LogFAQs > #905586684

ED rankings, including some commentary on the video portion! I'm really passionate about OPs and EDs and will usually watch the entirety of them in shows I enjoy.

Great Tier

6. ED4 (First half of Chimera Ants)

Slow, thoughtful, and not particularly gripping in the first half, as we patiently scroll through images of the cast. (Like in the Chimera Ant OP, Kite plays a very prominent role in the first half and fades away in favor of the latter cast.) The second half is straight-up lamenting lost innocence as G/K stand by the water and watch the night sky and sunrise. I like it a lot as a G/K song.

5. ED6 (Election/Alluka)

Copies one of the best songs, but some of the worse parts of it. ED6 has one of the worst lead-ins prior to the credits scrolling (the ending to ED5). There's also almost zero visually of note here, as our four major characters look off into the changing horizon. It gains a lot of points from familiarty.

4. ED2 (Yorknew/Phantom Troupe)

ED2 is the first to have intro music before you go to credits, and goddamn, that music is DRAMATIC. The entire tone of it is dramatic, even soap-opera-y. There are two distinct phases of it, and both are fun if not my favorite melodies. Unfortunately it lacks a little punch at the ending. Visually, I love everything about it - we start with each hero superimposed upon his greatest goal (Ging, Illumi, Spiders, and academia), move to a slow-roll of the entire Phantom Troupe, and finally end with some fading-in stills of major characters. It's the most theatrically satisfying of the EDs.

3. ED3 (Greed Island)

ED3 is suitably cheery for its arc (especially after the bloody revenge tale preceding it) and makes me think of childhood happiness, with its ED really only featuring stills of Gon/Killua/. The second half of ED3 actually gets better and feels nostalgic. Greed Island never gets too serious. The Chimera Ant arc is great, but even before it HxH gripped me with its ability to depict a frolicking childhood I may or may not have ever had. ED3 tugs at those.

Incredible Tier

2. ED5

ED5 came unexpectedly, as the corresponding OP never changed and the arc hadn't ended (even though we were transitioning into a clearly different second half). It's a mishmash of weird segments, where the first and third parts are decent but unimpressive and mostly we just slow-roll Meruem + Royal Guard versus Netero + Team Humanity.

These comments aren't entirely positive for such a high ranking, because ED5 is by far the ED that's most enhanced by the arc that it supports. It has near GOAT fade-in music, with the piano melody recapping the first segment of the song before we launch into it (the lead-in plus reptition have caused me to love all parts of the song). But the middle bridge, where the frantic pace slows and the accompanying instruments are at at minimum, yearns for you... and has the images of Meruem and Komugi playing Gungi. That storyline became by far the best part of the arc only an episode or two after the ED debuted - every time we finished an episode the bond to it grew stronger.

1. ED1

I love everything about this piece. It's interesting since this one lacks the emotional impact as well as a softer segment, or even an introductory melody. Doesn't matter, it's a really nice, simply illustrated visual treat, from the random screaming, to the flashing lights, to the pounding bass, to Hisoka's fantastic segment all to himself (he probably should have been more heavily involved in the conclusion of the show, were there to be one), to a rapidly escalating ending.

Part of what makes this so great is that it is tonally dissonant. The arc is very childish and nature-focused, yet here's this heavy metal piece with decked out disco lighting and screaming. I'd see Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas in person.
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yet all sailors of all sorts are more or less capricious and unreliable - they live in the varying outer weather, and they inhale its fickleness