10 High IQ Anime Characters
by Jon Greene
John Wayne's character in Sands of Iwo Jima said, "Life is tough, but it's tougher if you're stupid." There's a lot of truth in that statement, but thankfully many of these anime characters have genius-level intellects that make their lives exponentially easier than their contemporaries. Obviously, I've yet to watch every last anime/LN adaptation ever created, but of the ones I have watched, these characters stand out as prominent eggheads. (WARNING: MAY CONTAIN SLIGHT SPOILERS!)
10) Haru Yoshida, "My Little Monster"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... He's as dumb as a pile of bricks when it comes to social interaction, but excels in his academic life. The impression he gives off is that of a typical antisocial slacker. Yet, he aces every test he takes without so much as opening a book. Much to the chagrin of Shizuku, who struggles to study amidst Haru's lovable, but chaotic personality. What's most impressive, however, is that he outperforms Shizuku without having to attend dreaded "cram school." *shivers*
Possible IQ Score: 139
9) Kazuya Shibuya, "Ghost Hunt"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... Kazuya, A.K.A., "Naru the narcissist," is a pragmatic psychic investigator. In the world of Ghost Hunt, ghosts are very much a real thing. However, whether a case is real or not, Naru will get to the bottom of it using scientific principles, deductive reasoning, and -- when called for -- his own psychokinetic abilities. Usually providing the simplest solution is enough for Naru to solve a case, but he proves countless times he isn't afraid to delve deeper into the paranormal.
Possible IQ Score: 147
8) Naoki Irie, " Itazura na Kiss"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... Naoki by definition is an overachiever - he's the smartest guy in Japan, achieves the top score in all of his exams, expertly plays tennis, and cooks like Auguste Gusteau. Naoki's so smart that he lacks a personal goal in life... Seriously - he's too smart to find a goal in life. And yes, like most stereotypical intellectuals, he has an air of superiority to him that makes him come off as, for lack of a better word, dickish. In fact, he flat-out hates dumb girls, but wouldn't you guess, ends up falling for one.
Possible IQ Score: 200 (allegedly); 148 (realistically)
7) Keima Katsuragi, "The World Only God Knows"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... Keima is the master of gal (gadot) games. And somehow, he's able to leverage his knowledge of wooing 2D girls into conquering the hearts of real-life girls. If only I can do something similar with my Rollercoaster Tycoon knowledge... Anyway, in addition to his book smarts, he uses advanced metrics to do what any guy of any nationality would give his left testicle to do. And he does it multiple times on the same girls! He tackles high school romances like they're science experiments; testing out his hypothesis, and producing results... Hot, sexy results... They say just because you're good at video games doesn't mean you'll be good at the real-life equivalent of it. Well, Keima subverts that idea entirely.
Possible IQ Score: 144
6) Togame, " Katanagatari"
Why She's Considered to Be Smart... Sure she misuses the expression "cheerio" to hilarious effect, but she's also a very crafty strategist when she wants to be. The smartest thing she did in her quest to obtain the 12 deviant blades was enlist the help of swordsmen who fights without a sword. That in and of itself gave her an advantage over her enemies, but her brutal schemes pushed her way over the top. She contemplates every move she makes, explores every scenario, and completely analyzes the abilities of her enemies. But in the end, perhaps she's too clever, as in the long run she ends up manipulating herself to achieve her ultimate goal.
Possible IQ Score: 152
5) Shiroe, "Log Horizon"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... I thought I knew MMORPGS, then Shiroe, the "Villain in Glasses," showed me the fallacy of my belief. He looks 30 seconds ahead, while at BEST, I'm able to look 5 seconds ahead. Shiroe's the former master strategist for the Debauchery Tea Party, and currently uses his expertise, not only to win battles, but to literally change the mechanics of the game world. Whereas most use force to solve problems, Shiro uses his Intellect stat, which has to be at least 999. And with his high INT, he uses game mechanics in ways they were never intended to be used. For example, he keeps the guild leaders of Akihabara in check using in-game rules, figures out the process for creating real-world items, and creates a new form of magic. He's essentially exploiting the game of Elder Tale in ways no one's ever attempted.
Possible IQ Score: 157
4) L-Elf Karlstein," Valvrave the Liberator"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... L-Elf, or "uuuuhhhfff," is a brilliant military operative, who exhibits just enough apathy to see his coldblooded plans to completion. He's also merciless in combat, and his strategic prophecies more or less end up coming true. Regardless of the repercussions, he isn't afraid to use people to further his ambitions. The strange thing is, you can easily see why he chooses a particular course of action. No matter how cruel his schemes may appear at first, they're always based on their effectiveness in a given situation. Besides his mental aptitude for military tactics, he also possesses some pretty killer physical attributes. He's an expert marksman, and excels in hand-to-hand combat. He may not be able to pilot a Valvrave, but more than makes up for it by being intellectually superior to those who can.
Possible IQ Score: 165
3) Victorique de Blois, "Gosick"
Why She's Considered to Be Smart... The "Golden Fairy of the Library" is like a female moe-version of Sherlock Holmes. Hold up in her towering library, she spent the better part of her life reading books, and assembling fragments of chaos using her vast wellspring of knowledge. Any mystery she comes across -- that has the slightest hint of supernaturalism -- is debunked using plain, boring facts. If you need a case solved, just bring some fragments to her. She'll solve them for you - though probably at your own expense. For a sample of her handiwork, look no further than Grevil, who paid dearly to have her solve cases for which he'd eventually receive credit.
Possible IQ Score: 180
2) Lelouch Britannia, "Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... Lelouch is one of those guys you see in the park playing 10 games of chess simultaneously. Only in his case, he's playing against supercomputers. That's not the literal conflict of Code Geass, but LeLouch approaches every situation with that mindset. He almost appears to be prescient with how well he executes his plans. He predicts where his enemy's movements, what they're thinking, and what they think he thinks they're thinking (phew). He even eerily maps out entire conversations as if he's working from a transcript. What's more, the plans he devises aren't just limited to enemies; he treats his allies as pawns, and he doesn't even have to use his Geass power to do it. Watching LeLouch play the biggest symbolic game of chess is definitely a spectacular sight to behold.
Possible IQ Score: 183
1) Rintarou Okabe, "Steins;Gate"
Why He's Considered to Be Smart... 3/4 of the main characters in Steins;Gate are virtually science prodigies, but Okabe, a literal mad scientist, has to be considered for top honors, for the fact that he essentially invented the concept of D-Mails. For those out of the loop, D-Mails are text messages sent back in time using a microwave as a conduit. Which was cool at first, until Chaos Theory proved how dangerous a simple text message could be. However, Okabe then theorized that a person could send their entire consciousness back in time, and basically used a Large Hadron Collider (remotely operated via a hack) to do just that. Okabe was smart, but he was also obnoxious and arrogant. Despite his personality flaws, he was able to overcome them and use his "reading steiner" ability to alter the fate of him and his friends in a very definitive way.
Possible IQ Score: 190
Honorable Mentions:
Chamber, "Gargantia"; Sybil System, "Psycho-Pass"; every mental model, "Arpeggio of Blue Steel: Ars Nova" - Yeah, yeah, they're all AIs. So what?
Well, that about does it; so, dear readers, what anime characters strike you as exceptionally smart?
Please leave your thoughts and comments in the section below.
Facebook
Twitter