Recommended Anime/Manga?

[GaijinPunch]

GaijinPunch you understand me, lol.

Cobra rocks. 80s anime is the best, but a lot of stuff from the 90s ain't too shabby either.

I'll agree to that. Oddly enough I was first exposed around 91 or 92... so a lot of what I saw was that early 90's stuff. By the time I moved to Japan permanently (98) I was disenchanted. Definitely missed a few goodies. Apparently Cowboy Bebop is worthy checking out. Shows up in my Cyberpunk groups regularly.

[null1024]

Started on Gundam Build Divers.
I don't know if it's any good [no really, the whole premise is kinda dumb and these characters are kinda retarded], but I'm still enjoying it.
it's already loads better than Build Fighters Try ever was, if not as good as Build Fighters

[soprano1]

Batman Ninja. Gorilla Grodd makes a time machine that takes Arkham Asylum and a bunch of characters to Sengoku Japan, chaos issues. Yeah, I think this was made to be a fucking parody of iseikai anime, with the clichés all in place. Turn off your brain for this one and enjoy some of the Japanizing Beam character designs, as well as the GaoGaiGar parody at the one hour mark:https://imgur.com/a/JTzZqcq

[Steamflogger Boss]

GaijinPunch you understand me, lol.

Cobra rocks. 80s anime is the best, but a lot of stuff from the 90s ain't too shabby either.

I'll agree to that. Oddly enough I was first exposed around 91 or 92... so a lot of what I saw was that early 90's stuff. By the time I moved to Japan permanently (98) I was disenchanted. Definitely missed a few goodies. Apparently Cowboy Bebop is worthy checking out. Shows up in my Cyberpunk groups regularly.

Yeah I'd say definitely watch Cowboy Bebop. Looks stunning on BD. It has a lot of style to it and in a rare twist the ending is actually just about perfect in terms of how it fits the series IMO.

[GaijinPunch]

I think it's next on my list.

Debating checking out the two Rumiko Takahashi series which came after Ranma. As goofy as her stuff is, I still find it somewhat enjoyable. Half of that is nostalgia, but not needing subtitles now whereas I did before kind of opens up another level of complexity. Inuyasha was actually on TV while I was there... but I didn't bother. PITA to have it recorded. MIght just read the mangas. Probably truer to what I enjoy about her older stuff.

[Steamflogger Boss]

I flamed out somewhere in the middle of Inuyasha many years ago. I don't even remember why, I was still a teenager at the time.

I haven't seen any of Rin-ne but on the bright side it's short for anime adaptations of her stuff, at just 75 episodes. The manga is around her usual length so it kind of intrigues me.

Speaking of Rumiko I'm still watching Ranma, well kinda. I haven't in awhile as I've also been watching HYD and City Hunter as mentioned earlier. And now Yakuza 6 is out...so it might be a bit before I get back to it. It's fun but on the back burner for now.

[drauch]

I just hate to see her character design plummet with the trends. Rin-Ne is almost unrecognizable; just slight little things make me realize it's hers, but it seems abysmal. Outside from her earlier stuff she's definitely been a trend jumper, which I can understand if you want to stay in the race I guess, but it's saddening when I know what she's capable of.

And yeah, Cowboy Bebop is aces. There's some major over-saturation among American fans, but it definitely has its merits.

[GaijinPunch]

I just hate to see her character design plummet with the trends. Rin-Ne is almost unrecognizable; just slight little things make me realize it's hers, but it seems abysmal.

Does that go for the manga as well? I watched the opening scene of the first episode. Did not look promising...

And yeah, Cowboy Bebop is aces. There's some major over-saturation among American fans, but it definitely has its merits.

I don't really run in any anime circles, so that probably won't bother me.

[drauch]

Yeah, I figured I would give it a chance, but found it just seems so basic. Seems like over time her faces have gotten 'scrunchier', and cheeks and chins are more angular. Everyone just has this mopey 'tude and the same haircut. Just doesn't seem like she's even trying. Probably not as glaring to others, but it's hard not to notice this sort of stuff when you enjoy most of their career.

[Randorama]

+1 for the crowd waiting for Megalo Box to suddenly collapse in quality, but hoping it does not.

