#like the biggest ones for me are Kinomoto Sakura and Duck from Princess Tutu

[calcescarp]

to be honest there will never be anything as Rubin-core as the fact that i can't remember finishing a show in literal years and yet i just watched the whole first season of Kamisama Kiss in one sitting

[anthonyreadsthecards]

Hey so I saw you talk about Escaflowne are there other anime that you like and would recommend?

I mean...yeah but I’m what the kids call a “filthy casual” when it comes to anime. I don’t really watch a lot anymore. I think last year I watched like two or three? I can recommend what I like but I’m just gonna warn you now you’re in store for a lot of Magical Girl anime. Read for more if you dare.

So I feel like the first and most obvious anime I would recommend is, of course, Sailor Moon. Now while I don’t normally care for anime that are over a minimum of 13 and a maximum of 30 Sailor Moon is one of the few exceptions. Stacking up at 200 episodes the series has four seasons and overall it’s pretty damn great. Yes there is filler and yes it is a bit dated but people don’t give Sailor Moon enough credit. Our main character Usagi begins the series a little self-absorbed and a huge cry baby but ends with the biggest heart out of everyone and sacrifices her life, more than one occasion I might add, to save the world and those she loves. Plus everyone has a Scout that they can relate to (Neptune is bae) and everyone has their favorite arc (Saturn/Mistress 9 or Nehelenia arc). And while people complain about the filler those episodes are used to round out all of the characters and give each girl their moment to shine. Unlike Sailor Moon Crystal but I’m not getting into that rant today. I prefer the japanese dub because that’s all I really had since the DiC dub was all we had in the States at the time but there is a new dub from Funimation that is very faithful to the original script so whichever you prefer on that end. We also have two movies which are great

Another 90s classic would be Cardcaptor Sakura. I unapologetically love this anime despite it not having aged well in terms of writing. Sakura Kinomoto is our main character who accidently releases the mysterious Clow Cards and she must find and capture the cards or else they’ll wreak havoc. Season 1 is all about capturing the cards and Season 2, the better season imo, is about Sakura becoming the new master of the cards. So the writing is a bit...problematic and this is mostly due to CLAMP’s, the writers for the show and manga, wanting to take the concept of love and seeing it from multiple angles in all of their works. Cardcaptor Sakura is no exception...however there is a lot, and I do mean a lot, of relationships that show age gaps between two characters. Sakura has her crush on her brother’s friend Yukito she’s ten and he’s in high school, Sakura’s dad was a fresh out of college high school teacher when Sakura’s mother was like sixteen or seventeen and they got married after she graduated, and then there’s Rika, Sakura’s classmate, who has a crush on their homeroom teacher and it’s just...sigh. There is a good episode in Season 2 when Yuki finally breaks it to Sakura that she’s way too young for him, besides him having eyes only for her older brother, Toya, and Sakura realizes that she doesn’t love Yuki in the way that she thought before and it’s really good. Nothing is sexualized, everything is cute, and the characters are allowed to feel and express themselves which is you know great. There is also two movies as well as the sequel to the show the Clear Card Arc but I don’t recommend the sequel mostly because nothing happens and it’s mostly used to show how cute Sakura and her boyfriend are...which is a lot I’m not gonna lie they are incredibly cute and I love them. That being said the rest of the series is full of low stakes questions not being answered and a cliffhanger ending and who knows when that’ll get resolved (I’m not bitter I promise). So yeah stick with the OG anime. There was no redub of the show so I would just recommend the Japanese dub.

Revolutionary Girl Utena is one of my favorite anime of all time. Seriously when I’m super depressed I binge the whole show. This show has a lot going on symbolically and that’s like crack to me. I love deciphering hidden meanings in shows and Utena has that in spades. The show subverts a lot of tropes and gives me so many feels. The show is about Utena Tejo who dresses in the school’s male uniform instead of the girl one. She is a tomboy, good a sports, and pretty decent with a sword come to find out. She duels one of the student council members for Anthy Himemiya the Rose Bride. Anthy, who is just another student at the school, is passed around from duelist to duelist and is treated however her owner sees fit. After winning Utena treats Anthy like a friend and protects her from other duelists so that Anthy can be free to make her own decisions. It’s so good. Like really good. My main complaints come from the loooong walking scenes to the dueling area that we go through every episode but honestly it’s worth. The characters are well written, not all likeable but well written, the animation is pretty, the jokes from the gossip girls are dumb and I love them, and the overall story is just great. We even get queer characters. There is a movie retelling the events of the show but it’s...well...different. I would stick to the anime.

