This is day three, but technically still day two, of my sixty day of anime challenge. The second day talks about my favorite anime and I wanted to do something different. I don’t want to just single out on anime. I wrote down a favorite anime of mine on every possible anime genre. I listed down twenty two anime yesterday and it went out of hand. I was writing up to 12 AM and I needed to stop. After a hectic day of needless yelling and getting love advice from a lesbian, I have now downed by first of three cups of coffee for tonight and so I am now ready to continue this thing.
Let’s now continue with the twenty one genres I haven’t talked about yesterday.
Shows about something unexplained tried to be explained by a bunch of perceptive characters. Usually, it’d be a show about detectives but it can also be someone’s mysterious past or the disappearance of something. A safe choice for this genre would be DETECTIVE CONAN. This show has been running since forever and it is getting ridiculous now. As for me, my favorite mystery anime would be MOURYOU NO HAKO. It’s about a serial killer killing girls and leaving body parts in boxes for people to find. As the mystery is slowly revealed by a group of handsome characters, the truth is something that’ll never leave you like a goblin making its way to your brain. This anime is made by Sunrise after their successful CODE GEASS anime hoping to capitalize their momentum. It didn’t, really, but I still consider this show hauntingly good. It’s adapted from a novel anime and it is goddamn amazing. The ending is the best part. I’d equate it to Oldboy’s ending. It’s a Korean film with an upsetting conclusion and Mouryou no Hako is just as unsettling.
A show making fun of another show or an anime crammed with references from another show. This is a sub-genre of Comedy since most comedy also mock other shows like the aforementioned GINTAMA. I am not a fan of this genre because most references are so alienating that I am often turned off with watching anime like this. But I do feel a sense of accomplishment knowing some of these culturally one sided references. Parody can also be smart though and I love one Parody anime that is just one big references anime. It’s called HAIYORE! NYARUKO-SAN. It’s a shallow show but it is loaded with references from known ones to super intelligently hidden one like a panel of a manga recreated in one scene or a minor character of a beloved Japanese show doing a cameo or just fond Japanese memorabilia littered in the entire series. It’s deceptively simple but I think the blog dedicated to its references proved otherwise.
Shows about law enforcers and their duty to uphold the law. Just like the Cars genre, this genre is popular a long time ago. I don’t watch a lot of Police anime though but I do have one show Iamso deeply fond of. It’s called YOU’RE UNDER ARREST. It’s about the daily lives of a bunch of traffic enforcers. They fight jay walkers, wrestlers and even get tangled up in some romance. It follows two women doing their job that looks normal but the daily routine of these gals aren’t really typical. It’s an old show with an awesome opening song and I love this show a lot because it’s one of those under rated gems I love recommending to people.
Highly thought provoking shows with strong statements and some controversial ideals tucked in the folds. It’s often highly commentary and often times two characters facing off in a mental showdown. Obviously, the best choice here is DEATH NOTE. I hate how Death Note ended though but I do believe that show is truly revolutionary. For me, my favorite psychological anime is SHIN SEKAI YORI. It’s about a bunch of kids growing up having a taste of the discourse of their society hoping to break away only to learn how rules are meant to be followed. It’s a wonderful show about human nature and human society told in a great supernatural wrapper. The story is so well rounded that after you finish the show, I guarantee that you’ll be thinking hard on just what you watched. Greed, politics and hierarchy presented so beautifully and unapologetically that it’ll really make you think. This is another great novel adapted anime and this is actually one of the best highlights of 2012 for me.
Two people falling in love is the main skeleton of this genre. This is one of the most popular genre is anime. I could make a top ten list of my favorite romance anime. I think a safe choice here is FRUITS BASKET or BOKURA GA ITA. Those two shows really encapsulate the entire appeal of the genre. Of course, there is also HONEY AND CLOVER and a bunch of other good ones. As for me, my favorite would be REC. I find this anime remarkable for two reasons. The first is that it’s made by Studio Shaft who has never done anything normal ever since they released Bakemonogatari. The second is that this anime is nine episodes long and every episode is titled after Audrey Hepburn movies. Rec is just a straight up romance anime about a girl who wants to be a famous voice actor falling in love with a guy older than him. His sensible personality made her go swoon though plus they also had sex in the first episode after a vulnerable girl initiated the whole thing. In the span of nine episodes, the characters meet, lived together and slowly feel in love like your typical clichéd romance story. I am a sucker for a good romance though like a good Audrey Hepburn movie and this particular romance actually had a happy ending unlike a lot of romance anime that ends rather abruptly.
