Anime?

[effecT]

Dear FOT,
i liked some anime when i was growing up(12-15) like Dragonball and such.
Recently i really got into Neon Genesis Evangelion and thought it was some heady stuff that paid off in terms of time investment. I avoided anime mostly, because i thought it was for kids/teenagers, but i think i just need the right pointers from the right people(FOT).
Do some of you have a couple of recommendations for some smart anime?
I would really appreciate you sharing them with me.

[Stupornaut]

Cowboy Bebop is fun action-adventure sci-fi stuff, one of those postmodern deals where you can have spaghetti western John Woo Blade Runner Bruce Lee stuff happening all over the place and still have it make some kind of sense.

I haven't seen too much of Paranoia Agent but nearly everything I've seen from Satoshi Kon is great, maybe the closest animation will get to magical realism* (even if it's to horror/suspense ends sometimes).

*as opposed to what Miyazaki does, I guess, which is just more fantastical.

[Pidgeon]

Check out Monster. It's a suspense story that involves a lot of East German conspiracies in post-Soviet Central Europe. It's a very dark story but also unusually humanistic.

[effecT]

Thank you, if i may obnoxiously say so, for dropping the knowledge.

[Sarah]

I really liked Paranoia Agent.

[Boogdish]

I really enjoyed Azumanga Daioh.  It's more like a sitcom than most anime, it's about girls in high school.

[~L]

My teens were really into anime for years.  I just donated their collection to our local library this past year.  When they lost interest in anime, they found Doctor Who.  You should try it.  Start with Doctor Who Season 1 (2005) on Netflix instant or Sidereel.com  There are Doctor Who magazines, graphic novels, (I think), and plenty of collectables. The shows are great, very slick with special effects, and great actors and characters, and Sci-fi time travel! You may really like it!   

[Sarah]

Start with Doctor Who Season 1 (20051963). 

[Pidgeon]

Start with Doctor Who Season 1 (20051963). 

Those very early episodes are surprisingly entertaining. I didn't expect to like them as much as I did.

[effecT]

I looked into all of your suggestions and they are all great.
I remember Cowboy Bebop being on MTV when i was 16 or so. It's fun pulp stuff
Monster looks very promising, but i am most intrigued by Paranoia Agent, which i am going to devour now.

As for Doctor Who:
I have a lot of friends who are soooo into it and i cannot for the life of me get into it. Admittedly i have only seen the rebooted show. So maybe i will give the old series a try.

A sick effecT thanks you for distraction!

[Sarah]

The original Whos have the most gloriously crappy special effects.  I enjoyed them so much that the slickness of the reboot was an obstacle for me at first.  I also loved the way the stories extended over many episodes--as many as six, as I remember, but maybe even more.  No new Who has more than a two-episode story arc.  Oh, sure, there's each season's big, overarching theme, but that's not the same.

I think you will like Paranoia Agent.  It is wonderfully odd.

[~L]

Sorry Doctor Who isn't for you, not even Billie Piper? Have you tried Torchwood? 
The other ones my kids loved were; any Tim Burton movies, any Johnny Depp films, The Boondock Saints ( first movie is the best), Full Metal Alchemist.  Also, the Firefly Series and then the Serenity movie that follows it, (funny, quirky, cowboy sci-fi).  Have fun branching out!

[effecT]

Doctor Who(at least what i saw of the new one) for me resides in the "uncanny Valley"(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_valley)
I just couldn't get into it.

I know Firefly and Full Metal Alchemist, which are both ok.

Paranoia Agent is in that Polanski sweet spot for me.
I like it and i am going on a binge now.

[confound]

Sorry to hijack this thread even more, but am I the only person who thinks that the Daleks are the lamest and most over-used bad guys in all of scifi? I know they started out in the original series where they also had a robot dog that was obviously a cardboard box with a light on it but why can't they drop them?! Why do people love them so much?


I'm not really a big fan of Anime series outside of Cowboy Bebop but some friends of mine were raving about Samurai Champloo.

[Pidgeon]

effecT, I don't know if "smart" is the right word but might I recommend the anime adaptation of Anne of Green Gables?



Yes, it really exists. Apparently the book series has been a huge hit in Japan.