Forum - View topicHow you started with anime?
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moonie92
 Posts: 167 |
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When I first got into anime I had three titles on DVD. All of which I've seen at least five times. (Sailor Moon and Kiddy Grade as a newbie and Haruhi as of now.) They are Sailor Moon season 1 (it's a boot but I didn't know any better), The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzimiya, and Kiddy Grade.
Sailor Moon was pretty much a no brainer. I loved the show as a kid and seeing it in the sub form was a rediscovery. I bought it about a year before I got into anime so I watched the heck out of it. Every night before I went to bed I watched a few episodes and on the weekends I marathoned it. I was thirteen. (I got the series for my birthday, I got it under the promise this 35 dollar set was all I was getting for this birthday. I had such fond memories of Sailor Moon I said fine.) I didn't have a computer to watch anime on, our video processor was useless, or money to buy a new series, so if I wanted anime I watched it. It was the only DVD I owned. My family had DVDs but they weren't mine so I wasn't supposed to hog them so I just watched Sailor Moon all day. After six months it got old. So I saved birthday money and went to Best Buy. I bought Haruhi at 14. At first I had no idea what an LE was so when I saw a 50 dollar DVD and like four that looked pretty much the same, if figured they were all different covers for the box set. I thought stuff was only sold in sets. I ended up bringing home the fourth LE instead of the set, but thank goodness I read the back before I opened it and saw that it was just one disc and bunch of stuff from a show I didn't even know yet. I brought it back and got the box set. It was risque with Haruhi groping Mikiru and then making her prance around in a bunny suit. I almost cried after I saw the first episode to be honest, I thought the whole show was going to be like that. I watched it once and then went back to Sailor Moon marathons. I didn't understand it. The otaku jokes were not funny to me. Every month or so I would go back and watch the two mystery episodes because they stand pretty well on their own. They made enough sense. Eventually my neighbor who was 12 came over and saw it on my book shelf and begged me to watch it at a sleepover. So we watched it. I feel in love with the festival episode even though I didn't really have any idea about school festivals. All I knew is that their were songs and now me and my friend could sing them to each other. It was our thing for a while. Then I got Kiddy Grade off of Rightstuf. It was 25 dollars plus the shipping fee. It was six months or so after getting the DVDs from Best Buy and I didn't have the money to buy another series from there. But I had 30 dollars from saving the change from lunch and a five dollar a week stipend (allowance) from my father. I used to use that money for snacks, but I realized I could save it. So I did. I searched anime DVDs on our computer and Rightstuf came up. I was amazed by the mass quantity of stuff there was. But of course there was no more Sailor Moon, which was what I really wanted. (Dad wouldn't let me have S which was my main target.) I browsed the bargain bin and was torn between Spirited Away and Kiddy Grade. They were about the same price, but Spirited Away was only a movie (which I saw half of on Cartoon Network I think when we had cable) and Kiddy Grade was 26 whole episodes. Obviously someone was trying to rip me off. So I went with quantity not quality. I needed something new to watch and at the rate I was going I wasn't going to be able to buy a series but three times a year or so, if they were cheap. I again begged my father to buy something off line for me and after a week of protesting, he did it. After I got it, it played on repeat for about three months. It was nothing special, well the middle was, but it wasn't Sailor Moon and it wasn't filled with jokes I didn't understand. It came with art cards which I taped to my wall. I've since taken them down, but I still pour over them occasionally. I'm curious as to how the show holds up now that I know something about anime, but I'm a little scared to touch it. I could sing the opener and my neighbor and I had sleepovers monthly to watch anime. She had a Pokemon movie and I had my budding collection. My father was so sick of "kid's shows" that he didn't even want to watch Kiddy Grade or Haruhi which is good because he would have taken them from me. I went on the buy Gunslinger Girl and Sprited Away was a birthday gift. At 16 I rushed out to get a job and my collection boomed. By the time I had ten titles I wasn't rewatching them anymore. I bought them all from Best Buy so I overpaid but I was so happy. I had an anime collection. That's pretty much the progression of my early fandom, and I really want to know if I am the only one who has all these fond memories of watching the same thing over and over. |
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Kruszer
 Posts: 7994 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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I started as a casual watcher with Transformers in the 80s as a kid, the old Sci-fi Channel's anime block in the early 90s, with things like Akira, Green Legend Ran, and Iria in late elementary school age, then Robotech in the Mid 90s as a middle school student. What really hooked me into the medium was Dragonball Z though.
