I’m talking like, Bubblegum Crisis, an Anime that I am somehow aware of but have never watched.
I’ve seen bits and peaces of the stuff that was airing here in the 2000 like; Dragonball, Dragonball Z, Sailor Moon, Big O, Cowboy Bebop, Outlaw Star, Yu Yu Hakusho, Inuyasha, Full Metal Alchemist, Ranma 1/2, Gundam Wing. I have not even begun to touch 1 Peace. Basically, if it was on Toonami, I’ve probably seen some of it.
I feel like there is stuff from the late 80s through the 90s that were popular through the import scenes that I probably never heard of, that everyone who is in that scene knows and loves.
Tsee………
Why does anime look “like that?”
Should at least be a start. Those first two are works of Osamu Tezuka, the “godfather of manga”, so they were especially influential in creating the standard practices and visual language of anime and manga.
You can also check out Aggretsuko and Kemono Friends as two anime that buck the typical “anime style” in one way or another, and also Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt, which will come up again later.
Why are there so many cute girls?
To trace the historical development of moé and “waifu” culture, these works in order:
While you’re already watching so many shows by Kyoto Animation, you might as well throw in Nichijou and Clannad, too.
You can also take a swing after Evangelion to watch
I just wanna know the memes!
These are anime that are either extremely popular today or were extremely popular in the 2000s or 2010s, and spawned a lot of enduring Internet memes.
Edit: Ghost Stories is known for its dub, but like… Honestly, it’s probably better subbed. The hashtag edgy jokes in the dub can be funny as clips but it’s kinda tedious to watch as a show IMO.
Tell me about some auteurs or great directors!
You’ve already seen or been recommended other works of Satoshi Kon (Paprika, Perfect Blue, Tokyo Godfathers etc) and Shin’ichiro Watanabe (Cowboy Bebop), so to add to them I will mention Paranoia Agent and Samurai Champloo. The latter is also notable for being a major inspiration on The Boondocks.
Your Name is the first of Makoto Shinkai’s “disaster trilogy”.
Akiyuki Shinbo is a famous anime director known for frequent use of techniques like collage. Some of his most famous works include Bakemonogatari, Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and Hidamari Sketch.
Other works of Isao Takahata and Hayao Miyazaki have already come up elsewhere in this thread, so I will mention
There’s also these works of Mamoru Oshii:
If you’re already watching Urusei Yatsura, and have already seen Ranma ½, you might as well add Maison Ikkoku and InuYasha to your list as other adaptations of Rumiko Takahashi, one of the most successful women manga artists of all time.
Introduce me to some genres!
For magical girls (mahô shôjo):
For anime aimed at girls where the girls aren’t magical: Kodocha has my personal recommendation, Fruits Basket is extremely popular.
For idol anime, there’s Idolmaster and Love Live.
For iyashikei, there’s Yuru Camp, Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou, and ARIA.
For yuri, Kase-san and Morning Glories and Bloom Into You.
Anything else?
Stop!! Hibari-kun! is notable for having a pretty well-written transfem protagonist for an 80s anime.
Summer Wars is a movie I never cared for, but a lot of other people like it.
And also, everything everybody else has mentioned in this thread.
Edit: Added and moved around a few titles; I wrote this in a bit of a hurry.
This is a great list! Will definitely be adding some of these to my watch list.
I’m glad that other people think this is a great list, because I keep thinking “Oh, I should’ve mentioned X and Y and Z!” — like if I’m listing influences of influences of influences, then I have to stop myself somewhere, right, or else I’ll just end up listing literally every single anime ever made, over and over again, which is both unmanageable and redundant. I have to keep in mind that I’m supposed to only be scratching the surface, and have some faith that other people will mention the ones I didn’t think of, when it comes to stuff like mecha or yuri or magical girls.
Edit: for that matter, even if I did list every anime ever made, that still wouldn’t be a complete history of anime, because anime also draws inspiration from cartoons of other countries and from live action shows and films; and a lot of why anime has evolved as it has is because of budgetary/time/technical/bureaucratic constraints that are best understood by actually trying to animate something yourself.
yeah, its hard to make a comprehensive list of animation because its such a crosspolinated and crosscultural genre. mothers basement released a video on us cartoons influenced by anime that also put a bunch of cartoons on my radar i hadn’t previously seen or really thought about, if you want to have a starting point for unraveling that specific crosspolination thread.
Damn, incredible write up comrade, there’s a bunch of stuff here I’m aware of but never watched, I had to save you comment because this is great.