Anime is known to have a few common tropes across its genres. Shōnen, romance, and even horror animes all have a few key plot pieces that can be seen throughout their series. Some are great, progressing the story along thoughtfully even though they use common tropes. Other tropes aren't so great and can make a show feel much worse due to their inclusion.

The best tropes can be reused time and time again to great effect. Most shows can have a tournament arc, like Dragon Ball Z or Hunter x Hunter, and the series is all the better for it. Other tropes like the addition of Loli characters, or characters who look like children even though they're hundreds of years old, always make a show worse. While there are dozens of tropes to choose from, only some can be considered either the best or the worst in all anime.

10 Worst: Saying and Not Showing

Exposition Dumps Are the Worst

Saying and not showing isn't just a bad trope in anime - it's a bad trope in all entertainment. The key to a good story is the plot being shown, not told. There's no point in watching a series where a character is telling you what happened, which is closer to a monologue in a play than an actual plot. That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime is one of the worst animes for this, as the third season of the show told most of the plot in a series of meetings rather than actually showing the world itself.

The third season was so bad that it's commonly referred to as 'That Time I Got Trapped in a Meeting', as viewers would much rather watch Rimuru and his friends defeat their enemies and live their lives than sit together and talk about it. Slime isn't the only series that does this, as there are a litany of shows that talk about their story through brutal exposition dumps rather than just live it out.

9 Best: The Tournament Arc

Pure Fighting for an Entire Arc

The Tournament Arc is often the most exciting arc of a series. There's nothing better than streamlined action through a series of high-stakes fights. While some anime have to wait a long time to build up tension between characters before they can fight, the Tournament Arc skips all the waiting and pits the series' characters against each other in a few amazing bouts. Dragon Ball Z is one of the best animes for Tournament Arcs, as Goku has competed in several throughout the franchise.

Other fighting animes like Baki and Kengan Ashura also base nearly their entire shows on Tournament Arcs, wasting no time in exposition dumps or other useless story elements. Viewers like fighting anime for one singular reason - fights. There's no point in telling a detailed story when people just want to watch two muscle-bound characters punch each other in the teeth.

8 Worst: Interruption During a Confession

Fireworks Couldn't Come at a Worse Time

The confession is one of the most pivotal moments in a show, especially for romance. It takes a lot of courage for one character to confess to another, revealing their true feelings in a heart-pounding moment. While most romance anime get this right, some of them miss their golden opportunity. While not all confessions have to go well, or even feature two characters with reciprocal feelings, it's important for at least one character to voice their true feelings to another.

There aren't many more frustrating tropes in anime than an interrupted confession. A character will begin to confess their feelings before getting interrupted by fireworks, another person, or a variety of other things. Instead of redoing their confession, the two characters live in a weird limbo where neither knows what the other person said or heard. It makes for an awkward, avoidable moment that could be fixed if the two characters could either be honest with each other or just try and confess again.

7 Best: The Power of Friendship

Friends Can Help Solve Any Problem

Shōnen anime are especially known for the best friendships around. Friends are key in shōnen anime, as the main character is rarely strong enough to take on their enemies alone (unless you're the One Punch Man himself). By relying on friends, characters can overcome their own shortcomings, blow past any obstacles in their way, and establish wonderful relationships at the same time. While there are a ton of great moments of friendship in anime, some of the best come in Black Clover and Haikyuu!.

The Black Bulls saving their friend Finral is the most hype moment in the series. Langris goes to finish off his half-brother when Asta, Luck, and Magna swoop in. Luck in particular is the coolest, as he tells Langris that he can forget about his match and die on the spot if he tries anything. Haikyuu! is a series built on Kageyama and Hinata's friendship. They grow together over the course of the series into two of the most dominant players in volleyball, using each other as the strongest weapons on the court.

6 Worst: Stubbornly Dumb Protagonist

Some Protagonists Aren't the Brightest Bulbs in the Bunch

Some characters in anime are frustratingly dumb. While not everyone has to be the smartest kid in the class, it can hurt a series to see an otherwise confident and competent character become so ridiculously incompetent. Characters like Luffy, Goku, and even Gon can be ridiculously naive at times. Luckily, the writing within the show is so good that it can compensate for their lapses of judgement, like when Goku gives a Senzu Bean to Cell or Luffy generally has no idea what's going on.

