How did you get into anime?

[Mr. Hat'n'Clogs]

Yup, as the title says, describe how you got into anime. I'll go myself, so you can see how it's done.

I used to make fun of anime/manga all the time, and often mocked my friend for liking it. I was told by my misinformed Mother that "It's all violence and inappropriatly(sp?) dressed women", and i had this conception that it was all cheesy shows where the characters had a cheesy "fight" then learned a life lesson.

Later, I watched part of the Naruto marathon on CN, and was shocked when I saw characters bleed, get hurt, and even die. However, there was no way to watch it after that day, so I forgot most of it.

Then, I start going out with my first(and only) girlfriend. She is a big fan, and changes my view to a curious-but-can't-watch-it. Then, the week before she breaks up with me, she tells me to try out Naruto now that I have high speed internet. I try it out, and even though I didn't admit it at first, I loved it. It was different from anything I'd seen before.

And then my ex called. And she broke up with me. After that, to be honest, I kind of crawled in a shell and watched Naruto until I got kicked off the computer. I watched all of part one three times through.

So after the computer fried, I went into a lull, except I convinced my mom to let me read the manga at the library.And then we got a computer, and after a reccomendation from my ex and my sister, I watched Bleach and loved it. That's when I consider my anime fandom starting.

I'm guessing your's aren't as long, but you get the idea.

[LadyRushia]

Technically, it started when I was a kid and I watched Sailor Moon and Pokemon on T.V., but I eventually lost interest in those. Fast forward to the end of 6th grade when my friend and I decided to make a game out of Sailor Moon just for the lulz. Then, we became hardcore Sailor Moon fans. For about a year that was the only anime I watched. Then I got into .hack//sign, a little bit of Kenshin, and Yuu Watase's stuff, and I've been an anime fan since.

[wildpurplechild]

Yes, I too started out watching my cousins favourite shown "Digimon", I was young and thought "Oh, cute animals!". I started reading some manga in grade school, and then in when I was much older I watched "Naruto" for the first time. I didn't like the first few episodes, but then I got hooked and enjoy it and other manga sense.

[Roy Mustang]

I was anime fan since I was a little kid and didn't even know it was anime.

I use to watch some anime that aired on Nick Jr in the middle 80's and watch Macross and Go Lion as well.

After that, I saw Sailor Moon and a few anime movies and since then been into it for years.


[font="Book Antiqua"][color="Red"]Col. Roy Mustang[/color][/font]

[aalenfae]

My elder sister showed me the movie "Castle in the Sky." That's what started it all.

[ClosetOtaku]

I'd seen Astro Boy and some other 60's anime, but never really thought much about it as a genre.

In 2000, my son recommended I watch Fushigi Yugi. After that, and exposure to Serial Experiments: Lain and NGE, I was hooked.

[Pyro_artist]

Like Roy Mustage, I too was watching anime at a younge age (shows like Hamtaro, the comercial for Kiki's delivery service, and a few others that I don't remember), and didn't even know what the style was called. Then at, like, age 12 the Christian magazine by focus on the family, Breakaway ,did a article on anime, and manga, so then I knew what it was and started finding titles like: Castle in the sky, Porco Roso, and some others later on. Now i'm hooked.

[goldenspines]

If you don't count my Pokemon and Digimon never miss an episode, ever, fan days when I was just a little kid, there was this anime called Mew Mew Power (yes, I know, but it was a long time ago, when I was 11 or 12) that I used to watch. And that's when I was first introduce to what "anime" was as opposed to just a cartoon (which is what I had considered Pokemon and Digimon to be before).
Being rather interested in this show (for it's art, mostly, and the small part of my heart that likes shojo liked it for the genre too), I explore into the anime world a bit more and found that there are a lot cooler anime out there. XD Such as FMA, Rurouni Kenshin, Kino's Journey, Cowboy Bebop, etc...
And that's how my fandom was born.

