Recommended Anime/Manga?

[Lemnear]

Oh !!! Dorohedoro is one of the first 3 manga i ever read (Black Cat, Hellsing, Dorohedoro all together, then Daydream + 3x3 Eyes).

[Udderdude]

I finally got done watching Hokuto no Ken, 109 episodes. I didn't bother with HnK 2 aka "Here's some more crap that's not as good". I also watched all the OVAs, and out of them all, I have to say the Kenshiro one wasn't that great, but wasn't completely terrible (why is there a working computer system lol), and the Yuria one was ruined by one thing - That fucking dog. The little fucker even has the balls to show up after the battle with Souther, are you fucking kidding me? Punt that runt into oblivion, please.

Edit: This just came to my attention .. rejoice, Golgo 13 fans. https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/d64c4 ... ee316e0853 https://bs.tbs.co.jp/anime/golgo13selection/

[Lemnear]

I finally got done watching Hokuto no Ken, 109 episodes. I didn't bother with HnK 2 aka "Here's some more crap that's not as good". I also watched all the OVAs, and out of them all, I have to say the Kenshiro one wasn't that great, but wasn't completely terrible (why is there a working computer system lol), and the Yuria one was ruined by one thing - That fucking dog. The little fucker even has the balls to show up after the battle with Souther, are you fucking kidding me? Punt that runt into oblivion, please.

Edit: This just came to my attention .. rejoice, Golgo 13 fans. https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/d64c4 ... ee316e0853 https://bs.tbs.co.jp/anime/golgo13selection/

The first series of Hokuto No Ken here is considered at the level of Divine Comedy, Ulysses, Iliad etc. and is known at the same level. It shaped 2-3 generations at least.
It's probably the largest western fanbase.
Why:

Spoiler

Italy is the Western Country where there has been the highest distribution of Japanese Animes (even more than the USA). In fact the amount of Japanese anime series broadcast on US televisions from 1963 to 2012 has been 275, while in Italy 690 Japanese animated series have been broadcast on TV only from 1976 to 2006. And if we considered also all the Anime series distributed in Italy from 2006 until now, that number would be much higher.

While in the other countries Japanese Animes have taken hold only of a close community of fans, in Italy they have been a constant presence for multiple generations.
Oh they were always on the main TV channels! Since 1976! They are cults. ALL italians know them. Even older people like my mother or uncle would be able to identify an anime since its opening, and tell me which ones they liked best, the plot, or the names of the characters.

The final fight between Ken and Raoh (or the last 20 episodes) is something recent anime hasn't achieved yet...Raoh is one of my favorite anime character ever...a ruthless villain with a heart as big as the world.
He fought his fears, he suffered to achieve strenght, and like many characters in the series, is so manly and fragile at the same time, like real men.
Muscles and tears...honor and love, unscratchable men outside, but with an incredible inner sadness... i found in it so much poetry.
A reason for such a large fan base was also the opening, which is more serious and darker than the original, and it sets the tone of the whole series.
Hokuto No Ken 北斗の拳 (Subs and Trans)

Spoiler

[Lander]

Finished up Doro - satisfying length, no wasted panels. Goes big, and ties up in a neat little package with a bow on it. Splendid.

Wanting more Hayashida Q, I dipped into Dai Dark: Legendary space boy tries to get by, while everyone and their mother attempts to kill him for his wish-granting bones. Co-starring Skeleton Backpack and Death Herself, with Cute Stubby Skulldog as the spaceship.

It's not quite Dorohedoro in Space, but there are noticeable through-lines: masks, blood, skulls, carefree amazonian chicks. A goofy Dia de los Muertos vibe, of sorts. Trying not to get too excited, since there are only 40ish chapters translated so far, but it's good fun. The item shop is peripherally video gamey, but I can forgive that.

Seems she also did enemy designs for ill-fated Suda / Mikami road movie game Shadows of the Damned, which makes a good deal of sense in retrospect. Minus the GIANT PENIS OVERTONES, the irreverent devils-violence-skeletons aesthetic fits like a glove.

Ah man, you're the third TRVE+HONEST Shumps Fren™ to recommend that one - I must investigate! BLAME rec resonating hard - how I wish Miyazaki et al would lend a bit of their Berserk-poaching ears to that one. Here is fathomless underground megacity in ambiguous Dark Techno Future, pussy! Eat it! FUCK!

From design measured at relativistic scale; this nutsack-shriveling toxic zone is approximately the size of where Jupiter used to be. Right you are Ken
Alas, BLAME's greatest strength is also it's achille's heel - everyone too pousyboi to adapt Proper Art of such caliber

Despite loving BLAME's doomed technopolis, I gotta admit my pain threshold for the dumpster bizarro is a bit underdeveloped. I'll watch Genocyber episode 2 while wolfing down KFC - I'm not insensitive, just a realist - but I gotta steel myself for alligator head man and boobs-chan's tale of eldritch misfortune in Bad Smell AVE. Saw a brief fight clip featuring the latter, hit pretty fuckin hard; reminded me of Kengan Ashura's successful parlay of 3DCG into concussive tooth-rattling punishment

The anime looks like a brutal introduction - much harder to be imaginatively elective when the medium is dragging you along for 24Hz of gooey crunch that Oh Fuck Jotaro's Smoking BLACK IT OUT QUICK!! effect is going to get so much mileage.

