If there’s one show that you should’ve been watching this season, it’s Brave Beats, the bravest show around. Whilst its target audience is almost definitely younger than you or I, it can be an absolute joy to watch regardless of how old you are. As a spiritual successor to last year’s Tribe Cool Crew, Brave Beats offers a stronger premise with more potential for expansion with it adopting a ‘monster of the week’ format.

A dancing robot, a dancing dinosaur, a dancing cat, Brave Beats is everything you’ve ever wanted in life. Well, if you’re me anyways. Introducing rivals at a steady rate in a comical Team Rocket-esque fashion, Brave Beats never gets dull for a single moment. And it’s about dancing! It’s ridiculous! Hibiki and his dance robot friend have to save people through dance battles! If you’re not convinced already, you probably don’t have a heart.

Attack on Titan: Junior High is the perfect parody. Combining the dramatic world of Attack on Titan with a school comedy, the series is brought into a new genre with surprising success. Each of those darker overdramatic moments in the original series is turned into a new joke, existing both as a parody and a comedy of its own making. Bringing on Hoozuki no Reitetsu scriptwriter, Midori Gotou, Junior High was a recipe for success from the start.

Even if you’re not a fan of the original Attack on Titan, Junior High is something anyone familiar with the series can enjoy. It’s hilarious to see how little the characters need to be altered to be able to change them into comedic figures. It kind of shows how comedy and tragedy aren’t too far removed. It’s a brilliant comedy for the Fall season and the year of 2015 overall. Needless to say, it’s definitely worth the watch.

It’s great to see Haikyuu!! again after a year long break. It’s always interesting to see the sports genre expand into material that isn’t more bloody baseball and a volleyball series treads new ground within the medium. However, introducing a new sport isn’t enough to make a show cool and Haikyuu!! does so much right in every aspect. With team character dynamics coming into play with the sport of volleyball being the main drive, it seems to hit all the right notes.

And the second season brings all of this back, stepping right into its stride once again. The intense games are filled with passion, but seem to be set up under a new light after the moving conclusion of the first season. It’s a motivational premise that I’ll avoid mentioning as it is a spoiler for the first season and is in the process of offering the important second part of this brilliant story.

The Osomatsu series will be celebrating its 50th anniversary next year and that’s not something you can say for… pretty much any other anime. With this reboot being headed by Gintama director, Yoichi Fujita, it’s absolutely ridiculous. And that’s an understatement. With references and silliness throughout, Osomatsu takes its classic style of humour and readapts it for a modern audience with each of the sextuplets being even more eccentric than before.

Once a story about troublemaking six kids, Osomatsu-san is now about six out of work adults trying to be relevant in the modern world. It’s somewhat meta and appeals more to its older demographic whilst calling back to its origins at the same time. It gives opportunity for new situations and jokes and presents something new and outrageous that we really don’t get the chance to see much outside of Gintama itself.

Inarguably the most popular series within the West (I think Japan probably prefers Gochiusa), One Punch Man takes the superhero genre to its very extreme with Saitama being possibly the strongest being in existence. However, whilst gag series commonly give characters unlimited strength as a joke, One Punch Man puts this gag strength into a grounded world and watches as it plays out.

However, whilst One Punch Man fails to expand on this into new realms of comedy, it nailed the action in so many aspects. With Space Dandy director, Shingo Natsume in charge, he assembled a star team of animators to bring these battles to life. The best of Space Dandy, Fullmetal Alchemist, Naruto, Gundam Build Fighters and so much more. Even the star Bones animator Yutaka Nakamura turned up in the last episode uncredited! It’s a brilliant example of action animation and an incredibly entertaining show.

Yuru Yuri is one of those golden comedy series that seem to get everything so damn right. As one of the trademark series of Doga Kobo’s library, many feared that a new staff over at TYO Animations wouldn’t be able to replicate what director Masahiko Ohta achieved 4 years ago. But thankfully there was never a need to worry as we are reminded why we loved it in the first place. Even though some aspects of the originals were stripped out (Alas poor Akarin opening), the character dynamics and the style of comedy remains the same.

