Do you know what a filler in anime? This word literally means filling, but it is used by anime fans around the world to define the episodes or arcs of an anime series whose plot is not based on the manga or the original work. It can also refer to boring and unnecessary episodes that add absolutely nothing to the story.
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Why are there Fillers?
This usually happens when the studio developing the anime needs to stall to avoid catching up to the manga in few episodes or simply because it wants to stretch the work. Some tend to use a lot of flashbacks and prolong battles and journeys to extend the story. This does not add anything to the plot and is generally of lower quality both visually and narratively.
Many animes that are based on short mangas need to resort to fillers to maintain the 12 or even 24 episodes. This means they can be present in closed works, both in short animes and long ones.
Some manage to be nice and improve the original story of the manga, others manage to be really annoying and boring, especially when the anime is long and has more than 200 episodes. With that in mind, let's share a list or guide on how you can avoid boring fillers from several popular anime.
The word comes from English, derived from the verb to fill which means "fill in." Literally an "episode that fills" a space, gaps and time.
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Different types of Fillers in anime and series
Fillers can happen in any work whether Japanese or not, it can be anime, drama, movie and even games. Everything will depend on whether the work you are consuming has other original material or not. There are different types of fillers, we can list some below which are:
Filler canon – This one is not present in the original work, but was written by the original author of the manda or light novel, serving most of the time as real material for fans of the work. The canon comes from the word canonical. This often happens when the anime approaches the manga.
Semi-filler it consists of a certain original part of the work (manga and novel) and a certain part is created. This invented part is not present in the manga. This makes the anime longer and makes the main story go slower.
Flashbacks – Many anime authors and directors use character flashbacks to make fillers, things that are not even present in the original work are added. Repeated flashbacks and things that happened in the past are sandwiched between scenes to add more time to the episode and keep a little distance from the current source material.
final fillers – Some short works decide to create an original ending different from the manga, which in most cases tends to be worse or terrible. Some anime with known filler endings were Gantz,
Anime to fill sausage - Some anime are totally fillers and are made just to be successful on top of the name of the work. Some anime like this are Dragon Ball GT and Boruto that has a manga, but still remains a sausage filler.
List of large anime filler episodes
Bleach filler episodes - 33, 50, 64-109, 128-137, 147-149, 168-189, 204-205, 213-214, 227-266, 287, 298-299, 303-305, 311-342, 355;
One Piece filler episodes - 50-51, 54-60, 93, 98-99, 101-102, 131-143, 196-206, 213-216, 220-226, 279-283, 291-292, 303, 317-319, 326-336, 382-384, 406-407, 426-429, 457-458, 492, 497-499, 506, 542, 575-578, 590, 626-629, 747-751, 775, 780-782, 801, 807;
the anime Bleach and Naruto are considered the kings of filler anime with over 40% of their episodes being filled with sausages.
Fairy Tail filler episodes - 9, 19-20, 49-50, 69-75, 125-150, 202-226, 246, 256, 268;
Katekyō Hitman Reborn Episodes! - 56, 97, 119, 142-153, 178-189;
Sailor Moon - 2-7, 9, 11-12, 15-18, 20-21, 26-32, 37-41, 43, 47-59, 62-67, 69-71, 78-80, 89, 94-100, 104, 107-108, 114, 116-118, 127, 129, 131-132, 134, 136-142, 144-147, 151-157, 159, 175-178, 183-186, 192;
Digimon Adventures Episodes - 9-11, 25, 33
Saint Seiya Episodes - 16-22, 26, 33-34, 54, 63, 74-99;
Sakura Cardcaptores episodes - 5, 12-15, 19-24, 27-34, 36-38, 40, 43, 53, 55-58, 60-64
Rurouni Kenshin episodes - 13-18, 22, 25-27, 63-95.
