The first Anime and Manga you ever loved?

[ChrisIII]

Funny thing is Voltron is actually way more popular than it's Japanese original, Golion which didn't do great in Japan.

It's something that occasionally happens (and might influence a continuation of the anime or American co-funding; such as Space Dandy, Big O etc.).

Some comedic anime like Nichojo didn't do great in Japan either but did well in the US.


Streets of Fire is kind of a reverse thing, it was a flop in America but did well in Japan and influenced Bubblegum Crisis, Megazone etc.

[godisawesome]

Pokémon hit my school hard - and I became the first kid at my school (and mean *kid*) to realize I could use the internet to get spoilers on Pokémon the Movie.

However, the first time I really had a semi-independent, non-clique related fascination with an anime was Zoids on Toonami - first the New Century series with the Liger Zero and Berserk Fury, than the earlier Chaotic Century/Guardian Force series with the Blade Liger and Geno-Breaker.

Anyone here remember when Toonami finally got ahold of the last four episodes of Guardian Force, and knew there was just a large enough fanbase to make "The Final Four" a little mini-event?

[Zauriel]

When I was a kid, visiting my parents' homeland and spending my summer vacation there, I saw a couple of Philippine cartoons called Voltes V and Daimos, both of which were from Japan. As I recall, Voltes V was the first anime I watched and Daimos was the second one. Both were my favorite childhood shows.

If you watched Voltes V, you'd think it is another Voltron anime. Actually, Voltes V was broadcast long before the Voltron showed up on TVs in America.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voltes_V

[Zauriel]

Daimos is also good and fun to watch for me.



Dang it. Both video clips have been disabled by the owner from playback on this forum.

[Android 17]

I was raised by Cartoon Network. Sure, I'd seen and enjoyed the occasional import as a kid in the '90s (like Speed Racer, Voltron, and Samurai Pizza Cats), but it was around age 10 to 11 that I hopped on-board the newly revamped Toonami and became devoted at first to DBZ, then a year or so after that to Gundam, Tenchi, Outlaw Star, and The Big O, and then a year or so after that adult swim started and Cowboy Bebop just blew me away.

All this happened within my three years of middle school. I went in with DBZ being my favorite show and went out with Bebop being my favorite show. I was exactly the perfect age to pick up what Cartoon Network was throwing down!

As for manga? Was less into manga at the time. I followed more American comics (books and strips) as a kid, and manga just wasn't as convenient as just watching whatever came on TV.

I suppose it was the Nausucaä manga. Became a big Ghibli fan my last year of high school, which lined up with Disney finally making (most) of the Ghibli catalog avaliable and you had the marathons on TCM and Toonami. I believe the manga of Nausicaä was one of the first things I ordered off Amazon. Read it my first year of college.

You and I have the same Cartoon Network/Toonami experience my friend.

DBZ was my first anime. Coming home from school and doing homework while watching this was everything:


Sailor Moon was my first manga, loved Takeuchi's art.

[Jack Dracula]

Back in the late 70’s it was Battle of the Planets.
For Manga, I read the complete series of Naruto in my kids issues of Shonen Jump. I kind of miss it.

[krazijoe]

Star Blazers (Space Battleship Yamato) in the early 80's LOVED IT.

[Gray Lensman]

I'm going with "Battle of the Planets." At the time I wondered why the 7-Zark-7 stuff seemed so different.... then I found out. It killed me that the last episode I watched left on a cliffhanger where it seemed like Princess died and I never saw it resolved.

I also loved "Sailor Moon" ... maybe a bit more than I should have. (although, if there had been a "Project A-ko" tv show...)

I'm also going to have to go with Battle of the Planets, although I missed the title and picked up the team name of G-Force (ironically the title of the later re-release). But then, I was around 5 or 6 - it stayed in syndication on some stations for years.

My big reintro though, and the one that stays with me, was Record of Lodoss War. I knew what I was watching then.

[Jackalope89]

Pokemon was my gateway (though the term "anime" hadn't gotten to me at the time), while DBZ is my favorite anime. But I do admit, going back to watch those episodes, and anime of around that time in general, some of the 90s dub at the time was, not great. Oddly enough, the English dub of Ranma 1/2 is pretty solid, other than the ninja guy's name, Sasuke, being constantly mispronounced. Really, a rarity for early English dubs of the time.

Manga, also an older series in Ranma 1/2. Somehow, someway, my junior high library had ended up with the first volume of the series (this was 2004, BTW), and almost right after getting it, I got pneumonia. But that first volume (also my first manga, incidentally) led me to enjoying the series, both anime and manga. I ended up finding out that the public library (2 blocks from my house) had nearly all of the volumes as well. So, I spent that summer reading the series as my body continued to recover from pneumonia (which had made me miss a month of school, and a week in the hospital, right up until just before the last 3 days of the year).

[ChrisIII]

Ranma's dub was done by Ocean I think. Also the earlier episodes of Dragonball Z-I think the main problem there was the censorship-the infamous "Next dimension" stuff for example but the voices were mostly solid and pretty much what the later dub was based on.

The Cartoon Network dubs of Gundam Wing and the original show also used Ocean (The original voice of Vegeta did Zechs Marquise for example, Picollo's voice was Duo etc).

Personally though as far as dubs go I really liked ZRO limit, whose dubs of Tenchi and Cowboy Bebop I think are generally preferred by many to the subtitled version.

[nx01a]

[ChrisIII]

Funny thing about 80's anime being marketed to kids is City Hunter (Which is mostly not really Kid's stuff) was big in France as a slightly watered-down version called "Nicky Larson" was played on a kid's show called Club Dorothee, and they even had the French dub's singer do the song in a concert video.




What's even weirder is that they also played Fist of The North Star/Hokutu No Ken!Funn

They did get in some trouble with French censors for that though.

Granted, a FOTNS video game did come out in America in the late 80s when I think mainly the manga and one movie were translated. This is another anime people probably were familiar with without knowing it was an anime back in the 80s.




Funny thing is, the game has the enemies explode like in the anime except the gore (with even the sound effect made by the kicks sounding vaguely like the high-pitched ATATATATA sound), but given enemies exploded in pretty much most NES games at the time anyway nobody seemed to complain.

[K7P5V]

The majority won't agree, but an All-Time Favorite would be Fushigi Yuugi: The Mysterious Play (T^T)

[Android 17]

I’d be lying if I didn’t include Street Fighter II V as one of the first animes I fell in love with.

People hardly talk about it, very underrated show.

[Mister Mets]

I got to be a fan of the Ranma 1/2 comics, the Dragon Ball TV show and the Ghost in the Shell movie when I was in middle school. So one of those, depending on what I glommed onto first.