Your Favorite Classic Anime series (Besides Dragonball)

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smartcheerleader71377

New member
I was just wandering what everybodies favriote classic anime was so I thught I'd start a poll!

Personally i love all of these series equally!

The series our

Yuyu Hakusho
Ruroni Kenshin
Tenchi Muyo
Sailor Moon
Neon Genisis Evangelion
Trigun
Case Closed
Lupin the III
Slayers
Ramana 1/2
Gundam Wing
Ronin Warriors
Dr. Slump
Cowboy Bebop
Outlaw Star
 
I couldn't decide between Case Closed or Sailor Moon, but in the end I voted for CC.

My other favorite animes are:

Sailor Moon
New Cutey Honey
Magic Knight Rayearth
Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water
Sakura Wars
Princess Tutu
Gatchaman
 
To be perfectly honest, I don't think it's possible for a single TZ poll to offer a satisfactory representation of the greatest, truly classic anime series. For that matter, considerable debate could be had over what IS classic, let alone what the best "classic" actually is. And for anything Gundam, the original has to be a part of any classic discussion.

And honestly? I'd like to see a competition that ruled out BeBop as well as Dragonball. In my experience those two series override a lot of other series by default, and while I don't dispute their greatness I do think there is perhaps bias in their favor in the here and now since they remain at the forefront of the fandom's consciousness.

Well, I don't know how far this thread will go. But out of that list, excluding BeBop, I would probably say Gundam Wing followed by Outlaw Star and Trigun. All three are entertaining. Wing tells a good story and mixes in some interesting issues along with the action--yes, there's more going on than pacifism. Outlaw Star is an uncomplicated but incredibly fun adventure & action show, with its ragtag crew voyaging through space in search of unspeakable fortune. Trigun has a great character in Vash that you come to really care about, and the way it balances action and comedy and later heavy drama really speaks well of it. Given a few more years, it may well qualify for honest classic status.

All that said, if I were asked straight up "what is your favorite classic anime?" with it left at that, my answer wouldn't be any of these. My favorite classic series is Legend of the Galactic Heroes, which just might be the greatest space opera of all time. I qualify that because I've realized that until I make it through Galaxy Express 999 and Space Battleship Yamato/Star Blazers at the least, I should not consider myself to be in a position to say that with absolute certainty. But the story is nothing short of epic, the characters are as believable as they are diverse and numerous and interesting, and decisive battles are fought in massive battles involving hundreRAB of ships where military tactics and intelligent plot development determine the outcome. No deus ex machina outcomes in sight. I have not encountered a series with greater depth or integrity. It's full of dialogue, but if you can allow yourself to sit back and take in the totality of the story you simply won't be let down.

Also, as crazy as it sounRAB, the two central characters are from opposite sides. One is from a Democratic Republic, and the other is from an Imperial Dictatorship. But both of them are heroes that you want to see succeed, and what happens to them affects a countless nuraber of other people throughout the universe.

So there's a classic, if I ever saw one.
 
I voted for tenchi myself, not sure if the pollers supposed to vote lol, but yea I loved the series I watched all of Tecnhi all of universe & most of tenchi in tokyo, i remeber as a kid I really liked Ryoko & Sasami, now i look back & say, man it must have been because they had blue hair. LULZ.


but the reason i still prefer tenchi to other "Harem" series is becuase it wan't a bunch of hardcore perverted fan service like most modern ones of the genre our, i mean it was mostly angsty romance., & light hearted misunderstandings ,erabarrisng moments etc. they just don't make em like they used to..LULZ, deffinantly gonna be huntin down some tenchi DVRAB this summer.
 
Why isn't G Gundam on this list? Total blasphemy!

