Otaku USA Magazine
End of Year Round-Up: Big Moments in Anime in 2022

As the end of year approaches, we're looking back on big moments in 2022 anime!

As the end of year 2022 approaches, we’re looking back on memorable moments in anime! Lots of series began, others ended, and others came back for the first time in decades!

We’d love to hear your favorite big events from this year in anime. For now, here are some of ours. Which were you most excited about?

 

Lum Invades… Again

Urusei Yatsura (2022)

As our end-of-year festivities kick off, we’re celebrating an arrival… or, rather, a re-arrival. After debuting more than 40 years ago, Rumiko Takahashi’s classic Urusei Yatsura came back with a new series. Sure, we’ve had movies and specials over the years. But with this new series from David Production, we get to re-live all our favorite over again. Better still, it’s a fresh, exciting way to introduce the series to a new generation of fans!

The original anime was a landmark achievement. Mamoru Oshii went hard, adapting Takahashi’s kinetic manga style into an equally kinetic series. This new adaptation has its own energy and vibe, but stays true to the original manga. We can’t wait to follow Lum and Ataru into 2023!

 

The Rumbling

Attack on Titan: Final Season

End of year? More like end of world. We all knew this was coming… or at least Attack on Titan manga readers did. The Titan-fighting (and Titan-becoming) heroes of the series have been marching slowly toward this point. And more than a few of us were excited to see how this battle would look fully animated. This year, we got to see it… or, at least, the beginning of the end.

The manga iteration was already, frankly, terrifying. Seeing Eren’s last stand writ large in animated form—including that one visual—was worth the wait. That said, the final episode (so far) left us on an intense cliffhanger. With that visual lingering since April, and the final final season to come next year, we’re all excited.

 

Choosing a Quintuplet

The Quintessential Quintuples Movie

Speaking of big manga moments… we’d be remiss not mentioning this one in our end-of-year round-up. There’s always been one big question in The Quintessential Quintupletswho is the bride? manga readers found out when the series reached its natural conclusion. But anime-watchers would discover the answer in this year’s big movie event.

Debuting in Japan in May, and in the U.S. earlier this month, the film finally established which Nakano quint stole Fuutarou Uesugi’s heart. Each of us had a favorite. Did yours become the bride? Fortunately for fans of all five sisters, lots of different events have celebrated the greatness of each Nakano. And even though the series is over, there are plenty of games to let you relive memorable moments.

Ready to look ahead? Check out these web manga getting anime adaptations in 2023.

Kara Dennison

Kara Dennison is a writer, editor, and presenter with bylines at Crunchyroll, Sci-Fi Magazine, Sartorial Geek, and many others. Beyond the world of anime, she's a writer for Doctor Who expanded universe series including Iris Wildthyme and the City of the Saved, as well as an editor for the critically-acclaimed Black Archive series.

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