We're all talking about the best of the best in this forum, but what should we AVOID?

I'd have to say Urotsukidoji. The dub is... well... pretty horrid. And of course, it's hentai. Quite graphic hentai. 'nuff said.

Other than that? The dub of Bubblegum Crisis. Not so much for the dub(which was quite good), but for the fact that Animeigo decided to rerecord all the songs in English, and they ended up sounding horrible, IMO.

Eck... that stuff alone is bad... no storyline most of the time :( storyline is important...

Shin-Chan, from what I've seen of it, which was fairly little, but it was bad enough to leave a horrible impression. Probably didn't help that what I did watch was a dubbed version. The drawings were crude as was the themes.

Rosario + Vampire is also pretty bad, I read the manga and although the story was not the best I could still tolerate it and was curious enough to continue. The anime however screwed it up terribly, not so much with the plot, from what I watched, but the way it portrayed the female characters (and it is a harem story so that's significant). Basically Rosario + Vampire the anime is the story from the manga with an emphasis on bouncing breasts and panties. Too much fanservice for me. And ever since watching what I did of the anime, I couldn't be bothered continuing the manga.

Ah fanservice... I hate that... if the wind blows up a skirt sure... if the view is intentionally low... no... that gets annoying. That's the exact reason I stopped Rosario + Vampire very early. (Only a little)

For me, these types of anime bug me:

-Hentai, ecchi, moe, fan-service, or harem anime that degrades women and has only one or no interesting guys in the story.
-Anime with whiny Mary-Sue or emo Gary-Stu characters, or characters that are way too generic/boring.
-I can't understand most mecha genre anime, unless there's a lot of entertaining human interaction/story. Even if the story is good, any mecha fight scenes will just bore me.

Art style/quality is also a factor for me, though not that big of a deal if the anime itself is great.

Story can also be a huge thing...
I liked the characters in Alice no Kuni no Heart, but the animated movie was horribly made. It had no story at all, and was just a mess of confusion for anyone who never played/read the manga/game(like myself).

I've seen a small number of good mecha anime... though I have found that they are very rare... often times it requires a transition between what's on the ground, what's outside of the cockpit and what's inside. That way it's not just a full fight and allows storyline to continue.

Originally Posted by The Wandering Poet

I've seen a small number of good mecha anime... though I have found that they are very rare... often times it requires a transition between what's on the ground, what's outside of the cockpit and what's inside. That way it's not just a full fight and allows storyline to continue.

That's true. It seems pretty much any action anime does that. XD

I've only really seen Code Geass in full, if that counts, which I liked for the overall story and characters. I liked that it didn't focus too much on mecha.

Long ago, I watched a few episodes of Evangelion and Gundam Seed, and they were kind of interesting, I liked the character designs, but didn't know enough about the shows' plot/story because they would be random episodes on TV.

I'd have to say, the worst NON-hentai anime I've ever seen(outside of dubbed BGC, that is)? Pokemon. It's basically the same plot in almost every episode, if you think about it.

The Saban dub of DBZ was bad, too. "I'll send you to another dimension!" Ugh.

That's actually pretty true.
I haven't watched Pokemon in a long time, though still buy the games. There were a few episodes that were special, but most of them were pretty much just the same plot just introducing new pokemon. Now, pretty much the only reason to watch the anime is if you really like the games and want to see the new things in anime form.
The movies are a good watch, though. (Though the latest one was a bit weird as it seemed to not have much to do with the humans)

PS: I just remembered one I watched a few years ago called Super Milk Chan. I mean, it's cute and all, but the show itself was really a mess... It felt like the only reason I was watching it was for the cuteness and the opening/ending song. @_@

I actually loved Milk-chan, then again, I sometimes like things that are surreal, and Milk-chan is pretty bizarre.

You have a point with pokemon. Some of the episodes had good content though

Naruto. Here is why.

Naruto's annoying as heck and drives me up a wall, Sakura's denser than stone, and Sasuke is so blatantly emo that it gave me a headache. I'd be able to get past it if they weren't the main characters, but.. yeah. They are. The storyline was decent at first, but I just lost interest in it, and the show had absolutely nothing to keep me watching. I kept trying to watch episodes and just gave up. It's also partially influenced by my overall anger with the manga, but that's a different subject. Really, I used to love Naruto way back, but I stopped liking it when it hit Shippuden.

Also, the filler. Christ, even Bleach had better filler than Naruto.

Vampire Knight: Guilty. The first season was pretty good. The second just ... made no sense. The plot turned incestuous even though there was another male character who the lead female could easily have been with.

Originally Posted by Fox Demon Areiku

Naruto. Here is why.

Naruto's annoying as heck and drives me up a wall, Sakura's denser than stone, and Sasuke is so blatantly emo that it gave me a headache. I'd be able to get past it if they weren't the main characters, but.. yeah. They are. The storyline was decent at first, but I just lost interest in it, and the show had absolutely nothing to keep me watching. I kept trying to watch episodes and just gave up. It's also partially influenced by my overall anger with the manga, but that's a different subject. Really, I used to love Naruto way back, but I stopped liking it when it hit Shippuden.

Also, the filler. Christ, even Bleach had better filler than Naruto.

I think some anime are guilty of filler -- Naruto, Bleach, and of course, the granddaddy of them all, Dragonball Z(how else can it take a planet three weeks to blow up in five minutes? FILLER).

As far as I'm concerned with their insane power up times... DBZ WAS a filler

Originally Posted by The Wandering Poet

As far as I'm concerned with their insane power up times... DBZ WAS a filler

Dragonball Z: the only show where it can take three weeks for a planet to explode in five minutes!

Not to mention the fact that every time someone powered up, I thought they were incredibly constipated and just needed an Ex-lax.

Well where else do you think their power comes from?

Originally Posted by The Wandering Poet

Well where else do you think their power comes from?

That explains how the Z-Senshi fly. IT'S NOT KI.

Oh flight is a whole nother story...

Ergo Proxy - god, what a boring and depressing anime that is!!! I felt an unexplained depression after watching every episode of it. Not the good depressing kinda mood, but the boring-depressing mood. you know what I mean? I hope so. lol.

Wow, I'm a bit surprised to see Ergo Proxy listed here, deep and well thought out as it is. Though, this is likely because even my brother (who generally hates anime) ended up enjoying it...well, that and I'm a sucker for anime that focuses on human psychology and the larger problems in the world around us (especially as they relate to technology).

Interesting... It got stuck on both sides of the spectrum

The idea was good, the performance was overly depressing and boring. I've seen much better psychological animes than Ergo Proxy. This anime was too full of itself.

Just out of curiosity, what would you recommend (as far as psychological animes go)? I'm always on the lookout for more things to watch.