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Most anime fans prefer watching recent anime instead of digging around to find the good stuff – especially if it’s buried under the thousands of shows and films released over past few decades.
Newer anime are also written for more modern audiences. They’re easier to digest, and you don’t have to consider the cultural differences between us and past generations.
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Some shows are just there to make you feel good, like an episode of Seinfeld or Scrubs. And that might just be what we get here, in anime form.
Slayers follows Lina Inverse – a bad-ass roguish mage – and her band of adventurers on a fantasy journey straight out of someone’s drunk Dungeons & Dragons session.
It follows Marie Antoinette – yes, that Marie Antoinette – and the leader of her Royal Guard, Oscar François de Jarjayes, from their arrival in Versailles to the last Queen of France’s untimely demise.
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The show is full of drama, romance, romantic tension, and even some comedy that’ll surely make you forget that this story ends beneath the falling blade of a guillotine.
It takes some of the best parts of classics like Macross and Gundam, but pumps it full of cute anime girls and more modern tropes.
It starts getting a bit more serious in the second half of its run, so it’s tough to tell whether Nadesico is a harem anime, a comedy, or a drama.
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And this show gets progressively less mystery-oriented as it goes on, changing gears into full-blown fighting tournaments like you’d see in DBZ.
The adventures of Arsène Lupin can be seen as a mature anime version of Scooby-Doo – not so much for the mystery aspect, but for the energy of its colorful cast.
Emshi prince Ashitaka has lived his whole life amid his tribe. But after a curse takes root in his arm, he must leave his home on a quest to find a cure.
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The dichotomy between old and new, nature and civilization, is just as present in Princess Mononoke as it is in many other Ghibli films – but there’s also an exploration of the conflict between individual and community at the center of this story.
We can really see how war affects each of them in a meaningful way, making us care more about the outcome of each battle.
The Vision of Escaflowne is one of the most unique Mecha anime out there, thanks to its fantasy setting and unusual giant robot design, which takes inspiration from medieval armored knights.
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Sunrise put their expertise animating Gundam battles to good use in this show, giving us a masterful blend of epic giant robot combat and Shoujo romance.
Takumi Fujiwara is just another student working a part-time job and minding his own business – that is, until he gets behind the wheel of his Toyota AE86.
This absolute madman learned how to drive fast and drift on the mountainous paths of Japan by delivering tofu for his father almost every day over several years.
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It features some of the most exciting one-on-one races and crazy drifting techniques you can think of, and it’s profoundly enjoyable even if you don’t care much about high-octane entertainment.
After his release, he puts his all into becoming a professional boxer, overcoming hurdles like lacking formal education or any amount of money.
Still, the show also portrays the sport in a pretty realistic way. And it emphasizes the risks and health issues that come with the territory.
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Set in post-war rural Japan, the film follows two local girls as they befriend several friendly forest spirits like the titular Totoro, among others.
One, it introduced the world to Kenji Odawara’s unique mecha design that blew everything that had come before out of the water.
Gundam doesn’t shy away from considering the consequences of war and its massive human cost – even if it spends most of its time following the exploits of epic war heroes like Amuro Ray and Char Aznable.
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Based on the best-selling manga in history, Slam Dunk tells the story of young delinquent Hanamichi Sakuragi as he slowly straightens out and becomes focused on pursuing his dreams as a basketball player.
Our main character initially joins the basketball team to impress a girl, only to find out what he needed wasn’t female company but a passion to pour his all into.
Trigun follows legendary gunman Vash the Stampede as he fights off bounty hunter after bounty hunter after the price on his head.
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He doesn’t even remember the heinous acts that put the bounty on him. But once the shooting starts, you realize this man carries a bloodthirsty warrior deep inside.
Other than the intriguing story and mysterious main character, the show shines for the characters that travel alongside Vash, like the gunner priest Nicholas D. Wolfwood and the insurance agent Meryl Stryfe.
If you’re a fan of the Matrix, you can’t overlook the anime that inspired it (or at least offered a lot of similarities).
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But the sheer cruelty of some characters and the inherent violence of the world of Berserk might be a bit too much for some viewers.
The main character of Berserk was born from a hanged corpse, turned into a child soldier, abused by his brothers-in-arms, and had to kill his traitorous father figure before he even turned 10.
This film follows Mima Kirigoe, a former idol and aspiring actress, being harassed by a stalker who’s not too happy about her career change.
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Idols deal with offensive fans all the time. But this one will take it a step further and push Mima to the brink of losing her sanity.
Like Kon’s other works – including Tokyo Godfathers and Paprika – this psycho-thriller plays with blurring the lines between fantasy and the mundane reality of modern Japan.
This incredible show takes place eleven years into the Meiji Era, when Japan was undergoing massive changes and letting go of its isolationist past to welcome an industrialized future.
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Much in the same way, Kenshin must slowly let go of everything that still binds him to his past assassin identity, to turn the page and become a defender of the people and simply a good person.
In fact, it held the record for the highest-grossing Japanese anime film since 2001, until Demon Slayer: Infinite Train overtook it in 2020.
It’s only after Chihiro is forced into the service of nature spirits and works hard to clean Yubaba’s Bath House and its clients (like the iconic No-Face) that she manages to right the wrongs of her consumerist parents.
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This dark and gritty show tells a mature story about a group of mismatched individuals who are trying to move forward, while dealing with their accumulated karma.
Among the chaos, a group of rebels led by Quattro Bajeena – AKA Char Aznable in sunglasses – rises to defend the weak and oppose this fascistic government.
And really, the writing is incredible, the characters are absolutely fantastic, and the soundtrack is inspiring – but the art really hasn’t aged that well (we’re talking about the 80s here).
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It’s an anime about the harsh truths of life, the cost of war, and the turbulent human connections made in times of strife.
I watched most of Ghibli’s most renowned movies before I finally decided to check out Nausicaä, based on a manga by Hayao Miyazaki.
Not only does it show us how war could wipe out everything we know, but it reminds us that even then, we’d probably just rise from our ashes to fight with sticks and stones.
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Nausicaä herself (and the main antagonist Kushana) are fantastic characters presented by Miyazaki as powerful and commanding, which subverted gender stereotypes at the time, and still holds up to this day.
DBZ features plenty of cool fights and cosmic-level threats for Goku to beat to a pulp, all while his hair gets progressively wilder.
From the Emperor Pilaf saga onward, this 30+ year old anime progressively builds up a whimsical world where kids that turn into giant apes co-exist with high-tech tools you can carry in a tiny capsule.
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But really, everything about this anime is colorful and fresh. And that’s just as true in the 2020s as it was in the 1980s.
And still, there’s nothing quite like Hideaki Anno’s Neon Genesis Evangelion when it comes to pairing cool giant robots with a deep thought-provoking story.
Nelson Chitty is a Venezuelan expat living in Argentina. He’s a writer and translator passionate about history and foreign cultures. His ideal weekend is spent between leisurely playing games of Civilization VI and looking for the next seinen anime to marathon.
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