I'm finally considering getting into anime.

And, WOW, I have absolutely NO CLUE where to start.

Seriously, take a look at this list of noteworthy anime on TV Tropes. There are a LOT of series listed here, and although I have heard of many of them because of the general popularity of anime on TV Tropes and the internet in general, I really don't know if any of these series are a good place to start for someone who's not already into that sort of thing.

I know it really depends on personal taste, and I tend to know what I like in terms of live action TV and movies: sci-fi and fantasy, mainly, as well as several comedy series.

So, uh, I know for a fact that there are a few people into anime here, so maybe you could help me out?

Full Metal Panic is nice. Also try Macross.

Well, I can name four anime I would definitely recommend:

1. Blood+--They are called Chiropterans, ravenous creatures that can change their form, disguising themselves as human beings. Immortal creatures that feed off blood, they hide themselves among us. An organization called the Red Shield has been waging a private war to wipe them out. Now the struggle has grown. Saya Otonashi is a normal high school student who suffers from amnesia; she can't remember anything before the past year of her life. Then one day, a man named Hagi appears and gives her a katana, and her destiny is only partially revealed. The journey for the truth begins...

2. Death Note--An intelligent high school student goes on a secret crusade to eliminate criminals from the world after discovering a notebook capable of killing anyone whose name is written into it.

3. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni (When They Cry)--Higurashi no Naku Koro ni is a story of many chapters. It's about the town of Hinamizawa, and the people who live there, Rena Ryugu, Mion Sonozaki, Satoko Hojo, and Rika Furude, as well as friends, relatives, and visitors dealing with Lord Oyashiro's curse. Every year on the night of Watanagashi, people mysteriously disappear and are murdered which is rumored to be a curse, though it has yet to be proven. However, certain people don't believe it, especially with the odd behaviors of some of of the residents of Hinamizawa. This story is explained in many Question and Answer chapters.

4. Hellsing Ultimate OVAs--A retelling of Hellsing, based directly off the Manga.

Also, stay far away from anything from 4Kids.

dlausactor6373 wrote:

Also, stay far away from anything from 4Kids.

I must say "distributed by 4Kids", but everything else I agree. They are among the worst translators and editors ever!

I must recommend Death Note as well, and I also recommend the movie "Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone".

One piece is good, if you like comedy-adventure. Otherwise, stay away from it. And under no circumstance watch the first english dub of it.

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
FLCL
Slayers
Trigun
Outlaw star

Probably all on the list, but those are a few of my favorites, in no personal order.

The DBZ series, seasons 1-5 of Pokemon (don't go past the Johto anime! It gets really bad after that!), Naruto, and Naruto Shippuden.

Here are some of my favorit animes.

Devil May Cry: the animated series

Gundam 00

Final Fantasy Unlimeted (dont watch english dub)

Heroic Age

Gungrave anime

Soul Eater

Elfen Lied

Steel Angel Kurumi

Full Metal Panic

Vandread

Claymore

The Melancholy Of Haurhi Suzimya

Black Cat

Black Lagoon

Elemental Gelade

Negima

itsmeyouidiot wrote:

And, WOW, I have absolutely NO CLUE where to start.

Seriously, take a look at this list of noteworthy anime on TV Tropes. There are a LOT of series listed here, and although I have heard of many of them because of the general popularity of anime on TV Tropes and the internet in general, I really don't know if any of these series are a good place to start for someone who's not already into that sort of thing.

I know it really depends on personal taste, and I tend to know what I like in terms of live action TV and movies: sci-fi and fantasy, mainly, as well as several comedy series.

So, uh, I know for a fact that there are a few people into anime here, so maybe you could help me out?

Some term definitions first:

• sub - Means “subtitles, so a sub of a series probably has English text translations for the Japanese speakers.
  
• dub - Means “dubbed”; an English dub of a series replaces all of the Japanese voice actors with English ones. If done poorly, dubs can be considerably worse to watch than subs, even though subs require reading rather quickly.
  
• mecha – Walking humaniod-like weapon platforms. Lots of anime have these, but how they are treated varies wildly from the mostly realistic to fantastically impossible.
  
• giant mecha anime – A particular style of action-sci-fi anime that is pretty much defined by the Gundam series of animes. There are a particular subset of tropes that apply to giant mecha anime, and if you've seen one of these series you can pretty much predict the major events in other series of the same type. Personally I don't usually like them, but your mileage may vary.
  