After I got into that in my early high school days, I decided I wanted to see more Japanese animation so I went all out and watched all the other Toonami shows. When I saw that the Encore Action channel was airing anime too I also watched that and saw a different, side of the medium with things like Bubblegum Crisis, Ghost in the Shell, and Blue Seed. Then Adult Swim came around and I watched those landmark anime too. At this point I was a moderately large fan. When I graduated in 2001 and started college and a job, I started what is now my gigantic anime collection since I finally had money. The first thing I bought was Vision of Escaflowne because Fox canceled it mid-run and I wanted to see the rest really bad. I was amazed at the number of stuff on the shelves that didn't get aired on TV and ended up trying and liking a whole host of genres I'd never really got into before and became the hardcore fan I am today. Eventually, I my tastes moved away from shounen action shows like DBZ and into seinen at some point along the line, though I still watch the occasional shounen action show. Last edited by Kruszer on Tue Jul 17, 2012 3:19 am; edited 1 time in total |
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moonie92
Posts: 167 |
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I watched Pokemon and stuff on TV but I never connected that as anime. I didn't connect Sailor Moon as anime until I wandered into the anime section at Best Buy. I missed all the Adult Swim anime. It was on too late and I was a little girl.
Did you like everything you saw, or were there some stinkers but you kept watching anyway? |
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Kruszer
Posts: 7994 Location: Minnesota, USA |
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Some of the toonami stuff I didn't like too much, Blue Sub No. 6, comes to mind there, and there were lots of stinkers on the Encore Action channel I didn't really like, but watched anyway because they all short OVA series and movies so they were easily finished.
I also tried to watch Sailor Moon as well, but didn't like it, though further investigation over the years, proved that I just couldn't get into any magical girl show at all, aside from some distinctly uncommon examples of the genre like the Lyrical Nanoha series, and Puela Magi Madoka Magica which I did like. |
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moonie92
Posts: 167 |
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I find it kind of amazing that we all came back to it (or at least a few of us did), even though we watched shows we didn't like at all. Especially so early in our fandom. Had I not liked Sailor Moon I would have never looked for more anime or cartoons as I was calling them and I wouldn't be posting here today. I also wouldn't have the vast majority of my friends. When I think about it those choices to keep watching even though I didn't really like my second and third show pretty much changed my life, even though that sounds really hokey.
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Polycell
 Posts: 4623 |
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I've been pretty poor all my life, so I never owned much of anything until recently(for example, when moving into my current residence, most everything that wasn't furniture or clothes fit in a single box). Me and my brother did have a tape of the Gargoyles pilot movie that we pretty much wore out, though.
Anyway, my first anime were really Pokemon and Digimon. I gained a mild interest in DBZ, but it never really held me that tightly(me and my brother managed to get our father to watch a marathon with us, but he said after that he was burned out); I did catch at least one episode of Sailor Moon, but all I can remember is a girl drinking butter milk and suddenly becoming much older. Somewhere about this time Toonami ran their Giant Robot Week, which got me into Evangelion, Big O and Nadesico; this in turn lead to me and my brother discovering Adult Swim, where we found Kikaider, Cowboy Bebop and a bunch of others. Fast forwarding quite a bit(this period's a bit tumultuous(and hazy in my mind - perhaps I'm just trying to suppress the memories) and involves not having TV, not being interested in TV at all and watching the odd show with my father), I ended up on TVTropes and discovering various series(like Haruhi, Lucky Star and Gurren Lagann) that I decided to "Legitimately Acquire"; I also found out about Astarrote's Toy and ended up following it on Crunchyroll(the first time I'd followed something weekly since I lost interesting in Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood). I bought my first discs from RightStuf a little while later(the only ones I've watched all the way through are Evangelion 2.22 and Armitage III Polymatrix - and the latter was just a few weeks ago) and then got an invite for thirty days of CR premium free, where I picked up Nichijou and YuruYuri and did the CR Bucks thing so I could watch them all the way through. I grabbed their Black Friday special more on a whim and a hope they'd get WORKING`!! than any real care for anime. Early January saw my anger with the direction TVTropes was headed come to a head and I decided I'd never visit that site again(the inability of the "administrator" to separate vandalism by his hand and administrative policy and his general ownership complex of the wiki(isn't the whole point of those that the community runs the show?) had been ticking me off for a while). I ended up here since I needed a new timesink and the general intelligence level of Crunchyroll's forums is far below what I can handle on a regular basis; the winter previews lead me to expand the number of shows I followed, but I didn't really get bit by the anime bug until spring, where I found myself juggling about a dozen shows. A stray post on CR's newsfeed about the Popura Nendoroid had me crunching the numbers to see how badly I should mock those who bought it; in the process I started thinking "that's not all that unreasonable" and preordered her and the playset and thus got into buying figures. My hobby, of course, manages to remind that, despite having more purchasing power than I've ever had in my life, I'm still poor - and have a disturbing lack of shelf space. |
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Riddley
 Posts: 536 Location: Ireland |
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When I was very young, I watched Nausicca and the Valley of the Wind. This was in the early 80s and my sister and I were smitten.