Other stuff by Watanabe (Samurai Champloo and Space Dandy) display a similar adherence to the "old times", when anime were not engulfed with endless levels of self-referencing rubbish. Space Dandy also has the greatest passage ever in anime (I think it can be found on youtube as "Dandy's greatest moment"), and the wittiest ending song ever, although it gives away the entire plot...

On the other hand, the more I read Golden Kamuy, the more I think that the author is a genius. Luckily there are still a few seinen manga worth bothering about, but then again I imagine that the current demographics for this sub-market are mostly formed by people who would rather die than read mainstream (i.e. shounen jump-style) manga (and old perverts).

Speaking of which...I recently saw a bizarre series called Yuru Camp. Imagine a (winter) camping manga turned into an anime, with cute girls doing cute things for 5 minutes (-1/10 icycalms), and then talking like old rugged campers for the next 15 (8/10 icycalms, but I liked camping!). I swear, the need to market otherwise unpalatable works to otaku reaches new improbable levels by the day.

later Rumiko Takahashi stuff

I never was able to stomach anything but Maison Ikkoku, personally.
I believe that S.Fang (right nick?) mentioned the popularity of her work in Italy, but I detested them for the reasons he explained.
Drauch nails it, in my opinion: she has been a trend-chaser since forever, and trends have become increasingly dumber.

[BryanM]

It kind of makes me sad 90% of Goblin Slayer content on youtube is just this obese nerd nasally and sarcastically breathing into his mic for hours about how much he dislikes Goblin Slayer while demonstrating zero familiarity with DnD rules. Also - dismay at how there will be an avalanche of youtube content after the animation comes out because that's the only thing the masses care about.

She Is A Slow Walker is a quick little one shot that was just translated, with the expected Junji mix of humor, reality, and fantasy. Self contained, memorable little stories like this are really nice in this age of bloated beached whale franchises.

(-1/10 icycalms), and then talking like old rugged campers for the next 15 (8/10 icycalms, but I liked camping!).

eh eh eh

those aren't icycalms and you knwo it

5 point scale buddy

I swear, the need to market otherwise unpalatable works to otaku reaches new improbable levels by the day.

I really love the descriptions of some of these series far more than the works themselves:

some gacha isekai
Follow the adventure of a boy who spent too much money on a game that made the gold diggers from the other world drag him into their world. Also there is a cute girl who covers her face with a helmet. and there are 2-3 more cute girls so that the manga sells.

some bully revenge isekai
Seto Yu is a 12-year-old boy, that is abused violently by his father. One day, he is transported into a fantasy world with video game mechanics after being killed by his abusive father and he discovers that he has the unique ability to steal other people's skills for his own use. He quickly uses his special power to take revenge on the townspeople who bully him and obtains a harem of beautiful girls who love him unconditionally even though he shows no romantic interest in any of them and has the physical build of a skinny teenager.

Both of these series are absolutely terrible, even for the lonely otaku they're supposed to serve. That the gacha isekai webnovel got a manga angers me enough that I'm seriously thinking making my own gacha isekai in MS Paint. Which would be my revenge. On the world.

[ryu]

Saiki episode 13 made a reference to Silent Bomber.

Never thought I'd see that happen anywhere, ever.

[Steamflogger Boss]

I just hate to see her character design plummet with the trends. Rin-Ne is almost unrecognizable; just slight little things make me realize it's hers, but it seems abysmal. Outside from her earlier stuff she's definitely been a trend jumper, which I can understand if you want to stay in the race I guess, but it's saddening when I know what she's capable of.

Damn that sucks about the designs. Her first three franchises have a very distinct feel.

Can't say I know enough about manga/anime trends to add anything to that but I am curious as to what shows followed what trend.

Briefly looking into Rin-ne it kind of seems like a bit of an Inuyasha redux, but I didn't look too hard by any means.

And yeah, Cowboy Bebop is aces. There's some major over-saturation among American fans, but it definitely has its merits.

I was actually kind of slow to watch it due to all the overhype, but yeah it did not disappoint.

Looked into Megalo Box, that's something I'll give a chance.

