On December 19, 2023, I reached the milestone of watching
5000 anime titles with my 5000th title being the
Lupin III Pilot Film. Coincidentally, Lupin III's been one of my longtime favorite anime franchises since I seen Part 2 of the series on Adult Swim back in the 2000s and deliberately chose to set this title aside for this milestone when I reached this point just as a memento and some bragging rights for this achievement. Not so sure if 10,000 titles will be in the cards depending on whatever life circumstances get in the way. But I shall keep this paragraph up as a reminder of this goal I've set for myself as an anime fan.
On July 3, 2022, I made the milestone of reaching my
500th day of viewing anime. Whether you think of this as an impressive achievement or a waste of time is your call. From my end, my lifetime viewing of anime continues onward.
I've been a fan of anime for over 22 years now, having seen a good number of anime franchises and notable titles both past and present as I've seen over 5300 anime titles. My biggest turn offs with anime titles are fan service heavy titles, moe pandering and the use of gratuitous violence and sex for shock value in an anime title. Feel free to dig into my list to see any anime I've dabbled into over the years to find anything of interest.
Don't be too surprised if I have a slim list for manga as I am more a viewer of anime than I am a reader of manga. I hardly read manga nowadays except in cases where I need to look through it to recall events from what I read from the past, though I may make an exception if I come across a manga title that has yet to be adapted into anime form.
My Rating Scale
10 - Masterpiece. Pretty much anything I'd regard as flawless.
9 - Excellent. An all-time great for me.
8 - Very good. A title I'd still highly recommend, even if it has some flaws.
7 - Good. Has its issues, but wouldn't necessarily say I regret my time having seen it.
5 and 6 - Average for the most part. Will rate the title 6 if there are some elements to the title in question I think do enough to make it less mediocre, but not enough to make me hand it a 7.
4 or below - Bottom of the barrel quality. Lower the number, the worst the title is for me personally.
Favorite Anime of Mine by Years I've Existed (1985-2023)
Best Guy by Years I've Existed (1985-2023)
Best Girl by Years I've Existed (1985-2023)
Top 10 Worst Anime I've Ever Seen
Top 10 Anime OP
Top 10 Anime ED
Most Review Reactions (as of 2/5/2024)
All Comments (168) Comments
I knew who Matsumoto Leiji was, but I don't think I had seen anything by him directly. "The Cocpit" might have been the first one. Before "Interstella-5555" and "Captain Harlock."
In "Captain Harlock" the Queen of the Mazone leads her people into a mass exodus to save them from peril, coming into conflict with the one man who was ready to stand up to them, to save the Humans who scorn him. Later, it's revealed that the Queen herself is a human, which is never explained. But goes to show that it's one's kin versus another.
Common in all three works is the employment of goofy-looking characters alongside more traditionally drawn (in anime) ones. The Americans in "The Cockpit" do not have them, neither do the Mazone, or the antagonists of "5555". The Germans in the first episode also don't have them. In fact, they appear more sinister, as if degraded compared to the hero and his love interest, than the enemy whom we never actually see, just their fighter planes.
When people talk about "There's only one race (literally "people") the Human race" they're talking about our shared common ancestry, invoking the need to be loyal to one another, to be fair amongst ourselves, so that we don't have anymore bloodshed. But our common lineage is just the byproduct of evolution, and no other animal species avoids conflict and destruction within its ranks entirely, either. It's a bizarre truism that calls to cease our selfish notions of kinship, but neglects to acknowledge the establishment of sub-groups of "people" who have families and bonds and who will want to protect those families in order for the gens to survive.
I guess that's why DINKS (Dual income no kids) or a new wave of anti-natalists have emerged, to say "it's cool to just consume products, you don't need a family".
To bring this back to anime - the creator of Gundam saw the need to show the two sides of a conflict in his story. It's worth noting that the main character let goes of his biological family and gets taken in by his foster one - the crew of the White base. But him and they are still part of a greater family, the Earth Federation. So, rather like a primitive aboriginal, he just leaves one gens (clan) for another, but they're still related in a sense. Through memetics, ideas, values, norms, beliefs, etc;
Very interesting.
In Bulgaria, Cartoon Network originally had to share a spot with Turner Classic Movies and they'd rerun various old WW 2 movies like the Dirty Dozen constantly, which didn't have very virtuous characters. I think exposure to those kinds of films saved me as a kid from glorifying one side over the other.
I guess that's one very positive aspect of old Anglo-American cinema as opposed to old Soviet cinema. I think the first 20 years of World War II cinema in the USSR, the majority of films was the hero kind, in which the Red guard violently and honorably opposes the invading German/"Nazi" force. Really one-sided, but I guess that's to be expected.
Two months back I watched "Hell in the Pacific" with Mifune and Lee Marvin. Enemy soldiers who hate each other come to work together to survive and form a friendship. It falls apart when the sobriety of living ends, having survived the worst of it, and the merry times begin with them becoming inebriated. Suddenly they remember that they are enemies, from different civilisations, and the friendship ends. I wonder if there's an anime like that.
Yeah, I watched them all online but it wasn't very good imo