MAL April Fools

[Sindar]

Even original anime end on a note that gives opportunities for sequels.
AoT merely gives space for a sequel. However, it has a beginning, middle and end. That can't be denied.
Plus, when it comes to seasonal anime, there's change of staff sometimes, and it's pretty apparent in the case of AoT. The first season is a testosterone fueled action adventure, while the second one is more of a thriller.

And, why not? I mean, these long-running manga are divided into story arcs anyway, and when it starts to suck, you may as well pull out. Lots of people dropped Naruto during the war arc. They may as well have ended with the Pain arc because technically, Naruto entire character arc is over, which is being acknowledged by the village.
Be it BNHA, Food Wars, Nanatsu no Taizai, all of these don't have cliffhanger endings, and you can be happy with just watching the first one.
And yeah, I get your point, season 2 is something that has a beginning dependent on something, but it can still be judged on its own merits and values, because it was produced as a separate entity that continues from season 1, unlike Naruto or One Piece.
In that way, if I enjoyed My Hero Academia season 2 the most in 2017, more than any other anime I watched, then yes, it does make sense to include it in a list.

I'd argue the first season of AoT doesn't have an end in the way I mean it. I'll try to make it short. The anime has about 5 main plot lines: civilization line (war against titans), Eren's line (his personal quest to destroy titans, later spiced up by him becoming one), Mikasa's line, the Survey Corps's line (Levi, Erwin and others, who will survive, will they achieve anything, etc.) and the titan's line (so far mainly shown via Annie and Eren, hinting that they are not just enlarged zombies, not all of them at least). Every of these lines have a setup and a conflict, and these done fairly well. None of them however got even close to a climax, much less to a closure. In fact it feels like at most 20% of the story has been told. I am not referring to the manga, only talking about my impression as a viewer. If I were to consider the end of the first season to be the end of the story I would give the whole thing a pretty bad score. A lot of the things I like about this anime are based on the fact that I view them as a setup for a further story.

Naruto is a good example too. You could end it after the Pain arc, but that would be a pretty terrible ending - Sasuke's story is hanging, Sakura's story is hanging, the nine tails story is hanging, the ending is way too sudden and the consequences and the aftermath isn't obvious.
Also, when someone asks me if they should watch Naruto, I don't think about the first season, I am thinking about both seasons and even some of the extras from the manga. I don't see a person watching Naruto and not watching Shippuden. I would assume the same is true with the Boku no Hero and other multi-season adaptations of a single manga. Sure, you can put a second season in your top list, especially if the point of the list is to say "here is what I like" =) If it is meant as a recommendation of sorts, then I doubt its usefulness. But well, things aren't meant to be useful, I personally would be interested to see any kind of top list a friend made, just because I would be interested to know what they enjoyed watching. I am more demanding when it comes to the reviewers and their lists though.

 

[MadaraUchiha]

I'll make it simple: Clubbing sequels and the first season and ignoring it in lists just because they are sequels makes me feel like they are being ignored in spite of how good they are. Even though BNHA Season 2, was a season 2, I liked the characters, narrative, developement, action, animation, everything more than any other anime I watched. So, if I have a scenario in which a person who's watched BNHA season 1 is asking me for recommendations, but he's not really crazy about BNHA itself, and would accept anything good from 2017, I'd recommend BNHA season 2 over everything else.

 

[Sindar]

I'll make it simple: Clubbing sequels and the first season and ignoring it in lists just because they are sequels makes me feel like they are being ignored in spite of how good they are. Even though BNHA Season 2, was a season 2, I liked the characters, narrative, developement, action, animation, everything more than any other anime I watched. So, if I have a scenario in which a person who's watched BNHA season 1 is asking me for recommendations, but he's not really crazy about BNHA itself, and would accept anything good from 2017, I'd recommend BNHA season 2 over everything else.

 

[MadaraUchiha]

Maybe this comes down to having a list before watching a sequel, and having one after watching one to feel gratified. But, yeah, it kind of is a good idea to filter out all the sequels, OVA's and specials from a list, I guess.