Hello everybody! As we prepare to take a look at some of the best AMVs that 2021 had to offer, I want to start as I normally do with a short list of videos that are ineligible for my actual list, either because they don’t use anime (but were created by AMV editors), or they’re not really AMVs in the traditional sense, and one other reason that I’ll explain in my write-up for that particular video. Anyone who enjoys the stuff that we’ll be reading about starting tomorrow should also enjoy everything I post below, so please don’t skip these — they are well worth your time. I wouldn’t be writing about them if I thought otherwise!
Also as usual, these videos are not ranked, they are presented in alphabetical order by editor name. Check them out and enjoy!
Anime: Little Witch Academia
Song: “Here I Am Alive” by Yellowcard
Normally, when considering videos for my actual Top 50 list, I will only take into consideration the year a video was publicly released, not when it was actually edited (and perhaps originally shown in a contest). As such, I would normally put this video on my actual list and not here, in the Ineligible Videos portion, but I can’t in good conscience do that in this case. Aerialesque originally edited this video in 2016 and entered it into that year’s Nan Desu Kan AMV contest; however, she never officially released it despite my begging her to over the next five years, stating that she wanted to re-edit it with the actual LWA series instead of just the OVAs. She was kind enough to give me a copy of the video back in 2016, so I’ve had this on my hard drive during all that time, but without a proper release I was never able to actually share it or write about it when it would have been appropriate to do so.
Thankfully, near the end of this year she gave me permission to go ahead and upload it to my own channel, which I did almost immediately. Even though it was therefore officially released in 2021, because I’ve had it and have watched it so many times over the past five years, it didn’t feel right to include it in the proper list. Let me state here, for the record, that if it were on my actual Top 50, this would easily be in my Top 10, maybe my Top 5 videos of the year. That is how much I love this video, and how special it is to me. The editing in this thing is so intuitive — the lyric sync is so spot-on perfect with Atsuko’s character, the internal sync makes this video flow without a hitch, and the way aerialesque builds and releases tension throughout is second to none. It makes me feel so good, so happy, so inspired to make something like it, and I wish we got more videos whose existence feel as effortless and right as Touch the Sky’s does.
Video source: Original animation
Song: “Surges” by Orangestar
Every year, it seems, at least one animated short/music video like this finds its way to my eyeballs — I never explicitly seek them out but maybe I should start, because I tend to love them. As with most videos of this ilk, the animation carries it more than the editing, but there are some really special moments here — the rapid cuts between the balls at 0:21, the slowdown in pacing that starts around 0:51, and the explosion back into action at 1:31 all rank among the video’s best moments and serve to tell a self-contained story addressing the difficulty of navigating sports and extracurricular activities for students in this new, COVID-infected world. For a two-minute short whose ultimate purpose is to advertise an energy bar brand, it’s a surprisingly emotional and adrenaline-fueled work that’s easy to watch and rewatch. I’m sure that was probably the point, but if this is how companies choose to market themselves, I really won’t complain.
Video source: Nightcrawler
Song: “Cutthroat” by Imagine Dragons
I really dislike Imagine Dragons, and I’m usually not big on fanmade live action MVs — so take that into consideration when you’re deciding whether or not to watch this video based on my humble recommendation. It’s good. Having never seen Nightcrawler, this video does a fantastic job of establishing the characters and the story, and setting a dark, creepy mood that runs throughout. It’s an unsettling video, helped in large part by MinetChan’s deft touch in keeping the pacing constantly unsteady with her editing choices. The insanity that slowly builds through the video fractures through at all the right times, and keeps even the strongest doubters, like myself, rapt at attention. A thrilling, dark descent into madness.
Video source: Star Wars: Visions
Song: “True Survivor” by David Hasselhoff
(Is this source technically “anime”? I’ll leave it to the purists to argue over, but in my mind since this was created by Lucasfilm for Disney+, it counts as Western animation and that’s why it’s here.)
Look, ok? This video is just cool. I don’t care if you’ve never seen a Star Wars movie in your life and couldn’t differentiate an ewok from a sarlacc, there’s something for everyone in this video. Ridiculous ’80s throwback pop rock? Check. Sci-fi samurais with glowing swords? Check. An alien rock band? You better believe it. A stylish editing form that rotos scene elements over the letterboxes, giving the entire video this feeling that it’s about to burst out of the frame? Oh-ho man, yeah it’s got that. Silk just absolutely slays with the over-the-top action and fun here — it’s a video that doesn’t take itself too seriously, but still manages to communicate urgency and a unique flair that hasn’t really been explored to this extent in the hobby before — it’s a refreshing video in that sense, and one that everyone should watch and take notes on.
