My top AMV's of 2022: Honourable Mentions
Jan. 3rd, 2023 06:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
katranatHello Everyone and welcome to my list of top 50 AMV's for 2022.
I'm going to begin by talking a little bit about where my head's at, and also set some expectations for this list.
Around November time last year I began to really struggle with the idea of me even having an AMV blog. This is probably going to sound a bit bizarre and needlessly dramatic considering the amount of posts I have managed to write in just over a year, but I've been having a hard time getting around the fact that I dislike the act of writing. I don't really enjoy creating words in general, both verbal speaking and writing are things that if I could choose not to do, I would gladly do neither of them. Obviously communication is a thing in life that has to happen, and mostly I'm fine with this, but I greatly underestimated how uncomfortable this blog thing would end up being for me. My whole life so far I've managed to avoid any type of writing where the output is entirely dictated by myself and my thoughts and my feelings, and it's been quite an adjustment trying to articulate these things in a way I'm satisfied with and isn't also painful for my brain. I suspect this is one of the reasons I love AMV's so much - they're a mostly visual medium so I don't have to deal with any pesky words cluttering up the messages being communicated.
Anyway, what I'm ultimately getting at here is, the reason I started this blog was because I watch so, so many AMV's and I want to share them with people, so going forwards that's going to be my main focus - there will be less writing, and more AMV's. Obviously I will still do some writing, but if I'm struggling with words I'm not going to let that hold me back from sharing a video anymore. This will also be the case for my top 50 list. I would hope that simply being part of the list would be enough to tempt most people into checking these videos out, but I'm also keenly aware if I'm stating something is among the personal best for me, well then I should probably give people some kind of frame for that. So yeah, I've done my best doing write ups for these, but the content will vary wildly. I want to stress if I happen to write slightly less for one video over another that this has absolutely no relation to how good I feel the video is, it simply means there is less I feel I'm able to say about it.
Okay, now that personal info dump is over it's onward to the reason you're here, the list of AMV's!
2022 ended up being a completely crazy year for me in terms of AMV related things. When I created this list for 2021 I decided the way I would select AMV's for consideration on this list would be if I had added them to my "liked" list on YouTube, and in 2021 that decision yielded me 145 eligible videos. For 2022 this got me 292 videos. Needless to say, trying to whittle down 292 AMV's into a list of 50 was a bit daunting to start with. Surprisingly, the high amount of videos I watched over the year ended up working in my favour. Because there were so many, the time I was able to dedicate to each of these videos was quite limited, so even though I had a long list, there were many I simply hadn't been able to connect with in a meaningful way throughout the year. So I ended up being able to very quickly narrow this list down to a manageable amount before working out the ultimate rank order.
I was organised this year, so this first post will be some honourable mentions/ineligible videos which I feel are worth mentioning and still wanted to highlight in some way.
This is a mix of 16 AMV's where they either just missed out on being in my top 50, or I didn't feel comfortable trying to rank them against other AMV's for whatever reason. These are also listed in chronological order of when I first watched them throughout the year.
Before we dive in I would like to mention that CrackTheSky has pleasantly surprised us all by announcing he will also be creating an AMV retrospective of sorts this year. If you somehow aren't aware of his blog and his lists already I would recommend checking this out, they're always great.
And finally, it's less pertinent with this post as these are honourable mentions, but I do want to stress that any AMV's on this list are here because I love them and want to share them with the world. The rank order is completely my personal preference so there may be some choices here that you might not agree with, but it's what makes sense to me.
I hope you have fun going through this list and find something you enjoy watching!
Video title: SCARY MONSTERS AND NICE SPRITES
Editor: sailormoonfreak
Anime: Tokyo MewMew
Song & Artist: Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites - Skrillex
Comments: Tokyo MewMew and Skrillex? Yes please!
This was released late 2021 and I did consider it for my 2022 list, however it only just missed out. Sailormoonfreak makes some of the most unusual anime/song combinations work brilliantly, “SCARY MONSTERS AND NICE SPRITES” is an awesome example of this.
VPR: Flickering, Patterns/Motion, Flashes to white
Video title: O Amor é a Pedra Filosofal
Editor: Lobo Lualua
Anime: Tokyo Babylon
Song & Artist: Bola De Cristal - Espelho Mágico
Comments: Tokyo Babylon is a manga/anime that was quite important to me throughout my teenage years, so I’m always happy to see people editing with it. Lobo Lualua has used the Tokyo Babylon special to make this AMV, which has a bunch of unique visuals I don’t get to see very often in AMV’s. These are some great 90’s vibes here.
