Anime series everyone should watch at least once!

Similarly to my last blog, I'll be giving some recommendations, but this time anime ones. I won't list OVA/OAV/movie-exclusive anime though, as those are for another blog (I have a LOT of them)! This time, I'm focusing more on lesser known (or almost completely unknown) anime series that are a good or great watch, but will list some more recent ones that went completely under the radar.


Aoi Sekai no Chuushin De
Starting with a pretty average one, but for people on this forum it can prove to be a fun watch. Imagine a medieval world with two kingdoms based on Nintendo and Sega fighting for supremacy, with characters being based on characters from the respective company's games and having superpowers, with the added bonus of seeing hotties getting their clothes blasted away every so often!:P

.hack//Roots , .hack//SIGN , .hack//Versus - The Thanatos Report , .hack//Liminality , .hack//Gift , .hack//G.U. Returner , .hack//Legend of the Twilight , .hack//Quantum
Yeah yeah, I know, expected considering it was in my last blog (hell, if I make a game suggestion blog you can expect these to be in there:rofl2:), but as a huge fan of the series that started almost as many cliches as Akira, it's a must watch for everyone who's interested in game-based anime or anime that blend computers with the real world! If you aren't feeling like watching them all, give SIGN, Liminality and Roots a try in that order. Expect some of the most amazing music you will ever get to hear in an anime when watching these too, so fitting ("GOD Diva" for example is EPIC)!

Grenadier
Sexy busty blonde chick kicks ass with a revolver in a medieval-Japan-like world AND has kinda interesting characters and plot, so what else could you ask for?

Bokurano
Fight to save the Earth from getting cleansed with different Earths getting pitted against one another and being represented by a giant mecha, with home and away fights. While the main premise isn't that interesting, DEFINITELY give this a watch, as it has some of the best character development out of all anime out there, despite having a huge variety of characters with deep backgrounds! This anime mainly revolves around a certain group of early-teen kids, with greatly varying backstories and can get pretty damn dark at times!

K (aka K Project)
Plenty people know of this, but most of the new generation of weebs doesn't know it, so give it a watch. It's edginess overload, with interesting characters and a sort of comical hook which keeps you along until the very end. I'm referring to the original series though, not the second one (which is decent at best).

Mnemosyne: Mnemosyne no Musume-tachi (aka RIN: Daughters of Mnemosyne)
First off, heads up, this is an R-rated show as it contains a pretty damn nice amount of nudity, but also it can get VERY gruesome! This anime takes place around 1990 (but can vary a LOT throughout), in a real world-like place, but one where angels exist among the population. Angels are created from regular people seemingly randomly, with female ones gaining immortality (lucky them... except for all the torture in this show, lol:rofl2:), while males one gain immense strength and other abilities but can only live for a single week. The show follows the stories of two females and can get really interesting!

Rinne no Lagrange
A classic story that takes elements from mecha shows like Evangelion, about a schoolgirl ending up piloting a mecha and protecting her city against enormous aliens, so really cliche, but this one is good! And while this isn't a comedy or anything, whatever humor it has in it is actually funny compared to the cringey humor other shows like it have. On top of everything, it has some beautiful visuals if you are into that kind of anime watching, with a touch of fanservice...

Rozen Maiden (Seasons 1-3 and Zurückspulen)
A show about dolls that have been imbued with life by their creator for the purpose of finding a master to draw power from and fight until only one remains, who will turn into a girl that goes by the name of "Alice", a supposedly perfect girl that their creator has been longing for. A really fun show to watch, an interesting plot, beautiful visuals despite being outdated, AMAZING soundtracks (all 3 openings and especially "Kamp":bow: among others) and the two most important dolls being gorgeous, especially the "evil ones" (with Suigintou being by far one of my favorite characters of all time)!

Togainu no Chi
Here we have an anime with everything it needed to be epic, but falling really short because of bad production. However, it's still a great watch, despite the bad character development and even worse animation! It's about a guy getting framed for something and as means out, he gets sent to a secluded city of undesirables, where people murder one another without a second thought and tries to find a way out of it all. If you decide to watch this series, watch it through to the end, even if it starts losing you, as the towards the climax you will see that awesome powers can make even a badly animated series look incredible!:P

__________________________________________________________________________________
Welp, I'm tired, so I'll leave it at this for now... I mainly got tired trying to decide what series to recommend as I have HUNDREDS of them I want to, but I'm too lazy to write descriptions of...;-; I'll probably make a part 2 sometime soon, but don't count on it, may instead do the OVA/OAV/movie one first! Anyway, let me know what you think about these recommendation blogs of mine down in the comments and also whether you have watched these or what you thought of them after you watched them due to this blog!
  • Like
Reactions: 3 people

Comments

I think people should give School Rumble and ItaKiss a try, both are good. Although well known, I also think everyone needs to watch the dub of Ghost Stories.
 
@driverdis Actually, Itazura na Kiss isn't that well known and is yet another I was saving for next blog:P School Rumble is pretty famous, but is almost entirely mini-fanservice to be honest similar to things like Baka to Test to Shoukanjuu, so not exactly a "hidden gem"... As for Gakkou no Kaidan, why the dub of all things? I can't stand dubbed anime, with only like 3 exceptions (FMA, Soul Eater and DMC [Devil May Cry, not Detroit Metal City])... I liked the Japanese one though and had it planned for the part two blog.

@SG854 Yup, liked that one a lot, but as MANY others, I left it out of this part 1 blog (I literally picked these at random from my list of 400+ recommendations with the exception of .hack)

@XDel Never bothered with Super Book, but Flying House was kinda fun. However, it's not really for everyone and especially older people will get bored of it, so I left it out.

@invaderyoyo Hajime no Ippo is VERY well known, especially the manga, but yeah, it's a damn good watch and read! Also, the manga is one of the longest running series of all time!

@stanleyopar2000 Psycho Pass is neither good nor not that well known:P Season one was DECENT and it still got famous, so yeah...

@gameboy As I keep saying, I'm trying to suggest things not many people know about, FMA is one of the most famous anime right now! As for Avatar, that crap anime rip-off is well known and is one of the worst chinese/american cartoons I've seen...
 
If you want "hidden gems" then I guess the first two episodes of the Genocyber OVA series. Gantz is good. If you go by the title alone though, then I'd agree with many other people who said NGE, making sure to include End of Evangelion. Never bothered with the rebuilds, I somehow doubt they have the same charm and philosophical themes as the original.
 
Valkyria Chronicles. Its a bit different than the game because it adds elements of unneeded love interests and triangles yadyadyada that weren't in the game.

Corpse Girl is also based on the game that came out for PSP.

I think those two are also suitable for this game blog site
 
COWBOY. BEBOP.

One of the greatest pieces of animation of all time.
Admittedley it may not be for everyone, specially nowadays, but it's without a question one of the most polished, carefully and thoroughly produced pices of art ever created on any audiovisual medium.

One small post on a blog could never serve justice to its brilliance, from it's influences and themes from noir and avant-garde cinema, to it's incredible OST (from the genius that is Yoko Kano herself).
 
Does Interstella 5555 count? Any fan of Daft Punk and electronic music should see it at least once. My first experience the film was when Toonami showed 2 or 3 of the songs late at night.
 

Blog entry information

Author
ThoD
Views
1,571
Comments
306
Last update

More entries in Personal Blogs

More entries from ThoD

General chit-chat
Help Users
  • No one is chatting at the moment.
    Veho @ Veho: Looks like Link's Awakening was metaphorical.