Point me to Anime

[Nifft]

Good stuff:

Slayers -- It's a good series in its own right, but it's an excellent parody of D&D. Three series (Slayers, Slayers Next and Slayers Try -- 26 episodes each), then some movies which apparently have different characters, and which I haven't seen yet. The first series is the best, IMHO.

Fullmetal Alchemist -- Excellent and accessible. Usually my first recommendation, if you have the time for a long series. (51 episodes)

Mushishi -- The best anime no-one has ever seen. Simple, dramatic, haunting, beautiful. (26 episodes)

Wolf's Rain -- Wonderful non-human perspective. (26 episodes)

Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumia -- Every series since this one has echoes. Truly genre-defining. Non-linear episode ordering can be confusing at first, but it actually works well... except for the first episode. I skipped to the 2nd episode immediately, then went back later to watch the first. (13 episodes)

5 CM per Second -- Should be fully subtitled soon; some of the most beautiful modern animation. (movie)

Witch Hunter Robin -- Supernatural mystery; good characters; decent dub. (26 episodes)



Good, but not necessarily accessible:

FLCL -- Full of in-jokes for anime history buffs, but still quite enjoyable if you don't get most of the references. Makes excellent use of the medium. Highly recommended, particularly as it's very short. (6 episodes)

Here and There, Now and Then -- A very good depiction of a very brutal war. Painful and terrible and very well done; makes me sad thinking about it. (13 episodes)

Full Metal Panic -- Three relates series; same characters, different tone. One traditional mecha, one school romance, and one gritty "grown-up" mecha. Influential. Lots of "in-jokes" particularly in the 2nd series. (13 episodes each)



Good, but kinda girly:

School Rumble -- One of the funniest series I've ever seen (particularly season 1). Makes very good use of the medium. Too many anime in-jokes to be generally appreciated, though. (2 seasons, 26 episodes each)

Eureka Seven -- Might be fully dubbed into English by now; don't know the quality of the dub, but the original was pretty good. If you like the metaplot of Sid Meyer's Alpha Centauri, you may like this series. (52 episodes)

Ouran High School Host Club -- Very amusing, but perhaps too much of a parody of the traditional school drama to appeal to a wider audience. (26 episodes)


Current Events:

Darker Than BLACK -- Supernatural futuristic horror; great animation, cast and music.

Dennou Coil -- Studio Ghibli meets William Gibbson. Bit of a sleeper.

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni -- Mystery and horror in a small town. Very well done. Non-linear episodes, and some supernatural stuff... perhaps to be explained in Season 2, airing now. (26 episodes each)



Popular, but not necessarily recommended:

Evangelion -- Starts out as an interesting "modern" mecha, but eventually turns into abstract psyhcological horror.

Inuyasha -- Watch the first few episodes, where stuff actually happens. Now think about watching like 150+ more episodes where nothing significant changes. Bleah. Maybe the movies are good.

Bleach -- Watch 1 through 65, then stop and pretend they get married and everyone lives happily ever after.

Naruto -- Kinda interesting, but apparently has years and years worth of filler mixed in. Stop at 135 (if not before), and don't be afraid to fast-forward if something seems to be taking too long.


- - -

Wow, I wrote a lot.

Cheers, -- N

 

[ThirdWizard]

Look up a few of these: Elfen Lied, My-HiME, Trust & Betrayal, Blood+, Last Exile, Death Note, Claymore, Honey & Clover.

 

[Hopping Vampire]

If you like Cowboy Bebop, Try Black Lagoon. ive seen the first 5 episodes. good stuff.

 

[Nightfall]

And you people claim to love Ninja Scroll and Cowboy Bebop.

SAMURAI CHAMPLOO!

No question, no other necessity required. THIS is the show that proves what CB proved, put some unique characters in interesting situations, and insanity/fun/violence ensues.

Mugen, without a doubt the heir to all bad-ass dom, Jin, cool, killer and quite more efficient than Kenshin could ever hope to be.

Fuu...okay she's just there but she IS important to the story!

No question, GET SAMURAI CHAMPLOO.

You will not be sorry.

 

[Felon]

It is really tough to wade through anime to find something I like. Most of it is has horrible pacing, with way too much padding between action sequences.

Fullmetal Alchemist is the ideal that others should take cues from. Character development, tension-ratcheting, and kicking butt in proper proportion.

Wolf's Rain, Trigun, Witch-hunter Robin, Samurai 7, Trinity Blood, and Cowboy Bebop are all pretty execrable most of the time. They have lots of sequences that would be great if they had a Joss-Whedon type of sensibility to them, mixing wryness with sentiment. But instead, they're just slow and mopey, kinda jejune in their outlook.

If I gotta choose, I'll take "pretty but empty" anime like Vampire Hunter D, Ninja Scroll, Fist of the North Star, and Hellsing over the aforementioned any day.

I enjoyed watching Inuyasha off and on, as well as the one about the dead kid who becomes a spirit detective (Yuyu Hakachu or something like that).

 

[Meloncov]

I've been enjoying Death Note recently.

 

[horacethegrey]

Wolf's Rain, Trigun, Witch-hunter Robin, Samurai 7, Trinity Blood, and Cowboy Bebop are all pretty execrable most of the time. They have lots of sequences that would be great if they had a Joss-Whedon type of sensibility to them, mixing wryness with sentiment. But instead, they're just slow and mopey, kinda jejune in their outlook.

How can you include Cowboy Bebop in that lot mate? I'd understand your problem with those other series, since they do have problems that prevent them from reaching greatness. But Bebop for the most part is brilliant, and is quite good at mixing humor and drama effectively.

 

[Squire James]

This is more of a musing than a recommendation... I was idly looking through YouTube for interesting Star Ocean 3 video game clips, and I collided with the 3rd episode of a fansub for an anime based on Star Ocean 2. I got carried away and watched all the episodes, even though it was mostly a pretty typical action anime.

However, it was pretty interesting from the perspective of someone who's played Star Ocean 2 to death years ago without ever hearing of the anime. It followed the game's plot surprisingly closely for a long time, and even when it didn't I nodded and thought to myself, "you know, the game really did that part a bit stupidly, I can see why they changed it" with the occasional "yeah, I guess they didn't want branching plotlines to totally exclude certain characters like the game did - they'd never hear the end of it from the fans of the missing characters" followed by a bit of "Gee, I wish the game let me put Ashton and Opera in the same party".

It was one of those anime that you wish ended about 5 minutes before it did. It had a perfectly good ending that would have served well (though the material covered only the first 2/3 of the game), but they just HAD to add a little bit at the end to make room for a sequel that will probably never happen!

Just remember: plucky young heroines that are totally useless in action sequences fight a lot better when mind-controlled by an enemy! Hmm, she was actually as effective as she was in the game for a short time...

 

[Nightfall]

Bears repeating:

Samurai Champloo!

 

[Felon]

How can you include Cowboy Bebop in that lot mate? I'd understand your problem with those other series, since they do have problems that prevent them from reaching greatness. But Bebop for the most part is brilliant, and is quite good at mixing humor and drama effectively.

So I hear. I'd put it on a higher level than the rest, but I must've been tuning into the wrong eps, because nothing really happened in them.

On another note, I just got Karas: The Prophecy from Netflix. It's just the opposite of Bebop---a big frenetic mess full of wonderfull imagery and non-stop action, but apparently it's just not that important for the viewer to know what the hell is going on.