[Wyntre Rose]

Well, without realizing it, my absolute first introduction to anime was Superbook. We had almost all the VHS episodes when I was little, but I had no idea that they were anime. Or even that they were not just an ordinary Christian cartoon. Though I did wonder why the heck CAKE was a thing that was seen as the traditional Christmas food...I found out why later.

Fast forward to the year I turned 20 - I found out I would be going to Japan on a mission trip as an English teacher. I wanted to find something about the Japanese culture that was just fun that I could enjoy for it's own merit. I found a manga called Saint Tail, which was pure fluff, but absolutely clean and free from any objectionable content, and discovered that my preconceived notions about anime and manga (that they were either satanic, excessively violent or pornographic) were wrong. I then got hooked on Case Closed and Miyazaki's movies when I was in Japan, though I didn't speak the language, so I pretty much just admired the pretty pictures and tried desperately to piece together what was going on from the little I understood. I found out in Japan that Superbook was anime, too.

My time in Japan had been very difficult, and for several years after coming back home, anything that reminded me of Japan or the Japanese culture made me cringe, so my love for anime took a hiatus. Then, when that stage faded, I found all Miyazaki's movies that had come to the US and watched them. I loved them more than ever now that I could actually understand them (subtitles). I started looking around for other things I'd like, and found Fruits Basket. And that's when I really got hooked. At the age of 23. And I've never looked back since.

[Radical Dreamer]

If we wanna take it aaaall the way back, you could say my first experience with anime was Superbook when I was all of 3-4 years old. XD Fast forward to my brother and I watching Pokemon and DragonBall Z in the afternoons during my 5th and 6th grade years. I knew it was anime by this point, but I only watched those shows and mostly, I watched them because my brother did. In 8th grade, I saw a few episodes of Trigun late at night with my brother. I enjoyed it, but I only caught about three episodes.

Skipping ahead to...the summer between 9th and 10th grade, I saw about 6 more episodes of Trigun on my own, watching them on Adult Swim. I was interested in anime by this point, but I couldn't seem to find out which shows to watch, and I lost track of Trigun at some point that summer. Fast forwarding once again to October of my 10th grade year, I stumbled upon the first episode of Rurouni Kenshin on Cartoon Network. I made note of the time and watched it every week, realizing I was totally hooked around the episode 7/Jin-e arc. I went out to the bookstore, found some Kenshin manga, bought a couple of the DVDs, and the rest is history. XD

[Tsukuyomi]

My frist animes were actually on Nickelodeon ^__^ There was Sstabon and The Mysterious Cities of Gold, The Little Prince, Brother Grimm's Fairy Tale Classics, and those cute koala cartoons ^__^

I didn't know they were anime back then, but I remembered the art style in later years ^ ^ Sailor Moon and DBZ were probably next on the list ^^

[GundamFan]

Well my first introduction was Superbook and The Flying House this local Chirtsian TV station used to air them and I'm sure I watched some other anime as a kid but I never knew it was anime. I didn't get into anime until my freshmen year of college at the time I believed anime was nothing but junkie kids shows like Pokemon my friends convinced me try and watch DBZ which I hated and wonder why any sane person would even want watch anime. My best friend got me to give anime one more chance we watched Gundam Wing on CN which I loved after a few episodes of watching that, she lent this tape she had which had the first 4 episodes of Neon Genesis Evangelion and I have been fan anime ever since.

[Peanut]

DBZ is where I got my start...in fact that was the first show that I actually got hooked on and followed religiously until its end. While watching DBZ, I also would catch some other series that popped up with it while Toonami was still around such as Gundam Wing and Yu Yu Hakusho. In High School, Ryan introduced me to Naruto (which I watched religously until recently when I stopped), Monster (which I have slowly progressed through but still haven't finished...sorry Ryan...), the first FMA (which I only watched a tiny bit of before stopping), Bleach (which followed the same route as Naruto), and several other series which I won't list out of reasons of laziness. This motivated me to find series of my own to like such as Death Note (which is the last series I followed with the same fervor that I followed DBZ with once upon a time). So yeah...that's how I got into anime...yay Toonami and Ryan...

