Where can I find better anime?

[TheFeniX]

I caught Lupin III on Adult Swim, but that really doesn't count. Pretty damn good anime though. But a large majority of my "old school" stuff would have been from the 80s: Akira, Fist of the You are Already Dead, etc. Man, I remember so little about either of those.

So Voltron, 5 dudes and a hot Elven Princess. I don't know, that's just... too on the nose for 2016. Is the nerdy one a girl or am I just high? First scene I was thinking "dumpy nerd girl," but now I don't know. Female voice actresses do a good job with young males, but it breaks through, and I swear his VA is a woman, but I'm not googling it. Still, they have female cadets, so that doesn't make any sense and Bart Simpson's been voiced by a woman for 150 years, so that's not a stretch. My wife thinks I'm crazy, but that's nothing new. Whatever, I'm probably just grasping at straws.

Pretty solid for a kid's show. The premise is.... from a kids show, but the animation is solid, the humor is capable of delivering laughs to seemingly all age groups, even though I'm basically a man-child, and it doesn't waste a whole lot of screentime before getting into the meat. Will continue to watch.

[LadyTevar]

So Voltron, 5 dudes and a hot Elven Princess. I don't know, that's just... too on the nose for 2016. Is the nerdy one a girl or am I just high? First scene I was thinking "dumpy nerd girl," but now I don't know. Female voice actresses do a good job with young males, but it breaks through, and I swear his VA is a woman, but I'm not googling it. Still, they have female cadets, so that doesn't make any sense and Bart Simpson's been voiced by a woman for 150 years, so that's not a stretch. My wife thinks I'm crazy, but that's nothing new. Whatever, I'm probably just grasping at straws.

Keep watching, Pidge's sex will be revealed in Season One.
I highly enjoy Voltron, although there are a couple "filler" eps that can be skipped imho.

[TheFeniX]

Yea, the kid's out of stuff to watch and you seemed pretty excited about it so I figured "what the hey." Anything to keep the wife from loading up another Super Simple Songs because: "Dear God? Please make the pain stop."

[Q99]

1. Is Elfen Lied any good? It was out during that time I was given anime a pass. Heard both good and terrible things about it.

Elfen Lied is mood whiplash the series.

It's got some good stuff, but it's variable, and part of the effect is it's really hard to tell where the next scene is going to go. Like some bits are slice of life hijinks, some are pretty emotionally brutal scenes, and some are sudden fore. I can't say it's a smoothly made series but that roughness creates an unpredictability most horror doesn't, and there were some very effective stories and scenes in there.

Honestly I like it, but flipside I entirely understand why others don't.

Dominus Atheos is partially misremembering some stuff- like, one character gets artificial limbs, and then purposefully detaches them occasionally rather than having them get cut off repeatedly, but yea, plenty of people are going to hate it and I can't say they're wrong.



For a more conventionally good horror series, I liked Devillady /(aka Devilman Lady) of Go Nagai's Devilman series.

[SAMAS]

So, bringing this back up because I noticed some stuff got passed over.

Summer Wars: A movie about two seemingly unrelated plots: A girl asks her classmate to pretend to be her fiance for her grandmother's birthday party, while a supervirus rampages though the internet. Both turn out to be very closely connected.

Space Battleship Yamato 2199: a remake of a classic series from the 70's. Earth is being slowly destroyed by hostile Xenoforming by the Gamilas Empire. Friendly aliens send a message saying they have the technology to reverse it, but Mankind will have to come to their galaxy to get it. Fortunately, they give us the technology to do so. So naturally, Humanity bolts it onto a battleship and turns it into a huge gun.

Gargantia of the Verdant Planet is a pretty interesting series. A young mech pilot and his sentient machine find themselves crashed on a watery world, far from their battlefield. They end up on a huge flotilla of ships sailing the endless ocean, and find themselves having to make a life in a world that doesn't have much use for their skills.

