Rec us some anime!

[firecat]

OMG, we've only got one more anime series in our Netflix queue. Please rec us some anime series! Here's some stuff we like and don't like:

Don't like:
Really silly and/or romance obsessed characters/plots (Jubei Chan is about our limit)
Plots that are really surreal or difficult to follow (we're watching Ergo Proxy, but it is a little past our comfort level)
Series that go on for more than ~30 episodes

Like:
Black Jack
Cowboy Bebop
Death Note
Gankutsuou
Genshiken
Ghost in the Shell: SAC
Hellsing
Kaze no Yojimbo
Last Exile
Macross, Macross Plus
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Outlaw Star
Princess 9
Samurai Champloo
Shakugan no Shana

Comments

[deakat]

I have never watched any anime, unless you count Kimba the White Lion and Astro Boy when I was a kid. Your list might be a good place for me to start, seeing as I've many of those recommended to me previously.

[firecat]

We recruit ;-)

[jennaria]

Hmm. Okay, here's a few, with the usual YMMV:

Inu X Boku SS - on the one hand, it's silly romance. On the other hand, it has some of the most self-aware characters I've encountered in anime, and knows how to both use the classic romance tropes and laugh at them at the same time, without getting nasty about it. 13 episodes, I think it's still available on Crunchyroll - I do suggest watching the sub if possible, as the dub is terrible.

Sword Art Online - full immersion MMO, yay cool - wait, what do you mean we can't log out? And if we die here, we die in real life? Like InuBoku, it handles its cliches well. I admit that Asuna is one of my favorite anime characters, so there's that. Sub still available on Crunchyroll, dub coming out, uh, not soon enough.

Darker Than Black - I'm recommending the first series only, as I haven't seen the second and have heard seriously mixed things about it. I loved the first for its intelligent supernatural spy action: at no time was anyone required to carry the Idiot Ball. (One of the main characters is a female police detective. I am jaded and wary about these things.) Haven't seen the dub, so I can't comment on its quality.

[firecat]

Thanks! Inu X Boku SS and Sword Art Online aren't available on Netflix yet, but I've noted them down for the future.

[azurelunatic]

I enjoyed Witch Hunter Robin -- plotty, characters I felt were solid, explorations of authority and morality. It's leavened with humor (and I recall there being at least one point where there was honorific-based humor that I followed but the bff who was only reading the subtitles didn't notice; basically -chan is ... perhaps not how you ought to address the local badass) but nobody's particularly much of an extreme fluffhead.

Trigun is 26 episodes. It has some distinctly silly elements although I hear it gets more serious later. I haven't watched the entire thing yet, but I did enjoy the parts of it that I saw.

[firecat]

Thanks! both added.

[libskrat]

Planetes, if you haven't seen it already. Good stuff.

[libskrat]

Oh, and Last Exile, though it's probably crowding the episode-number limit.

[libskrat]

haha, or possibly I could actually read your list!

[firecat]

We actually did try to watch Planetes but we were put off by the silliness of some of the scenes. Does it get less silly later?

[libskrat]

Oh my gosh yes. In a pretty major way.

The work supervisors (not Fee, the two dudes who are perennially stuck stationside) will never be less silly. Unfortunately. But they can usually be fast-forwarded over with basically zero loss of plot threads. I recommend doing so.

[firecat]

Thanks, that's a good tip.

[inkstone]

I second the rec for Sword Art Online with the caveat to watch only the first season. The second season is a mess full of rapey bullshit. I also loved Witch Hunter Robin.

Other series you may to check out: Blast of Tempest, Psycho-Pass

[jennaria]

Unfortunately true about SAO, with the further note that 'first season' here means 'up to episode 16' because that's where the actual resolution to the first major plot arc is. Adaptation, how does it work. :shrug:

Seconding recommendation on Witch Hunter Robin and Psycho-Pass, which are not entirely unlike each other.

[firecat]

Thanks! Those aren't available on Netflix yet, but I put them in a wish list.

[jennaria]

Psycho-Pass and SAO are on Hulu, if you have that? Hulu actually has a really impressive list of anime streaming - most in sub, if that makes a difference to you - and (if you're not already a member) it's free if you're willing to watch on your computer.