Swords and sword wielders. Yes, BLEACH. And yes, as well, SAMURAI CHAMPLOO. I’m mainstream for my choice here as well since my fave Samurai anime is ROURUNI KENSHIN or Samurai X. I grew up watching this anime. It aired nightly on a local channel and it was respectfully English dubbed. It’s probably the only English dub I like. It’s about a famous Samurai slayer with a crazy blood trail changing his life hoping to do good. Unfortunately, his past catches up to him when a bunch of people he cares for are soon put into danger. Soon, he was involved in an uprising in Japan and he met a lot of skillful warriors like him. I like Samurai X because of how well paced it is and how interesting the opponents are. A lot of them are as well developed as the side characters and it made the journey that much more worthwhile. The opening song always gives me chills.
These shows are about characters in school or going to school or having a colorful school life. There are a lot of shows under this genre and basically anything released in the 2000s has this as a genre. My favorite show for this genre would be THE MELANCHOLY OF HARUHI SUZUMIYA. It’s the first show I ever finished in one sitting. It’s about a girl who is actually a god and she is in a club with a time traveller, an esper and an alien. The anime is about a normal guy caught in the crazy circumstances that makes his normal school life certainly not normal at all. This is also the big break KyoAni had to make them a relevant studio and one of those shows that urged me to blog about anime. There’s a lot of feels to go around in this one. Also, the ending sequence made its director a legend and inspired a bunch of random otaku to dance like the cast as well.
The setting is in a place with advanced technology and science not known in any present day. A good example of this anime would be the boatload of Space Opera anime released in the 80s. PSYCHOPASS is also a good example and the ever so popular a GHOST IN THE SHELL. I’m not really a huge fan of this genre. I guess for a safe choice I’ll chose AKIRA because c’mon. It’s Akira. It’s about a dude who has a friend that went berserk or something. I never really followed the plot that well. The guy is someone who went beyond 100% of a human or something and he lost control then turned into a mass blob. The title is about another boy who had the same thing happen to him a long time ago and his body remains helped a bunch of odd skinned psychic kids to defeat the mass blob. This movie is a good example of an awesome anime. Did you know that the background art are all hand painted and the creators admitted to taking things too far with how awesomely detailed each background picture is. One insanely detailed painting per frame during certain parts of the movie. It’s insane. I think original pieces of the background goes for a lot of money because they’re so f*cking epic.
This is a hard genre to explain. It’s about grown male characters and their daily lives. The focus is on the male characters and their life. Like Shounen and Josei, this genre also has a target audience. I think late 20s to early 30s around that range but Seinen is often a subgenre of a lot of awesome anime. A good example of Seinen is WELCOME TO THE NHK. See, the main character and his life is the main focus. Another good example is CHOBITS. For Seinen as subgenre, there is ARAKAWAUNDER THE BRIDGE or BLACK LAGOON. See, the male character’s life is the focus in some way. With that being said, my favorite Seinen is NATSUME YUUJINCHOU. Oh my gawd, I love this show. I watched it alone in my dorm room and I was crying a lot because this anime has a lot of feels. It’s about a guy that can see supernatural creatures and it turns out his grandmother also had it. She collected names of a bunch of creatures and now, the creatures want them back. Grandma is dead though and Natsume is now tasked to give them back. It has a sentimental theme of “nobody wants to be alone” and every episode is sad in some way or another. Being shunned his whole life by his family and friends, Natsume is now forced to confront his feels and c0ome out a better man in the end. I also love the opening song of this anime. Listening to it is already making me teary eyed.
Anime for young girls like how Shounen is for young boys. “Young girls” is a loose term though because I think My Little Pony has already proven show for young girls aren’t only enjoyed by young f*cking girls. Basically, anything overly girly (as in feminine as in girls can really relate to it is under this genre) so magical girls, romance and fashion/idol themed anime is part of it. I think any anime fanatic has seen their fair share of Shoujo. I have personally seen the light and dark sides of this genre. From CARDCAPTOR SAKURA to MAGICAL LYRICAL NANOHA, the Shoujo genre can be pretty diverse. I guess I’ll be listing another romance in this genre though. I’ll be listing down my first Shoujo romance here. It’s KARE KANO or HIS AND HER CIRCUMSTANCES. Evangelion’s hype created two shows. The first one is FLCL where tired and too lazy to give a f*ck creators didn’t want to commit to twenty six episodes of another show thus making FLCL one of the awesome anime in existence. The director of Evangelion then created hype for another anime named Kare Kano. Unfortunately, the author actually did double backies on the anime when the author realized the adaptation isn’t following the spirit of the manga. Low budget and just a feeling of deject, this romantic anime is the very first one I have ever seen. It’s about a straight A student girl who acts like a doofus at home practically the opposite of her perfect façade. This handsome boy discovered her secret and they started dating after that. It’s just acute high school romance sweet and honest. It’s a shame the anime was abruptly ended but I think the ED song is enough to conjour up some nostalgia time and again.