Characters like Sawako from Kimi ni Todoke are defined by their lack of intelligence. Sawako's entire character is that she has a fundamental misunderstanding of human behavior. Like an alien from another planet, she doesn't know when people are being nice, mean, or anything in between. This can be very frustrating when someone is trying to confess to her, and it seems like she doesn't even speak the language they're talking to her in based on her aloof behavior.

5 Best: Pushing Glasses Up to Show Intelligence

A Quick Way To Show Off

Characters pushing up their glasses in an anime is a quick way to let the viewer know they have just pulled off a smart move. The smartest characters in anime usually wear a pair of glasses to let everyone know how smart they are, but when they push them up, it's like their intelligence goes up a level or two. It's a fun trope that doesn't change much in an anime but adds a lot to the story at the same time.

Shiroe in Log Horizon is one of the biggest glasses-pushers around, signaling to everyone that he's playing chess while they've been playing checkers. Other tropes, like the Tournament Arc or the power of friendship, usually take a bit more time to establish, but not pushing up glasses. All a character needs is a pair of frames and the intention of showing off to make this trope successful.

4 Worst: Not Actually Dead

Anime Characters Can Be Too Durable

Deaths in anime can be heartbreaking when done right. It doesn't matter if a character that dies is a villain or a hero, when they die, it's almost always an emotional moment. This is why a fake death feels like the rug is being pulled out from under the viewer. They've just dedicated so many of their emotions to saying goodbye to a character, only to see them reemerge moments later. It makes the rest of the series feel invalid, and can make other deaths feel less permanent as well.

Dragon Ball Z is a series known for worthless deaths. Most of the Z Fighters have died at least once, with Goku dying twice in the main timeline as well. Frieza is another character who should have died. He was bisected by his own Death Saucer and left on Namek when it exploded. Even after Future Trunks swooped in and killed Mecha Frieza, it still didn't feel as satisfying, because there was no guarantee that Frieza wouldn't just come back again.

3 Best: Rage Mode

Rage Brings Out Extraordinary Powers

Rage mode is a great way to see how a character is truly feeling in an anime. It rarely comes out, but when it does, viewers can be sure the character in their rage form is going to do some damage. Rage mode usually comes out when a character loses a loved one or thinks that all is lost. Goku's rage when Krillin dies results in the best-ever transformation in anime when he finally becomes the legendary Super Saiyan against Frieza. Trunk's rage form is another great pick from Dragon Ball, as he's able to go toe-to-toe with Zamasu for a little bit.

Gon's rage mode is a moment that defines his character arc as well. He started the series as a light-hearted boy before gaining quite a bit of darkness in his fight against Pitou. He sacrifices his entire future to gain enough power to kill the Chimera Ant and doesn't care about what he lost for a second.

2 Worst: Young Appearing Characters Being Put in Uncomfortable Situations

The Ancient Vampire Who Looks Like a Child Trope Has Been Mocked For Good Reason

Though anime is an incredible medium with plenty of great anime series that have no fan service, it's difficult to deny that too many anime put characters who appear very young in situations and outfits that are uncomfortable for many viewers. It is a common trope for some anime characters to look especially young, usually like children, when they are much older than they appear. Characters like Biscuit Krueger in Hunter x Hunter can get away with this trope because they aren't love interests and aren't sexualized, but as soon as a child-like character falls in love with a non-child-like character, things just get uncomfortable.

Arifureta is a popular isekai series, but the relationship between the main characters Nagumo and Yue can make the show hard to watch for some viewers. Yue looks like a child, but she claims to be well over 300 years old. She says that because of her healing factor, she doesn't age, but that doesn't make her romantic relationship with 17-year-old Nagumo any better. For many fans of anime, it's a creepy and uncomfortable trope that can make otherwise enjoyable shows uncomfortable to watch.

1 Best: Transformations

The Best Way To Show an Increase in Strength

A character transforming into a new, more powerful form is the best trope in anime. No series does it quite as well as Dragon Ball Z, which shows characters with new hairstyles, hair colors, and new abilities that define their transformation. When a character doesn't seem like they're able to defeat another, something has to change. Transformations in the heat of battle are always a spectacle, allowing a character to scream at the top of their lungs as they acquire an otherwise unobtainable level of power.

Other series like Tokyo Ghoul, One Piece, and Naruto also have plenty of great transformations. Naruto has several great forms, including Sage Mode, Sage of Six Paths Mode, and Baryon Mode in Boruto. Luffy's Gear Five transformation broke Crunchyroll's servers due to how popular it was, showcasing the leader of the Straw Hats in a hype new white form that allowed him to fight on a whole new level.