Yona of the DawnL A Fantasy series with reverse Harem elements. A spoiled princess in Fantasy NotKorea has her life turned upside down when her beloved cousin kills her father and takes over the country. So she and her hot bodyguard/childhood friend seek to regain her throne by calling on the aid of the Four Dragon Warriors, who of course all happen to be attractive young men.

GARO is a fairly long-running adult toku Horror series about gold-armored knights who battle demons(think Power Rangers meets Hellsing). There have been three anime adaptations licensed by Funimation, and they're pretty good.

[Q99]

Devilman Crybaby is a super popular one right now. It is *dark*, it has sex and violence, but it's really well done.

[TheFeniX]

Yea, I have to hold off on Crybaby for the when the other people who occupy my home aren't there. Still only 3 episodes in.

Gargantia of the Verdant Planet, I've only got the last two episodes to go, but it's all serious business now and I know it's about the end so I just stopped watching as at that point, I was tired of getting invested in something and it just be "done." I'm in for some pain here anyway, but I figured I could take a break to mess around with Ash vs the Evil Dead. I feel the same way about Knights of Sidonia, but at least that went on longer, and it looks like they are releasing more this year.

[Elheru Aran]

Ash vs the Evil Dead is good not-so-clean fun. It heavily references the first couple of movies and has shied clear of Army of Darkness apart from a few references, but it's pretty clear they're going to bring it up later on and that it actually happened. If you like the Evil Dead series, you'll like Ash.

Anyway. Anime. I've actually found Cowboy Bebop on Prime. That's been fun since I actually never watched more than the one episode of Bebop back in the day. It's surprisingly excellent.

Also, got into Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. I still like the original FMA anime a little better, but Brotherhood has had a quite good plot so far, particularly once you get past the initial... eh, ten? episodes that it shares with the original. Since it follows the manga much more closely, it's predictable if you've read that, but the plot still holds up pretty well, and the Elrics are always fun to watch together.

[Dominus Atheos]

Yea, I have to hold off on Crybaby for the when the other people who occupy my home aren't there. Still only 3 episodes in.

Gargantia of the Verdant Planet, I've only got the last two episodes to go, but it's all serious business now and I know it's about the end so I just stopped watching as at that point, I was tired of getting invested in something and it just be "done." I'm in for some pain here anyway, but I figured I could take a break to mess around with Ash vs the Evil Dead. I feel the same way about Knights of Sidonia, but at least that went on longer, and it looks like they are releasing more this year.

Is you oiginal question "Where can I find better anime?" still limited to "on netflix" o is it actually "Where can I find better anime?"

Because you've watched all the anime on netflix it sounds like.Can I can convince you to subscribe to hidive?

[Elheru Aran]

I'll also throw in my hat for Amazon Prime. The actual amount of anime available there isn't like... seriously deep, but it can hook you up with stuff on Hulu and channels like Tubi. However those work, I don't know, I haven't dug into them just yet (only just got a Fire TV Stick a month or two ago).

[TheFeniX]

The wife has Amazon Prime for Teacher Stuff.™ I used it to watch The Tick. While... actually pretty good, it's gone mostly it's own route from the Cartoon and Live Action version. It gets too serious at times for my taste. I had added some other "free" stuff to the watch list, but my wife had to remove it because her 1st period kids lost their shit when they thought she watched anime.

I still have my list.... mostly, it made the move, but Littleman tore a chunk of it off. I should really type things. I have my streaming box setup, but we don't have a decent electronics stand for near the TV. The Xbone is setup, which can do Funimation and Crunchyroll, but we dove pretty strong into SWTOR again (when this thread was made, we were only fucking around in HotS and that game is BS), so it's hard to justify setting up a bunch of stuff and paying out for anime I'll only watch at 3am when the wife is snoring too loud.

I just figured we'd talk (and bitch) about anime at this point. I mean, it never hurts to have shit rolling around in my head as an "oh yea" moment. I also found my old anime box, so (if I can handle the lack of fidelity) I plan to watch Escaflowne again as I remember so little of it.