[GaijinPunch]

Other stuff by Watanabe (Samurai Champloo and Space Dandy)

A very dear friend of mine (our total running time of talking about or watching anime together is like... 5 hours, and 4 of that is Akira twice, at the theater) has told me Champloo would break me of my "everything new is shit" phase. I see now it's a bit old, but this was like 5 years ago he told me. So, I figure I should give that a whirl.

As for Takahashi being a trend chaser and Maison Ikkoku being her best. Well, I've seen MI like 5 times at least... mainly b/c (as stated here a few times) I timed all the scripts back when subtitling was done w/ analog. So there was basically 3 times right there. Ranma was huge while I was doing that. Maybe not ground breaking, but it's before everything in the medium got creepily pervy. I dig the martial arts aspect as well. It's mindless... something I can watch and not have to worry too much about. Also again, nostalgia. I've started Urusei Yatsura a couple of times. One of these times it will take... I assume.

[Xyga]

Champloo somewhat like Bebop is made of highs and lows (serious episodes vs comedic) but the highs are delicious and some of the odd episodes kinda funny.
Before watching it I refused to believe the chanbara + some hip hop recipe could work even in dream, but it does, strangely.
The animation isn't the best yet the action's excellent.

[Randorama]

A very dear friend of mine (our total running time of talking about or watching anime together is like... 5 hours, and 4 of that is Akira twice, at the theater) has told me Champloo would break me of my "everything new is shit" phase. I see now it's a bit old, but this was like 5 years ago he told me. So, I figure I should give that a whirl.

Well, we can generally agree that manga and anime were (and some still are) better when they wisely used sources and inspiration from outside the extremely narrow pool of otaku "culture". Watanabe has not produced much, but he produces works that blend together as many sources as they can, without worrying too much. Cowboy Bebop is overexposed (and struggled in Japan) because it mostly has influences from western culture (and the western genre!). I adored it, but it felt like a U.S. studio asked Sunrise to produce something for their market (and it turned out exceptional). Ditto for his other series. Besides, his protagonists are actually adults who smoke, struggle to pay the bills, etc....i.e. realistic characters.

eh eh eh

those aren't icycalms and you knwo it

5 point scale buddy

;__;

OK, this one was really 0/5 for 5 minutes, and then even 4/5 for 15 minutes.

The other weird one is Sora yadda yadda: 4 teen-ager girls go to Antartica because they want a challenge. Swap them with first year BA students or first year salary-people, and the series would have been a perfect "coming of age/existential journey" work. As it is, it's like Yuru Camp.

Aside this: the new Lupin series is weird (but good). The only adaptations that are faithful to the original manga are the newer ones focused on Fujiko and the others (also in drawing style). Thanks to Miyazaki, we had the other rather campy series to (mis)represent Monkey Punch's work.

This one is also relatively campy, but it is using a darker edge in the plot and dialogues that is refreshing (say, Lupin discussing with an underage protege' whether he would do her or not...). Let's cross fingers.

As for Takahashi being a trend chaser and Maison Ikkoku being her best. Well, I've seen MI like 5 times at least... mainly b/c (as stated here a few times) I timed all the scripts back when subtitling was done w/ analog. So there was basically 3 times right there. Ranma was huge while I was doing that. Maybe not ground breaking, but it's before everything in the medium got creepily pervy. I dig the martial arts aspect as well. It's mindless... something I can watch and not have to worry too much about. Also again, nostalgia. I've started Urusei Yatsura a couple of times. One of these times it will take... I assume.

OK, you basically mean a lunch/dinner break thing! I am fine with watching the modern crop of shounen (e.g. One Piece...the waifu is hopeless) during meals. These are fine, and maybe also the newer works. I watched the entirety of the newer one with the demon protagonist (white hair?), and have no recollection of it.

I do remember watching both Ranma and Urutsei at meal times as a kid. Yes, private TVs in the '80s showed them at lunch time, and my parents approved (they probably enjoyed the pervyness...)

[BryanM]

The odd thing is that the trendsetters aren't even always The Worst.

Mushoku Tensei is probably to blame for the modern isekai trend, as it was the #1 web novel in Japan at the start of this decade. But it differs a bit from the typical template - no explicit video game system or numbers, the protagonist has to put in effort, the world doesn't revolve around the protagonist, there's some creepy waifu stuff but it's comparatively moderate and doesn't consume everything else around it.

