Analysis on Animation Production Studios – Series

Next thing I want to look at is the animation studios that produced these top-rated animes. The table below list the series in the top 100 as per the same methodology as my earlier post, segmented by animation studios. The ‘title rank’ column denotes the rank of the anime series as talked about in my earlier posts.

#	Animation production studio	Title	Title rank
1	Madhouse Studios	MONSTER	3
1	Madhouse Studios	Paranoia Agent	11
1	Madhouse Studios	Gunslinger Girl	14
1	Madhouse Studios	Black Lagoon	16
1	Madhouse Studios	Dennou Coil	20
1	Madhouse Studios	Texhnolyze	28
1	Madhouse Studios	Kaiba	32
1	Madhouse Studios	Gungrave	34
1	Madhouse Studios	BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad	53
1	Madhouse Studios	Death Note	59
1	Madhouse Studios	Shigurui: Death Frenzy	62
1	Madhouse Studios	Chobits	67
1	Madhouse Studios	Kaiji	68
1	Madhouse Studios	Hajime no Ippo	80
1	Madhouse Studios	Boogiepop Phantom	81
1	Madhouse Studios	Claymore	89
1	Madhouse Studios	Nana	95
1	Madhouse Studios	Space Pirate Captain harlock: Endless Odyssey	98
2	BONES	Fullmetal Alchemist	6
2	BONES	RahXephon	26
2	BONES	Eureka Seven	35
2	BONES	Ouran High School Host Club	40
2	BONES	Soul Eater	48
2	BONES	Wolf’s Rain	61
2	BONES	Darker Than Black	85
2	BONES	Xam’d: Lost Memories	87
3	Gonzo	Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo	13
3	Gonzo	Last Exile	29
3	Gonzo	Full Metal Panic!	38
3	Gonzo	Saikano	65
3	Gonzo	Welcome to the N.H.K.	74
3	Gonzo	Seto no Hanayome	93
3	Gonzo	Kaleido Star	99
3	Sunrise	Planetes	21
3	Sunrise	Gintama	36
3	Sunrise	Banner of the Stars	37
3	Sunrise	Code Geass	44
3	Sunrise	My-HiME	70
3	Sunrise	Gundam SEED	75
3	Sunrise	Yakitate!! Japan	94
3	Production I.G	Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex	5
3	Production I.G	Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex 2nd Gig	42
3	Production I.G	Kemono no Sou-ja Erin	43
3	Production I.G	Eden of the East	57
3	Production I.G	Cromatie High School	64
3	Production I.G	Library War	92
3	Production I.G	Seirei no Moribito	96
6	J.C. Staff	Honey and Clover	8
6	J.C. Staff	Azumanga Daioh	9
6	J.C. Staff	Nodame Cantabile	25
6	J.C. Staff	Toradora	69
6	J.C. Staff	Ai Yori Aoshi	83
6	J.C. Staff	Honey and Clover II	84
6	Kyoto Animation	The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi	7
6	Kyoto Animation	Lucky Star	18
6	Kyoto Animation	Kanon 2006	39
6	Kyoto Animation	Clannad -After Story-	55
6	Kyoto Animation	Full metal Panic: Fumoffu!	72
6	Kyoto Animation	Clannad	86
8	Hal Film Maker	ARIA The Origination	22
8	Hal Film Maker	ARIA The Animation	23
8	Hal Film Maker	Princess Tutu	47
8	Hal Film Maker	ARIA The Natural	49
8	Studio DEEN	Fruits Basket	24
8	Studio DEEN	Higurashi no Naku Koro ni	30
8	Studio DEEN	Maria-sama ga Miteru	71
8	Studio DEEN	Simoun	73
8	SHAFT	Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei	19
8	SHAFT	Ef- Tale of Memories	41
8	SHAFT	Bakemonogatari	82
8	SHAFT	Pani Poni dash	91
11	Brains Base	Baccano!	10
11	Brains Base	Natsume Yuujinchou	27
11	Brains Base	Kure-nai	66
12	Artland	Mushi-Shi	2
12	Artland	Bokura Ga Ita	76
12	Studio Pierrot	The Twelve Kingdoms	15
12	Studio Pierrot	Hikaru no Go	79
12	GAINAX	Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann	4
12	GAINAX	Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi	97
12	Satelight	Macross Frontier	54
12	Satelight	Noein – To Your Other Self	56
12	Manglobe	Samurai Champloo	17
12	Manglobe	Ergo Proxy	51
17	Daume	Ichigo Mashimaro	100
17	Xebec	Love Hina	63
17	Studio Comet	School Rumble	33
17	Nippon Animation	Fantastic Children	60
17	IMAGIN	Spice and Wolf	58
17	Studio 4C	Mahou Shoujo Tai Arusu	50
17	Studio Wombat	Kino’s Journey	12
17	Oriental Light and Magic	Ah! My Goddess	46
17	Radix	Haibane Renmei	1
17	Toei Animation	Mononoke	31
17	Palm Studio	Genshiken	45
17	A.C.G.T.	Koi Kaze	52
17	A-1 Pictures Inc.	Kannagi	77
17	Shirogumi Inc.	Moyashimon	78
17	Bee Train	.Hack//Sign	90
17	GALLOP	Hataraki Man	88