[Elheru Aran]

Finished FMA: Brotherhood today.

Man, even though I know how it ends... it's still fucking brutal. It hurts. It's a good hurt, though. Just everything that the Elrics go through. As it all gets up to the end, the shit never stops raining down on their heads.

[K. A. Pital]

Genocidal Organ, a recent thing, is actually fairly good if one goes beyond metaphors and to the actual reality it represents.

Although Psycho-Pass definetely remains a superior story, and perhaps a superior and more ominous and important exploration of reality and concepts of what constitutes a crime.

[LadyTevar]

Not Anime, as it's a joint Italian/US effort, but I've been enjoying the cartoon Huntik: Secrets and Seekers, now on Netflix.
There's two full seasons (48 eps), with seasonal arcs, mini-orcs, and an overreaching story. Seems to have taken a page from Timmverse, both in animation style and scripts that are well-written, with dialogue that works on adult and child levels. Great character growth across the show, even with the villains. Also, while most fights end with the villains running away, there are consequences for repeated failures, which also allow new, more powerful (and interesting) villains to step up.

The Premise:
Lok Lambert, a teenager who has a knack for puzzles but is otherwise ordinary. However, that changes when he and classmate Sophie Casterwill discover a journal belonging to Lok's missing father, alongside a mysterious amulet. Within mere moments, they are attacked by "The Suits", henchmen under the employment of "The Organization".
Lok and Sophie manage to drive away the suits with the help of Dante Vale, a private detective with an extensive knowledge of amulets. Dante also informs Lok of his destiny as a Seeker, a person who can use magic and bond with magical creatures called Titans, and recruits him into the Huntik Foundation, an alliance of Seekers with noble purposes who try to find and investigate historical and magical artifacts. Now Lok and his new friends must use the knowledge contained within his father's journal to find other Titans and to keep them out of the world-domination-seeking hands of The Organization.

The Characters: (using TV Tropes file system)
Lok Lambert: Ordinary High-School Student, becomes The Lancer over the course of the series. His search for his father drives the first season, and drives him to become a hero.

Sophie Casterwill: The orphaned daughter of the family that started the Huntik Foundation, she's a Deadpan Snarker who is not only The Smart Girl, but also The Action Girl, who does a great job holding her own until Lok comes into his power.

Dante Vale: (love his name, just so suave) He's the Ace of Huntik, and becomes The Mentor to both Lok and Sophie. As The Leader, he comes up with the plans (which are never spoken aloud) and most are shades of Batman Gambits, if not Zanatos Gambits.

Zhalia Moon: Another Deadpan Snarker, she is the Dark Action Girl and at first the Aloof Dark-haired Girl. She is also The Big Guy, able to hold her own with Dante. She also becomes The Love Interest for Dante, in a very touching way.

And then there's Cherrit, the Token Non-Human. He's a ancient Titan, but unlike the other Titans he's not bound to a amulet or ring, making him free to help Huntik as much as he wants. Thankfully, he's not annoying like most token 'pets', he is another Smart Guy, able to help Lok solve several puzzles along the way. Part of that is his age, he's Over 700, but his memory isn't as good as it used to be.

[TheFeniX]

Strassman voicing a snarker. Could be good, she always a treat and hard to pick out. I always liked Chromie either way.

[Elheru Aran]

Not quite anime... but Netflix released the Japanese live-action FMA movie. Had to watch it, of course.

Hoo boy. The CGI Alphonse is very well done (though he seems awkwardly fitted into some interior scenes), and the alchemy effects are pretty OK for the most part. I don't know if Ed's automail is a physical effect or CGI, probably CGI, but anyway. You can definitely tell they didn't film the exteriors in Japan, IIRC it was in Italy and looks like it. Not bad. The costumes are also pretty well done in general. The Japanese actors suit their anime/manga counterparts pretty well, particularly Marcoh, though Mustang looks a bit silly.

Without spoilers though... they bend, twist, and mutilate the plot rather excessively to fit everything into a two-and-a-quarter-hour film. And even then it wasn't 'everything', apparently they're saving some characters for the sequel.

