Jumping The Shark

[Recon 5]

The ending aside, didn't NGE play out exactly like Anno intended? If so, that doesn't count as jumping the shark.

[Kavik Ryx]

Regarding NGE, which is a personal favorite of mine, those last episodes were mixed. On one hand, the drop of a narrative did screw over Eva's ending on a storytelling point of view. However, I can really appreciate them on an intellectual level, making them all right in my book.

[VR7]

Kamen Rider Ryuki's TV series ending was very abrupt and wasteful. Even with Odin's time-related powers in mind, everything basically rewound as if none of the events of 50 episodes worth ever happened, making Ryuki's very existence meaningless.

The anime adaptation of Utawarerumono introduced the sci-fi elements of the story way too suddenly, which makes it seem like it's jumping the shark. The game version of the events made more sense, because sci-fi elements were being slowly introduced to the story rather than being crammed at the end like the anime was. (i.e. Genjimaru and Kuuya, and even Kuuya's giant mecha, made appearances before Touka was ever supposed to)

I remember Gasaraki's final episode jumping the shark too, don't seem to remember why. I think they just crammed the resolution of the supernatural aspect of the story all the way in there.

[Imperial]

The ending aside, didn't NGE play out exactly like Anno intended? If so, that doesn't count as jumping the shark.

No, it did not.

As is my understanding, Anno always wanted to wrap it all up with an epic ending that we didn't get until End of Evangelion. Unfortunately, by the time he got to the end of the road, the budget had dried up so he was forced to recycle animation and take a more cerebral route to cut costs. When fans cried out for a more definite conclusion (and Gainax realized there was a profit to be made), Anno got the funding for Death and Rebirth and End of Evangelion.

And don't even get me started on how different Evangelion wound up being from the original outline. Between mechanical Eva Units and extra Angels and a weird sub-plot about an ancient race, it's almost a different show.

[Z]

Kaworu appears and suddenly becomes the most important character in Shinji's life after 10 minutes of being on screen. And so on.

The odd thing is that the Kaworu incident had been planned since Eva's original outline, when he was just called "kid with a cat" and the show was going to have a completely different 2nd half, and it always was supposed to be a single episode event.

[Antares]

I know this might slide to the side of offtopic a bit, but when I gave it some thought I realized that jumping the shark is annoying as it is because you have had a taste of the good stuff which starts to turn to bitter ashes in your mouth, but what about series than clearly run out of material and have to either end it very, very quickly in the span of two or so episodes? I am especially annoyed when good/funny series strike up a good thing going and then they stop, leaving me wanting more. I know one of the reasons why this happens is that the manga is unfinished and as such can't fuel the anime, but I would rather opt for a longer run than a half-serious try to tell a fraction of the story in anime form. That said, I've also seen how bad it can get when the material ends and the anime staff have to do the story on their own (Samurai Deeper Kyo manga and anime are good examples of this).

A few examples come easily to mind:
FMP - TSR: Ends abruptly IMHO, with lots of unfinished business.
Moyashimon: Very funny, and I only felt like I got to the intro of the whole story (I could've seen at least 20+ episodes more with minimal ease).

If you think this might warrant a separate topic, I don't mind that either, I just thought it would fit this thread too in general terms.

[Hyakushiki]

TSR ends abruptly only because it was only the end of that chapter of the story, the studio handling the show were trying to be as faithful to the original source material, with a few alterations what you saw is what was in the novel.
I'm sure they'll be another season of Full Metal Panic, they are just waiting till they finish the other novels. If you mentioned the fact that they kept bringing back Gauron, then you may have a point but this is more of case of ending on a cliffhanger than Jumping The Shark.

[Antares]

Yeah I know the circumstances of TSR, but maybe what I was more talking about was why not give the story enough time instead of doing 12 episode stories. That said, I realize there are the rather obvious promotional and monetary reasons.
And regarding Gauron, well sort of, but isn't the incredible and continuous survival of the antagonist (only for him to be defeated another day) also somewhat related to jumping the shark?

[wing zero alpha]

I agree on TSR; personally I wish they went with the 24-26 episode run like the last FMP! rather than break it down to a mere 12. Sure, the animation was better than before, but I really didn't think it was worth it.

[mcred23]

I'm suprised this hasn't been mentioned yet...

Gundam 0083: Episode 10, the moment Kou and Nina kiss. Prior to that, the show had been, IMO, overall pretty good. From that point on (And including that sceen), things didn't go as well. The story went from plausable/fairly well done to Retcon City with the whole colony drop, the uber-mobile armors and the somewhat suddenly increased development of the Kou-Nina thing, and then that was only made worse with the much maligned love triangle that come out of nowhere. The only good thing the last episodes of the series still had was the battles, which remained well done with the series' good fight choreography, but in pretty much every other way, after that point in Episode 10, things seemed to get worse...

[Chris]

In reading more and more posts, I think a lot of people posting here don't quite understand the concept of what "jumping the shark" means. If a show gets progressively worse over time, that doesn't really count. When an event happens that's so ridiculous that it completely ruins the show, that's jumping the shark. I'm not seeing that in most of the descriptions being mentioned.

[AmuroNT1]

Personally, I think it's a little hard to classify any anime show, except for the insanely long-running ones (Dragonball, Sailor Moon, Detective Conan) as being "shark-jumping", primarily because they don't have the length to do so. To quote TV Tropes: Jumping The Shark is the defining moment when an established show changes in a significant manner in an attempt to stay fresh. Ironically this means the television program has reached its peak and from then on it's all downhill. From that moment on, the program will simply never be the same.

For example, the reason Fonzie's shark jump is considered the moment Happy Days went downhill is because it marked the shift from a slice-of-life show focusing on Richie Cunningham to focusing on Fonzie and his increasingly absurd and unrealistic adventures.

One very strong example of jumping the shark that's always stuck with me is the webcomic "Everything Jake". It began as an amusing slice-of-life story about a guy attending college, but then came an arc where his Dungeon Master friend created a creature with the combined DNA of Wolverine and Pikachu (no, I'm not making this up). After that, the comic spiraled into an insane drama with mystical conspiracies that were completely disconnected from the original concept.

[Kavik Ryx]

It just occurred to me though then what would be considered jumping the shark in all technicality. .Hack//Legend of the Twilight lost its charm after Rena became comatose. Before then it felt like a video game slice of life, and turned into yet another typical .Hack story which get annoying after a while.

[VentZX]

It just occurred to me though then what would be considered jumping the shark in all technicality. .Hack//Legend of the Twilight lost its charm after Rena became comatose. Before then it felt like a video game slice of life, and turned into yet another typical .Hack story which get annoying after a while.

the problem with Legend of the Twilight was that it was following the manga pretty faithfully for I believe the first half of the series. The rest is anime original and greatly deviated from the intended plotline. If you want a superior story, and technically the canon story, read the manga.

[Kavik Ryx]

Which I have, and preferred much more.