Errata: Anime movies are just like regular movies, a few hours in length. Anime TV series are similar to regular TV series, but most are either 13 (one season long) or 26 (two seasons) episodes in length, a rare few are hundreds of episodes long. OVA's are something of an unusual beast, somewhere between movies and TV series. Often they are movie length, but can be pretty easily chopped up into 30 minute sections.


I would suggest that you start out with a few movies at first. They have nice English dubs and are of high quality, plus they are shorter than full series so you won't have wasted much time if you end up not liking them.

The movies are:
Princess Mononoke - Genre: Action-Fantasy A fantasy piece set in what I would call the Japanese Middle Ages, it involves a young prince traveling to a distant town to try to find the source of his curse, which he received when a monster attacked his village. Link to trailer

Spirited Away - Genre: Fantasy Another fantasy piece set in the modern days; a young girl and her parents accidentally end up in the spirit realm, and the young girl has to work as a servant to try to free her parents. Link to trailer

Howl's Moving Castle - Genre: Fantasy A fantastical piece about a girl with a curse, a wizard, a funny fire spirit, and a moving castle with chicken legs. Link to trailer

Steamboy - Genre: Action Set in Britain in the age of steam, it is about a young boy and his wonderfully steam-punk steam powered devices, the mysterious "Steamball" device, and his attempts to find his father and grandfather, both of whom are working for the sinister O'Hara. Link to trailer

(And yes, there is a reason why a lot of those movies I mentioned are made by Hayao Miyazaki. He's like the (pre-special edition Star Wars) George Lucas or Steven Spielburg of Anime; everything he does is high quality, good stuff.)





I don't know the quality of most of these series English dubs, but here are some series that I consider worth watching.

Excel Saga - Genre: Comedy I actually suggest that you watch this only after having watched several other older anime series; the jokes in this series are a lot funnier if you know the source material they are parodying. Link to an episode

Cowboy Bebop - Genre: Action-Sci-Fi It's about a duo of bounty hunters and their growing crew, and their jobs. Link to an episode

The Vision of Escaflowne - Genre: Action-Fantasy It's about a high-school girl who gets transported to another world, where she runs into a young prince and his kingdom that is under attack from an evil empire... and is disturbed by the visions she starts having. It's a mecha-anime, though considerably different than one of the Gundams, more magi-tech like. It's also quite old, having come out in April 1996, so it's a little hard to find online. Sorry about the link to the Spanish sub of the second episode, it's about all that I could find. The English dub of it is actually pretty good. Do be warned that there is also an Escaflowne movie, which I do not recommed. Link to the Spanish dub of part of the second episode.

Neon Genesis Evangelion – Genre: Action-Sci-Fi/some other stuff One that is probably best watched after watching a few other anime things first. An anime that is a classic, and for good reason. It is also a mecha anime, but also rather different than a Gundam series. There is the original t.v. series, some movies, and a new, incomplete, OAV series as well. I haven't seen the OVA yet, but the TV series and movies are excellent; the only thing I have to say is that you pretty much have to watch the movies if you want a proper end to the TV series, as the TV series ending is really WTF... the movies explain the ending much better. The basic story is that an abandoned young boy has been called to his (dickish) father's side to help prevent humanities destruction from invading giant creatures called “Angels”. Link to an episode

Full Metal Panic! - Genre: Action-Comedy with Sci-Fi elements A high-school age military sergeant and his team is sent to protect a high-school girl for reasons unknown, and quickly discover that she is being targeted for kidnapping by forces unknown. Not a giant mecha anime, though it has mechas... including one really fucking big one. Episodes tend to alternate; one is mostly comedy, the next might be considerably more serious. Link to an episode

Full Metal Panic! FUMOFFU – Genre: Comedy, with a bit of action from time to time. Sort of a humerous interlude between Full Metal Panic! and Full Metal Panic! TSR. Same characters, mostly the same plot, more humor. Link to an episode

Full Metal Panic: TSR - Genre: Action-Comedy with Sci-Fi elements A sequel to Full Metal Panic!, obviously you shouldn't watch this one until you've watched the first. Tends to be more serious than the first Full Metal Panic. Link to an episode


Others that I would also suggest, though probably not until you've watched some of the others first: Eureka 7 (Action-Sci-Fi), about a young boy's journey to adulthood while piloting a large mecha, and figuring out what these alien like lifeforms really want; and Martian Successor Nadesico (Action-Comedy-Sci-Fi, about a battleship filled with eccentric geniuses helping Earth fight a war against the “Jovians” attackers from beyond the planet Mars. Its kinda old and often parodies other, older, space anime. While it features mecha, early on it brutally makes it quite clear that it isn't a giant mecha anime; towards the end of an episode something happens that would absolutely never happen in those types of shows, and it sets the mood for the rest of the series.