But then yeah, there's stuff like Sword Art Online. SAO isn't about being trapped in a situation where death is an inevitability lurking around every corner, nor is it about MMORPG's. (Grimgar is much closer to being about both of these things.) It's about how awesome and special Kirito is. That it became popular probably has more to do with strong on-boarding, with the first couple episodes giving the impression that it's about the former things. I know I'd rather spend 20 minutes of my life watching someone kill boars and explain the skill tree of an imaginary video game that doesn't exist, than 20 more seconds of Kirito.

Being about stuff and expressing opinions just excludes potential viewers who aren't interested in or agree with such things. At least that's how the cynical bean counters who greenlight this stuff think. (And it's not as though our markets aren't as vapid in different ways. Two and a Half Men and company are about boob and wiener jokes, which is also creepy stuff. We're just conditioned to think otherwise by familiarity.)

Most of the shovelware is not even about "otaku culture." Genshiken is about otaku culture. Welcome to the NHK is about otaku culture. They're about as far as you can get from a Maken-Ki as you can get, short of being about the day to day life of POW's in a Vietnam internment camp.

[Randorama]

The odd thing is that the trendsetters aren't even always The Worst.


But then yeah, there's stuff like Sword Art Online. SAO isn't about being trapped in a situation where death is an inevitability lurking around every corner, nor is it about MMORPG's. (Grimgar is much closer to being about both of these things.) It's about how awesome and special Kirito is. That it became popular probably has more to do with strong on-boarding, with the first couple episodes giving the impression that it's about the former things. I know I'd rather spend 20 minutes of my life watching someone kill boars and explain the skill tree of an imaginary video game that doesn't exist, than 20 more seconds of Kirito.

Objection! A thing called Isekai no Seikishi Monogatari is like SAO but came out in 2009. Also, I think that Overlord might be worse (well, it came out recently). Besides, I am aware that there is a new SAO spinoff, and the description is scarier than anything else (one word: "chibi").

Do all isekai writers produce this...stuff by chanting "dig deeper! Dig deeper!", I wonder?

[Steamflogger Boss]

Besides, his protagonists are actually adults who smoke, struggle to pay the bills, etc....i.e. realistic characters.

It's pretty refreshing. Usually most anime has to be written off as nonsense in that regard. I should check out more of Watanabe's stuff.

Looks like Funi needs to rerelease this shit though. I'm not paying $45 for 11 episodes of Terror in Resonance, though it does look pretty interesting. That probably sounds hilarious to anyone that has to deal with Japanese prices... Also yes I don't pirate, so please no one say I should do that, it would just be a waste of time.

Aside this: the new Lupin series is weird (but good). The only adaptations that are faithful to the original manga are the newer ones focused on Fujiko and the others (also in drawing style). Thanks to Miyazaki, we had the other rather campy series to (mis)represent Monkey Punch's work.

This one is also relatively campy, but it is using a darker edge in the plot and dialogues that is refreshing (say, Lupin discussing with an underage protege' whether he would do her or not...). Let's cross fingers.

I will generally watch anything Lupin, though some of the tv specials are bad and kinda boring. The Fujiko show and subsequent movies were a much needed kick in the pants for the franchise. I haven't seen Part IV yet but it looks good and I'll be buying the BD day one. I liked Cagliostro but of course that Lupin was NOTHING like the manga. I can enjoy all of it well enough though.

Most of the shovelware is not even about "otaku culture." Genshiken is about otaku culture. Welcome to the NHK is about otaku culture. They're about as far as you can get from a Maken-Ki as you can get, short of being about the day to day life of POW's in a Vietnam internment camp.

Network TV is pretty trash here, and CBS has the formula down to a t. Seems like all their bullshit does well. I know some people (of course) that eat up their CSI formula (there are too many to list now) and I'm just like...why?

[GaijinPunch]

Besides, his protagonists are actually adults who smoke, struggle to pay the bills, etc....i.e. realistic characters.

Wow... what a bizarre concept. Are they able to not get nosebleeds when they see a girls?