Video source: Death Stranding
Song: “Mephisto’s Lullaby” by Yair Albeg Wein & Or Kribos
Death Stranding is one of those games where, every time I see clips of the cutscenes and read a little bit about the story and setting, I’m fascinated in a way that few games really fascinate me from the outside. But then I read about the actual gameplay (and watch clips of that) and immediately lose all interest. Beached Things does maybe the best job I’ve seen yet of convincing me that maybe, someday, in the distant future, when I have more free time and patience than I do now, it will be worth it to play. In any case, until I cross that mental Rubicon I have SQ’s video to return to — it’s dark, strange, and unsettling in a very subterranean way, suggesting things rather than outright stating them. We never really get a clear look at the entity(ies?) responsible for the dread that permeates every frame of this video, but that only makes it…weirder. I’ve always been of the opinion that horror is best when it relies on the viewer thinking things, rather than actually knowing them, and Beached Things is nothing if not very good at accomplishing exactly that.
Video source: Various (Marvel)
Song: “Wake Up” by NF
I’m not going to pretend I know much, if anything, about the larger story here — I’ve never been really big into the Marvel universe and this video does nothing to make me think that I’ve been making a mistake by avoiding it. That said, Never Awake is a really powerful character profile, and the big story beats in the video are obvious enough to an almost complete outsider like myself that they communicate immense pathos and tragedy without needing the familiarity with the source that most of these Marvel fanvids tend to rely on. The editing here is simple enough that I didn’t really notice it (and I mean that as a compliment) — but this was never going to be a video that needed anything more than fantastic scene selection and a few big moments to carry the day. It’s always the mark of a good video when it takes a source I am completely uninvested in and makes it into something larger than life, that feels like the most important thing in the world for the time that I’m watching it, and Never Awake is one of the best examples of this that I can think of from this last year.
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I absolutely love that aerialesque AMV. I think I remember you saying that you were kind of “meh” about Little Witch Academia videos but I must have really misunderstood whatever you were saying when my brain decided THAT was the important takeaway. The first time I watched this I was like, “yeah, that’s fun.” The second time I watched it I was like “oh damn, this is amazing!” This song was stuck in my head for a couple of days and that’s a good thing because I’m really not feeding myself a lot of upbeat music these days and this was really doing it for me. The editing is really fun. Everything in this video works so well. I can think of a few AMVs made with this anime that make me unusually happy and this is the primest example of that I’ve seen so far.
The sports commercial is NOT propaganda but I will say that it does a far more convincing job of moving me into the “oh hell, they’re only kids once, just let them play!” camp then any of the angry parents on the news who are protesting restrictions or cancellations of their children’s school sports over the past 2 years. This definitely appeals to my emotions far more effectively than anything they’ve done to plead their case. Clearly, I can be persuaded to throw caution to the wind by exciting animation and dramatic music. Going into this not knowing what it is at all (I’m trying to watch everything here before actually reading anything you’ve had to say about it) is a real wild ride: the emotional whiplash from 0:52 to the whole sequence that follows after that and then the big reveal at 1:59 (in which I realize I’ve been emotionally moved by an advert for some unidentifiable meal replacement product) totally blindsided me.
You know I’m not here for live action edits (“here” being this blog but also the Internet as a whole and everything else) but I’m not going to lie, the Nightcrawler video is really good. I loved this movie so that might be influencing my opinion but this was solid enough to overcome a musical choice that didn’t exactly fill me with the highest of hopes.
I heard that all of these Star Wars animated shorts are supposed to be really good, not in the way that all new Star Wars stuff is supposed to be but For Real this time. So I purposefully avoided watching every AMV that was made from them, meaning I didn’t watch what was probably some of the coolest work from some of my favorite editors. I finally broke that rule at last with this SilkAMV video (honestly, we’re not signing up for Disney Plus, so I have no idea when I’ll ever get the chance to actually watch these in full) and I’m glad I did because yeah this was one of the coolest videos I’ve seen this year. I think I knew what the gimmick or the trick of this video was supposed to be going into it but it played out so much cooler than I ever expected it to be. I know this isn’t “3-D” and it’s not trying to specifically imitate that or evoke it but this was a more convincing “3-D experience” than anything I’ve ever seen on a small screen and it achieved that via such a simple illusion that it’s a wonder I’ve never seen it before now. I’m glad I never have because it probably wouldn’t have been attempted with such attention to detail and fantastic sync as this AMV demonstrates.
Not real big on video game edits as the realism and the cinematic style of the cutscenes they use make them feel indistinguishable from live action edits (I don’t mean this literally or universally but hopefully you or whoever is reading this understands what I’m trying to say). “Bleached Things” doesn’t defy any of my expectations in this regard but it’s effectively creepy and very well edited and I totally agree with you on how well it hints at a dreadfully terrible threat while only giving you little glimpses of it or clues and how that really works to its advantage.
It would take more time than I want to spend to articulate my feelings about this Wandavision video but your assessment is spot on, it’s a good video by a good editor who sees possibilities in this that I never could. She takes us on a ride and I enjoyed every minute of it.
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Actually genuinely surprised to hear you liked the Wandavision video, because I know how you feel about NF. But glad you did!
I also have somewhat mixed feelings about being emotionally manipulated by a food company but you know what, screw it, I’m here for it and it’s not like I’m going to buy their product anyway!
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