stories—from Kimi in Todoke to Horimiya. However, tiresome tropes still refuse to leave the romance genre, and Love Is Indivisible by Twins embodies the worst of them.
A classic love triangle between an indecisive and dense teenager, Jun Shirasaki, and his childhood friends—the Jinguuji sisters—Love Is Indivisible by Twins features all the hated staples of the romance genre, from a featureless protagonist to unreasonable love interests. Filled to the brim with superficial drama, illogically fluctuating feelings, and pointless infighting between heroines, this anime should be no one’s pick for a compelling and touching romantic comedy.
4. Tasuketsu: Fate of the Majority
For all the excitement and thrill of its premise, death game anime is an incredibly difficult genre to perfect. Generating just the right amount of suspense without making the plot too predictable or overly illogical is no easy task—and Tasuketsu regrettably fails to accomplish it on all fronts.
The series attempts to immerse the audience in the survival of Saneatsu and his group of friends as they navigate a deadly yes-or-no question game where siding with the majority guarantees imminent death. However, between the series’ jumbled pacing, the hard-to-follow decision-making, and forgettable characters, getting hooked on the story of Tasuketsu proves to be impossibly difficult. Above all else, Tasuketsu lacks the most crucial element of an outstanding death game series—intrigue to make it genuinely interesting.
3. Dahlia in Bloom
An isekai with an endearing premise and a praised light novel source material, Dahlia in Bloom follows a young woman who aspires to create magical tools with the help of her modern-world memories. A compelling mix of romance, fantasy, and slice-of-life, Dahlia in Bloom had the markings of, if not outstanding, but decently engaging and relaxing isekai.
Regrettably, after the first arc centered around Dahlia’s relationship troubles with her cheating ex-fiancé, the series slows its plot progression to a snail’s pace. The show’s lackluster production value also didn’t help to keep fans engaged, and the stiff animation and reused shots became a running gag among the few who chose to follow through with Dahlia in Bloom, fighting boredom with humor.
2. Narenare -Cheer for You!
A cheerleading anime with excellent visual treatment from P.A. Works, Narenare -Cheer for You! held tons of promise for both Cute Girls Doing Cute Things fans and enjoyers of good sports drama. In the first few episodes, Narenare showed competence in establishing compelling characters and giving them captivating issues to overcome. However, the series’ potential gets squashed by Narenare’s inability to stay on topic and commit to one overarching plotline.
Most conflicts in the series get resolved too swiftly through ridiculously convenient means, and no plotline gets enough time to develop into something meaningful. A disjointed drama that would’ve worked much better as a longer series, Narenare is one of the worst P.A. Works originals to have come out in recent years.
1. Failure Frame
For all of the popularity of the isekai premise, even the most diehard fans can’t argue that the genre suffers from an influx of mediocre and outright unwatchable shows releasing steadily alongside incredible, innovative exemplars. Regrettably, this Summer’s Failure Frame feels like a compound of everything outsiders and fans alike deem isekai’s greatest problem.
A generic story about an underdog who gets summoned into a fantasy world alongside his much more competent classmates, only to swiftly discover his latent overpowered abilities, Failure Frame is an edgy galore of tired isekai tropes. Yet, what takes Failure Frame from predictable and uninspired to one of the season’s worst is the show’s technical shortcomings. A combination of awkward CGI and aimless direction, Failure Frame possesses neither style nor substance.
This ranking encapsulates the most disappointing entries from the Summer 2024 anime season. While some shows offered glimpses of potential, they ultimately fell short of delivering engaging narratives or memorable characters, leaving fans to eagerly await the next wave of premieres.
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