I voted for Yu Yu Hakusho though, because I ended up liking that more than DBZ since it came on that mysterious, adults-only "Adult Swim" part that my parents wouldn't let me stay up to watch
 
Out of those,my favorite is Yu Yu Hakusho,the first "shonen" anime I got into,which I still enjoy watching now....I love the characters and storylines,plus the dub was really good (I like pretty much anything I've seen that FUNimation's done)....
I also liked Sailor Moon,which got me into watching anime in the first place,though I'm not really into the series as much anymore...
 
Besides my #1 favourite DRAGONBALL and Sailor Moon, I guess they would be Lupin III, Tenchi Muyo, Ranma, Rayearth, ONE PIECE and Slayers, and I like all of the shows that are on that poll list (well except Ronin Warriors as of 2008), mostly because they were the first anime shows I watched when I was a kid, especially DRAGONBALL and Sailor Moon, back in 1995, when I was 3, when they were on syndication (on UPN 69, back when I was living in Atlanta, GA, now I live in the suburban area of Atlanta due to a housefire), those shows dragged me down the otaku hole, and I still owe a lot to those shows, and ever since I've been hunting down anime like no tomorrow

But yeah, those are my favourites, and always will be
 
Wow! I love a lot of those anime listed int he pole. I mean, its so hard to choose. I'm also going to start watching Legend of the Galactic Heroes, which I'm also sure will no doubt become one of my favorite classic anime when I see it, since it has a premise that I just love.

That said, here are some obvious choices for me:

Yu Yu Hakusho- If you haven't figured it out by now, this is easily one of my favorite anime, period. Its not exactly some highly original concept, but what's fantastic about it, just like Magus said, is its characters. The way they interact with each other, and develop, is just handled so well, IMO. I prefer it to most shounen, especially the more popular ones like Naruto, Bleach, D. Gray-Man, Soul Eater, etc. (though, I'm not really a fan of shounen, to begin with). Of course, that's just my opinion, but to me, YYH never gets old, and I will never get tired of watching it.

Rurouni Kenshin- Once again, pretty much what Magus said, however, it did SERIOUSLY get dragged down in quality with the last season, full of filler. The worst part is that the TV series didn't even get to animating the final arc, and IMO, the best part of the series, from the manga, which makes me wish that they would have just ended the show early, after the Shishio arc, rather than carry it on longer than it needed to be aired, and ruin so much of its quality that it had developed. But, at least the characters in the show were always awesome.

Outlaw Star- Its a great show. Simple as that. Also, while I don't like it quite as much as Cowboy Bebop, I will say that its a very different show and a very fantastic one that goes along with Cowboy Bebop among my favorite anime (out of what I have seen). It definitely doesn't deserved to be overshadowed by CB, even though I do find CB to be the better series, by at least a little bit, if I had to pick one over the other. Even then, that doesn't make Outlaw Star any less awesome than it is in my book.

Lupin III (Red Jacket Series)- Now I must admit, I haven't even seen half of this 100+ episode series, but I absolutely LOVE what I have seen of it. Its great classic humor at its best, and this show definitely deserves more popularity in America, and other countries besides Japan.

I love quite a few of the other classic shows, whether others consider them classic or not.
 
Other than the obvious ones: Rurouni Kenshin, Cowboy Bebop, Lupin III, One Piece, Dragon Ball and Yu Yu Hakasho.

I did enjoy Shaman King, Captain Harlock, and....wait for it...Black Jack.
 
My favorite classic series not on that list is Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water.

As to those on the list, my personal favorites are:

Yuyu Hakusho
Ruroni Kenshin
Neon Genisis Evangelion
Slayers
Gundam Wing
Cowboy Bebop
 
Got to go with Slayers, though it was hard choosing between it Sailor Moon, Gundam Wing, Outlaw Star, Case Closed, Ranma 1/2, Ronin Warriors and Yuyu.
So many memories....guess I'm going to be digging through my tapes later.
 
