With the fantastic news that Fruits Basket is in fact getting a reboot in 2019, I decided to revamp this list.
So many anime have great ideas or start well but just can’t stick the landing or don’t have the resources they need behind them. This is my wish list of 5 anime I feel could be really amazing if redone (and by that I don’t mean following the manga or other source material more closely, but I mean they actually think about the story they want to tell and just tell it without all the clutter or distractions and with a clear purpose and end point).
I’d love to know what is on your wish list for anime reboots so please leave a comment below.
Please Note – There will be spoilers below.
Honourable mentions this week go to Higurashi, Sword Art Online, and Gilgamesh.
Fruits Basket was taken off the list because it is getting a reboot.
Number 5: Record of Grancrest War
This one comes from this year. I really liked aspects of Record of Grancrest War and a desire for a fantasy anime (not an isekai one) kept me watching it, as did some great characters – not necessarily Theo. Unfortunately as this anime rushed through huge amounts of story, crossed vast realms geographically, introduced multiple threats and political as well as supernatural problems, and had a huge cast, it just never managed to find a pace that worked and didn’t execute its narrative well enough (though there were some unintentionally hilarious moments with the animation). All and all, I’d actually like to see this idea and these characters get the time and attention they deserve with a narrative that was straightened out, maybe simplified a bit, and given sufficient thought as to the pacing.
Number 4: Vampire Knight
As much as I have mocked vampire knight when talking about it (the anime version of Twilight) there is actually something quite interesting about the idea of a vampire hunter starting a school where humans and vampires co-exist. And the pure blooded vampire with his own agenda living at the school is kind of interesting. As is the child of the hunter family who has been bitten by a vampire and is slowly turning into one. I’d love to see this story redone with a little more focus on the darker aspects and a little less on Yuki’s indecisive love triangle (okay, every Vampire Knight fan now hates me).
Number 3: Claymore
I really loved Claymore. Until we got to the end which was rushed and inconclusive. Seriously. This is a great concept for a story and the characters are interesting. The world building was well done. Why did we get that ending? I’d love this anime to be redone with a clear focus on where it is going and an actual ending.
Number 2: Soul Eater
Soul Eater has been showing up a lot lately. As much as I love this anime, that ending was bad. Inexcusably bad. That and there’s probably a lot of padding that the series could afford to lose. I’d love to see a much tighter focus on the main villain rather than all the other villains they face off against and actually just watch the students and teachers prepare for and fight that battle. It would be different but I think the show could really benefit from a much stronger focus and a conclusion that doesn’t leave people stunned by how lame it is.
Number 1: Bleach
It had to be. As much as I am in love with Bleach as a series and as much as Bleach is a big part of the reason I became an anime fan as an adult, there are some real issues with Bleach as a story because of its excessive length, scope, and endless rounds of filler. Now that the manga is finished can we decide what the main point of the story is and just tell that story. 50 episodes. Bleach in 50 episodes. Really trim everything unnecessary from the mix and just tell the core story with the characters you actually need. I would absolutely love to see this. Either that or give Hitsugaya his own show. I’d be pretty happy with that (joking – kind of).
Okay, so over to you. What would you like to see rebooted?
Thanks for reading
Karandi James
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Fruits Basket Mini Shikishi Collection BOX (Set of 8 pack)
I like Fruit Basket and Vampire Knight
Imo I’d love to see a reboot of the underappreciated anime “The Law of Ueki”. It’s tragically underappreciated and desperately needs some reboot.
Have to admit, I’ve never heard of that one.
Oh, my gosh–reboot Fruits Basket with the same art style and voice cast?? YESSSSS!! <3<3<3
Glad the idea excites you, now we just need someone to do it.
A lot of good choices, some I have been eagerly wanting to watch like Claymore. If Bleach was remade it certainly would make rewatching it slightly less daunting with all those episodes. Cybersix is a series that I would love to see rebooted at some point, maybe even Zatch Bell to make it more like what the manga was without chopping off the ending. Those would be my top choices for reboots.
I had to look up both of those choices because I hadn’t heard of either, but both look like they could be pretty cool if redone.
I would love to see an FMA: Brotherhood equivalent to Soul Eater, as I believe the manga is one of the greatest shounen series of all time.
I think I would like to see berserk and Tokyo ghoul rebooted both anime have problems and would like to see fixed.
That’s the second vote for Berserk. Totally agree with you on Tokyo Ghoul. Season 1 is fine, not as good as it oculd have been, but fine. Season 2 on the other hand needs to be totally scrapped and started over.
Omg I need to see fruit basket.
It’s quite enjoyable. Considering its sickly sweet high school romance and I still found it entertaining, I should probably ammend that to really enjoyable.
Good to know
I wouldn’t mind seeing Aldnoah.Zero get rebooted myself. I know it’s pretty recent so maybe it’s too soon to be clamouring for a redo, but I love the whole idea of the human military and a magical Martian kingdom fighting it out with giant mechs. The way it is right now, Aldnoah.Zero is a decent first season with less-than-excellent production values and a second season that quickly devolved into an uninteresting dumpster fire, and I wanna see if this concept and story could be saved by a longer treatment and a more competent production crew.
A full-length reboot of the 3-episode OVA Detatoko Princess would be cool too, but really that’s just because I love the idea of watching a brash 15-year-old princess travel across a wacky magical world, destroy everything and eat way too much pudding.
Second season Aldnoah definitely crashed a bit. It would be lovely to see them redo that though as you said it is probably too recent.