[firecat]

Thanks! Haven't done much with Hulu yet but it's great to know they have some good stuff.

[feuervogel]

Psycho-Pass is free to stream (legally) from Funimation, the US licenser.

[silveradept]

Trigun and Brigadoon are excellent. Both start with a heavy dose of comedy and then make it disappear completely, revealing a good story underneath.

[firecat]

Thanks!

[feuervogel]

I've been running weekly(ish) recs on my blog. :D Some of our tastes may overlap.

[firecat]

Ooh, thanks!

[feuervogel]

You're welcome! I've put keywords of a sort in the listings, to give readers an idea of what to expect and whether to click the link or not.

I've linked (where available, which is most of the recent shows) to official/legit online streams, so they're free to try.

I really liked Planetes; the humor is admittedly silly, but there's a really good story under it. You may want to skip the episode where Fee really needs a smoke (though there's plot going on in the background...)

If you like weird deconstructions of things, Princess Tutu is amazing. It's a deconstruction of magical girls and fairy tales, whose theme is largely free will vs fate. (Yes, it's about a duck who is a girl who is a magical girl, and there's ballet. It sounds ridiculous, but I love it so much.)

[firecat]

Both of those were ones where we couldn't get past the silly humor parts to enjoy the story. It was really frustrating with Planetes because we liked the other parts a lot.

But I'll definitely be watching your blog!

[sqbr]

Full Metal Alchemist: Brotherhood is brilliant steampunky alternate history with great characters and worldbuilding but probably too long (60ish episodes I think). There's no filler, it's just a long story.

Baccano is a great but rather violent show set in 1930s Chicago. It has a non linear plot structure so to begin with it is rather confusing but everything slots into place brilliantly by the end.

And on the girlier end of the spectrum:
For a short and intense exploration of magical girls there's Puella Magi Madoka Magica.
12 Kingdoms is 45 episodes but is the best "person from our world ends up in magical world" story I've seen.
Gokusen is about the adventures of a yakuza's grand daughter trying to work as a maths teacher despite constantly getting into fights and is lots of fun.

[firecat]

Great suggestions, thanks!

[sarahmichigan.livejournal.com]

I guess that rules out Ranma 1/2 because it's super silly. I think only the first couple seasons are worth watching.

[firecat]

Yeah, too silly for us. We tried it a while back and I think we made it about halfway through the first season.

[erin-c-1978.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I like a bunch of your likes.

Vision of Escaflowne: A young girl from Japan crosses over into a fantasy world with low-tech mecha. Oldie but goodie. Pretty animation, especially for the time period, and phenomenal soundtrack. 26 episodes. The movie is a retelling of the series and isn't nearly as good, IMO.

Noein: Lovely little coming of age story mixed with quantum physics-based time travel. 24 episodes.

Eden of the East: Short and quirky and almost impossible to describe, but I loved it. (I guess it might fall into SF?) I think it was 13 episodes + two followup movies.

Samurai 7: Steampunk remix of the Kurosawa movie. Same studio as Last Exile, Hellsing, and Gankutsuou. I think 26 episodes.

Wolf's Rain: In a dying world, four wolves (that can pass themselves off as humans) search for Paradise. 30 episodes, but there are 4 filler eps in the middle that you can safely skip.

Darker Than Black: Weird and spooky, gorgeous animation, first season is 26 episodes. Present-day... urban fantasy, I guess? With spies and people with strange powers. There is a second season that I did still like but isn't as good, IMO.

Paranoia Agent: 13 episode series by Satoshi Kon, who directed Tokyo Godfathers, Perfect Blue, and a number of other acclaimed anime films. Defintely surreal, but I didn't find it confusing.

Recently finished and enjoyed Princess Tutu, a sort of metafictional ballet fairy tale, but might be too romance-oriented and/or silly? 26 episodes.

This is just a standalone film, but I thought Summer Wars was really funny and uplifting. (The world is threatened with destruction through the power of the Internet! The world is saved... through the power of the Internet!)

[firecat]

Oh, jackpot! We didn't like Princess Tutu, but the rest of them look great. Thanks so much!