Episodic Viewing vs. Marathoning Anime

Most everyone has a preference, but is one method better than the other?

I definitely preferred this the episodic way.

Recently I stopped to analyze my own anime viewing habits and how much they have changed over the last seven or eight years. Interestingly, I've noticed a trending shift from a marathon-only approach to an almost exclusively episodic one, and blogging isn't the only reasoning I can come up with for such a change. I don't necessarily think that episodic viewing is better than marathoning, as each have their own quirks and cons, but in some ways I've found myself unable to marathon as much as I used to. Does that mean I've started to lose my love of anime? Surely not, considering I follow some ten series a season and spend a good 3 hours per episode blogging every single day. But I do think it means that I now look at the anime viewing process a bit differently than before.

I watched the first season marathoned, at least.

When I first began watching anime, for example, I was always hungry for more; more plot, more characters, more everything. I hated stopping and having to wait for a new episode every week because it made me impatient and I absolutely needed to know right there and then what was going to happen next. I watched whole series within days (I remember Bleach being caught up to in less than a week) and was constantly looking for new shows to satisfy my appetite. Occasionally I found a show I absolutely had to watch in an episodic fashion, say Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, but for the most part I avoided this and tried to stick to completed series. Even now, I routinely marathon my favorite series, and my records are pretty impressive (if I do say so myself, twelve to fifteen hours is all I need for Eureka Seven), and there's something about this approach that really works for things like fangirling and other fandom-related activities. It helps me immerse myself more completely into the world of the series I am watching and it also helps me form hugely unhealthy attachments to characters and their stories. So if that's the case, why do I now mostly follow an episodic method?

I watched both ways; it was good regardless.

Part of it, I think, has to do with my becoming more introspective, as well as retrospective, over the years. When I watch an episode of an anime and have no choice but to wait for the next one, I am forced to dwell on the events of the last one, to analyze and wonder and guess far more than when the answers are given to me in immediate sequence. While a younger me may have found that maddening, I've rather grown to like that ability to think things through, and it enhances my interactions with anime in more fulfilling ways. I now theorize far more than I ever did when I was a pure marathoner, for one thing, and I also have more time to appreciate little details and specific scenes than I would if I were watching whole portions of a series in one go. I can better point out characterization as it happens, and better catch references and other interesting material. It also allows me to get invested in the series differently; it may not be as intense an immersion as in the other method, but I do appreciate the community of viewers who get together and discuss a new episode together. It's a different sort of fandom-experience, but just as valid nonetheless, and I really enjoy the sorts of interesting thoughts generated by such discussions.

As a blogger, I've found I prefer the episodic method as well. It's much easier to analyze a specific episode sometimes, especially when there's so much happening in one week, though there are also cons (such as timing: the later a post, the more useless it is) and sometimes an overall analysis is somewhat more succinct.

In any case, there's no real "better" method of watching anime. Everyone has their own preferences and their own reasoning for why they prefer watching in their style of choice, and while episodic viewing works for me now, who knows, I might find that I'll change my mind again in a few years.