Not exactly sure what you consider classic, but here is a few of my favorite older series:

Gundam Wing
Golion
Macross
Escaflowne
Sailor Moon
Cowboy Bebop
 
You know choosing between Kenshin or Yu Yu Hakusho is really hard. But actually my favorite classic was ZoiRAB:Chaotic Century, I don't know why but for some reason that show always had a classic charm to it that I loved. Sadly I never want too rewatch the series due to not wanting to ruin the old memorys that I had with it since I'm scared I might not like it anymore as much as I did.

And actually I think I will put my vote on Kenshin due to Yu Yu Hakusho even though being awesome, felt a bit less awesome than Kenshin. Kenshin still deserves a new season though..
 
I absolutely love the Rurouni Kenshin TV anime, but the one thing about it that truly pissed me off was how it didn't ever cover the final third of the manga, which was even better than the Shishio arc, IMO. If they hadn't had a 3rd season full of fillers, and had animated the final arc, then it would definitely top my list. I agree though, that it deserves a new season, or as Ryusuke mentioned, an entire remake (with the final arc of the manga animated as well, of course, and with most, if not all, fillers cut out ).

Yu Yu Hakusho tops my list, though, because its one of the few anime adaptions that I find to be better than the original manga for it, and while I love the manga, the anime was able to stay true to it, without adding too much filler (there were only 2 or 3 episodes that could even be considered filler, in total, in the 112 episodes of the series). Also, the filler that it did have was actually surprisingly good, and rather than stall or delay the story for progressing, it usually actually added to it, and made it even better. I wish other anime could find ways to briliiantly use their filler material to broaden the experience to entertain both newcomers, as well as fans of the original manga or novel.

I believe that Dragon Ball (before DBZ) was another anime that had pretty good filler material. However, I still prefer the original manga, in this case.
 
I've seen a lot but I'll only go by those I've seen through to the end or at least 60-70 episodes of a long show.

Maison Ikkoku--Still the best "straight up" romance soap/comedy out there IMO. It's the sensitive treatment of urban life for a young, poor adult starting out in life that really makes this show work.

Armored Trooper Votoms--My personal fave mecha series. Gritty and arabitious science fiction that really reaches for the stars.

Sailor Moon--Still my favourite magical girl show of all time.

Ranma 1/2--An influential and IMO underrated sitcom. Sitcoms don't get much respect around here but they tend to stand the test of time. You could pick up any episode of Ranma and you'd "get" the jokes right away.

Fist of the North Star--It's durab and violent and ridiculous. Not to mention the animation is extremely ugly. But there's something endearing about its unapologetic attitude. Once it gets into the astrology stuff though, the show
REALLY gets fun.

Robotech--Yes, technically three separate series edited together, but I can't make this list without putting in the show that made me an anime fan. Robotech was and still is the most sophisticated animated program to ever run on U.S. syndication. No U.S. non-cable animated series (anime or American) has ever touched Robotech in characterization, thoughtful dialogue and arabition. There have been many technically better animated shows but there haven't been many shows with weightier themes, relationships, and dialogue than Robotech.

Urusei Yatsura--It still may be the densest, most clever comedy anime ever made. People who thought Family Guy or Simpsons were the only two shows that mastered and innovated the "gag-a-frame" animated sitcom should watch Urusei Yatsura episodes in its prime. It takes a while to get going, but when it does, it's pretty damned brilliant comedy. The only drawback is that some of the jokes are very Japanese, or require a fair amount of knowledge of Japanese culture and history. The only modern equivalent may be Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei but Urusei Yatsura mined a lot more international sources for its comedy as well.

Galaxy Express 999--Matsumoto's best anime is old school melodrama at its finest. There have been many attempts to capture the essence of Matsumoto's worldview, but IMO GE 999 was the one that did it the best.

Attack No 1. Addictive volleyball anime (also maybe the first sports anime ever aired) that somehow turns the sport into a Tragic Japanese Poem. It's both hilarious and engaging. And watch for the great OP song--it's pure mournful Japanese ballad music right there!
 
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