As we grew up in the 80s, there were a lot of cartoons to get into. Particularly we were crazy about Voltron, Thunder Cats, and Transformers. But as I got into my teenage years in the 90s I stopped watching them. I think we all go through a phase were, as teens, we're transitioning from children to young adulthood and it's a tumultuous time. It was during that time I think that I sort of suppressed my love of animation (both japanese and western) for fear of being ridiculed. It wasn't until the late 90s or very early naughties that I came back to it. I'd gotten divorced and moved back to my hometown to go back to college. As a young man in his twenties I found myself hiding away a lot when I should have been socializing. But I found it difficult to identify with my peers and I was suffering a lot from the divorce. It was then that I got into Sailor Moon, Tenchi Muyo, and Dragon Ball Z. Now I will say this, they were all dubs. And they weren't very good ones. But something about the animation and stories grabbed me. I remember Naussica. And I enjoyed the drama, comedy, and the idea of being special. Even at the time though, Sailor Moon was way too kiddy for me. Tenchi was more adult and the relationships between him and the girls was what really caught my attention. I watched DBZ for a bit for the fights, but after the constant repetition I got bored easily. After that though I dropped it again. I tried to connect with a few people about anime but either got the blank stare, the laughing eyes, or the condemnation (why are you watching cartoons at your age?) This was particularly hard because in college I studied humanities, particularly Japanese humanities, and I found myself really enjoying the culture and learning about it. I would occasionally pick up anime over the course of the years, but it wasn't until a few years ago that I really got back into it and accepted it as a part of me and something I really loved. I would say the advancement and acceptance of anime as a whole helped, but it was really me hitting my 30s, having children of my own, and just feeling comfortable in my own skin and with who I am. I don't give a damn anymore whether people judge me based on my hobbies, likes, or dislikes. Once I accepted that part of myself I dived into anime like crazy and haven't let up since  I've got a lot of time to make up for! Over the course of the last few years I've watched 100s of animes and I'm still going! I started at the top of the Top 10 list and worked my way down. And in the last year and a half I've been watching live anime releasing from Japan, which has broadened my exposure a lot.
I think I got lucky there as well cus I know some of the regulars have mentioned that the years after the tsunami have been rather poor. Funny enough, as a result I've become much more interested in learning Japanese and have been exposing myself to it so much that I can pretty easily distinguish between words now and found likely find it easier to pick it up in the future if I want to hardcore study it. Coupled with my love of the Japanese culture, I'd consider myself a Japanphile Even though I'd never live there haha.
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ookamigirl
 Posts: 2274 Location: Croatia |
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I watched Sailor Moon, Dragon Ball and Pokemon on the local TV as a kid. At the time I though they were just cartoons but I totally felt the difference between them and regular cartoons such as Looney Toones & others. I still remember that at first they were just subbed with Japanese audio, but later on they dubbed them. I learned way later on that they were actually anime. After that I discovered there were lots and lots of different anime out there and I started watching them. My official first after those on TV was Fullmetal alchemist. Loved it and continued to watch anime till now. Seems like I keep loving anime more and more as time passes ^-^
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kaydub
 Posts: 318 Location: Cincinnati, OH |
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My first experience with anime was back in the late 90's. I was a huge Pokemon fan as a kid, and I'd always watch the anime on TV after school. Also, I was always watching Cartoon Network, and Toonami came on right as I was coming home from school, so I'd always be watching Dragon Ball Z as well. I didn't really know at this point that there was a real difference between US animation and Japanese animation, I just knew that Pokemon and DBZ were "cool" and that I wanted to watch them.