Honestly it left a rather bad taste in my mouth. It wasn't -terrible-, but... it wasn't great, either. It's worth a watch, but I wouldn't recommend watching it only a week after finishing the vastly superior Brotherhood...

[Q99]

Hey, you know how most giant robot series have the robot controlled by a young kid with a remote control at a distance from the action?

Well Mazinger Z introduces a revolutionary new concept: There's a cockpit so that a pilot can pilot the mecha from the inside!

What will they think of next?

[LadyTevar]

Hey, you know how most giant robot series have the robot controlled by a young kid with a remote control at a distance from the action?

Well Mazinger Z introduces a revolutionary new concept: There's a cockpit so that a pilot can pilot the mecha from the inside!

What will they think of next?

What giant robot anime have you been watching?

[Q99]

Obviously recent hits like Tetsujin 28 and Giant Robo!

[TheFeniX]

Ho boy, the AICO English dub. Wow. I honestly can't think of a worse dub off-hand. I caught parts of a couple episodes of One Piece, but I recall that just being terrible. AICO is both terrible and harsh on the ears. The girls are practically screeching at the microphone. The Japanese dub is (thankfully) pretty good.

So, I don't know if I asked here, but I recall another anime where some psychic woman pulls this guy to her, digs her fingers into his skull (physically, like knuckle deep), sucks up all the info he has, then lifts his body up into the air and he explodes in a shower of blood. Was that Angel Cop? It's literally the only thing I remember about the anime, probably because I was high on pain-killers at the time. Legitimate BTW as I had just had foot surgery.

[TheFeniX]

I finally got the chance to finish up Devilman. Yea, it had a pretty hard shift, but setup really well so it wasn't like they blind-sided you. Americans think they know "grimdark." Hell, this isn't even that, it's just grim. Not even grim really. It's a singularity of "how can we make you feel MORE shitty after watching this?" I haven't got much. I mean, had they shown someone strangle a Golden Retriever to death.... or beat a toddler to death with a shovel and take their time doing it.

That could have made the ending mildly more depressing that it was. And the toddler/shovel thing, as shocking as that would be, I mean the show already had it beat. Fucking. Bravo. 9/10 anime. Would NOT watch again. Because it would ruin the impact. There's a few annoyances, the info dump at the end, the feeling of "oh man, we have to wrap this whole thing up in 2 episodes." But still really solid.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

You say that's grim only because you've never seen Yojo Senki.

[Elheru Aran]

I recommended this on the Streaming Recommendations thread, but I'll throw it in again here (unless I already did, I don't think I did)-- Silver Spoon on Netflix. It's a Hiromu Arawaka work. So plot is pretty decent. Artwork is reasonably average. Pretty amusing without being overly cheesy.

I mean... as far as animes go, it's fairly generic, considering... but the story is actually rather fun.

Sometimes one just needs a break from all the sex and violence, yanno?

[TheFeniX]

You say that's grim only because you've never seen Yojo Senki.

Kharak is burning.

More seriously, I'll probably have to take a hard pass based on that recommendation.

Sometimes one just needs a break from all the sex and violence, yanno?

I just watched the scene in Fairytail (for like the 5th time) where Mira Jane gets her takeover power back and wails on Freed (he had it coming). So, I can kind of get where you're coming from, so I started in on Violet Evergreen. The violence is pretty low (except in flashbacks), then Cattleya enters the screen and I got my second wind.

Anyways, I got my streaming PC set back up, so it's been nice to watch DBZ Abridged with a popupblocker. On that same PC, I found my old FLCL videos. Which is cool because they pulled it off Netflix.

This did however lead to a funny conversation:
Wife: "That is ugly."
Me: "Yea, kind of low res at this point."
Wife: "What resolution is it at, smart man."
Me: I think "5."
Wife: "5 what?"
Me: "Just 5."

[U.P. Cinnabar]

Ah, FLCL. One of the classics.