However, what San Hai! brings to the table is brand new combinations that we haven’t seen before. With just simple rearrangements like this, it unlocks something new in terms of the types of comedy that it can unleash. Calling back to the originals whilst creating something new is an intrinsic requirement for sequels but Yuru Yuri achieves it within the boundaries of one of the best comedy anime of all time and that’s no small feat.

Fantasy series often have certain tropes associated with them. There will be battles, guilds, orks and catgirls. However, Utawarersomethingsomething is more than that. Sure, it has battles and catgirls, but it’s more interested in its depiction of life in a fantasy world, utilising its extraordinary grasp on atmosphere. Utawarereallyreallylongname has little interest in a larger plot at hand and that’s totally okay, as it clearly establishes early on that it’s more about living life in an unfamiliar world.

Whilst it’s a different direction than the original Utawarehowdoyouevenpronouncethis, a new take with a stronger slice of life series is certainly welcome with its strong hold on light comedy. It’s also got a giant pigeon in it. Who can pass that up? But all jokes aside, if you’re into this, you’re into it for the beautiful expression of atmosphere that can only be achieved in a world like this. The world of Utawarerumono.

Unconventional narrative is something that’s incredibly difficult to pull off. It’s hard enough to establish a story that’s interesting and offers a spectacle in itself but to deliver that in an unfamiliar way is the writing equivalent of walking a tightrope blindfolded. Although through impeccable pacing, Concrete Revolutio successfully delivers a story from two different times to tell a complete story. Not all conclusions are immediate and ConRevo acknowledges this by ending episodes by skipping ahead in time and concluding each episode in style.

Following the Superhuman Bureau, they must protect the Earth from the weird and wonderful as ridiculous situations arise. Magical girls, aliens, robots, mecha, Concrete Revolutio has no limits. Each of the cases involved are more mysterious and exciting as the last thanks to the creative visual design and all-encompassing narrative format. It’s excellent in more ways than one and hopefully we’ll see more like it in the future.

The Lupin III series exists as one of the best examples of action comedy within anime. Lupin travels around with his gang of thieves stealing some of the most valuable treasures, often for the result (although not always with the intent) of doing good. Imagine a crude and selfish Robin Hood and you probably have the right idea. It’s a repetitive formula at face value, but like some of the best long running series, it is creative enough to offer a fresh experience every time.

And this is particularly true for the fourth entry into this legacy. It’s been 30 years since Part III ended and Lupin III is ready to reinvent itself with a new setting and cast. Diving into Italy, the land of history and riches, there is many a artifact for Lupin to steal. However, it’s not just Inspector Zenigata and Fujiko Mine here to thwart him as his new ex-wife steps up as an eccentric rival thief. Like any Lupin series, the fourth part is as brilliant as ever and there’s never a better time to dive in.

Speaking of long running franchises, Mobile Suit Gundam offers an apology for Reconguista in G with a gritty tale of orphan soldiers gaining their freedom and taking on the impossible. Despite the silly name, Iron-Blooded Orphans offers a dramatic story across the stars worthy of the best anime of the season. Starting in the aftermath of a war between Mars and Earth, tensions persist and work as a backdrop to a modern space opera. There’s a majesty involved that few series outside of Star Wars can replicate when it comes to the stars and Gundam Orphans proves its place very early on.

By showing battles both on the surface of Mars and in space, there’s a brilliant contrast as the crew of Tekkadan take advantage of space elements to immediately develop into something exciting and it replicates the original series in many ways. Some of the best character dynamics throughout anime have existed on the basis of crew relationships with Cowboy Bebop and Mobile Suit Gundam 0079 being prime examples. All hands on deck and facing forwards as this set of personalities work as a collaborative machine to achieve a mutual goal. It’s a Gundam series for a new generation, the best anime of Fall 2015 and one of the best series of the year overall.