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While most anime tend to follow the original manga, there are times when an anime tends to veer off and create its storyline for the end of the anime. This is usually because the manga hasn’t fully finished yet, and the anime can’t sustain any filler. The writing and animation team has to develop their own endings, which may or may not be good.
But this list isn’t about just quality, but about the audience's expectations.
[This article contains spoilers for various anime and manga and reflects the writer’s personal views. Some of the embeds contain depictions of canon-typical violence. Discretion is advised.]
10 anime that had unexpected endings
10) Soul Eater
For the most part, the Soul Eater anime followed the manga pretty closely, save for a few harmless changes. Such as Mifune surviving, or plot points playing out in separate but tiny ways.
They even had an excellent idea of turning Maka Albarn into a Demon Weapon, which makes sense given her parentage. But what shocked viewers was that Maka managed to kill the Big Bad with, and this is word for word: “a fist full of courage.” In other words, she punched the greatest evil known to the world, Kishin Ausra, and killed him in one punch. This might be the wrong anime.
9) Akame Ga Kill
The Akame Ga Kill show has its praise and scorn, with its characters being randomly killed off, very strange power scaling, and having divisive endings for both the manga and the anime.
For the latter, things took a turn for the weird. Takumi dies after using his powers to their breaking point, and Exdeath dies along with him by encasing herself and him in ice, which shatters. Numerous fan favorites have also been killed without so much so a goodbye, such as Leone.
While such events did happen in the manga, what really made this one unexpected was the almost rapid-fire way plot hooks got tied up and the anime ending on a cliffhanger.
8) Great Teacher Onizuka
While this anime and manga did follow each other very closely, the anime of GTO had one problem. They were wrapping up, so they had to cram the remaining plot points into the last two episodes.
From top to bottom, the final two stuffed as many details as they could before leaving with a final word of goodbye. Whether it worked or not is up to the viewer.
7) Claymore
Claymore, much like GTO listed above, does follow the manga to a degree, but come to the final episodes, they had to cram the final scenes together, but unlike GTO, Claymore didn’t do it so well.
The end result was a bit of a mess, with the main protagonist, Clare, gets a sudden and random power-up that allows her to kill the main antagonist with ease, resulting in an ending that left fans confused. It was unexpected, just not in the way people wanted.
6) Bobobo-Bo Bo-bobo
Let it never be said that this show can’t surprise its viewers. While it followed the manga very, very loosely, they followed the same plot until a certain point. Right up till the very last episode, where a whole new bad guy was ready, willing, and able to fight. Heroes and villains alike gathered to fight this new threat, and in the last final minutes of the episode…
It ends. Just like that. The female lead, Beauty, even hangs the mother of all lampshades on it. The manga continues, but the show itself ceased production.
5) Hellsing
The Hellsing 2001 show did try to follow the manga’s run, but only the first three episodes could have done so, and from there, it was all original. Numerous characters and plot threads went unmentioned, such as Walter being a traitor, and Alucard never being captured by the omni-present catboy.
Instead, Alucard fights a demonic creature by the name of Incoginto, and kills him by somehow firing a silver cross from his broken gun. His hair also turned white. While this ending definitely wasn’t what fans were expecting, it was indeed, charming in its own way.
4) Black Cat
Any viewer who knew the Black Cat anime would have expected a different ending when series’ protagonist Train joins a bit later then the manga. But what’s really strange was that the anime was made after the manga ended, so there was really no reason for the changes.
In any case, this time around, the anime focused more on Eve, and her true purpose as a bio-organic weapon who can change her shape into whatever she wanted, and Train fights his mentor, who is supposed to be dead. Black Cat is a good show, but the ending is a hit or miss depending on the viewer.
3) Blue Exorcist
Much like the previous entry, this one had its own take on the story somewhere around the halfway point. Things like Rin Okumura’s mother and grandmother made an appearance, and Satan’s goals were revealed.
What really makes this strange, however, is that the second season just ignored all of these plot points, and went on to follow the manga. Its definitely one the stranger anime endings out there, if only because no one treated it as an ending.
2) Shaman King
Talk about a plot twist. The Shaman King of the early 2000s, like many others on this list, had a different ending from the manga. The biggest difference? In the manga, the big bad evil guy managed to not only survive, but win. In the anime, the series changed around the mid-way point, and became more of a typical shonen show.
While some fans didn’t like the change, others were glad to see Hao finally shut his trap after going on nigh unchallenged for the majority of the series.
1) Full Metal Alchemist (2003)
Ending this list is an old favorite, it’s the FMA series from 2003. Back when the manga was still in production, the anime had to take a few different creative liberties with its story. One of the biggest being Edward Elric’s character development, what happened to Al, and the fate of several other characters.
The biggest twist, however, was that Ed, in the series finale, somehow managed to transport himself to a version of planet Earth. Suffices to say, no one saw this coming.