[Steamflogger Boss]

GaijinPunch I'm going to need for you to be sitting down before reading the answer. It's THAT SHOCKING.

Spoiler

Yes

[BryanM]

Looks like Funi needs to rerelease this shit though. I'm not paying $45 for 11 episodes of Terror in Resonance, though it does look pretty interesting. That probably sounds hilarious to anyone that has to deal with Japanese prices... Also yes I don't pirate, so please no one say I should do that, it would just be a waste of time.

It's not a series I'd recommend, but I guess you must dislike streaming as well? Crunchyroll only operates on official licenses. Funimation subscription is 6 bux a month if you don't want ads or like dubs.

I know some people (of course) that eat up their CSI formula (there are too many to list now) and I'm just like...why?

I'd guess that's just the kind of person who's still watching TV here in the year of our lord 2018. Normies are weird.

This old essay on 80's television always comes to mind when discussing the medium and the cultural relevancy of any given product. It's not just hikikomori otaku who like safe spaces.

One of the most soul crushing things was that ad where David Cross shows up to inform us that "More people will watch tonight's re-run of Two and a Half Men, than all of the people in history who will watch a single episode of The Wire."

[GaijinPunch]

GaijinPunch I'm going to need for you to be sitting down before reading the answer. It's THAT SHOCKING.

Spoiler

Yes

It's a low bar that's been set.

[Randorama]

Besides, his protagonists are actually adults who smoke, struggle to pay the bills, etc....i.e. realistic characters.

Wow... what a bizarre concept. Are they able to not get nosebleeds when they see a girls?

Everybody seems to get some ass without too much trouble. Space Dandy (the protagonist) struggles to some degree, though.

I would also suggest the new Devilman, which is relatively close to the original manga but has lovely Eu nhung Choi animantion and Masaaki Yuasa direction (Yuasa's works have beautiful stories, brilliant animation and directing, and hideous drawings unless Miss Choi is the key illustrator).

SteamFlogger: Part IV is more of the same, but looks really cute and has Lupin in Italy (most overrated country in the world, eccetto per l'Abbruzzo che e' bellissimo e ignorantissimo).
It's nevertheless less Miyazaki-esque, which is a good thing. In part V, Lupin is also killing a lot of people (no blood), and feeling good about it.
It has a bizarre blend of cutesy animation and dark themes. Well, it's set in France...

I'd add Gintama. This is a weird manga and series. Half of it is a bizarre version of Rurouni Kenshin.
However, the invaders are aliens, and the aftermath sees Japan and the world jumping three centuries ahead in terms of technology, so you have samurai and spaceships.

The other half mixes a constantly broke yorozuya samurai (fac-totum?) protagonist who lives in Kabuki-cho, never pays his underage employers, and frequents a wide cast of lunatics and low-lifes with stories that parody everything under the sun (including other manga/anime). The combination of toilet humour and at times brilliant writing is exhilarating. The shounen parts often have good jokes, but are forgettable.

And it's a shounen jump stalwart, on top of that!

Ravings aside...

I think that most anime is drivel, but there are 1-2 series per cours (quarter) that are suitable for adults, on average.
The true problem is that a certain brand of good SF (adult themes, a certain intellectual engagement, characters that can take some fucking decisions) is now a thing of the past, for a very long set of reasons. Two basically are:

1. Proper space opera settings require lots of time for world building, and may cost a fortune to animate.
Mangakas who wish to create such settings need to take a risk in building worlds, which means taking time to do research etc.
Battle mangas, isekai, cute girls doing cute things revolve around extremely simple settings and highly codified situations, and those are easy to write and draw/animate weekly.

2. Demographics: otaku, fujiyoshi (or whatever they are called), etc. want absolute escapism, among other things.
Otomo's early works, 2001 nights, LOGH used fiction to address fairly complex topics.
The rare modern SF is all laser beams and no content, like the SF of the '40s (which was read and written by fringe elements of society, honestly).
The popularity of dystopian fiction in most western countries seems not to be matched in the Japanese market, as far as I know.

(1 and 2 are brief explanations that Jacqueline Berndt gave me once, and she is quite the expert. Errors are based on my bad recollection of her account).