I personally would suggest staying away from Bleach and Naruto for now, as they are really long (hundreds of episodes), as of yet incomplete, and, at least in my opinion, declining in quality. Like some American TV shows *cough*Heros*cough* I feel they have failed to follow the storytelling "arc" that requires a show to end, and are now suffering character stagnation because of it.

Also, while I don't like DBZ (Dragonball Z), Team Four Star's "Dragonball Z Abridged" series is very funny. Basically what they did was take the original script from the series, rewrote it in a funny manner, then added their own voice recordings over rearranged version of the original footage. It's full of humor, though a little hard to describe, so I suggest that you just watch the first episode to get a feel for it.

Let the celebration begin!

It depends what you like, but I'd recommend:
Mushi-shi - Genre: Dunno really, it's not action though.
Follows the exploits of Ginko, a Mushi Master (or, Mushi-Shi). What are mushi you ask? It's best to watch the anime. I highly recommend this as a starting anime. ( teh second episode is well.... "The eye thing"
you'll know what I mean).

FL CL - Genre: Classic
Along with Excel saga, the weirdest and anime ever. It's a classic. It's about a boy on his journey to maturity. Also, giant robots come out of his head and 2 older women are interesting in him. (No nudity though)

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann - Genre: Giant Mech
Not everybody's cup of giant robot tea. It's very over-the-top.

I know Zoekin's already mentioned these, but I must recommend these again:
The Melancholy Of Haurhi Suzimya - Genre: Haruhi is in her own genre
Haruhi is god, but she doesn't know it. Hilarity ensues.

Steel Angel Kurumi - Genre: Romance/action/ecchi

Also everything that Oldman said. ESPECIALLY Steamboy.

Hmm, all of these Have been mentioned. I'm not the biggest fan of anime, at least not a good majority. Different anime to watch depend really on your mood. Some of my favourites...

Neon Genesis Evangelion - Adroitly combines Science Fiction with emotional drama and big robots. All around, simply interesting and worth watching just for the experience.

Cowboy Bebop - My personal favourite. The future is here and it is funky and badass. Basically, if Bob Dylan knew all of Bruce Lee's moves, was a bounty hunter and could fly a spaceship better than Wedge Antilles. And Radical Edward is great for the lulz. Every episode is different in their own ways, some movies towards noir, harder sci-fi, horror, drama... really anything.

Death Note - As mentioned, idealistic high school student starts killing off the worlds criminals with a demonic notebook. However, the series quickly goes far beyond this into a REALLY thrilling and suspenseful game of cat and mouse.

Trigun - Good, pure action packed fun. A hero who is a very endearing character and a good combination of science fiction and western elements.

FLCL - I can't explain this one at all. But it is awesome and doesn't afraid of anything - even not making any sense.

Elfen Lied - Defiantly not everyones cup of tea. Nudity and lots of violence... especially... interesting violence as well as being quite dark at moments. But its an interesting story and sometimes all you want to watch are people getting shredded to pieces by Lucy.

Full Metal Alchemist - I dunno. This one has just always appealed to me, especially the newer series, "Brotherhood".

Hellsing OVAs - The Hellsing TV series, in my opinion, tried to make the manga make "more sense" but only stifled the material. The OVAs are badass condensed into anime form. THIS IS WHAT VAMPIRES ARE SUPPOSED TO BE LIKE. (Up yours Stephanie Meyers). #4 is a personal favourite. Alucard annihilating Van Winkle still gives me chills. And the Major's infamous speech.

Steamboy - Technically a movie, but I must emphasize it. Admittedly, this may be because I am a Steampunk. But still. SCIENCE!

These are the ones I personally like and have seen. Ones like Dragon Ball Z or One Piece can be fun if you just want something formulaic and with action. Dragon Ball Z is overly dramatic and often silly but hard to hate.

Ones like Naruto and Bleach I'd tend to avoid... my opinion, once again...

Here are some of my favourites, listed in no particular order:


Code Geass: Great series, not completely released yet but you can find the full series online in places.

Mononoke Hime: Already mentioned, this is Princess Mononoke. I was introduced to anime with this.

Starship Operators: Scifi/Tech Opera/Drama.

Seikai no Monsho/Senki I, II, III: Scifi/Tech Opera/Drama.

Outlaw Star: Already mentioned as well.

Tenchi Muyo: A bunch of collections that all are based on the same universe, but with different characters and outcomes. All comedy.