[~darkelfgirl~]

It all started with Digimon (actually with Monster Rancher, but Digimon is what stuck on me). Didn't know what anime was, thought the characters looked strange, but I absolutely loved Digimon.

Then I moved to the U.S. A few days later in our new apartment, my mom was flipping the channel and happened to stop on Sailor Moon on Toonami. We watched the entire episode.

A few days after that, my brother, who was an avid fan of DBZ happened to be watching it in my grandmother's kitchen when I came home from elementary school. I sat down, watched it with him, asked questions (which he answered like an encyclopedia) and became a fan.

I also discovered Toonami was Toonami (:D), so every weekday, when I came from school to grandma's house, my sister, brother, and I would watch the lineup from beginning to end. Those were the good ol' days.

And you know the rest about Toonami and CN. Since they were downgrading on anime goodness, I went exploring on my own, searching for others' opinions, hungry for more xD.

Now, I'm only focused on one anime at the moment--obviously, Bleach. And I love it, despite some holes (which I hope will be covered *glares at Kubo* xD).


Anyways, the interesting thing about anime is that I've met and became good friends with a significant amount of people because of it (my best friend, for instance. We became friends after a chat when I saw an anime sketch on her folder). My roommate--by God's Will, I know--happens to be an anime lover, also. When I found out she was going to be my roommate, I looked for her on a social networking site--lo, and behold--she has Sailor Moon and Inuyasha icons all over the place. I think that similarity helped us bond (she's a Christian also ^_^).

Whoops--long bio xD!

[KhakiBlueSocks]

[font="Trebuchet MS"][SIZE="4"][color="RoyalBlue"]This is going to be a relatively long story. (as many of my stories are, heh.)

Much like Roy-Boy, my unknown journey into anime started with Nick Jr. Back then, I didn't have clue one what anime was--I just noticed that some cartoons looked "different" than others.

Fast forward to my middle school years. DragonBall Z was the hot ticket. It was dang-near required that you knew how to draw Goku, Vegeta, Krillin, Freeza, etc. There was always a handful of guys at work who knew how to draw them really well, and they made a killing doing what we would call "commissions" today. However, DBZ was not really my bag--I was into Pokemon, back when there were only 151. I had the posters all over my wall until my mom ripped them down after it came out that I was hiding my failing report cards.

Fast-forward to high school. My tastes had wondered over to Pokemon's clone Digimon. It was also around this time when my SN KhakiBlueSocks came into being. Digimon was my first real series that I watched from beginning to end. This was when I realized that shows like this were from Japan and it was called "anime". I also had a short-lived viewing affair with Monster Rancher and Beyblade, but that didn't last very long, thankfully.

Late one Saturday night, in my Sophomore year of high school, I was flipping through the channels and I stopped on Cartoon Network. I noticed the opening sequence of a show I had never seen. The animation style favored all the anime I've seen, but it was different somehow...I kept watching. The anime was Yu Yu Hakusho, but I will forever remember it as being my anime baptism by fire--my introduction into REAL anime. As I watched, I knew this was something special--the main character was not your cut and dry "genki" hero, the story was complex and multi-faceted, and at the end, I was left wanting MORE.

And the rest, as they say, is history.[/color][/SIZE][/font]

[Fish and Chips]

Let me think. Back in high school I was actually pretty dismissive of Anime and Manga in general. Not because I was particularly convinced it was Ultra Violent Rape Porno Cartoons like millions (or at least a couple) of Americans did, but more because I saw a lot of it as formulamatic and overdone - in a way this hasn't really changed. The only Anime I was really familiar with was Pokemon, but that's only because I played the game, and if you didn't play Pokemon in California Middle School just what kind of social outcast were you. Pokemon the game quickly burnt out on me, so did the show (and the trading cards, oh dear). I guess I also watched a couple episodes of Sailor Moon in there somewhere, and like all of five minutes of Gundam Wing, and in some haze of my youth I knew what Speed Racer was.

