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Worst Anime Dads

Anime has some of the best worst dads in any medium.

By Isaac ShapiroPublished 8 years ago 16 min read
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As most anime fans have realized, having somewhat inept or absent parents is necessary for any adventures on the parts of underage characters. Moreover, bad anime parents also work as a catalyst for the main characters to go on their journey.

In particular, perhaps due to something about masculinity in Japanese culture, anime dads are most noticeably the worst. From disappearing altogether to actively working to tear down their children, anime dads have made a name for themselves among the fandom. Fortunately, a lot of the “worst” anime dads have good hearts, but for the sake of the plot, they have to take a step away in order for their children to gain much needed maturity and experience by searching for them.

Other anime dads, however, can be the absolute worst. From being inconsistent and emotionally abusive, to flat out trying to kill their children, sometimes fathers in anime are scarily close to some of the horrible fathers frequenting live action-family dramas.

For the most part, parents that have passed away in stories about kids and adolescents are plot tools to remove obstacles for the characters to go on an adventure. It’s admittedly hard to have someone like Spiderman swinging through New York fighting crime in high school if he has a curfew or worse, a helicopter mom. The same could be said for anime, which is an artistic medium that often rests on the theme of encouraging teens into higher self-esteem by giving powers to characters their age.

For example, in Sailor Moon, Usagi Tsukino is in junior high when she discovers her special powers. Her parents are present in her life, but it is later revealed that these are her Earth parents and that her real mother died trying to save her and protect the universe. This creates a distancing (and a plot catalyst) between Usagi and her Earth parents that allows her to disobey them or keep the truth from them so she can become Sailor Moon and save the universe.

Basically, the concept of bad anime dads provides an avenue for removing the seemingly helpless nature of childhood by giving anime characters the ability to go on adventures and take care of themselves. As a concept, it makes any anime series appealing to a younger audience who may feel burdened by their inability to accomplish things because of their youth.

Purely from a story standpoint, bad anime dads can be useful on fronts beyond creating a window for their children to go on adventures. The obvious one is to serve as a catalyst for the main character—you’ll find that plenty of bad anime dads on this list went on their journeys in search of their fathers. That can be complicated in a situation where the kid is searching for the father because they have the answers to very important questions. For example, Eren’s father in Attack on Titan would not only be a source of comfort for Eren, but also his father potentially has answers to major questions about the history of titans.

In short, anime dads can be the worst, but it’s usually for a much larger reason.

Mukaze from Snow White with the Red Hair

To be fair, in Snow White with the Red Hair, Shirayuki handles living without her parents pretty well. Unfortunately, it’s not because they’re both tragically deceased as some (myself included) may have thought based on dialogue from the first few episodes. Her mother is dead, but her father Mukaze is off being a pirate and I guess trying to make the land of Tanbarun a better place. Unfortunately, Mukaze has time to take on plenty of boys as makeshift children, but not his own intelligent and badass daughter. You could easily argue that Shirayuki would have avoided that whole issue with scumbag Prince Raji if her dad hadn’t left her with her grandparents, who eventually died. On the other hand, she may have never met the love of her life, Zen, if not for having to escape Raji, but still—it sucks having to think you’re all alone in the world only to find out that your dad has a new life and makeshift new son named Kazuki. Which, by the way, I guess Mukaze took it upon himself to tell Kazuki all about Shirayuki but neglected to see if she was doing well.

The Chairman from Prison School

Though the Chairman is responsible for getting the boys into Hachimitsu Academy, his behavior as a father is probably largely why Mari hates men and Chiyo initially struggles to see Kiyoshi as anything beyond disgusting. It’d be one thing if he was a fair and just principal who at least bothered to be discrete about his perversions and obsession with butts. But the fact that he is pretty shamelessly open about it and so happens to be the principal of a school full of teenage girls is pretty bad behavior. In fact, if you had a hard time understanding why Mari wanted the boys out of the school, it’s hard to blame her when the most important man in her life has a butt cheek wrist rest for his computer mouse. Basically, it’s hard to respect a compassionate man when that man is easily manipulated by a naked woman. Also, he let Mari AND Chiyo get sent to the prison. That is definitely not something a good dad would do.

Gakuho Asano from Assasaination Classroom

In the very first episode of Assassination Classroom, the awful structure of Kunugigaoka Junior High is implicated as the reason why Class 3E has such low self-esteem. Who is responsible for that? Douchebag dad Gakuho Asano. Thanks to Gakuho, not only are the kids in Class 3E suffering, but he also makes Gakusho and the other intelligent kids go to rather immoral lengths to suppress success of any other students than that of Class A. Gakuho is a textbook emotionally abusive parent to Gakushu, never treating him as anything more than a pawn to continue the maintenance of the structure of the school. Even when Gakushu rises to the occasion and manages to score the highest scores and defeats Class 3E, Gakuho just rubs his past failures to prevent the class from doing well on exams and competitions in his face. Ultimately, Gakuho makes for the perfect villain to Korosensei’s caring teaching style. Too bad Gakushu couldn’t have been Korosensei’s part human part octopus alien son.