VPR: All
Video title: Nebulous
Editor: xQueenyLeAcH
Anime: Please Save My Earth
Song & Artist: Nebula - Astral Tales
Comments: I discounted "Nebulous" completely from being eligible for my top 50 list due to it being a video made specially for me, I would have had all sorts of bias about it.
I still wanna talk about it though, because yeah, xQueenyLeAcH made this video for me. Not only did she acquire a copy of Please Save My Earth, she also had a friend help her upscale it to look super pretty and then she made an AMV for me with it.
I’m still not over it, I’ll be giddy for years.
VPR: Light leaks, Flashes to white
Video title: Seemann
Editor: F-Zero TV
Anime: Odd Taxi
Song & Artist: Seemann - Rammstein
Comments: If any of you also read through my favourite reddit AMV list, you may recognise the editor F-Zero TV, who I mentioned was someone who spent 2022 creating lots of interesting and unique AMV's. Well this is one of them - "Seemann" is one of the most visually striking AMV's I have ever seen. It's absolutely fascinating the way F-Zero TV turns the anime almost manga-esque in some sections, creating a narrative with panels. There's also a lot going on here that I don't want to get into simply because I feel it's best to simply go ahead and watch it to see how unusually beautiful "Seemann" is for yourself.
VPR: Major contrast, Motion/patterns, Flashes to white
Video title: 𝓛𝓮 𝓓𝓲𝓪𝓫𝓵𝓮 𝓐𝓶𝓸𝓾𝓻𝓮𝓾𝔁
Editor: Lobo Lualua
Anime: Shisha no Teikoku
Song & Artist: Le Diable Amoureux - Molly Nilsson
Comments: I had never heard of this anime before seeing this AMV and boy does it look all sorts of horrifying. Because I haven’t seen the anime, I’m unsure if Lobo Lualua is following the story of the anime here, or if they are making it seem like something else. Either way, I find this video incredibly intriguing, and I adore the way Lobo Lualua composites the scenes and weaves the narrative.
VPR: Motion/patterns, Flickering, Fades to black
CW: Gore, Surgery, Body horror
Video title: Angel of Lies and Teeth
Editor: EloquentFaun
Anime: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Song & Artist: Teeth - 5 Seconds of Summer
Comments: I would like to applaud EloquentFaun for making the only AMV with this song I have seen so far without sound effects. I don’t quite know when or why it happened, but this song became super popular to do that type of snappy noisy editing that a lot of people love but I personally can’t stand. I actually kind of enjoy this song so I was always dismayed when I couldn’t find any AMV’s I was able to watch with it.
I feel I should also clarify, the fact “Angel of Lies and Teeth” is sound effectless isn’t the only reason I enjoy it, it is also a pretty darn good video, the sound thing is a bonus really.
VPR: All
Video title: drank
Editor: Shizaya
Anime: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Song & Artist: Aminé - Charmander
Comments: Shizaya is the king of weird Evangelion AMV’s. In contrast “drank” is not exactly what one might call a masterpiece, considering Shizaya does state in the description "made this whilst intoxicated" - it did however get under my skin a surprising amount. The editing is fairly solid, although notably there are several sections which repeat/loop in an almost hypnotic manner. I don't quite know why, but watching this feels a little bit like being a kid again and finding something on the internet you know your parents wouldn't approve of.
I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to be taking "drank" seriously in any capacity, but honestly the world of Evangelion AMV's is so vast, I find myself giving "drank" quite a bit of my AMV bandwidth simply because it's slightly unusual.
VPR: All
CW: Nudity
Video title: Don't Stop Me Now but Everyone's Running
Editor: RustiK
Anime: Various
Song & Artist: Don’t Stop Me Now - Queen
Comments: There have been many notable AMV’s which use this song, and I feel there’s room for one more. I enjoy RustiK’s take on it here - the video is exactly what the title says, it’s purely joyful running scenes, which is surprisingly a lot of fun to watch.
VPR: Flashes to white, Major motion/patterns, Quick cuts
Video title: Get Your Wish
Editor: SakuraBipolar
Anime: Weathering With You
Song & Artist: Porter Robinson - Get Your Wish (Sewerslvt Remix)
Comments: I didn’t consider "Get Your Wish" for my top 50 list due it essentially being a remake of an older video by SakuraBipolar. You could definitely make an argument that it’s completely transformed from the older video, but I still felt weird about it, so honourable mention it is.
There are a few select anime that I’m tired of seeing in AMV’s these days, Weathering With You is one of them. Yes the anime is pretty and all that, but sadly most of the time I don’t care and my brain starts to glaze over whenever I see it. This is no one's fault but mine, I watch too many AMV’s and get way too much exposure to the things that are popular.