3. Absolutely insular companies: I have friends who worked and work in localizing works and meet executives from the big companies (one guy is called Marco Pellitteri: I am probably misrepresenting his explanation, too).

Imagine arrogant kids who think that the world begins and ends in [insert district of Tokyo] and tell you "ah, but we don't need gaijin money", so they ask absurd fees to license a manga.
As far as i know, for some authors localizations are the key to survival. Tsutomu Nihei should have sold X tankobon of Blame! in Japan, and at least twice that amount in Germany alone.
Itani's Oyasumi punpun, which is a masterpiece, had a similar fate.

Simplifying a lot, as long as the market keeps catering at people who gave up on life (i.e. otaku, etc.), without trying to also sell to people who bitch about life (gritty, proper adults), the output will be...well, rubbish, I would guess, with curious cases like the ones I mentioned a few posts before (the camping anime with cute girls).

[GaijinPunch]

Imagine arrogant kids who think that the world begins and ends in [insert district of Tokyo] and tell you "ah, but we don't need gaijin money", so they ask absurd fees to license a manga.

This isn't really new. Japanese organizations (business, govt, you name it) are notoriously hard-headed and narrow-sighted. Seems any small game developer shits their pants when they find out they have an international calling. Cave was super late to that game. The tourism industry on the current tear it's on, and the olympic money that will come in has opened some eyes, but not sure how many.

[charlie chong]

was talking with someone how crap crows the battle action for sega saturn was and he mentioned that there were two animes for it and that it was based on a manga. i'm not much of an anime manga man apart from typical stuff like akira,fist of the north star, ninja scroll,devilman etc but i enjoyed both of the 50 min installments which were in that type of vein ,whats not to like about a violent cartoon set in a school for delinquents.

[Randorama]

This isn't really new. Japanese organizations (business, govt, you name it) are notoriously hard-headed and narrow-sighted. Seems any small game developer shits their pants when they find out they have an international calling. Cave was super late to that game. The tourism industry on the current tear it's on, and the olympic money that will come in has opened some eyes, but not sure how many.

Yes, of course, but at some point Murakami convinced a few people that cool Japan was a marketable form of soft power, and there was a concerted effort in some quarters to partially correct the narrow-sightedness. I mean, I have colleagues who risked a very violent death by display some golden standards of this attitude (while working abroad), and I was about to say: "I am white, progressive and European, so everything I say is automatically true!" (which is arguably the winning argument ever, of course).

Mind you, Netflix seems to be investing money in getting shows that are palatable to a wider audience, and although most are not so remarkable, there is a decent change of pace (Studio I.G., Bones and Studio Wit are decent companies interested in the partnership). I am willing to pay for those, too, so we could settle for getting an hefty 5% of the industry stopping being, well, Japanese. After all, 90% of everything is crap, manga and anime have huge outputs...5% should entertain us long enough.

EDIT: I forgot. Italians at large are majestically more hard-nosed and worse at marketing their products abroad (say, ever heard of great, recent rock bands/directors/wines/beer/whatever/etc. from Italy?), but then again I would nuke my home country from orbit (just to be sure), so I am not criticizing an attitude I might cultivate behind closed doors.

Also, CharlieC: for delinquent manga, you need Be-Bop High School, my favourite secret guilt!

[Steamflogger Boss]

Looks like Funi needs to rerelease this shit though. I'm not paying $45 for 11 episodes of Terror in Resonance, though it does look pretty interesting. That probably sounds hilarious to anyone that has to deal with Japanese prices... Also yes I don't pirate, so please no one say I should do that, it would just be a waste of time.

It's not a series I'd recommend, but I guess you must dislike streaming as well? Crunchyroll only operates on official licenses. Funimation subscription is 6 bux a month if you don't want ads or like dubs.

I'm down to legally stream. I'll check out funi's site, never had a reason to sign up before now. Then if I see that I like it I'll consider getting the BD.

I would also suggest the new Devilman, which is relatively close to the original manga but has lovely Eu nhung Choi animantion and Masaaki Yuasa direction (Yuasa's works have beautiful stories, brilliant animation and directing, and hideous drawings unless Miss Choi is the key illustrator).