Monkey D. Garp from One Piece

On the surface Monkey D. Garp of One Piece seems like he's a real stand-up guy. What could possibly be wrong with him? He's a legendary hero of the Marines, famed for constantly clashing with Gold Roger, the former Pirate King and one of the most famed bad-asses in all of One Piece. Garp's presence has inspired a whole generation of Marines. He even offered to adopt and raise Ace, the son of his sworn rival, Gold Roger, after his execution. All seems well, but later the horrible truth becomes apparent. You see, Garp is far too lazy to actually put in the time necessary to raise children. The only idea of parenting he seems to be aware of is constant physical abuse. It's honestly no wonder that Luffy wants to be like Shanks, a pirate, more than anyone else. Shanks is perhaps the only person in the series who served as a responsible father figure in Luffy's life. Maybe if Garp had actually put in the time to raise Luffy, he might have become the Marine Garp wanted.

But no, Garp is far too lazy to do that. Instead he just dumps Luffy (his own grandson), as well as Ace (his adopted son), with a bunch of bandits. The man who wants his wards to grow up to be Marines leaves them with criminals rather than taking on any responsibility of his own. Leaving your grandson and adoptive son to be raised by murderous bandits in the woods. Great parenting! It gets even better. The bandits don't make any effort to raise Luffy or Ace because they're... y'know, BANDITS. They mostly just ignore them and let them dick around in the woods, where they find themselves constantly attacked by wild animals. It's truly a childhood that would make Edgar Burroughs proud. There's little wonder why Luffy and Ace don't seem to give a shit about becoming Marines in Garp's image because the only thing Garp has shown them is constant abuse and neglect.

Minato Namikaze from Naruto

You might be wondering what could be wrong with this guy. After all, he does fall into the dead parent category, and generally we don't hold too much against those folk in fiction. They get killed off in circumstances beyond their control. No one ever accused Harry Potter's parents of neglect; They were just killed off by Voldemort, and they were nice enough to leave Harry with a small fortune that covered his entire wizarding education. Minato, also known as the 4th Hokage, died in similar circumstances, defending his village from a great evil, but here's the thing: This guy knew shit could have gone wrong during his son's birth, and he knew there was a huge risk, thanks to the fact that his wife was harboring the very beast that wound up getting him killed.

However, he did not do anything proactive to help his child, or prepare for his own untimely death. He didn't leave behind anything, not even a will, letting his son know who his parents were. We've seen contemporary technology exist in the Narutoverse, including videos. Would it have been that hard to send him a message or ask that someone... anyone... explain who the hell his parents were? Instead he just left him to inherit the hatred of the village with no idea wherehe came from. Minato figured the best thing to do would be to use a convoluted system where he wouldn’t get to meet his son until he was sixteen via ninja magic. It's not surprising that after Naruto finally learns the truth about his lineage, his first reaction is to punch his dad in the gut.

Monkey D. Dragon from One Piece

Monkey D. Dragon is the head of the Revolutionary Army, and Luffy's biological absentee father. Of course, considering Garp's awful parenting, maybe Dragon decided to run away. With no idea what real parenting is like, it makes a lot of sense that he would also become an absentee father, further perpetuating a never ending cycle of neglect. The sad thing is that Dragon did have the opportunity to stop by and say hello to his son, but even though he was in the neighborhood, he made absolutely no effort to meet his progeny. Leading the revolutionary army and bringing justice to the downtrodden is all cool and what not, but would it really take that much effort to bring your kid along with you?

Even if you were worried about the danger, how about you find someone competent to raise your child, rather leave him to your abusive father. You could say Dragon slightly redeemed himself when he saved his son Luffy from Captain Smoker. But even during their fated meeting he could have at least told Luffy who he was. He doesn't though. Instead, Luffy doesn't find out who his father is until 200 episodes later, which is extremely messed up no matter how you look at it. This only further cements Dragon as one of the worst fathers in anime.

Iemitsu Sawada from Katekyo Hitman Reborn

Iemitsu Sawada is the father of Hitman Reborn's main protagonist, Tsuna. Tsuna's father spends most of the series, well, nowhere in sight. When he does come home, he mostly gets drunk and gets underage kids drunk as well. Tsuna hates his father, and thinks that he's a huge embarrassment. This would be fantastic if things just stayed like that, and Swanda was just a loser father. But of course because it's Shonen manga, the reason why Swanda is never home is because he's apart of the CEDEF, a really convoluted acronym that boils down to basically the anime mafia CIA.

Despite the fact that the entire manga is about Tsuna being forcibly drawn into a hyper-shonen interpretation of the mafia world, Iemitsu never bothers to tell his son about any of this. The drunk, neglectful father angle is great, but what really takes this over the top is towards the series end when they're forced to fight. Tsuna's father sides against his son and doesn't offer any support to him whatsoever. He even goes as far as to beat the shit out of him, humiliating and emasculating him even further.