Anyway, I love this because there’s so much stuff happening here, the fact that I’m looking at images of Weathering With You doesn’t register anymore. Heck, it barely feels like an AMV - it’s more like an impressionist painting of an AMV that’s been filtered through a strobe light.
SakuraBipolar released a fair amount of similarly edited videos this year, but “Get Your Wish” remained my favourite.
VPR: Major All
Video title: Aggressive Years
Editor: Tyken
Anime: Aggretsuko
Song & Artist: Selfish Years - Honestly
Comments: "Aggressive Years" is possibly one of the most adorable videos I saw in 2022. I’ve not watched Aggretsuko, but Tyken’s storytelling absolutely makes up for any gaps in my knowledge. I love all the small details Tyken pours into the editing - the whole thing feels incredibly heartfelt. Watching "Aggressive Years" always puts a smile on my face.
VPR: Fades to black, Flashes to white, Peripherals
Video title: Echoing Coda
Editor: TroubleClef
Anime: Ballroom no Youkusou
Song & Artist: Remind Me - Bastille
Comments: I’m going to go on a bit of a ramble here. I personally have a hard time watching any AMV’s containing Ballroom no Youkusou - I simply cannot get over the artstyle. I get it, when people ballroom dance they accentuate their necks as part of the dance. Why they had to take this so far in Ballroom no Youkusou and make everyone look horrendously unnatural is mystifying to me. I can’t watch anything containing this anime because I spend so long simply staring at the characters necks thinking to myself “whyyyy?” I completely miss whatever is actually happening in the video. Honestly I hate that I hate the art, in an ideal world I’d be able to appreciate it, but sadly I don’t.
This brings us to “Echoing Coda”, which is the only Ballroom no Youkusou AMV I’ve seen where I genuinely feel it’s beautiful - this has nothing to do with the anime, and everything to do with Troubleclef’s editing. Troubleclef somehow manages to completely distract me from hyper focusing on the elements I dislike, and succeeds instead in drawing me into the drama and emotions happening on screen. It's completely magic for me.
VPR: Flashes to white, Motion, Red Emphasis scenes
Video title: Spare me Yo link clink Kongming!
Editor: Shark Tooth Goosie
Anime: Paripi Koumei, Shiguang Dailiren, Da Wang Rao Ming
Song & Artist: Do Bad Well (feat. Nevve) [Extended Mix] - KSHMR
Comments: Every moment in “Spare me Yo link clink Kongming!” flows so perfectly together - this is partially to do with the qualities of these particular anime openings, however it’s also credit to Shark Tooth Goosie’s scene matching proficiency. “Spare me Yo link clink Kongming!” isn't a very long video, but it sure does pack a punch.
VPR: All
Video title: Monogatari edit
Editor: takara
Anime: Bakemonogatari
Song & Artist: ME!ME!ME! - TeddyLoid feat.DAOKO
Comments: A while back when “ME!ME!ME!” exploded onto the scene, it became quite a popular source to edit with. If you’ve not heard of it you can look it up, but be warned - it’s a highly NSFW music video, and I don’t think it’s available to view on YouTube anymore. I’d not come across anyone editing with the song before though, everyone seemed to ignore the song in favour of the visuals, which is a shame as “ME!ME!ME!” is a really good song. takara though, breaks this trend finally with “Monogatari edit”, where they use a section of the song “ME!ME!ME!” to showcase some excellent Monogatari drama. This particular combination works exceedingly well considering the themes present in both Monogatari and “ME!ME!ME!”
VPR: All
CW: Violence
Video title: Orange Crush
Editor: SeasonsAMV
Anime: Revolutionary Girl Utena
Song & Artist: Selfish - The Other Two
Comments: "Orange Crush" probably would have made it into my top 50 for 2022 if it weren’t for the fact that after the slew of Utena AMV’s YouTube bombarded me with in 2021, I am quite burnt out from watching Utena content. Seriously - my top 50 list for 2021 contained 5 AMV’s where Utena was the only source, and (spoilers!) in my list for 2022 there are none. Seasons is on form here - I feel this is a video I need to ruminate on and come back to in probably about a year before I can fully appreciate it.
VPR: Black screen wipes, fades to black
Video title: the cow song
Editor: antediluvian
Anime: Revolutionary Girl Utena
Song & Artist: The Cow Song - The Mountain Goats
Comments: Since I fell in love with one of their Utena AMV’s in 2021, antediluvian has gone from strength to strength in 2022, continuing to create new Utena videos focusing on many different aspects of the anime - "the cow song" is one which I feel is particularly notable… In case it wasn't already obvious, it’s about Nanami… And also cows.
VPR: Flashes between red and black at 01:32 - 01:34, flashes to white, flickering