It’s basically like the old Zone of Enders games/anime. Honestly it’s not that original. Though I will say I did enjoy it. I didn’t think they were going to use the Odin parable the way they did. That being said it’s more easily forgotten compared to the likes of Gundam, Zone of Enders, Macross, or the legendary Neon Genesis Evangelion. For me it was like less well made versions of the genre. Like a B Movie, still fun but nothing to write home about.
I wouldn’t mind seeing Claymore rebooted. Claymore was a great anime, and even the romance was well done.
It was such a great anime. If only they finished it.
I agree! I tried to keep up with the manga, but it got too long for me =(
I actually agree with you on almost all of it. Bleach needs a remake. Claymore deserves an ending.
The Soul Eater Manga actually has a good ending. It’s completely different than the anime and actually makes sense. It focuses more on Kid and less on Maka. Which actually makes sense given who he is. They teased it in the anime with Death’s mask cracking when the Lines of Sanzu starting connecting, but that’s all it was a tease. Our favorite Lord of Order basically played second fiddle to a story that supposed to be his in the end.
Berserk: I’m sorry fans of the new anime but that thing is atrocious. Berserk deserves a proper remake. It needs a studio like Madhouse who will not skip out on the blood, gore, and nudity/sex. I suppose when the manga finally ends in 20 years we will finally get a real adaption.
I still haven’t gotten around to trying Berserk (either the old or the new), though given what I’ve read about the new I think there’s quite a few people in agreement with you.
The older one was ok. Nostalgia has been saying its amazing but honestly it had its issues. It omitted characters in the manga, shortened the first arc, and downplayed the humor present to focus on the dark and gritty. It’s still better than the god awful animation of the new one. But we should recognize it’s not perfect.
Unfortunately this is so far best consumed in manga form. There you can see Berserk in all its bizarre and horrific beauty. The art is fantastic and detailed and the story is humorous, dark, and tragic. It’s a shame we can’t get a proper adaption. I’m usually not that guy but this is one case where the manga is better.
I’d second a FMA Brotherhood style reboot for Soul Eater. Wouldn’t mind Claymore either.
Seems like Soul Eater is a popular choice for rebooting. Someone should get on that fast.
I really enjoyed the love triangle in Vampire Knight, thought Yuuki had great chemistry with both Zero and Kaname. I loved the first part of the manga, I rolled my eyes a few times in the second part. I liked the anime adaptation but many of my favorite moments from the manga were ruined by the horrible animation.
I still need to read Fruits Basket… It’s been at least ten years since I watched the anime and I’m planning to read it since then.
I really enjoyed the Fruits Basket manga. It kind of filled in a lot of those questions the anime just kind of put out there and left hanging. Normally I don’t bother to follow up with a manga if the anime can’t stand on its own, but I really wanted to find out how Fruits Basket could have gone.
I’m glad the manga got a new English release so hopefully I can buy it soon and start to read it.
Great post, and a very interesting topic. If I would have to decide on a reboot for an Animeseries that I have recently seen it would be Joker Game. I thought that series was pretty unique because of it’s setting…but the series eventually went nowhere and ended in a very unsatisfactory way 😢
I’d go for that. Though rather than a reboot, I’d rather just atke the concept and start over because after the inital first two episodes, it really just kind of went nowhere.
Karandi, Love this post – really agree with all of these. We’ve covered Vampire night and Sword Art Online on Our Mangforum and we agreed on both accounts that they have such potential but turn out as a massive manga bellyflop (although still somewhat enjoyable, the anime in both cases seem to be more enjoyable to our panel anyway) I’d also like to give an honorable shout out to Code Geass and Gunslinger Girl – shall we write the lot of them?
Gunslinger Girl – I should have had that on my list. Great concept but little done with it.
Bleach is definitely a good pick. I’m not too familiar with what has a manga and what doesn’t, so I don’t really know which series have stories still to be told, but I can’t agree more about Bleach.
Soul Eater and Claymore I absolutely agree with. I loved both but the endings left me annoyed. With Bleach, trimming it down would work, but I honestly think that it should ahve ended after the final battle with Aizen rather than continue (in the manga). I do enjoy the anime though.
A new reboot for Dominion Tank Police would be fun and nostalgic.
I agree that the battle with Aizen is kind of the best ending point for Bleach. Given he’s set up as the main villain after the first part, defeating him finally kind of feels like the story is done.
Exactly. I would ahve rather that, if it had to continue, then they’d switched away from Ichigo and used one of the vast number of other cast members a focus. Ichigo’s ending felt right, then to bring him back in again just felt like it devalued it for me.
Given how many characters are in the show, it would have been easy to write Ichigo out and essentially shift the focus to one of the other characters after that. You are right in that Ichigo’s story felt done and everything after that point just cheapened that ending.
I love bleach and vampire knight
Oh yeah, Soul Eater! That’s a good choice! For me, I’d like to see Trigun rebooted!
Trigun? That’s an interesting choice.
Good call on Soul Eater. Would love to see that one given a proper ending.
Yes, I say Soul Eater is one of my favourite anime but even I regularly don’t watch the final battle when I rewatch the series. It’s just too cringe worthy.
Are you familiar with the manga? Soul actually becomes a Death Scythe (you know, fulfilling the whole point of his and Maka’s quest?) so it takes a pretty interesting direction.
Never read the manga of this one. Though I have the first chapter book of it that I picked up last time I was in Japan that I’ve so far translated less than half of. I somehow don’t think I’m going to get far through the story.
Not everyone would agree with you there pal, but i do. I also think that Claymore should definitely get rebooted too. I didn’t like the end too much though because #R.I.P. Jean
I’d like to see Soul Eater get redone, and closer to the manga. You know, give it the Brotherhood Treatment.