I suppose I also watched Samurai Pizza Cats for a bit, mainly with my neighbors. We thought it was a pretty cool show at the time, but moved on not too much later.

Then some time near the end of my high school years, we were cleaning out one of the transitory computer labs that doubled as an art room and just a generally unfurnished blandly-painted patch of ugliness. A friend of mine, Ryan, had decided to bring a DVD player, where he was watching Cowboy Bebop. Earlier that same year I'd spied another friend watching clips of Princess Mononoke between what he was supposed to be working on, and was interested on some tangible if vaguely established level. So I sat down with Ryan for a couple episodes, those being Pierrot le Fou and (after cleaning) Boogie Woogie Feng Shui. So basically my first exposure to contemporary Anime was space bounty hunters tracking down a murderous cross between the Joker and the Penguin; which Mad Pierrot technically was. Since I had always fostered a closet fascination with Batman (and my association, the bad guys he generally faced), I was intrigued enough to decide to pursue Anime. However, I don't consider Cowboy Bebop my fabled First Anime. It was what caught my attention, but it wasn't what hooked me.

That would be FullMetal Alchemist. A couple of friends of mine on a board (this was long before CAA) had name dropped it a couple times, specifically citing various elements of the show that unconsciously clicked a lot of my buttons. I quickly decided to take the plunge and cautiously picked up the first volume of the Manga at a local bookshop; mind you this was when FullMetal Alchemist was still new and kind of a big deal in the states, so only the first two volumes had been published here. I left the second volume on the shelf, figuring if I cared for it I'd come back later.

Later ended up being that afternoon. A few hours at most. And I still consider FMA vol. 2 to be one of the finest volumes of any Manga I have ever read. I also ended up catching the show (which another friend, David, graciously taped for me), and FMA became my Exception Anime, which just about everyone has unless they loved the idea of Anime from the start.

Granted, eventually I'd become incredibly disenchanted with the Anime, but I won't deny it kept me up nights, sneaking out of bed to watch Adult Swim when the rest of my family was asleep. I'm fairly certain I still have stacks of tapes (yeah, VCR tapes) in my closet of nothing but FMA episodes. And of course the Manga is still a masterpiece of Shounen.

Shortly after I started branching out. I believe my second might have been Hellsing, but I'm not positive; the third was most certainly Death Note (which, hilariously, I dislike now), and somewhere in there it snowballed until I was reading ten or twenty different series, many of which my younger self wouldn't believe you if you told him (some of which even I don't believe now).

So that's it, though I seriously doubt most of you will bother to read this. Long post is long.

[bigsleepj]

Mine was a two-step program brought upon me by two very popular local anime's in its day: Heidi: Girl of the Alps and Robotech, which was most people from my generation's first start at anime.

Heidi was originally produced in Japan but exported to Germany. South Africa bought it from Germany and dubbed it into Afrikaans. It still shows on TV and it's available on DVD as well. So popular was this anime among people of all ages that South African Prime Minister John Vorster (a fairly unpleasant, hardhearted character by the way) called off a cabinet meeting so that he could go home and watch it.

Robotech, on the other hand, came later and was just plain good, and many like it. Other stories began to seep through as well; some old Tezuka Osama animes, the occasional Hayao Miyazaki movie. I watched these as a child and after almost a decade of ambivalence I eventually began exploring it as an adult.

[Fantasy Dreamer]

My anime watching days started with Pokemon and Sailor Moon I suppose. I didn't realize what they were then, but I was about 9 or 10 at the time. Eventually, I learned that they were both anime. Then, CN started their Toonami jetstream stuff, and I started watching DBZ, Gundam Wing, Tenchi Muyo, Outlaw Star (the censored version XD) and a couple others. By this point, I was hooked on anime, and when I discovered this sight is when the number of animes I started likinge expanded.