Irresponsible Captain Tylor: Comedy with a message. An old series now. One of my favourite episodes of all time comes from this anime. Episode 23: The Longest Day In Space.

Last Exile: Scifi/Fantasy Drama. Great series.

Gundam Seed: Mecha.

Vandread: Women vs Men vs the Universe. Romantic comedy/space opera.

Slayers: Another oldie, already mentioned.

Record of Lodoss War (OVA): How has this one not been mentioned? Classic RP fantasy style. OVA only, do not watch the TV series unless you're out for disappointment.

Martian Successor Nadesico: Scifi/Tech Drama. Some good quotes and messages in this one. The OVA Prince of Darkness has Ruriruri piloting the Nadesico's successor, though it left much to be desired. They tried to cram WAY too much into that OVA.

Trinity Blood: Vampires vs Vatican vs others. Great series, if you feel the ending is out of place you'd be correct. The person who was writing it died, and so the ending was tacked on and made up by the rest of the production team. Kinda feels hollow, wish we could've seen the original author's ending for it.

Solty Rei: Great scifi opera/drama. Guy meets girl, girl is android from a collection of three where all of them are set on destroying humanity. The one he meets has a memory loss, but eventually regains it - in the meantime deciding that humans aren't so bad after all.

Black Cat: already mentioned.

s-CRY-ed: Fighting/Fantasy anime. Not for everyone, but some good stuff here.

Fate/Stay Night: Definitely love this. Own both games and the anime. Fantasy set in modern times where several magi fight for the Holy Grail to achieve their wishes using avatars of famous past heros. BTW, the heros have their own wishes they'd like to see received. The game shows a lot more than the anime (anime combines several of the games storylines and ends with only one of them, the 'main' or 'default' ending if you will), but overall it was great regardless.

Scrapped Princess: Fantasy/Scifi. The scrapped princess is the child born under an ill omen who will have the power to destroy everything on her 16th b-day. Of course, this means everyone is out to get her. Fortunately for her, she has some good protection. My avatar comes from this series.




I know I missed a couple, maybe add them in later.

Edit: Already thought of a couple:


Spice and Wolf: Fantasy/comedy with some serious elements. Guy meets goddess who just wants to go home. She also happens to be a giant wolf.

Lost Universe: Fantasy/romanitc comedy/space opera. Made by those who made the Slayers series, LU is from one of the other 4 dimensions that are explained in Slayers. Lost ships are highly sought after technology, and you'll notice the names of these ships might seem familiar with those from Slayers. Canal Vorfeed and Kane Blueriver are the main characters. Canal happens to be the only Lost ship that doesn't try to consume it's pilot once they've accomplished whatever they've set out to do either.

Gurren Lagann: already mentioned.

Gunparade March: Romantic comedy/mecha. Do not misread this anime. It is not about the war or the mecha. It's about the two main character's and their relationship, so more of a guy vs girl vs world.

Coyote Ragtime Show: Reminds me a lot of Cowboy Bebop without the funk.

Air: Romantic tragedy. This one is a tear jerker, but worth watching. Short series.

Glass Fleet: Romance/scifi/tech space opera/drama. A bit of an oddball, but a good story.

Nadia ~ Secret of Blue Water: Another oldie, but worth watching. Young inventor learns all about the world and the labels humans often put on their own kind; plus aliens, giant warships, and of course crazy fights.

Read or Die: Romantic comedy/fantasy. Set in modern times.

Witch Hunter Robin: Interesting spin on the witch theme.

Kenshin: Past Fantasy. Loosely based on history. One of the more famous samurai animes.

Shakugan no Shana: Romantic Comedy/Fantasy. Based in modern times. Humans, flame hazes, monsters, you name it. The main character is also dead.

X: Fantasy/Action. If you ever wanted to experience a story where the good guys lose, the bad guys win, all the main characters bar one dies, and the bad guy winds up being the good guy in the end? This would be it. Can be hard to follow at times, recommend watching more than once in order to understand it.

Gunslinger Girl: Action. A bunch of little girls who were abandoned by life and left to die are saved by an organization that turns them into cyborg killers who forever remain in their child form and pair them with a 'handler'. Based in modern times. Good story, my description is not up to par.

Ah! My Goddess: Romantic comedy. Guy makes a wrong number phone call and winds up wishing for his own personal goddess and throwing the Goddess Help Lines for a series of unfortunate affairs.

Zoids: Action/comedy. The original series I do not own, unfortunately. I wish I could find it somewhere, but its no longer in production. Great mecha fighting anime. The spinoff series Chaotic Century is okay, but I liked the original show better.