Basically girls love or something lesbian. Subtle or not, two girls constantly fixed together is considered Shoujo Ai. I think this has become a staple subgenre along with “otokonoko” (google it) ever since light novel anime started surfacing. The idea that two girls rubbing face is also a dark dirty wish fulfillment a lot of audience has. So anyways I particularly don’t like Shoujo Ai since I like girls kissing not girls suggested they should kiss. Nonetheless, I think my favorite one would be LOVE LAB. It’s about a group of girls practicing dating tropes for when they have their boyfriend. The fun thing is that they practice on each other. So yeah, that’s about. It’s a thin show but it has girls suggested their into each other. For a classic, there is REVOLUTIONARY GIRL UTENA and there is also YURU YURI for a recent good example.
Over powered guys, the power of friendship and shouting out your super moves’ name. Shounen is THE anime genre. I bet your first anime was a Shounen and you didn’t even realize it. Naturally, a good example is the undying DRAGON BALL Z. Most people know the big three by heart as well: NARUTO, ONE PIECE AND BLEACH. Of course, myIGN’s favorite anime is also Shounen. I’m talking about FULL METAL ALCHEMIST: BROTHERHOOD. I think everyone has their own favorite Shounen anime. Frankly, I am growing to hate this genre. I hate how engaging they are despite clunky storytelling and how they can make me watch thirty episode without realizing it. I’m weak. As for my favorite Shounen anime…um…geez, there’s just so many. I could make a top ten list of just this genre. I think anyone can. I think almost everyone does. My favorite would be…um…JOJO’S BIZARRE ADVENTURE. I’m not really sure why. I guess it’s different and I like different. I mainly like the second arc because it was the most epic. It has blood and guts and overly muscular guys posing so I like two out of three of the things I just mentioned.
Two boys in love or two boys suggested to be in love. I think this is more of a good sub genre but there are some yaoi manga turned into Shounen Ai. The very much dirty JUNJO ROMANTICE and SEKAIICHI HATSUKOI are good Shounen Ai anime. They’re also very effectively scarring yaoi manga. Remember, Shounen Ai has no penetration and yaoi has A LOT of it. While the two I mentioned has sex scenes, they’re all not seen or the room is too dark to see it. I like this more as a subgenre. Shows like NO.6, KARNEVAL and “K” are all good anime with Shounen Ai subtle tones. For me, my favorite would be NABARI NO OU. Damn, I managed to sneak this one here. This is one of my most recommended anime. It’s about modern day ninjas fighting with each other but the plot is so smart that good guys become bad guys, bad guys become good guys and two dudes can fall in love by the end of the series. I know my description is shoddy but I swear you’ll like it. Check out the opening song, it’s one of my favorite opening.
Just the natural pace of life with no real plot, just nature, simple school routine and dialogue heavy cuteness. Pure Slice of Life anime is amazingly boring like the underrated drama classic called ASATTE NO HOUKOU and ABSOLUTE BOY. Slice of Life is best enjoyed with comedy though or paired with another genre. K-ON, LUCKY STAR, and ARIATHE NATURAL are all good Slice of Life mixed with other genre. For me, my favorite slice of life would be a recent one. It’s called GINGITSUNE. It’s very much like Natsume’s Book of Friend where a girl can see invisible creatures and she has a fox friend that resides in their shrine. The story is about the everyday natural life of the girl with her unnatural powers. I guess Natsume is also Slice of Life but Gingitsune is more effective as one since this has no central plot like how a good Slice of Life should be. It’s one of those undiscovered treasure I like sharing to other people. The cute characters and the sentimental feel of the anime really make it a one of a kind show.
Anime set in space. Once again, Space Operas like their title suggest. A boatload of Gundam is also under this genre. I don’t really watch a lot of Space anime but I think I do have a favorite. I recently saw this one as well and it’s called Knights of Sidonia. It’s a fully rendered CG anime about the last known humans in a space colony fighting a bunch of tentacle aliens. It’s a heavy Sci Fi anime with a lot of awesome things to present like humans being able to photosynthesize. It’s also a coming of age story about the main character but it balances out with a lot of naked girls photosynthesizing by floating in space naked bathing in the sun. Yeah, I watch too much anime.
Sports – Physical sports is the main focus of this anime. Basketball, Soccer, Kendo and even Volleyball being played in the anime would be a good example of a Sports anime. This is another heavy staple genre since a lot of kids grew up with Sports anime. A lot of soccer player actually admitted to being inspired by CAPTAIN TSUBASA. There is also SLAM DUNK! And EYE SHEILD 21 as another good example of Sports. I think my favorite sports anime though would have to be another recent one. I watch too many anime to think of older shows. I did grow up with Slam Dunk but I think HAIKYUU has a special place in my short attention span. Give me a break, I’m listing down forty three genres. Geez. Anyways, Haikyuu is about volleyball. I’m now too lazy to explain this show so have a GIF instead.