1). Madhouse hands down produces the most good animes in 2000s, with 18 entries in the top 100 anime series list. The animes in there is also very diverse, ranging from action gangster (Gungrave), to teenage slice of life (Beck), to gambling (Kaiji) and even moe stuff Chobits). The works also have both the popular (Death Note, Chobits) and obscured (Kaiji, Kaiba)

2). Gonzo, for all its ill, does produce a few series that are rated very highly. Gankutsuou and Last Exile are the consensus top thing they have ever done while Full Metal Panic! is not a far behind third.

3). BONES seems to be the best at producing shounen, action series, with FMA, RahXephon and Xam’d in its rank. The odd one out in their 8 productions is Ouran…

4). It’s very fascinating but totally make sense to see how genre-consistent some anime production studios are. J.C. Staff definitely knows how to make a good high-school, slice of life anime! Kyoto Animation also has figured out what it’s good at with high-school hi-jinx being pretty much the only genre it is represented

5). GAINAX for all its past glories, seems to have only 2 series of any quality in the last decade (Gurren Lagann and Abenobashi; it may have a few more highly rated non-series stuff, which we will see in the next postings)

6). Only series that Studio 4C has done that got in the top 100 list is ‘Tweeny Witches’ (what a bad name!). It sure has its niche in the industry it seems. Other notables it has done are Mind Game, Tekkonkinkreet and Detroit Metal City, all shorter format. In all honesty, Mahou Shoujotai Arusu is also a 9-minute episode type so I guess it fits in with what the studio likes to do…

7). have tried to rank these studios by their average scores of the series in top 100. I only include those with 3 or more in the entries. Obviously this is a little skewed. I will probably try to impose the same combination of rank and title count like I did for individual animes and rank these studios again at some point in the future.

Rank	Animation studio	Average rank	Count title
1	Brains Base	34.3	3
2	Hal Film Maker	35.3	4
3	Kyoto Animation	46.2	6
4	J.C. Staff	46.3	6
5	BONES	48.5	8
6	Studio DEEN	49.5	4
7	Madhouse Studios	50.6	18
8	Sunrise	53.9	7
9	Production I.G	57.0	7
10	SHAFT	58.3	4
11	Gonzo	58.7	7

One thing I would like to get around doing at some point though is to see out of how many series has each anime production studios produced that result in this many. For example if Madhouse is big enough to produce 50 yet only 18 are any good, the 40% success rate may not be better than another company that only produces 10 but 7 are hits.

Next post will probably concentrate on the anime directors.

---