YuYu Hakasho: Action/Fantasy/romantic comedy. Great fighting anime, a bit long at four seasons, but nowhere near as bad as Bleach/Naruto/DB.

Alright, thanks a lot everyone. I think I know where to go from here.

Avoid anything like Code Gaess, Evangelion, or the later series of Gundam. They're just random Angst ridden emo-fests with douchebags who cry every single moment they get when they're not busy cutting themselves.

And don't bother trying to change my mind on that. SEen them all, hated them all.

Pendragon wrote:

Avoid anything like Code Gaess, Evangelion, or the later series of Gundam. They're just random Angst ridden emo-fests with douchebags who cry every single moment they get when they're not busy cutting themselves.

And don't bother trying to change my mind on that. SEen them all, hated them all.

Oh, good point. God forbid that the characters actually have any emotional development. I mean, multi-faceted characters don't matter nothing compared to giant robots.

And the flames begin...

FalconJudge wrote:

And the flames begin...

Nah.

Just because someone doesn't like a certain series that you enjoyed isn't any reason for that. I personally love Evangelion and Code Geass and I'm not a whiney little-oh wait-ANYWAY-you like what you like and to buggery with anyone else.

If you want an emo series-try Rozen Maiden. I loved it myself but the male lead is very depressed to the point of being a shut in.

For fun-Cromartie High School, Azumanga Daioh, Air Gear or Lucky Star. I laughed until I cried.

AzD, lucky star and those jumpy-funny animes are a little too hyper for me.

as for code geass, civilians that take weapons into their own hands and murder other people without training will lead to angst, regret, or some kind of happy feeling. thats one of the reasons why civilians are often disgusted with the recent wars.

on another note, i rather liked tengen toppa gurren lagann. met the director, although i only spoke through to the translators XD

Actually, I really didn't see that much wrong with Code Geass as far as the character development. Lelouch is one of my fav characters of all time, just because of what he was willing to do in order to achieve the end goal. Perhaps thats also some bias from the strong references the anime and manga uses to the Ulster Cycle and the Arthurian Legends. Sort of like the first time I watched Full Metal Panic and they stated the submarine's name was Tuatha Dé Danann, was so happy to catch a side reference like that. Love seeing modern authors pulling on the old stories for ideas. The way Lelouch dies in the end is very similar to another tragic hero from mythology who suffered the fate of geas.



If you want to see crying and angst, watch Infinite Ryvius. Putting a bunch of kid trainees on a lost ship and making them fend for themselves without adults is the epitome of what you describe. Nice trolling though.

Lemme clarify what I said.

The anime I mentioned are all unoriginal. It's basically one guy who thinks he can do everything, but he's emotionally unstable. And the stupidest people just clamor over how zomg kawaii the guys are. Not to mention that, despite half of them being mech shows, they somehow manage to fit some type of magic in there and abuse it to hell. Code Gaess in particular.

They throw in some bible references and think they're so edgy. I HATE ANIME LIKE THAT. And I can't stand people who actually like it.

It's garbage.

You know, it's people like you who argue about this sort of thing that kinda make me want to turn away from anime altogether.

I haven't watched many animes, I've seen Haruhi, Hellsing, Death Note, Elfen Lied, and a few others. Dunno what I can recommend and what I can't since I'm not picky at all and I'd be hard-pressed to find a reason to hate something, but yeah D:

itsmeyouidiot wrote:

You know, it's people like you who argue about this sort of thing that kinda make me want to turn away from anime altogether.

Well, you know, you could always just ignore me if you're gonna get ornery about it.

I'm not stopping you. I'm only giving you fair warning.

Honestly, it's people like you who make me sick of anime in general.

edit: Lemme put it this way. Death Note, Evangelion, Code Gaess, etc. are all the Twilight of anime. Overrated, underdeveloped, unoriginal nonsense that only appeals to fangirls because of the guys who like to murder and kill people left and right and you all actually enjoy it. You can see why I dislike them.

And if I sound like I'm being an ass, then I apologize. But i've seen one rabid fanbase too many. And i don't let it slide when someone tells me to give them a chance. > : (

Right-before this thread gets locked (and it's about time in my humble opinion) let me say this.

I avoided anime for years thinking it was either too silly or too bloody. Then I decided one day to give it a try. (And this was when there was only a handful of series available in NZ and WAY before I had the Net).

What I found was that there are some incredible stories and characters to enjoy out there. If you're interested in getting started I say go ahead by all means. I'm sure that you'll find something you'll like. Form your own opinions.

'Nuff zed.


(And Asuka rules)