And one more:
Basically anything involving characters going Kamehameha!!!!! Not to be confused with Magic. Super Powers are anything else but magic like incredible amount of spiritual energy or something. This is also usually partnered with the Shounen genre. My favorite Super Power show would have to be Yu Yu Hakusho because it’s my first shounen anime and the storytelling is just so amazing. It also has some of the coolest powers in anime like arose whip and a spirit gun. Ok, not the best powers there are but don’t tell that to my nine year old self. Yoshihiro Togashi is also an amazing storyteller. All hisworks are so smartly paced and interestingly conceived. HUNTER X HUNTER and LEVEL ONE are also good anime written by this amazing author and I assure you, it’s as awesome as Yu Yu Hakusho. Also, this anime has the Taguro brothers. C’mon, the two of them are awesome together.
Myths and legends and zombies and anything unnatural. For this one, my favorite would be filed under the “vampires” category. It’s called BLOOD THE LAST VAMPIRE. It’s a massively gory anime about monster vampire creatures messing up a military base. A government weapon is tasked to slay the beasts. This weapon is a school girl with a long samurai sword. It’s a fast paced movie with awesome gory scenes that a young me was not prepared to watch. It aired on a Japanese channel called Wowow on a random midnight. They usually air porn movies at that time and they aired this anime instead. I was like “Oh, an anime” and I regretted it a long time after seeing it but soon learned to love it after the following installments sucked. This movie is just amazing with graphic scenes and an awesome anti-hero. The follow up series tried to humanize this anti-hero and BLOOD CLAMP just gathered the ire of every Blood the Last Vampire fan’s anger.
People killing each other. These are shows where someone is being killed or someone running away from a killer. I think some of the best mystery anime are also great thrillers. For the spirit of people killing each other as the true nature of the genre, my favorite Thriller anime would be MIRAI NIKKI. It’s a show where people with diaries predicting their deaths try to kill each other and the winner become gawd or something. It features one of the most awesome yanderes in recent years that gave us both awesome and disturbing moments like when she obsessively stalked the main character. This show has twelve characters trying to kill each other. It is pretty graphic but I saw the censored version. The story is pretty decent but I think seeing the yandere with a knife is enough to make this show awesome.
Shows about vampire. I consider this one of the dullest genre since it’s such a western concept and the east doesn’t really treat it well like how they treat the zombie genre. Good example of vampire anime includes the anime version of Twilight: VAMPIRE KNIGHT and there is a good classic one called MASTER MOSQUITON. For me, there is one outstanding vampire anime I don’t consider dull. It’s called SHIKI. It’s about a small town where people dying from supposed heat stroke or something unexplained. A doctor soon became concerned when a whole lot of people started dying and it all started ever since this family moved in on an old castle. He met up with a Shinto priest that conducted the burial ceremony and was also thinking something is not right. Soon enough, the dead out numbers the living and this simple anime turns into a fight for survival. Vampires rule the night and humans are now too scared to do anything about it. That is until they prove how humans can be just as evil as vampires and now this tale of survival is now a tale of how the two sides of the coin is very much the same coin still. I’m saying that vampires can still act like humans all scared and vulnerable while humans can act just like vampires preying on the weak in the most brutal fashion.
If Shoujo Ai presented penetration then it’s now a yaoi. I’ve only seen one and it’s a shotacon anime as well. Shotacon is when young boys have sex with old boys and I’m talking about BOKU NO PICO. I think no one deserves to be introduced to this anime so let’s just quietly moved on.
more things happened in this anime FUN THINGS for fun time
Yuri – If Shoujo Ai has penetration then it’s now a yuri. I’ve only seen one and it’s called SONO HANABIRA NI KICHIZUKE O. It’s an OVA anime where basically two cute girls finger each other then proceeded to scissor each other. It’s basically a hentai but with two girls and it also have a flimsy plot and more sex. I heard the manga is amazingly deep though focusing more on the love story than the sex itself. Still, I tried one and I just don’t think anime sex should be so…inventive. I’ve seen tentacle porn and Lolita hentai but something about two ham sandwiches making mayo just don’t feel right to me. I’m f*cked up.
Oh look, people are doing this thing. You don’t have to put my name in the title. Please, it’s embarrassing but thank for doing this journey with me.
http://www.ign.com/blogs/raith94/2014/11/24/karuhis-60-day-anime-challenge-first-anime
http://www.ign.com/blogs/azac13/2014/11/24/60-days-of-anime-challenge-because-i-needed-more-distractions-thanks-karuhi-first-anime/
You can join a long as well. After all, sixty days of blogging is more fun with more people for the journey. We can even do this Willy Wonka style and have people randomly be caught up in some scary sh*t. I’m just rambling though but seriously, let’s all do this random stuff together.
