CAA: Christian Anime Alliance

My first anime was Yu-Yu Hakusho. It was what got me interested in watching anime. It really caught me off guard when the main character died in episode 1. I'd never seen anyone do that before. I still go back and rewatch it sometimes.

My first anime (excluding anime that I watched when I was a kid) was SAO. When I saw SAO, I was like: "Wow! Anime is awesome!" SAO is now on my re-watch list, which I'll probably pick up early January.

Pokemon was my first.

Then it's a somewhat jumbled haze of Ruroni Kenshin, Yu Yu Hakusho, .hack//Sign, and Inuyasha. I don't know what came first in regards to my first "grown-up" anime, though.

The first anime that I consciously knew was anime was Transformers Galaxy Force, followed by Area 88, Full Metal Panic, and lastly Spice & Wolf.

Speed Racer on Cartoon Network, Sailor Moon, and the Lions Gate dub of Dragon Ball on the Hawaiian TV station KIKU around 1995 or 1996. Moved on to Dragon Ball Z and other series from there with Toonami.

I'm not really sure. I'm thinking Chōdenji Machine Voltes V or Go-Q-Choji Ikkiman.

The first anime that I "knew" was Japanese anime was Fushigi Yugi, back in 2000.

I was watching Astro Boy regularly in 1967, but had no idea it was anything other than yet another cartoon. When my parents moved to a different city, we did not get anything other than the major network channels, and I never saw anime (or many of the other shows like UltraMan) on a regular basis for decades.

Love Hina, episode 22, in 2002. My sister found the crazy boat chase scene hilarious.

DBZ ... followed closely by Sailor Moon =)

Fullmetal Alchemist, courtesy of Netflix. Growing up in a home without cable TV, and never really having an interest TV, I never would have been introduced to anime otherwise.

I actually have no idea. It was probably Kiki's Delivery Service. But at the time, I didn't even know what anime was.

One of my brothers was really into it when I was a kid, so I grew up with things like, Inuyasha, Trigun, Gundam Wing, Tenchi Muyo, Digimon and pokemon as well as some hamtaro.

As others have said, I guess it depends on how you qualify first.

The first anime I watched was the US release of Voltron way back in the day, along with a few episodes of Robotech. The first anime I watched that I knew "Hey this is that Japanimation stuff I've heard about" was when I caught an episode of Sailor Moon on TV while I was channel surfing during a snow day. After that, the first "real" anime I watched was a VHS copy of Akira that I got for Christmas.

Pokemon, I guess.

Or Kodomo no Omocha

Nate wrote:As others have said, I guess it depends on how you qualify first.

I hadn't thought about how things qualify. Things I saw before realizing I was watching anime was Gatchaman, Voltron, and a little bit of Transformers.

I've been watch animu, knowingly or unknowingly, longer than some of the posters here have been alive.

DBZ and/or Pokemon... I don't remember if I knew then if it was from Japan or not. Although I did think it was strange back then that the 4Kids dub of pokemon referred to onigiri as doughnuts. That was probably a clue. haha

That I didn't know was anime, watched as a kid: Heidi: Girl of the Alps

That I did know was anime: Evangelion and Love Hina

Like Nate, I grew up with Voltron and Robotech, but didn't identify them as anime, per se.

Ranma 1/2 was the first anime I watched "as anime" over at Mithrandir's place.

I believe the first anime I ever saw was Pokemon, then...I think this was called Yu-Gi-Oh, I saw a piece of it. It looked really weird....
Then I stumbled onto Spirited Away at the library and I was hooked.

Moved to anime section.

I never identified Heidi as anime, but I watched it a lot when I was younger. Princess Tutu was the first anime show that I watched and knew was anime.

Inuyasha was the first anime I wached knowing it was anime. Tokyo Mew Mew was the first anime I watched from beginning to end.

Yu-Gi-Oh! And pokemon, but i just watched them as shows, not specifically watching anime, first show i watched as looked for anime all the way through, Death Note special shout out to robotech for being what got me into mech anime

Technically Superbook and Pokemon when I was a little kid, but the first anime that I watched after I actually knew what anime was would've either been Tsubasa Chronicle or D.N.Angel. I think Trigun was one of the first I saw too, but I never saw more than the first few episodes.

I think it was Yattaman or Astro Boy back in 1982, but the ones that really got me into anime in the beginning was Golden Lightan the year after, and Gordian Warrior the year after that.

Urashiman also has a special place in my heart as being the anime that started making opening / closing theme songs memorable for me.

My Neighbor Totoro. It was the first time I noticed that there was an extremely different style of animation out there, and I instantly loved it.

That's a hard one, since I didn't realize a lot of shows I watched were "anime." To avoid spamming with titles, I'm going to take a shot in the dark and say it was Pokemon.

Pokémon but I'm not even sure if I really realized it was anime and if I did I didn't care. Avatar: The Last Airbender got me interested in anime (even though I know it's not anime). And Vampire Knight was my first official one and I've been a fan ever since. So...yea...XD

Depends on your qualification.
My first anime was Voltron. However, I didn't know it was Japanese. I didn't know what anime was until Ronin Warriors came to the US. So, the first anime that I knew was anime was Ronin Warriors.

Yeah, It's amazing how many shows we grew up watching that were from Japan without us ever knowing! I watched all the 80's cartoons which included Voltron and Transformers. I just thought they had awesome art styles and stories! There was this one show.. called Grimm's Fairy Tales Classics I think. I had always loved it and to this day it stays in my heart. I just found out a couple years ago that it was originally from Japan! My whole life has been a lie... lol ^_^