Rasa from Naruto

The fourth Kazekage, also known as Rasa, is a victim of circumstance. He didn't want to be forced to shove a demon raccoon spirit into his youngest son, but he was forced to due to budget cuts for his village's defenses. That's kind of understandable, but what happened later really isn't. Instead of helping his son cope with his incredible power and responsibility, he makes no effort to try to raise him. Instead, he tries to kill him repeatedly, which molds little Gaara into a remorseless sociopath.

Maybe some counseling might help, but no. The fourth Kazekage is too lazy to put in any effort into actually dealing with his problems in a mature manner, and being a father to his youngest son. Instead he forces his two elder children to be responsible for supervising him to try and curb his murder rage. It's honestly not much of surprise that no tears were shed when the fourth Kazekage was killed off-screen. He tried to make amends as a zombie by apologizing, but the damage had already been done, and no one seems too eager to use the same zombie ninja magic on the dozens of people his son casually murdered before learning the power of friendship. And how did his son learn this valuable lesson? Someone was nice to him. Once. Nice going, oh great Kazekage.

Kurosaki Isshin from Bleach

How could this guy possibly be on the list? He's got so much going for him. He's a single dad raising three kids, including a set of twin girls. He runs his own medical practice, and he's usually a very supportive dad. But is he really? He seems like a supportive dad, but then about 100+ chapters in which we learn that he's not actually just a regular guy, but like his son, he's a super powered Shinigami. That's when everything falls apart. The very beginning of the series opens up with Ichigo having to defend his siblings from an attack by supernatural monster. At the time he has no powers, and the thing attacks his siblings. His dad is nowhere to be found during this. It might be understandable if it wasn't for the fact that later we learn that not only is his dad a Shinigami, he's super awesome Shinigami capable of blowing people away and destroying buildings with his middle finger.

So Mr. Awesome Super Dad, capable of destroying buildings, leaves his defenseless children completely alone when they're attacked by a homicidal monster. He just leaves everything up to his son who, at the time, had no idea about his Shinigami heritage, hoping Ichigo would somehow just manage to deal with that. I think not trying to protect your kids from monsters counts as pretty awful parenting, but it gets better. Early on in the series we learn the history of Ichigo's mom and how she died. So yet again we have Ichigo's sisters being stalked and attacked by malevolent forces. We have Ichigo completely alone without any support dealing with the creature responsible for murdering his mother. Maybe we could accept this, if we knew there was nothing Ichigo's dad could have done to prevent his wife's death, but that's the thing!

He's capable of destroying skyscrapers, so what the hell? Why wasn't he there to save his wife, and why isn't he there in the present to protect his kids? Instead, he just sort of leaves his son to alone to take care of serious business. He could have saved his kids years of therapy, but he doesn't because he's enjoys dicking around and neglecting his children far too much. The best case is when he finally does reveal himself as a Shinigami to Ichigo, but then proceeds to not bother giving any explanation of his family history. Thanks for nothing dad, it’s no wonder every time we see Ichigo with his dad on screen they're usually trying to murder each other.

Ging Freecss from Hunter x Hunter

We've had some pretty awful fathers on this list, but we've saved the best for last. The worst father ever to grace the screen of any anime, and my personal favorite best worst dad, is Ging Freecss from Hunter X Hunter. What makes Ging so wonderfully special is how completely and utterly unapologetic he is about abandoning his son Gon. He had a kid, then he dumped that kid on his sister who was responsible for taking care of him, and Ging NEVER EVER BOTHERS COMING BACK! His sister becomes so fed up with his absence that she gets sole custody and vows never to tell Gon about his father, instead lying to him, saying he's dead. Eventually, Gon finds out about his father, and he also finds out that his father is a Hunter, which basically is professional adventurer.

So Gon goes off into the world with the goal of becoming a Hunter himself. He even eventually meet his father, but his father makes no efforts to try and see him. He claims to be too ashamed of how he abandoned Gon, but honestly it's mostly because he's extremely selfish and just doesn't give a shit. The best part is that later on in the series Gon becomes severely injured after a big fight where he uses the classic Shonen Pyrrhic victory power-up. In the aftermath, he's so mutilated that he is beyond traditional medical help, and can only be saved via deus-ex machina. Despite all this, Ging still fervently refuses to see his son. It gets even better! Supporting characters like Leorio (who hasn't been in the main story for something like 100 episodes) literally come out of the woodwork just for the purpose of telling Ging how awful of a parent he is. Eventually Gon is healed thanks to the deus-ex machina story device, and he finally gets to meet his dad. The meeting is just epic. Not only is finding his dad Gon’s big goal for the entire series, but the normally brave and bold anime hero breaks down into a broken child who just wishes he had his father as a guiding influence instead of being abandoned.

Even after their meeting, Ging does everything he can to avoid further contact with his son, desperately trying to make sure that he doesn't have to engage his son in further conversation. Even the surrounding background characters become fed up with Ging and his absolutely awful parenting, and start to attack him, acting as audience surrogates. After a few minutes of conversation of chit chat Ging then proceeds to abandon his son... again. Forcing him to chase after him, and that is why Ging is the best worst Shonen dad of all time.

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About the Creator

Isaac Shapiro

When not scrounging the internet for the best content for Jerrick Media, Isaac can be found giving scritches to feathery friend Captain Crunch.

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