In the early 2000's, I was really starting to get into shows like Gundam Wing, Outlaw Star, Tenchi Muyo, and Cowboy Bebop (and later on, Trigun and Yu Yu Hakusho). At this point, I knew what anime was, and that it was distinctly different than US animation not only in looks but in plot and style as well, but I still didn't know much about it outside of what was shown on Cartoon Network. After around 2003, once I started high school, I stopped watching anime for a while (I had completely stopped watching TV at some point during high school). The only animation I really watched during my high school years was American stuff like Family Guy, King of the Hill, The Simpsons, and South Park. In fact, I think the only anime/manga I really got into during that time was Initial D, as I had recently discovered the sport of drifting and was really into the Japanese automotive scene. I didn't get back into anime until about 2009 or 2010, when one of my close friends at the time (who was half Japanese and really big into anime and manga) showed me the first couple episodes of Gurren Lagann while I was over at her house. I was completely hooked on how crazy and energetic and colorful it was, and it ended up being the first anime series that I purchased on DVD as I ordered the complete DVD set from Amazon soon after. After that, it was all downhill. I re-watched all my Toonami favorites and got into some newer shows as well, such as Code Geass and Eureka Seven. Those kept me occupied for a while, but I decided I wanted to start watching more and more, and branch outside of my shounen mecha space opera comfort zone. I found ANN after a while and started using the encyclopedia to find new titles, and eventually made an account at some point last year to keep track of what I was watching. Thinking back on when I was just starting to watch anime makes me smile. I still feel like a little kid sometimes, getting all excited to come home from school and watch anime on Toonami. Only now, I'm coming home from work and watching it on my laptop. But the excitement is still there 
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EricJ
 Posts: 876 |
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I remember seeing Beautiful Dreamer raw on laserdisk at the back room of a gaming con, and since I couldn't remember the title, serendipitously searched comic-book-convention markets (that's where you got the VHS tapes, back then) for six months to find out which was the show with the tiger-skin bikini girl. Oh, and Dirty Pair, since that title I did remember.
As luck would have it, one fansubber stuck the UY Ep. 1 sub as filler on the end of "Project Eden", and both my questions were answered. Now familiar with the territory, and how to navigate it, I could explore outwards. |
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DuskyPredator
 Posts: 15580 Location: Brisbane, Australia |
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I watched various anime when I was a kid, but did not know they were really anime, I just liked watching them, this includes: Pokemon (my first), Card Captors, Beyblades, DBZ, Mew Mew Power (aka Tokyo Mew Mew), Zoids and YuGiOh. I will say that I did not really realize about their origins of being Japanese cartoons, until I saw some of my seniors in highschool reading manga, although it felt foreign and out of reach then. I learned about its more ecchi moments though.
I did not have the internet through Highschool so I could not look into the genre, but I did catch an ad on a small channel which had some sort of giant, goth, crow, demon thing shortly before moving. When I moved I got the internet, I liked the art style of the pictures, and I did what you would expect from a 17 year old with the internet, I don't usually mention that part of getting into anime. I must have come across pictures of Death Note, I remembered the commercial and how I liked the feel of it, so I looked into it. At the same time as above I had heard of a popular fad online called Yugioh Abridged, and I watched that and continued watching other abridged series. I moved onto other dubbed anime that were popular: Cowboy Bebop, Bleach, Naruto and Full Metal Alchemist. I purchased DVDs in Death Note, and hit a line when I wanted to watch Zero no Tsukaima, and was forced to watch it subbed, and that is when I really got into anime. |
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egoist
 Posts: 7762 |
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As much as I liked Dragon Ball, Pokemon and Digimon (etc.) between the age of 10-13, the one that really got to me was Saint Seiya. I still remember the afternoons when it aired (usually between 5 and 6). Man, I just loved it.
People tend to revere Pokemon and Dragon Ball as some kind of godlike things from their childhoods, and that sorta distances myself from both franchises. |
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Stark700
 Posts: 11762 Location: Earth |
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I can't remember exactly the first anime I've watched but it might of been either Ronin Warriors or DBZ during my childhood days. One of my best friends showed me an episode of the series which was Vegeta vs Goku in one of the seasons. If I could recall, he also rented videos from the Guyver series and watched them weekly and I occasionally watched it with him when we were bored.
I probably started watching anime seriously though after watching Clamp's Cardcaptor Sakura in subbed. This was the first series that I watched in subbed rather than dubbed. After watching both versions (subbed & dubbed), I got serious into anime and began watching and judging some of them. Some of the earliest anime series that I've watched if I could remember now would be Ronin Warriors, DBZ, Cardcaptor Sakura, Tenchi Muyo!, Digimon Adventures, and some other Toonami's titles. The first long terms series that I've looked at a bit more carefully was (shock and horror) Naruto when I was a sophomore in High School. Yup, the years have gone past by so fast 
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born2die
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I feeel youuuu banana, I peel you. I religiously watched Pokemon everyday when I was young. I thought it to be the most amazing thing ever when I was in second grade, although didn't understand that it was "Anime". Even so, to me it's gotten to be a trend. A cool thing if you liked it. Same goes for Dragon Ball Z or Sailor Moon. |
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born2die
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I feeel youuuu banana, I peel you. I religiously watched Pokemon everyday when I was young. I thought it to be the most amazing thing ever when I was in second grade, although didn't understand that it was "Anime". Even so, to me it's gotten to be a trend. A cool thing if you liked it. Same goes for Dragon Ball Z or Sailor Moon. |
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