Fast forward a bit to when I was about 14, I started watching the anime's they put on Adult Swim: Inuyasha, Wolf's Rain, Trigun, Cowboy Bebop, Full Metal Alchemist, Scryed and others. Not long after that I started watching anime's online wherever I could find the episodes, thus introducing myself to Fruits Basket, Ouran High School Host Club, Baccano, and other animes that I'd heard about from here and other sights that I was curious about. Not long after that I started purchasing mangas and started collecting four different series. The rest is history!

[ShiroiHikari]

Well, like many people my age, I watched Superbook and The Flying House when I was very young, and was only vaguely aware that they were "different". I also knew that Voltron and Robotech existed, but I didn't watch them much (even though I thought they looked cool). Then my family got cable around 1988-1989 and I started watching Nick Jr. I liked the cartoons on there and was really fond of the art style, especially Grimm's Fairy Tales. I think it was around this time that my dad told me those shows were Japanese.

Then I got too old for Nick Jr., and forgot about "Japanimation" until around 1997. I was 14 and was babysitting my little nephew, and he wanted to watch Sailor Moon on Toonami. I thought it was dumb at first, but I gave it a chance. Eventually I became a huge fan. I liked the style, I liked the characters and the fact that there was a story-- something I had never really seen in an animated TV series before.

Pretty soon, I started to be interested in Japanese things in general and then DBZ premiered on Toonami, and I got swept up in that too. My dad got AOL around this time and I started looking up Sailor Moon and DBZ stuff on the internet, and was fascinated by the fact that these shows had been heavily edited and there was so much more to them than I had realized. Then Gundam Wing came out in 2000, and from that point there was no turning back.

[Sheol777]

Before I knew it was anime Star Blazers (Yamato) was my intro into the anime world. Then Voltron (Go Lion) and Speed Racer. Then in the 90's, a friend of mine was slightly into the VHS tape trading days and I got to see Akira, Fist of the North Star, Vampire Hunter D and Detonator Orgun...which was unfortunately in the raw.

I kinda lost my taste for anime for a number of years after seeing Legend of the Overfiend, Ninja Scroll and Demon City Shinjuku. These were a bit...explicit...and I thought this was the way that anime was now.

I would hear about things here and there but mostly turned a blind eye to the Adult Swim line up and this thing I was kinda into back in the day was huge again.

I watched some Dragonball Z for a bit, but the ball started rolling again when the same friend from all those years ago taped this new show called FullMetal Alchemist. The story was cool and hey there was this other show Samurai Champloo that topped that!

I started back in a little, then I got an iPod about 3 years ago and started getting some podcasts about anime...and that where it all exploded.

I heard about new shows daily and started with Serial Experiments Lain, Boogiepop Phantom, Paranoia Agent and my new favorite Neon Genesis Evangelion.

So to date I've seen roughly 200 anime and I have no intention to stop anytime soon.

[EricTheFred]

I was a huge fan early on. Strangely, what probably sold me on anime was a series that was not anime by the American definition (meaning animated stuff from Japan. In Japan the definition is just 'animated stuff'.) This was the animated Star Trek produced in the early 1970's. This is how I learned that a serious science fiction story could be done in animation and use animation to do things that couldn't be done live action.

Speed Racer and Star Blazers were also important in my development. I already had a comic book obsession as well (especially old ECs and Marvel) and encountered early manga through this. I saw plenty of early stuff like Galaxy Express 999, much enjoyed it all, then... got married and had to be a serious adult for a while.

It wasn't until my children began discovering manga and anime and I (since I was aware how adult the material could get) felt I should preview what they watched, that I got back into it. I fully admit I was probably using them as an excuse for such a 'childish' activity, but I've grown up since then (and met plenty of other people my age who also enjoy anime) and realized I wasn't being childish so much as holding onto something I enjoy. The real childishness was thinking I could be 'adult' by not enjoying comic books and cartoons anymore.

