Summer 2013 Anime Season Preview:

The spring 2013 anime season began with a lot more hope than it ended with.  Who could have imagined that Naruto would remain filler all season long?  Even in this coming month of June, Naruto is slated to host nothing but filler episodes.  It's mind-boggling when there are so many chapters of manga yet to be animated they could have shown instead.  There are other disappointments as well.  The Higurashi Daybreak oav/movie/whatever which was slated for spring has simply vanished from sight, probably stuck in development hell, much like Kizumonogatari.  Haitai Nanafa's 2nd season hasn't been subbed, and Gundam Destiny's remaster has ceased being subbed.  Alongside the ending of Saki Achiga, the spring season is really running on fumes:

1.  Railgun
2.  Oreimo
3.  Hayate
4.  Hunter x Hunter
5.  Leviathan
6.  Hataraku Maou-sama
7.  Dokidoki Precure
8.  One Piece.
9.  Chihayafuru
10.  Shingeki no Kyoujin
11.  Yahari Ore no Seishunn Love Come wa Machigateirru
12.  Valvrave
13.  Suisei no Gargantia 
14.  Namiuchigiwa (12 minutes)
15.  Miyakawa-ke (3 minutes)


To distract ourselves from the woeful state of spring anime, perhaps it's time to look forward to the summer anime season?  Cart Driver's more detailed preview is now out for perusal, (http://thecartdriver.com/summer-2013-anime-season-preview/#more-23486) but here are my picks for the coming season.

This summer, we'll be losing almost every series from this spring.  Only Railgun, Hunter x Hunter, Precure, One Piece, and Shingeki no Kyojin will be continuing forward.

In addition to continuing good series, we get surefire good sequel series in:  The World God Only Knows, X-monogatari, Fate/Kaleid Liner, Ro-Kyu-Bu and Tamayura.

That gets us up to 10 shows.  The summer season would only need 5 more to match this spring season in quality.  Who might be these elusive five?

Silver Spoon is a manga by the same manga-ka as wrote Full Metal Alchemist, so it has potential.

Watamote has a funny premise so it should be good.

Kamisama no Inai has a cool title so it should be good.

Kimi no Iru Machi is famous so it should be good.

Danganronpa is based off a visual novel so it should be good.

Hyperdimension Neptunia has a cool premise so it should be good.

Servant x Service is done by A-1 pictures so it should be good.

Plus there's always dark horses that are great no one saw coming.  As a result, we could have anywhere from (worst case scenario) 10 good series this summer to (best case scenario) 20 good series.  If Naruto ever quits being filler, it would help strengthen the ranks of the summer season as well.  As a result, I'd say the summer season is looking slightly healthier than the spring season we're currently living in.
 
Add in a bunch of oav's from older good series and you've got a full plate.

Combine it with manga and visual novels and you've got a full course meal.  Omochikaeri has finally released its May 2013 visual novel preview and the June preview should be up soon enough.  The Saimoe Contest starts in June as well.  If none of that is good enough, check out Yes Precure 5 GoGo.  A new fansub group has been diligently subbing the final episodes of Pretty Cure that have yet to receive an English translation, DreamingRoses.  With their help, the best anime franchise of all time will finally be available to the entire world, not just the island from whence it came.  The wait for this series to be subbed is about as legendary as the wait for FF XIII Versus, I'm so glad it's almost over.  Thanks to various sub groups, many older series are becoming available on blu-ray:  Sword Art Online 1-22 is at Coalgirls, Shinsekai Yori 1-16 is available at UTW, even Da Capo III has been picked up by Nubles.  The best series deserve to be seen in their full glory, so even if you've seen the tv versions, the blu-ray editions are also an absolute must.

If June delivers to us the rest of Yes Pretty Cure 5 GoGo, that's enough in itself to be a great month, so I have no complaints heading into the midyear mark.  Even so, with the advent of the summer anime season and the release of Dynasty Warriors 8, the real fun starts in July.  I can't wait!