I avoided it for the usual muh 2D reasons, but a brief window-shop has me wanting to watch. Heftier combat chops than I expected for something that isn't a pure combat piece; Sharp Dressed Luchador above is a particular favourite, bearing the unusual hybrid class of Brawler Medic (more like HippocraDEEZ amirite ), and their happy-go-lucky Let's be besties after we *blech* beat the shit out of eachother! disposition has been done abdomen-rupturing justice.

The earlier stuff is the freakiest, I'd say; it doesn't tone down as such, but you start to get accustomed once the heebie-jeebie formalities are out of the way.

It's nice enough not to rummage around in the reader's guts for ammo, too; If I recall, the invocation of Kafka is actually what had me put it down the first time round. I find it implies drawn-out discomfort horror that hovers over beloved characters like a drippy sword of damocles, but in truth the skull-crushin' face-rippin' percussive violence is also more characteristic of its approach to weird magic shit; quick, brutal, and oft solvable via quick mageicide or doctor's visit. And then Beer 'n' Gyoza!

As is my effort-averse wont, I spent the weekend orbiting old favourites, namely Shigurui - which was on my mind after a romping DS1 revisit as Mike Smith, the tragically under-fed gardener, press-ganged into lordly service after he brained five motherfuckers with a shovel when he was nine!

Man is born to carnage.

This world itself is Hell.

A strange and wonderful case amongst adaptations - "FAAACK they only covered the first few chapters! BUT they did so at such floorboard-shatteringly heavy, TRVE KVLTIC pace, each authentically catastrophic exchange agonisingly contemplated from "Sup pussy duel at Old Saw Mill 4pm or ur gay lmao" notification to *BPPPLTH* resolution, it feels longer than the entire fuckin manga!" Recommended ONCE AGEEN

Wah, the filmography! That is something else to not watch would be dishonour.

Edit: Bloody hell, you weren't kidding! Artistic aspirations as big as that paddle being swung around in Ep2, to where I almost expected it to cut the established characters after Ep1 and go full series-of-snapshots across the era. And Unstoppable Object pacing that is oh so gradually migrating toward inevitable tragedy if my gut has anything to say about it!

Rice mill scene - incredibly *DON* tasteful. *DON* Had me *DON* in stitches *DON*

The first series of Hokuto No Ken here is considered at the level of Divine Comedy, Ulysses, Iliad etc. and is known at the same level. It shaped 2-3 generations at least.

HnK as one of the great myths of our time, eh? its influence can't be denied - the narrator's specific enunciation of Kenshiro weaved itself into my cultural fabic long before I knew what a Kenshiro was. Who knows how - could have been from someone's TV, the background arcade blare while queueing for movie popcorn, or any number of things! One way or other, any sentence preceded with it was likely to be about something Epic.

Probably due for a rewatch; my gore threshold was too low to get far last time round. Think it was the ribcages.

Oh !!! Dorohedoro is one of the first 3 manga i ever read (Black Cat, Hellsing, Dorohedoro all together, then Daydream + 3x3 Eyes).

Cripes, I noped back to the comfort of original Dragon Ball and didn't return for 15ish years! Managed to fit some of Hellsing's gleefully amoral vamping in the interim though.

What is 3x3 Eyes anyway? I know it well, but only as the first entry in every Emuparadise ROM list circa 200X

[BryanM]

Sazan Eyes is a seinen series. Basically it's a magical girlfriend show like Ah! My Goddess, but much edgier and with some actual violence.

To my knowledge it's not as remotely as gorny as Blood or Devilman. Pretty emblematic of the 90's aesthetic, where the bad guys are these monsters that 13 year old boys would think were cool. The kind of things that wouldn't be out of place in a Valis or Magician Lord game.

It's kind of understandable that the monsters have become less monstrous as the median demographic aged up to ~38 year old men instead of edgy teenagers. Seeing them try to revitalize a property like Muv Luv Alternative was rather nostalgic, but the audience has moved on.

... it doesn't help that the game they developed to go along with the franchise push was a horrible Robotron clone. Tis the curse of any corporate product - you can smell when these things are an empty shell churned out in the hopes it'll stick to the wall and make a buck, instead of made by someone with actual passion for what they're trying to make. Even really terrible movies can be rather endearing if their heart was in the right place.

[RiMaDe]

Has anyone already recommended Suzumiya Haruhi no Shoushitsu?
This is a masterpiece, as they say, of all times and peoples.

Yesterday I watched it again, although I know it by heart.

[Lander]

Continuing Shigurui - superb and twisted. In retrospect, it feels like those first few episodes tricked me into thinking we were just doing straightforward, incredibly well-presented, dramatic Samurai action.

wr-ONGGG-ggkhhh *pssshhhhh*

Old Times

Kogan as a binary of madness and evil clarity, backed by a structure of unbending loyalty, is rather potent innit! Hard to know where the line between dementia and malice lies, and just how fuzzy it is. Rock solid foundation for a study in ruination of social structure, and - necrofeudal color aside - brutally true to life

Interesting to see it juke the tragically wasted master angle; his acolytes wreaking second-hand interpreted havoc is chaos, but having him walking around switched on all the time would likely be worse!

Cold Times

Mie stealing the sword and going all Yuki-Onna was a good twist. I'm fascinated to see where her future hatred for Irako comes from once the color's back in her cheeks. And glad some of the gang were still sane enough to attempt a peaceful conclusion - a small touch of heroism despite everything being enormously fucked up!

Enormously! The subtext reads as a tale of men in literal becoming demons in figurative, framed against the weighty imagery of myth without going full fantasy as so many works do, with weewee-ojisan the roiling corruption at the heart of it all. We're Kamataichi from Nakayama pass - yes you fucking are, as it turns out!

HARD TIMES (`⊙Д⊙)

Reality check me: I either have a completely ruined mind in the wake of buggery and sodomy (assorted), or the bug-eyed guy was - behind the signature tasteful abstraction - sucking his own dick to climax while having an episode over the dead kid. Feck, ech! Here's hoping the metaphorical dandelion explosion was ackshually of deep curuturu significance, and my gaijin ass simply doesn't get it!

Sazan Eyes is a seinen series. Basically it's a magical girlfriend show like Ah! My Goddess, but much edgier and with some actual violence.

To my knowledge it's not as remotely as gorny as Blood or Devilman. Pretty emblematic of the 90's aesthetic, where the bad guys are these monsters that 13 year old boys would think were cool. The kind of things that wouldn't be out of place in a Valis or Magician Lord game.

(...)

it doesn't help that the game they developed to go along with the franchise push was a horrible Robotron clone. Tis the curse of any corporate product - you can smell when these things are an empty shell churned out in the hopes it'll stick to the wall and make a buck, instead of made by someone with actual passion for what they're trying to make. Even really terrible movies can be rather endearing if their heart was in the right place.

Ancient mystery solved - ta sounds like I'd have fit the demographic at the time, if not for the language barrier; right around when stray episodes of Yugioh and Cardcaptor Sakura started entering the periphery.

I recall seeing a SNES game that resembled a 2D adventure-action thing and didn't look entirely soulless, but digestible fare like Jump 'n' Shoot Man 7 and chargeshot-alike peer Something Or Other Shbibinman ended up winning out.

[BIL]

Continuing Shigurui - superb and twisted. In retrospect, it feels like those first few episodes tricked me into thinking we were just doing straightforward, incredibly well-presented, dramatic Samurai action.

wr-ONGGG-ggkhhh *pssshhhhh*

Glad you're enjoying! And withstanding! I was shamefury over-refreshed when I wrote that post, thought to myself later "I really hope nobody jumps in expecting Kenshin! Or mercy!"

Oof, Christ; I suppose plucky Kenshin is a trying property nowadays, too. 3; Speaking of suggestive banging sounds!

*Japanese man in bedroom, frantically breaking CDRs with rice mallet*
"Yep! That me!"
*cut to SWAT battering front door*
"You're probably wondering how I end up in this situation!"
*door bursts open; freeze-frame on Kabuki "YOOOOOO;" cue Baba O'Riley*
Title: ARRESTED NOBUHIRO

Old Times

Kogan as a binary of madness and evil clarity, backed by a structure of unbending loyalty, is rather potent innit! Hard to know where the line between dementia and malice lies, and just how fuzzy it is. Rock solid foundation for a study in ruination of social structure, and - necrofeudal color aside - brutally true to life

Spot on; it's squarely in the Zankoku Jidaigeki tradition. IIRC, its source novel Tournament At Sunpu Castle was part of the genre's 1960s boom. The author had a great description of the setting; "A handful of sadists leading an army of masochists." It's an anthology orbiting the dread live steel contest, tales of those who found themselves there. Shigurui adapts one; much as I'd love the rest, as with any good anthology tale, it's resoundingly complete unto itself. Without wishing to spoil, if you dig the anime, the manga is an easy recommendation.

I'd so love to see the whole manga adapted in that astonishingly heavy style, but I know it'd have taken them decades. Those chapters fly past on page. A partial adaptation that acquires an identity all its own, as does the manga itself.

Speaking of the 60s; on film, Mischief Maker's spiritual triptych Harakiri / The Sword of Doom / Samurai Rebellion is highly endorsed! Harakiri's probably the one to watch, on the sheer conviction of dear old Tatsuya Nakadai; but all of 'em are starkly memorable snapshots of feudal iniquity. (credit to Nakadai, he's in the other two as well, unrecognisably protean as ever)

HARD TIMES (`⊙Д⊙)

Reality check me: I either have a completely ruined mind in the wake of buggery and sodomy (assorted), or the bug-eyed guy was - behind the signature tasteful abstraction - sucking his own dick to climax while having an episode over the dead kid. Feck, ech! Here's hoping the metaphorical dandelion explosion was ackshually of deep curuturu significance, and my gaijin ass simply doesn't get it!

I was gonna say "Nah just a mournful fap," going by the manga. But the more I remembered the anime's erm tempo (*wapwapwapwap*), the more striking that mental image became. The Hovis SEED EXPLOSION™ is in the manga, though!

All doubtlessly inspired by The TRVE Master Of Hentai

[Lemnear]

HnK as one of the great myths of our time, eh? its influence can't be denied - the narrator's specific enunciation of Kenshiro weaved itself into my cultural fabic long before I knew what a Kenshiro was. Who knows how - could have been from someone's TV, the background arcade blare while queueing for movie popcorn, or any number of things! One way or other, any sentence preceded with it was likely to be about something Epic.

That intro was the ONLY one sung by non-professional singers (and with the lyrics) it's like if the intro was sung by all the people Ken saved on his journey, so the general tone was a bit different, more drammatic and somber...come on it begins with the description of nuclear bombs that destroyed the world (also implying that Ken witnessed the apocalypse), "never, never, will you forget, the moment, the earth that shook, the air that caught fire, and then, silence"...and ends with "never, never, will you live, the happy days".
The Outro instead is the original japanese intro.

But every intro here was remaded, leaving the original japanese intro as outro (sometime was the original japanese outro directly) since 1977...even things like Batman (90s animated series) and Action Man (LOL!) had an intro song...or the Sonic X intro, created by Eiffel 65.

So here and there some vibes were altered.
Seen through a different lens.

What is 3x3 Eyes anyway? I know it well, but only as the first entry in every Emuparadise ROM list circa 200X

Glad that you didn't ask what Daydream is . Yes, Mid 2000 more or less.

Sazan Eyes is a seinen series. Basically it's a magical girlfriend show like Ah! My Goddess, but much edgier and with some actual violence.

Yeh but, i've only read the manga

[Steamflogger Boss]

I remember liking 3x3 Eyes well enough. Not the games ofc, but the manga.

Been dipping into SAO lately. Not too much to say here, it's all been said. The reeing over this is so overblown. Standard fare that some people take way too seriously. If something has people writing small novels over it in the form of reviews it has already achieved more than most anime series.

[BryanM]

Sword Art Online Abridged is much better than the actual show. Almost an inversion of quality - crappier in the beginning but exponentially better over time. (I think maybe that's an effect of "if you can't do something better than the original, don't". There's.... a lot to improve after the introduction.)

The entire thing is one of the early webnovels to become popular, for current trends only Mushoku Tensei is more influential.

The gokuian ubermensch stuff is still always kind of gross. Why even have an ensemble cast if the only function they serve to this forever alone loser are as symbols and trophies.

Watch the first episode, read the deleted sex scene that involves glopping, and move on to the expanded universe fanwork!

Ark always makes me smile because it's almost a parody of this kind of thing, but the writer is so earnest about it. How does Ark become the most famous MMO player of all time? By playing solo, and only interacting with NPC's. And by fucking up constantly. And by learning a little tae kwon do in his free time.

------------

(The reeing isn't actually overblown - one of the better aspects of Mushoku Tensei is it spends time with characters for us to develop an attachment to them. And is aware that its protagonist is kind of a shit person. And allows its protagonist to not be an all-powerful god in control of situations at all times. But the flood of isekai content that came after was far more in line with Sword Art Online. SAO isn't just SAO, almost every series is SAO. That a series manages to grab my interest solely by being willing to have its main character appear foolish sometimes... that shouldn't be such a big deal! But in the world we exist in, it is.

At least for Japanese fantasy content. Otaku are the worst. Huge sticks up their bums. Can't handle a voice actress or a TV weather girl holding hands with a boy that isn't them. No other country really has this degree of miserable nerd culture, to my knowledge.)

(I recommend tossing Overpowered Cautious Hero on your pile, for anyone that likes the videogame Dragon Quest-knockoff genre. This is by the same guy who did Full Dive: This VRMMO Is Shittier Than Real Life thing. It's not going to be everybody's thing, nothing is, but at least the writer's bum is stick-free.)

------------

Still amused by my brain's copium with the Haruhi stuff. "Of course they wouldn't announce anything at the music festival! That'd be disrespectful to the other series! But surely, next year.. right?"

[Steamflogger Boss]

Lol. Somehow I was figuring you would post. Low tier bait my apologies.

I'm through Aincrad and honestly it could have ended there. The whole thing is just a blatant copy of other pieces of media (which most is don't get me wrong but I see no new ideas here really). I think the author even admitted this.

Yeah Mushoku is pretty enjoyable, been waiting for more. Overcautious is one I actually just got the blu-ray of. So, eventually.

Lol, what the hell is this youtube video. Obsessed train otakus lol.

Haruhi is never ending and I'm not convinced the author knows how to end it anyway.

[Lemnear]

I remember liking 3x3 Eyes well enough. Not the games ofc, but the manga.

Been dipping into SAO lately. Not too much to say here, it's all been said. The reeing over this is so overblown. Standard fare that some people take way too seriously. If something has people writing small novels over it in the form of reviews it has already achieved more than most anime series.

SAO was the reason why i stopped with modern anime.
For me is 1/10 score.
Worst mainstream anime/manga out there...the first of a tons of this isekai stuff...or any random modern Shonen with no real meaning.

[Steamflogger Boss]

It's all braindead. SAO definitely popularized the isekai thing but the skin on top of stuff doesn't really matter. Think Bryan said is well with "gokuian".

Lots of series end up just following a formula that gets repeated. I liked Fist of the North Star will enough but it can be boiled down to something along the lines of bad guys commit crime, Kenshiro beats them up, they go cry to their boss, boss gets mad yada yada yada etc Another series I was watching recently boiled down to guy tries to get girls to confess to him to help a demon girl harvest lost souls that enter the hearts of girls. I found the show amusing but it's pretty stupid. The same guy did 16bit sensation, which is on my list to watch at some point. I could probably do this with 90% of tv series anime or not at a minimum.

[Lemnear]

It's all braindead. SAO definitely popularized the isekai thing but the skin on top of stuff doesn't really matter. Think Bryan said is well with "gokuian".

Yeh...
Gokuian? is referred to DB?
I respect Dragon Ball (original and Z mostly). Was another era, the character designs are so iconic that anyone can recognize them, immediately!
It's hard to be as iconic as DB, even if the plot is just "beat the strong guy, then the stronger guy after him and so on"
Still on air here (with Super also), over and over and over, endlessly! (with Lupin III, One Piece, Naruto and Bleach and others).

So...sometimes i'm curious about how americans perceives anime/manga, because U.S. had already it's onw strong culture about comics and western cartoons.

[Steamflogger Boss]

Yeh...
Gokuian? is referred to DB?
I respect Dragon Ball (original and Z mostly). Was another era, the character designs are so iconic that anyone can recognize them, immediately!
It's hard to be as iconic as DB, even if the plot is just "beat the strong guy, then the stronger guy after him and so on"
Here is still on air (with Super also), over and over and over, endlessly! (with Lupin III, One Piece, Naruto and Bleach and others) there are at least 2 dedicated channels.

Yeah it's referring to Dragon Ball. Basically complaining about the god main character archetype that can't lose. Very obvious self insert fiction.

The grunting and stuff really got so bad in Dragon Ball Z. Literally entire episodes of basically jacking off. I was doing a watch recently and forgot how silly it got. The annoying part is that the original Dragon Ball actually starts out really promising. The first 13 episodes especially are really good. Then the tournament arcs start repeating and DBZ well...

I do like Lupin. Maybe because it's not trying to pretend it has a real plot. It's just fun episodic bullshit. If you've seen one you've seen them all with that franchise but I still find it fun.

[Steamflogger Boss]

This should have been in my Bryan bait post but I will add that the ending to the Aincrad arc is pretty problematic in multiple ways. But on the other hand it also does tell you exactly what you are in for the rest of the way. The show tries to leverage character death and say that characters can die but it is established right here that

Spoiler

there is absolutely no shot the main character(s) can stay dead

. That felt very, very cheap. I'd have respected it more if at the very least

Spoiler

Asuna stayed dead

.

ETA: Also started on Dirty Pair recently. Another episodic type series. Pretty fun and extremely 80s.

Looks like my November pre-orders have shipped which includes Fist of the North Star : the Legends of the True Savior Legend of Yuria/Legend of Toki. Really thought the first movie in that series was pretty enjoyable so I'm looking forward to that.

[BryanM]

I read a webnovel the other day, My Magus Academy Is Run By Players. It's a setup that shows up time to time: Someone using gamers for slave labor to build up their base, pretty much an MMO RTS with less emphasis on immediate external threats. The comic I'm A Fake NPC has the same premise.

In Gamers of The Underworld, the players would always follow the "NPC" around hoping for plots, which I always found amusing. Also that the gamers were all bored rich korean yuppie kids who found it fun to log in every day to haul bricks for 14+ hours.

(None of these are especially great - but because it's not done to death it's an idea worth making a series off of. The real chad trash consumer makes up series that only exist in their head. I calls it metafiction.)

Plot is really the least interesting thing about a series to me these days.

Aincrad

Aincrad was really a nadir of the series. I've watched at least to the Gun Gale arc, I remember enjoying it for the most part.

One of the things I learned from writing things is simply existing in the current moment is important, and why things like time skips are so harmful. If you're not invested in or enjoying what is happening right now, then there's no point. All fiction is fundamentally a kind of isekai - leaving your current life behind to live in another world or another person's story, for a while.

So...sometimes i'm curious about how americans perceives anime/manga, because U.S. had already it's onw strong culture about comics and western cartoons.

It's a bit unfortunate that superheroes are the only real teen content out there. There's some stuff like The Sandman and League of Extraordinarily Fucked Up Gentlemen, but they're a minority of the products being produced.

There was this one era of X-Men were the X-Men were allowed to be interesting, the New X-Men run. Until the author did a rug pull and was like "lol, X-Men has to be shit because X-Men wouldn't be X-Men if it wasn't!"

The writer of Invincible made his comic as a kind of love letter to everything he loved about superhero comics and a hate letter to everything he hated about them. It's a pity how he wrapped it up, but I like to remember the good times before the plot ruined everything.


Oh and I guess there's the Heavy Metal comics. Those are always super popular with ladies and guys ten years older than me who probably all have mustaches.

... obligatory nsfw South Park clip.

I respect Dragon Ball (original and Z mostly)

I was really into it as a youth. Our original version was censored bigtime, so I really enjoyed the uncensored version that aired on our spanish networks in the mornings. "Dragon Ball Zeta." It's naturally kind of a big deal in Mexico. If you put seeds into the ground, crops will grow. If you put meat into a river, piranhas will come.

[Steamflogger Boss]

Yeah I mean, even the writer was seemingly pretty down on Aincrad to the point where he rewrote it (SAOP). I'll watch that at some point. It's supposed to be better and does some retcons.

[Udderdude]

I read a webcomic the other day, My Magus Academy Is Run By Players. It's a setup that shows up time to time: Someone using gamers for slave labor to build up their base, pretty much an MMO RTS with less emphasis on immediate external threats. The comic I'm A Fake NPC has the same premise.

In Gamers of The Underworld, the players would always follow the "NPC" around hoping for plots, which I always found amusing. Also that the gamers were all bored rich korean yuppie kids who found it fun to log in every day to haul bricks for 14+ hours.

I just mentally filter out shit like this at this point. It's just background noise to me. Whatever this latest trend is might not last much longer now that we've got isekai vending machines and pigs.

[BryanM]

Sure, as soon as we're all dead, in torture cubes, or living in The Postman video games and their trappings will stop being popular. That's coming up pretty soon; two or three decades is a long time to a human but speedy quick to a species.

Context drift is always one of those amusing things. Thanks for letting me know about Buta no Liver, I don't have any interest whatsoever in video normally, besides a sleep aid. Too slow and passive, normally. Feels like being dead. I'll be sure to give this one a try, though!

[Lemnear]

So...sometimes i'm curious about how americans perceives anime/manga, because U.S. had already it's onw strong culture about comics and western cartoons.

It's a bit unfortunate that superheroes are the only real teen content out there. There's some stuff like The Sandman and League of Extraordinarily Fucked Up Gentlemen, but they're a minority of the products being produced.

There was this one era of X-Men were the X-Men were allowed to be interesting, the New X-Men run. Until the author did a rug pull and was like "lol, X-Men has to be shit because X-Men wouldn't be X-Men if it wasn't!"

The writer of Invincible made his comic as a kind of love letter to everything he loved about superhero comics and a hate letter to everything he hated about them. It's a pity how he wrapped it up, but I like to remember the good times before the plot ruined everything.

Oh and I guess there's the Heavy Metal comics. Those are always super popular with ladies and guys ten years older than me who probably all have mustaches.

... obligatory nsfw South Park clip.

I respect Dragon Ball (original and Z mostly)

I was really into it as a youth. Our original version was censored bigtime, so I really enjoyed the uncensored version that aired on our spanish networks in the mornings. "Dragon Ball Zeta." It's naturally kind of a big deal in Mexico. If you put seeds into the ground, crops will grow. If you put meat into a river, piranhas will come.

The south park clip is not available [BTW I love south park]

There was NO CENSORSHIP here, especially for older series (blood, sexual reference etc.)

You can find some of those intros in the PatMac video, but he covered only (and not every) openings made in 2000s, mostly Cristina D'Avena and Giorgio Vanni songs, but this trend started in late 70s. I don't even know if those old anime reached the rest of the world outside of japan and italy D:

Here are some (JP and IT), just to show you how different can be something from region to region, in style and vibes, and radically altering how the series was perceived.
This was the FIRST Lupin III Part 1 opening AND outro song here, (before the Enzo Draghi more notorious version). The song was Daisy Daze & the Bumble Bees - Planet O, not related in any way to Lupin, and for some reason someone thought that was a good idea to do this pairing:
This really happened !!!

Early 70s/Late 80s Openings:

Spoiler

Muteki kōjin Daitān 3 (Original JP Version, Original JP Video)
Daitarn 3 (Original IT Version, Original IT Video) This one in particular is considered a masterpiece.

UFO Senshi Dai Apolon (Original JP Version, Original JP Video)
Ufo Diapolon (Original IT Version, Original JP Video Extended) i love the chorus.

Trider G7 (Original JP Version, Original JP Video)
Trider G7 (Original IT Version, Original JP Video)

Burokk-a Gundan IV Mashīn Burasutā -The Blocker Troopers Machine Blaster (JP Version, can't find the video)
Astrorobot (IT Version, can't find the video)

銀河旋風ブライガー Galaxy Cyclone Braiger OP (Original JP Version, Original JP Video)
Bryger (Original IT Version, Original JP Video slighty extended)

Yeh..lots of mecha in the past, passed down to me by my mother who is a fan of those stuff, or The Roses of Versailles...and Kyashan (which has it's original japanese opening here).

For now i avoid to post Shoujo anime openings (90s mostly)...because here they have an even more cuter opening than the originals lol...and for some reason also Batman have a "cute" opening LOL (your eyes and ears could implode)!

Invincible is in my list after seeing Omni-Man in MK1

[Lemnear]

Double-Post [Delete]

[Steamflogger Boss]

That Lupin opening is insane thanks for sharing.

In general a lot of older anime is pretty unknown in the US. Many certainly would not have reached the US at the time if that's what you are asking. Discotek puts out older anime releases here. Most are things released here before but there are also plenty where it's the first official release in the US ever.

Anime popularity has completely blown up here but it's not hard to guess the things that are popular. We have seen celebrities and pro sports players talk about anime but it's going to be stuff like DBZ/Naruto/Bleach.

[BryanM]

In my youth we had almost nothing. Voltron and pretty much nothing else. My favorite show was Thundercats, which probably ruined my life and made me overly sympathetic to furries.

Pretty much anything that was a break from the norm was like mana, so OVA's like Lupin and Fist of the North Star were the vanguard. I saw them on this weird TV station that felt slightly illegal. Reading about how college kids in that time had to make friends with clubs overseas and they'd trade tapes of shows is such a trip. You tend to value something more if you have to go out and work to get it. (My trash-digging hobby really is an embodiment of that sentiment. For every 1 thing I find that I like, I have to sift through like 20+ things that I don't.)

It wasn't until the later 90's that things like Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura and Dragon Ball got aired on TV. The seinen-heavy stuff my generation was introduced to has definitely been pushed to the back. You can often see me whining in here about how nobody translates almost any of that stuff, if it ain't Gantz or written by Kengo Hanazawa.

I still can't believe no one translated that one about the shark flood apocalypse, with the heroes surviving on a floating bathtub and the fat guy in his underwear. Did humanity fail to tell that that one had to be a masterpiece, from the cover alone???

The south park clip is not available [BTW I love south park]

It's the Major Boobage episode, that was taking the piss (literally) out of the old Heavy Metal movie.

Now that we've lingered on it a bit, that reminded me there was a sequel to that movie. Never saw it. Feels kind of wrong, in that I tried giving New Simpsons a chance this year. Oh well, maybe in 2025 if we still have oxygen and stuff by then.

[Lemnear]

That Lupin opening is insane thanks for sharing.

Fun Fact: There was an editing error and they used the wrong tune (it was for another show), but they left it as is .

In general a lot of older anime is pretty unknown in the US. Many certainly would not have reached the US at the time if that's what you are asking. Discotek puts out older anime releases here. Most are things released here before but there are also plenty where it's the first official release in the US ever.

Anime popularity has completely blown up here but it's not hard to guess the things that are popular. We have seen celebrities and pro sports players talk about anime but it's going to be stuff like DBZ/Naruto/Bleach.

Here it started decades earlier until reaching its absurd peak during 90s and mid 2000s.
Those old bands play concerts all together with all the openings (70/80/90 block), while the other two.. (Cristina D'Avena and Giorgio Vanni) do the same in a similar way but with their openings, essentially EVERYTHING during 90/2000/2010s.
Sometimes even nowadays there are concerts like these...and are heartwarming! if you can survive the waves of Average NMK Enjoyers .
Then it declined as the quality of anime declined...the famous things around are always the ones you mentioned...despite their actual low quality (Boruto, Dragon Ball Super..One Piece...) + Hokuto No Ken, Jojo, Saint Seiya, Sailor Moon and Hunter x Hunter.

In my youth we had almost nothing. Voltron and pretty much nothing else. My favorite show was Thundercats, which probably ruined my life and made me overly sympathetic to furries.

Voltron/Golion , is one of the few full instrumental opening..and sounds like a melancholy outro.
I like Thundercats or He-Man and their sci-fi-fantasy imaginary..like Heavy Metal (1981). Or Fire & Ice..Wizards.
Is very rare now .

Oh BTW Walt Disney cast a similar spell on me , but not for furries.

It wasn't until the later 90's that things like Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura and Dragon Ball got aired on TV. The seinen-heavy stuff my generation was introduced to has definitely been pushed to the back. You can often see me whining in here about how nobody translates almost any of that stuff, if it ain't Gantz or written by Kengo Hanazawa.

Here everything is dubbed, mostly...now a bit less. In the past for some reason every opening MUST sounds like the opposite of what the Anime is.
Cardcaptor Sakura got a slighty-creepy opening.
Batman a cute opening instead! (LOL!)
Mazinga Z a stupid one...
Grendizer/Goldorak (Goldrake) even more stupid.
Shoujo Anime had an even cuter opening or extra added shoujo-ness. They totally shaped the girls in their era.
Seinen stuff had even more seinen openings with mature lyrics (or sometimes totally shonenized).
And some shonen received the opposite treatment becoming seinen conceptually here in particular Record of Lodoss War, Saint Seiya and Hokuto No Ken (the second opening was Tough Boy as usual instead) also in how is dubbed.

I still can't believe no one translated that one about the shark flood apocalypse, with the heroes surviving on a floating bathtub and the fat guy in his underwear. Did humanity fail to tell that that one had to be a masterpiece, from the cover alone???

What the hell is that?

The south park clip is not available [BTW I love south park]

It's the Major Boobage episode, that was taking the piss (literally) out of the old Heavy Metal movie.

Just to stay on the topic
________
Why Amazon Prime Video have a sub-subscription like "Anime Generation"? WTF! I want my Records of Lodoss War and Berserk T__T...and why Mobile Suit Gundam Wing is only on CrunchyRoll T__T
Sometimes i wish that "MTV Anime Nights" never ended

[Lemnear]

That Lupin opening is insane thanks for sharing.

Fun Fact: There was an editing error and they used the wrong tune (it was for another show), but they left it as is .

In general a lot of older anime is pretty unknown in the US. Many certainly would not have reached the US at the time if that's what you are asking. Discotek puts out older anime releases here. Most are things released here before but there are also plenty where it's the first official release in the US ever.

Anime popularity has completely blown up here but it's not hard to guess the things that are popular. We have seen celebrities and pro sports players talk about anime but it's going to be stuff like DBZ/Naruto/Bleach.

Here it started decades earlier until reaching its absurd peak during 90s and mid 2000s.
Those old bands play concerts all together with all the openings (70/80/90 block), while the other two.. (Cristina D'Avena and Giorgio Vanni) do the same in a similar way but with their openings, essentially EVERYTHING during 90/2000/2010s.
Sometimes even nowadays there are concerts like these...and are heartwarming! if you can survive the waves of Average NMK Enjoyers .
Then it declined as the quality of anime declined...the famous things around are always the ones you mentioned...despite their actual low quality (Boruto, Dragon Ball Super..One Piece...) + Hokuto No Ken, Jojo, Saint Seiya, Sailor Moon and Hunter x Hunter.

In my youth we had almost nothing. Voltron and pretty much nothing else. My favorite show was Thundercats, which probably ruined my life and made me overly sympathetic to furries.

Voltron/Golion , is one of the few full instrumental opening..and sounds like a melancholy outro.
I like Thundercats or He-Man and their sci-fi-fantasy imaginary..like Heavy Metal (1981). Or Fire & Ice..Wizards.
Is very rare now .

Oh BTW Walt Disney cast a similar spell on me , but not for furries.

It wasn't until the later 90's that things like Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura and Dragon Ball got aired on TV. The seinen-heavy stuff my generation was introduced to has definitely been pushed to the back. You can often see me whining in here about how nobody translates almost any of that stuff, if it ain't Gantz or written by Kengo Hanazawa.

Here everything is dubbed, mostly...now a bit less. In the past for some reason every opening HAS to sounds like the opposite of what the Anime is.
Cardcaptor Sakura got a slighty-creepy opening.
Batman a cute opening instead! (LOL!)
Mazinga Z a stupid one...
Grendizer/Goldorak (Goldrake) even more stupid.
Shoujo Anime had an even cuter opening or extra added shoujo-ness. They totally shaped the girls in their era.
Seinen stuff had even more seinen openings with mature lyrics (or sometimes totally shonenized).
And some shonen received the opposite treatment becoming seinen conceptually here in particular Record of Lodoss War, Saint Seiya and Hokuto No Ken (the second opening was Tough Boy as usual instead) also in how is dubbed.

I still can't believe no one translated that one about the shark flood apocalypse, with the heroes surviving on a floating bathtub and the fat guy in his underwear. Did humanity fail to tell that that one had to be a masterpiece, from the cover alone???

What the hell is that?

The south park clip is not available [BTW I love south park]

It's the Major Boobage episode, that was taking the piss (literally) out of the old Heavy Metal movie.

Just to stay on the topic
________
Why Amazon Prime Video have a sub-subscription like "Anime Generation"? WTF! I want my Records of Lodoss War and Berserk T__T...and why Mobile Suit Gundam Wing is only on CrunchyRoll T__T
Sometimes i wish that "MTV Anime Nights" never ended
[/quote]

[Steamflogger Boss]

There was an anime scene here in the 90s but it was a lot smaller. Really *just* before my time entering the fandom so I'm going off the word of older fans about it. But really even when I got into it (like 2002) there was still largely a huge stigma around it in the US.

[vol.2]

In my youth we had almost nothing. Voltron and pretty much nothing else. My favorite show was Thundercats, which probably ruined my life and made me overly sympathetic to furries.

Pretty much anything that was a break from the norm was like mana, so OVA's like Lupin and Fist of the North Star were the vanguard. I saw them on this weird TV station that felt slightly illegal. Reading about how college kids in that time had to make friends with clubs overseas and they'd trade tapes of shows is such a trip.

I grew up in MD, so we had Otokon in the mid 90s when it moved from U Penn down to Hunt Valley. I was at the first few of them before I moved away. It was basically started by guys like that who were trading stuff. I was also lucky enough to have a local comic book store that rented VHS tapes of anime. A lot of them were all those early OAVs from AnimEigo and Genon, but also all of the first Viz stuff to be released in the states like Ranma

On local TV, we also had Macross in the form of Robotech, Speed Racer, Astro Boy, and translated Miyazaki stuff played on Nickelodeon; I first saw Nausicaa on Nick in must have been the late 80s or early 90s, definitely before HS

You tend to value something more if you have to go out and work to get it. (My trash-digging hobby really is an embodiment of that sentiment. For every 1 thing I find that I like, I have to sift through like 20+ things that I don't.)

I think the reason that the journey to find the thing is what creates the value. imho, it's not the value of "working for it," it's the actual experience of interacting with the world that enriches cultural media. As a long time record collector, there has always been something fun and special about going to the record store, or having a conversation with a friend and stumbling upon new music that adds to the enjoyment. Of course it's still possible to do that, but most people are just sticking to the Spotify playlists at this point. It's great for set-it-and-forget-it, but not so good at creating strong connection and personal meaning to the music. It's psychological element to the media that's somewhat lost or replaced

Perhaps with anime though, it was the scarcity of it here in the early days that created the value. I feel lucky that I got to watch Macross in the Japanese form in the early 90s, and I had the "rentals" at the comic store; I absolutely treasured all that stuff back then, and I would watch anything I could get my hands on lol. Even today, I still have a kind of reverence for older anime that stems from those times

[Steamflogger Boss]

I've probably mentioned this before, but anime is horrifically overproduced now. The goal of anything has always been profit but a lot of stuff getting worse has lined up with tons more being pumped out. There are still some interesting series but you really have to dig.