So I you know how I mentioned I like symbolism in my shows? Well one thing that I really like is when it symbolism that involves fairy tales. Princess Tutu while funny when you say the title is another great show with darker things going on in the background than one would assume. In the show we follow Duck, yeah that’s her name, an actual duck that transforms into a young girl due to the machinations of the mysterious Drosselmeyer the author of the fairy tale we are in. This anime deals with ballet which I love and uses dance and music to help Duck purify the hearts of those who have been taken over by darkness. This show gets a bit dark over the course of the series but the hope and light that comes from it by the end is so worth it. 

Ok this is the last magical girl anime I promise. Puella Magia Madoka Magica is amazing, dark, subversive, and soul crushing. I love this show, again, for the symbolism, the characters, the music, the animation, and for how much it makes me cry. There are a lot of allusions to Faust and things get darker well before they get happier but they do get happier by the end of the series. Unless you watch the sequel movie The Rebellion Story and then you’re just left with bitterness and tears. The show was an actual show but then was later split into three movies, just the same show with more details in the animation, but personally the show was just fine with me. 12 episodes long you could get through it in a weekend. Just make sure to bring some tissues along and plenty of comfort food. 

So if you have an interest in RPGs and fantasy but don’t want anything to serious or heavy I would recommend Slayers. In this show we follow Lina Inverse one of the strongest mages of her time and we watch her blow up a lot of things. By episode 2 she gains her first, and constant, follower Gourry Gabriev a dimwitted but talented swordsman who is very sweet and endearing. This show doesn’t really have a plot except Lina and Gourry trying to make money so they can eat and Lina stumbles upon a quest where hopefully she’ll get some gold. This show is mostly an action comedy and boy does it deliver. This show had five incarnations and I still haven’t seen all of it in it’s entirety but it’s pretty great and has a lot of memorable characters. 

 If you want to watch something to mellow you out that also gives you that folklore and fantasy feeling then you should watch Mushishi. We follow Ginko, a mysterious white haired man, who studies and deals with Mushi, spirits...sorta. The show is set in the Edo era...I think and it really gives off this folklore and almost ghost story vibe. Like this would be stories that your great-great grandpa would tell you about when there weren’t so many cities and everything was trees and fields and there was a strange magic to everything. This show is by no means scary. I was really zen throughout most of it. Travis Willingham does great as Ginko and his cadence really helps with that mellow feeling. 

 Romeo x Juliet is what I would recommend anyone that is interested in a love story with a bit of war, destiny, and a whole lot of Shakespeare. This show is set in Neo-Verona which is a slightly futuristic but at the same time not. Lord Montague, Romeo’s father, has murdered Juliet’s family, the Capulets, and rules over the city with an iron fist. Juliet is a badass sword-wielding vigilante and Romeo is a soft cinnamon roll who needs to be protected at all costs. I really loved this retelling of the the classic story and I really hate Romeo and Juliet for reasons I’m not gonna get into as this list is already so long. The interpretations of the characters are different and unique and that alone is worth watch. If you know anything about Shakespeare you’ll catch the references to all of his other works, the bard himself even pops up in the show which was wonderful, and the even include several scenes where people speak in iambic pentameter, especially Ophelia. My only complaint about this show is the main musical theme which is “You Raise Me Up” by popular by Josh Groban and as a person who really doesn’t like Groban this was almost a deal breaker for me. Thankfully the song is sung by women in English and in Japanese and, when used appropriately, it really made the show feel as dramatic and epic as the original play. 

So if you like Dynasty Warriors, hyperactive cute boys, explosions, adorable father-son moments, a rivalry that borderlines on romantic relationship, and a bad guy who literally travels with ominous music and a death storm then Sengoku Basara is for you. Ok so when I first saw this show I was surprised how quickly I fell in love with it. Like it’s so stupid with how campy and action packed it is and I loved every second of it. We follow historical Japanese soldiers and fighters in their quest to defeat Oda Nobunaga the Demon King. Like most of these people actually existed but we gave them elemental superpowers and pumped up the action to the extreme. I don’t have much else to say except it was a wild and fun ride from start to finish. 

And I think that I’m gonna end this with Fate/Stay Night:Unlimited Blade Works. Having seen the original Fate/Stay Night and Fate/Zero I can say that UBW has enough from both series for people to find something to love. Also you don’t need to have knowledge of any of the other works to get into this series as it is a retelling of the original story. You say Fate/Stay Night was originally a visual novel with three routes. The Fate Route, the Unlimited Blade Works Route, and the Heaven's Feel Route. The first route is considered the “best route” as pretty much everyone survives it, the second there are some casualties but overall it is the actual best route because one of our main characters, Shirou, isn’t a complete idiot this time around, and the third and final route is super depressing and holy shit who wrote this? UBW is full of action, historical figures...again, great animation, great fight scenes, and a pretty good story. 

And that’s my ten sort of broad animes that I would recommend. I think that you’ll probably find something that you like in all of this especially if you like magical anime. 

Take care