Inuyasha episodes - 59, 63-65, 68, 72, 75-79, 89-101, 127-130, 133-140, 162-163
Detective Conan – 6, 14, 17, 19, 21, 24-26, 29-30, 33, 36-37, 41, 44-45, 47, 51, 53, 55-56, 59, 61-62, 64-67 , 71, 73-74, 79-80, 83, 87-90, 92-95, 97, 106-109, 111-112, 119-120, 123-127, 135, 140, 143, 148-152, 155 , 158-161, 165, 169, 175, 179-187, 196-198, 201-204, 207-211, 214-216, 225, 232, 235-237, 245, 248, 251-252, 255-257 , 260-262, 264-265, 273, 276, 281-283, 294-300, 303, 314-315, 318-322, 328, 337, 342, 348-349, 352-353, 357, 360, 363 -365, 368-370, 373, 376-380, 384, 388-389, 392-393, 397, 403-405, 409-410, 413-414, 418-420, 423-424, 426, 433-434 , 437, 439-442, 448, 450-452, 456, 459, 461, 468, 471, 475, 478, 480, 483, 486, 489, 512, 518-520, 527, 536, 539-541, 544 , 547-548, 553-556, 562, 565-567, 570, 577, 582, 588, 591, 594-596, 599, 602-607, 629-631, 634-641, 658, 663-666, 669 -670, 677-680, 686-689, 692-698, 707-709, 716-721, 726, 729-730, 733, 735-737, 742-743, 750, 753, 757-758, 761-762 , 767-769, 774-778, 784, 789-791, 794-807, 813, 816-821, 824-826, 829, 833-835, 838-842, 845-846, 851-85 2, 855-860, 865, 868-871, 875-877, 880, 883-884, 891-893 (It's kind of unfair not to watch the episodes since this anime is 1-3 episode investigation).
Pokemon filler episodes - 8, 19, 32-33, 37-39, 44, 46, 49, 51, 54, 57, 59, 64-67, 70, 85-89, 93, 95-97, 100, 105, 116, 118-119, 123-124, 129, 131, 133-136, 144-146, 149, 151-152, 158-160, 162-163, 166, 168-169, 173-176, 180-182, 184, 186-189, 191, 193-194, 197-203, 207-208, 210, 214-215, 225, 228-230, 235-241, 244-245, 251, 278-279, 290, 298, 306, 311, 314-315, 318, 326, 334, 344-345, 355, 357, 363, 365, 373, 375-376, 381, 405-406, 408-410, 413-414, 433-434, 436, 441, 452-453, 456, 483-484, 499, 502-503, 515-518, 529, 562, 574-575, 583, 593, 606-607, 616, 631, 657, 675, 678-679, 684, 702-704, 715, 737, 744, 747-748, 774, 776, 778, 781-782, 787, 799, 805-807, 809, 817, 819, 836, 839, 841, 862, 873-874, 877, 880, 886-889, 899, 902, 908, 914-915, 938, 943, 948, 955, 960-961, 988-989.
Gintama filler episodes - 1-2, 50, 57, 75, 82, 100, 106, 111, 114, 120, 124-125, 135, 137, 150, 155, 164, 166, 171, 173-174, 176, 185, 189, 209, 252;
Yu-Gi-Oh! filler episodes - 13, 33, 41-45, 80, 98-121, 136, 144-198, 233, 237-244, 247, 262, 264, 266-267, 271, 278, 284, 287-288, 290, 295-305, 309-310, 314-316
To find more anime filler episodes, we recommend the website: https://www.animefillerlist.com/
List of Naruto filler episodes
Classic Naruto - 26, 97, 99, 101-106, 136-220
Naruto Shippuden - 28, 45, 49, 57-71, 90-112, 127, 144-151, 170-171, 176-178, 180-196, 213, 223-242, 257-260, 271, 279-281, 284-295, 303-320, 327, 347-361, 376-377, 386, 388-390, 394-413, 416-417, 419, 422-423, 427-457, 460-461, 464-469, 480-483;
Boruto - 16-17, 33, 40-50, 52, 60, 67-92, 96-97
Dragon Ball filler episodes
Dragon Ball Z - Dragon Ball Z 7, 9-17, 20, 39-44, 100, 102, 108-117, 124-125, 170-171, 174, 195-199, 202-204, 274, 288;
Dragon Ball - Dragon Ball 29-33, 42, 45, 79-83, 127-132, 149-153;
Dragon Ball GT - 1-65 (Totally);
Dragon Ball Super - 1-2, 15-17, 42-46, 68-76;
Video talking about fillers
I hope you enjoyed the article, now that you know what it means, are you ready to avoid them? If you liked the article, don't forget to share it with your friends and leave your comments. Finally, I'll leave you a video that talks about this subject: