What anime got you into anime?

[Yopaz]

As a kid the popular series were Pokemon and Digimon, but while I enjoyed them they weren't series that made me get into anime and anime generally isn't shown on TV around here as far as I know so it took a long time before that happened. I would say that there have been two times when I got into anime so I am going to present them as individual occurrences.

What got me into anime the first time was in fact helped along by manga. I started reading Dragonball at some point and I realized I liked it a lot. Later I came across Case Closed (Detective Conan) and Love Hina. At some point I decided to watch the anime of Love Hina (quite disappointing) and form then on I tried to watch a few other series and eventually. After a few years that died down and it would take 4 years before I watched any anime.

I don't know how it happened, it might have been a clip, a reference or just a coincidence, but I ended up searching for Hayate The Combat Butler in a Google search and I eventually stumbled across episode 1 on Crunchyroll. I thought the site looked nice and legit so I bookmarked it so I could watch the episode later. So about half a year later I finally took the leap and decided to try watching an episode. It was ruined by the ads, the video stopped playing and in the middle there was another ad and that made it stop completely. So I registered as a premium user (got 14 days free) and went back to it. I enjoyed the series a lot, so much that after completing it I started buying the manga.

I took a break from anime for a couple months, but in order to get the most of my Crunchyroll membership (I had paid for a couple months without using the service) I started checking out the other series they had there. I've kinda fallen out of the loop now since I don't have the time to watch much, but that's how I REALLY got into anime.

I'm not sure if getting into anime is more about the series I watched or if it's simply about Crunchyroll making it easy for me to access it legally, but there's probably a good combo. Also, do no take this as advertisement for Crunchyroll. I am not receiving a big stack of cash for doing so. I promise...

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

I remember watching a few episodes of like Sailor Moon, Digimon, Pokemon and Dragon Ball Z when I was a later. I also watched Transformers: Robots in Disguise and Transformers: Armada but I never really understood those shows as 'anime' back then, mostly because I'd never heard of the word back then.

I suppose my first proper step into Anime was Cowboy Bebop. First caught it on a TV Channel which was meant to be dedicated to showing Anime but only had two shows (the other being Ghost in The Shell: Stand Alone Complex). Absolutely loved Bebop, and probably watched it through about 4 times on that one channel until it went down and it really made me want to try some other shows.

 

[Shinkicker444]

I has fond memories of Samurai Pizza Cats, Dragon Ball z and snippets of Pokemon from the early to mid '90s. Cowboy Bebop in the late 90's was great to. But I think what really got me into Anime was Ghost in the Shell several years later. Hellsing as well, holy balls those two series were my bread and butter for early 2000's. I could never get into Evangelion despite watching a few episodes, never could get past the angst and weirdness - Asuka was annoying, but OK; I liked Rei; Misato = epicsaucelols. Have watched a lot since then, maybe even earlier (but can't remember that), some really good stuff some forgettable stuff. But I haven't watched anything in the last year or so - everything seems to be fanservice bullshit, although I did get Fate/Zero just haven't watched it yet.

I am looking forward to the re-release of Sailor Moon though, can't wait for that.

Have been meaning to check out Outlaw Star and Saint Seiyu though.

 

[likalaruku]

It was either 1989 or 1990 when I stumbled upon Major Video, which had a foreign animation section & lots of anime in the children's section. My introduction was the Unico & Hans Christian Anderson movies.

*The Fantastic Adventures of Unico.
*Unico in the Island of Magic.
*Andersen Douwa Ningyo Hime. (Anime Little Mermaid).
*Sekai Meisaku Douwa: Hakuchou no Ouji. (Anime Wild Swans).
*Sekai Meisaku Douwa Hakuchou no Mizuumi. (Anime Swan Lake).
*Rankin Bass The Last Unicorn.
*Rankin Bass A Flight of Dragons.
*Fushigi no Kuni no Alice. (Anime Alice in Wonderland).
*Oz no Mahoutsukai. (Anime Wizard of Oz).
*Kashi no Ki Mokku (Anime Pinocchio).
*Samurai Pizza Cats.
*Noozles.
*Li'l Bits.

Mistakenly grew up thinking Rainbow Brite, David the Gnome, The Littles, & Inspector Gadget were anime. Rankin Bass stuff is animated entirely in Japan, so their stuff counts.

In one of these shows, the villain has a horribly violent death, in another the hero commits suicide.

 

[V4Viewtiful]

Street Fighter II the movie, thanks to my brother, I watched in his hose on VHS (if any of you kids today don't know what that is, i'll pray for you) that movie also got me into Alice in Chain's. From there I watched older and more recent stuff.

I don't care what anyone says, the 90s was awesome

 

[Ubiquitous Duck]

I don't know if I count really, because I can't say that I am into 'anime' at the moment, but I can see the potential there.

I recently started watching Attack on Titan or Shingeki no Kyojin.

I have really gotten into this series and it has opened the doors for me to consider watching more animes, so I am a potential new fan.

If there are more like Shingeki, I would definitely keep watching.

I've still got a while to finish Shingeki first though.

 

[Kilroy17]

Medaka Box. I had watched Dragon Ball Z before it and while I enjoyed DBZ it never made me feel like I wanted to try other animes but when I watched Medaka box, a few years after DBZ, I started to really enjoy the anime style and currently I'm watching Bleach and loving it.

 

[mjharper]

Well, as a kid I was massively into Battle of the Planets (even made my own costume at about the age of 6), and a bit later I remember liking Ulysses 31 and Mysterious Cities of Gold, and how epic they seemed compared to the other cartoons on British TV at the time.

But I guess I have to succumb to stereotype (for my generation) and say that Akira was the thing that got me into anime. It was 1991 or 1992, and I was at university; the student's union showed movies, and Akira was one of them. I had literally never seen anything like it at the time.

A couple of years later, BBC 2 showed a series of anime movies, including Roujin Z, and I was pretty much sold

 

[TheSYLOH]

I was a long time ago, but it was either Evangelion, Gundam Wing or Cowboy Beebop.
Or possibly Noir.

 

[The Wykydtron]

With my one year anniversary of becoming an anime fan being around now, I decided to ask this question. To make sure you get the question, this has to be the anime that got you into anime. Not your first. I watched Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh when I was younger and that was it. No Dragonball, Naruto, or Bleach. Until last year I thought anime was weird and nothing but naked women. Doesn't help that my first anime encounter as a teenager was the island episode of Code Geass. Also if you can, feel free to say if your first anime may have sculpted your anime taste.

The anime that got me into anime was a crappy harem series called Rosario+Vampire. When I first watched it, I fell in love. I don't know why, but I just enjoyed the hell out of it. It was my first anime binge and sculpted my future anime taste. Huge fan of harems and romcoms, with a massive tolerance to fan-service. Even now I still love it and think the English dub is fantastic. Too bad the series broke away from the manga in the second season.

Oh Rosario Vampire, there's something I haven't seen in a while. (i've always cut out the cross when writing for convenience) I never finished the manga, did it end well? I used to marathon the manga back in the day. The days where Onemanga.com was live... Good times.

OT: I am the classic example of double gateway anime fan. Naruto and Bleach into Death Note and Code Geass. Code Geass is still one of my favourite animes ever and I still watch my Death Note DVDs all at once sometimes too. I did manage to stick with Naruto and Bleach for ages too, I stopped on issue 500 of Naruto because christ I just couldn't be bothered anymore and left Bleach at the end of the Aizen arc because lord that was the worst cop out ending ever. It could have been good too. The team up issue when the entire supporting cast 10v1 Aizen was great, just end the arc there. Nope, Ichigo has to win everything because the writer says so.

I watch everything and anything now and i'm even back into keeping up with the current season. I forgot how hard it was to wait a week for the bloody hook at the end of every episode to be explained.

 

[Legion]

Assuming that we are not counting Pokemon when I was a child (which like most people I got into because the cards were the current craze/fad in school), then The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya was the first anime that I ever watched.

As for why I watched it? The person I liked was into the series, which is one of the most idiotic reasons ever now that I think about it.

 

[WindKnight]

Well, a couple of stages... first was being a kid watching stuff like Battle of the Planets, Mysterious cities of gold, Ulyses 31, Thunderbirds 2086 and Starfleet on tv as well as Voltron (mainly vehicle voltron... I seem to be something of an oddity for preferring it to the lion voltron), Robotech and various other mecha shows redubbed and rebranded on VHS, and getting this insistent feeling in the back of my head that these weren't quite like all the other cartoons on TV.

Then during the 90's anime bubble, picked up Akira as I saw buits and pieces, and was intrigued... and yeah, it blew my mind, even with the crappy dubbing. I decided to follow it up with RG Veda, and that show pretty much sealed my fate as an anime fan (as well as getting me obsessed with Clamp in general).

 

[gigantor21]

Honestly? Probably the original North American airing of Sailor Moon. Or maybe the original airing of Dragon Ball Z.

This. I was a super Sailor Moon/DBZ fanboy before I even knew that it was Japanese, LOL.

 

[Wasted]

Full Metal Alchemist

Saw it fairly recently (within the last 2 years) and fell in love with it. I managed to see a few others like Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Makoda Magica, Paranoia Agent, and FLCL. I would love to check out others.

On my list that I to check out.
Cowboy Bebop
All Miazaki films (only saw Spirited Away)

 

[StormShaun]

Just like many, I was a wee 'noob' in the anime world.
Before in my younger days I watched "Grave of the Fireflies". Still I did not know this was anime, just animation.
Then young high school happened, "Naruto", "One Piece", "Fullmetal Alchemist", and "Gundam Seed" entered my life.

The best out of these three was "Gundam Seed" and "Fullmetal Alchemist".
For it was not apart of the big three, it was ... free you could say. Freedom. Gundam Freedom.
I did not think of this until later in my anime life.

So I began to get into more anime, curious with this form of media.
Then ... then I stumbled onto the best romance, drama anime that I have ever came across, even to this day.
That was "Clannad" and "Clannad After Story".
It pounded a hole into my heart, left a hole.
This hole was filled much later, by many, many anime.

... also this opened my way to Visual Novels, and even manga.

It was a good journey, yet it is not over.
I look forward to the future. ^_^

 

[Elfgore]

snip

Oh Rosario Vampire, there's something I haven't seen in a while. (i've always cut out the cross when writing for convenience) I never finished the manga, did it end well? I used to marathon the manga back in the day. The days where Onemanga.com was live... Good times.

Well around half-way through the second season, the show went so dark and edgy I almost cut myself on it. Evil organizations, world destroying evil, etc. The ending was really good, it does one of those... I don't know to describe what it is over the internet. Something really bad happens and they do a cheap shot to not make the ending so sad. I liked it, but sometimes a I want something to end with a little sadness. Tskune becomes a total badass though. I'd suggest finishing it.

Going a little off topic, how'd you like TWGK's ending?

 

[Edl01]

As a guy from the UK I don't remember seeing much anime on the TV like Full Metal Alchemist or Bebop to actually convince me it was a worthwhile form of media. In fact, what convinced me to go out and start watching Anime was playing Dragon Ball Z Budokai 3 on the playstation 2. I had had watched Dragonball Z before, but there was big gaps in what I had seen, but after playing that I went out and watched the whole series online. After that, like most people I begun watching the Big 3, I saw Naruto first Naruto and then Bleach.
The first show I watched that wasn't a big long running Shonen series though was Soul Eater, which is what made me go out and start actively looking for popular series outside of the big 3.(Even if it did have a crap ending).

 

[Ultress]

The first show that really got me into it was probably Deathnote or Code Geass but I really didn't start watching it as much till me and a friend got into Mai-Hime.Looking back they all are kind of awfuleath note has some pretty weak characterization and a shitty second half and Mai-hime's final arc requires everyone being sort of stupid. Geass has become one of those shows that I know is goofy but it's having so much fun I can't really fault it.

When I was younger I only watched Pokemon and Hamtaro which between those and the above mentioned shows really didn't push me towards your more action type shows. The slower breather episodes of those series with "drama" and the like actually probably sparked my love for slice-of-life style shows.

 

[happyninja42]

The first japanese animation I recall seeing as a young kid, was Naussica of the Valley of the Wind, possibly called Warriors of the Wind back then, not sure. The original voice actors version, not the remake they recently did with Uma Thurman and stuff.

I remember being I think....6? 7 years old? And it was on HBO one night. Sat there on the floor with my parents, stunned by it. I still cry at the end of it, the imagery and music of the final sequence is just that powerful to me. And to this day, I feel that movie is one of the defining reasons why I want strong, well developed female protagonists in my entertainment.

Shortly after that would be Akira, as well as a mixture of things on MTV's Liquid Television. Then Ghost in the Shell (movie), then Trigun much later.



I wouldn't say that I'm "into anime". I don't really own any of it, I don't do cosplay, and I don't go to cons or anything, but I have a respect for the medium as a whole. Personally I think most of what comes out of it isn't very good, but that's mostly a personal taste thing. But when something good does come along that is an anime, I will enjoy it for the good piece of entertainment that it is.

 

[Souther Thorn]

My very first was Speed Racer, followed shortly by Starblazers and Robotech. Those when I was a kid firmly cemented Anime in my head as an emensly enjoyable type of animation, though the only difference I could see at the time was that the characters had the BESM look that characterizes most Anime.
As a grownup, Tenchi Universe hooked me on long form series.