SteamFlogger: Part IV is more of the same, but looks really cute and has Lupin in Italy (most overrated country in the world, eccetto per l'Abbruzzo che e' bellissimo e ignorantissimo).
It's nevertheless less Miyazaki-esque, which is a good thing. In part V, Lupin is also killing a lot of people (no blood), and feeling good about it.
It has a bizarre blend of cutesy animation and dark themes. Well, it's set in France...

Devilman Crybaby is pretty good, and I wasn't huge on the original Devilman.

Glad to hear it on Lupin. I had heard good things about it but hadn't looked into it a ton so I didn't know if it was carrying more of the same tone or not.

Italy is alright, but what's your bar for overrated? People claiming it's the best in the world? Cause I'd agree that it isn't, and I wouldn't want to live there. Nice for a vacation though. Overall, I'd prefer Germany and some other countries as well.

I think that most anime is drivel, but there are 1-2 series per cours (quarter) that are suitable for adults, on average.
The true problem is that a certain brand of good SF (adult themes, a certain intellectual engagement, characters that can take some fucking decisions) is now a thing of the past, for a very long set of reasons. Two basically are:

1. Proper space opera settings require lots of time for world building, and may cost a fortune to animate.
Mangakas who wish to create such settings need to take a risk in building worlds, which means taking time to do research etc.
Battle mangas, isekai, cute girls doing cute things revolve around extremely simple settings and highly codified situations, and those are easy to write and draw/animate weekly.

2. Demographics: otaku, fujiyoshi (or whatever they are called), etc. want absolute escapism, among other things.
Otomo's early works, 2001 nights, LOGH used fiction to address fairly complex topics.
The rare modern SF is all laser beams and no content, like the SF of the '40s (which was read and written by fringe elements of society, honestly).
The popularity of dystopian fiction in most western countries seems not to be matched in the Japanese market, as far as I know.

This reminds me of how much I liked LOGH. And of course how annoyed I am by the limited and pricy nature of the US release. I'd be down to pay close to that price but long term. Releasing it all at once is rough, and just 1k copies to boot.

Oh well, I've already watched it in all it's magnificence from VHS rips back when I would torrent/download and man it's a hum dinger. To this day probably still my favorite anime. I tried to get a friend of mine into it but he wanted to boil it down to the simplest bits. One of the few shows we've disagreed on.

It's too bad there isn't room for the escapist stuff AND good thought provoking things. Guess there just isn't much of a market for it...

I can't stand cute girls doing cute things anymore but YYH would have to be classified as battle, and I did enjoy that one. Can't say I've bothered even trying any isekai manga/shows.

3. Absolutely insular companies: I have friends who worked and work in localizing works and meet executives from the big companies (one guy is called Marco Pellitteri: I am probably misrepresenting his explanation, too).

Imagine arrogant kids who think that the world begins and ends in [insert district of Tokyo] and tell you "ah, but we don't need gaijin money", so they ask absurd fees to license a manga.
As far as i know, for some authors localizations are the key to survival. Tsutomu Nihei should have sold X tankobon of Blame! in Japan, and at least twice that amount in Germany alone.
Itani's Oyasumi punpun, which is a masterpiece, had a similar fate.

Simplifying a lot, as long as the market keeps catering at people who gave up on life (i.e. otaku, etc.), without trying to also sell to people who bitch about life (gritty, proper adults), the output will be...well, rubbish, I would guess, with curious cases like the ones I mentioned a few posts before (the camping anime with cute girls).

Unfortunately I've heard a lot of the same from others who have had to work with Japanese people to release their work elsewhere (in my case US licensors).

[soprano1]

Space Dandy episode 4 is amazing for zombie fans, shitload of humour and references, and even John Carpenter-esque music. I must have been drunk when I dropped this series after the second episode.

[GaijinPunch]

So digging around for oldies but goodies, there's way more in the manga world than anime world given that I didn't really ready go for the books back in the day. Anyone bothered giving the enormous library of Golgo 13 a spin? Gotta tip my hat to the guy for tenacity. I'm curious what has changed about it through the decades. I certainly would hope there are loads of bell bottoms through the 70's runs.