I came here to CAA by first finding the reviews while searching for resources for parents looking for information on anime series. After lurking for a while (possibly as much as a year, I don't remember) I finally joined and began participating.

[-Frail-Dreams-]

Last July, I was at a convention like thing, with kids from all over the US. It was at that time that my two best friends spent at least 2 of the 5 days discussing the first 40 episodes of Naruto. And seeing as how I had absolutely no idea what it was, I was curious. So when I got back, it blanked my mind for a little while(maybe a week), then I youtubed it and watched the first season before I found an actual reliable site.
Eventually I had watched 140+ episodes, and I soon branched out to Bleach, Death Note, Fullmetal Alchemist(I read the manga first ) and others.
Yeah...That's my story.

[Mr. Hat'n'Clogs]

^I was one of those two best friends! That was right after I started.

I forgot to mention that my first was Pokemon, but I stopped watching that by about the time I learned what anime and manga were, so it further fueled my thoughts about what all anime was like.

[battletech]

Early 80s I saw Volton on TV and Superbook at church. I learned what anime was in 88 and saw Sailor Moon and Ronin Warriors on CN at my grandparents because they had cable.
Then I got a job and got my on cable and started buying all the animes I liked.

[MasterDias]

Digimon is basically what I credit with getting me interested in anime, although I had watched Superbook years earlier and was watching Pokemon around the same time.
I didn't have cable, so I missed the Cartoon Network/Toonami shows that many of today's fans credit getting them hooked on it.

[Lilac#18]

The first animes I've seen before I knew what anime was were Speed Racer, Robotech and Sailor Moon. When I was 9 or 10, my uncle called and told me a little bit about Sailor Moon. He said that the main character's name was Serena, which was the main reason why I wanted to watch it because she had the same name I have. I remember I was so obsessed with the show that was all I talked about and I wouldn't shut up about it XD. Next, it was DBZ. I really like this anime too and I liked it next to or as much as Sailor Moon. I think I talked about this too as much as Sailor Moon. The first anime I saw when I knew it was anime was either Tenchi Muyo/Universe, Key the Metal Idol or DBZ. How did I get into anime in the first place? I think when I watched either Tenchi Muyo/Universe, Key the Metal Idol, Urusei Yatsura, Please Save my Earth or Sakura Wars (I still have to finished watching Urusei Yatsura, Sakura Wars and the third series of Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-ohki).

[That Dude]

My first animes I ever saw were superbook, and a movie called Scamper The Penguin which was my favorite movie for the better part of my childhood. Anyway around age 10-12 I started becoming fascinated with Japan and I learned of anime, I don't really remember my first but I knew about DBZ. I thought it was descent. If not a little dumb...Anyway my real introduction to anime happened when I was at a friends house who had cable and saw Cowboy Bebop and Outlaw Star. I thought they were the coolest things I'd ever seen and have been hooked ever since.

[Radical Dreamer]

...and a movie called Scamper The Penguin which was my favorite movie for the better part of my childhood.

hgajgldkasgjklj IS THAT AN ANIME? Dude!! I used to love that movie as a kid! XDD I had no idea! XD

[Tancos]

Some years back, I read a review of Princess Mononoke and decided to see it when it came to town. It never did, but I later discovered that a friend had the DVD, which I borrowed.

The very first anime I ever saw, though, was Shonen Sarutobe Sasuke, released in the USA a long, long time ago as "Magic Boy." It completely blew away everything I'd ever seen by Disney, and I wanted to see more. But there wasn't any more until years later, and I eventually forgot about it until recently.

[That Dude]

hgajgldkasgjklj IS THAT AN ANIME? Dude!! I used to love that movie as a kid! XDD I had no idea! XD

I still enjoy the movie, I have it on VHS actually. To bad I don't have a VHS player currently. And yes it's an anime, actually it's done by the studio that made Slayers and Saiyuki. Here's the ANN page for it. http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/encyclopedia/anime.php?id=1412