Hi, guys. Hey, look, I remembered the password to my side channel.
That's just good to... remember every now and then.
I said I was gonna upload a little video to this just saying a funny anecdote that happened to me a while back,
but it makes me sound... like, really stupid; it's really stupid, so I just didn't want to.
Maybe I should. Peer-pressure me down in the comments.
ANYWAY!
Today, I thought I'd make a quick cas video here on the side channel
talking about ANIME recommendations.
As you should know, I made a video over on danisnotonfire called
"ANIME WILL RUIN YOUR LIFE"—
great name—where I talked about animoo,
and I said that I would give you guys my recommendations,
'cause some of you might have never watched anime before.
I imagine a lot of you watching this like, "AnImE..... bhvfhbbhb...",
and some of you probably spend your life watching anime
and might just be interested in what I'm saying,
so I thought I'd tell you my recommendations today.
Not everything
that I've ever watched, but just some
that I think are good.
I've made a list here on my laptop—
that's how prepared I am.
And I will link to all of these down in the description below.
Ayyyyy!
So, the first thing is good first anime.
The first one that pretty much everyone in the world will tell you is the best first anime to watch is this:
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.
It's about two brothers, who try to save the world in a world where people have special powers
that allow them to control elements-- you can think of it like that.
And the reason it's good is 'cause it's a really epic, amazing, entertaining story that's not too complicated
or hard to watch, but it's very western.
So it's not gonna be hard to understand; there's no weird Japanese words that you don't get or senses of humour;
it's very accessible... and it will ruin your life.
Make sure you get *BROTHERHOOD*. Fullmetal Alchemist: *BROTHERHOOD*,
'cause they remade it and made the show better.
There we go.
The second one, which is a bit different: if you don't like the idea of, like, cheesy adventures with magic,
'cause that's not your kind of thing, but you like Sherlock 'cause you kind of like cute male characters
that have angst between each other—'cause you're trash—
I think you'll love Death Note. Death Note is the story of this boy with... cute brown hair
called Light Yagami, who finds a diary, and anyone whose name you write in this "Death Note"... DIES.
Oh my God, drama!
But there's a detective called L, who looks a bit like Phil after he hasn't had any sleep...
Um... *laughs*
... who tries to catch him so he doesn't go on a psychopathic killing spree.
And there's angst, it's short, it's easy to watch,
and it has a terrible second season with a character called Misa-Misa
that makes me want to pull out my eyes, but I think you'd like it.
And the other one which I think is good for beginners 'cause it's just really simple and easy is
Sword Art Online! Look at these characters.
It is about an MMO with virtual reality—which is like a thing that's totally gonna happen in, like, ten years—
but the psycho creator of the game makes it so that everybody who goes into this MMO is trapped inside,
and if they die in the game, they die in real life. So they have to beat the game to escape.
Simple premise, easy to watch; it has amazing music, amazing fights.
It's really epic, it's simple; there's even some soppy romance,
which some fans really hate and think that the fanservice romance ruins the entire show,
'cause it's crap. But—BUT... *laughs* it's good.
So that's that. Now, if all of this excitement and magic is all a bit silly for you and you're not convinced,
the other things that I'd say are good for beginners are
the sports animes 'Free!' and 'Haikyuu!!'.
These ones are good because it's just like... having young high school friends
in a simple universe where there's no drama or stress; it's just, you know, high school sport teams.
That's, you know, the most intense thing about life. They're so pleasant; just switch off and watch these.
Now, you might not be into sports—that's okay; neither am I—but you might be into cute boys in Speedos.
Yup.
So, I'm sure you've seen pictures of this all over Twitter and Tumblr. 'Free!' is an anime about some boys
in a high school swimming club, and some of it's about swimming. Most of it's just about
mild friendship drama and them being in their underwear the whole time
and it was a bit ridiculous and silly, and when I watched the first season, I was like,
"Oh, this show's just silly. Everyone's just watching it 'cause it's boys in their pants."
But then the second season actually gets quite dramatic, and they end up worrying about
what they're doing with their future and if they're going to college or not, and it—
you know, I was like, "I signed up for this show to—for Speedos, and now I'm questioning my life choices."
Free!
And the second one, which is really, really popular right now, is called 'Haikyuu!!',
which is about a volleyball team, and THIS is just SO GOOD.
Like, it's just about... *laughs* a high school volleyball team, but
it's made me actually have an interest in team sports. I said this in the video.
Like, I actually want to go join, like, an amateur volleyball club because this is so exciting.
You can just watch these anime and escape. They're just great.
And, okay, now that we've gotten the good first-time ones and the easy, pleasant ones out of the way,
let's just talk about GOOD ONES.
So first, we're gonna talk about two kind of realistic dramas for people that aren't into all of the, you know,
fictional, fantastical magic-y nonsense.
One is called Erased, which is brand new that me and Phil just finished watching, and it's—
It is about a guy who goes back in time to be a child version of himself
to solve the mystery of a friend of his who got kidnapped and murdered...
So it's children trying to solve the mystery of a child murderer...
And it's really good. It's a mystery. It's one season long. You'll be on the edge of your seats; it's good.
The other, which I think is really underrated and not enough people know about
and is probably in my top five—ever—
is Your Lie in April.
Without spoiling it for you, this about a young boy who is, you know,
a sad loser at school that plays the piano that meets a young, mysterious girl that plays the violin
and how they kind of form a friendship and encourage each other to get through the difficulties in their life,
but it is beautiful, it is incredible, it is artistic, and it will make you cry and ruin your life.
I can't say anything without spoiling it, but, like, Your Lie in April—Dan's top five.
Another one, which a lot of people really like which is kind of more realistic,
is Steins;Gate, which LOADS of people on the Internet rate extremely highly.
It is about a scientist who experiments in time travel and is kind of like a nerdy loser friend.
So it's good because it's really modern and just kind of references anime and Internet fans and things.
And again, just like Erased and Your Lie in April, what I like about it is it's one season.
The person that made this was an artist who said, "Hey—one season, I am gonna tell a single story
"and wrap it all up perfectly in one long thing: Steins;Gate."
Now let's move on to some harrowing, scary, violent ones that you might've heard of.
First one:
*hums "Guren no Yumiya"*
Attack on Titan!
That thing.
It's about a world where humanity lives in a giant walled city because outside of these giant walls
are giant people called Titans that eat humans. And the show is about trying to work out why this is happening
and killing them. It's HARROWING. It's STRESSFUL. It's GRUESOME.
Everyone you love dies. There is no happiness. Unrelenting stress... but it's amazing.
It's the trendy one that everybody's talking about; it's like the Game of Thrones as anime.
You—you should watch it.
Next one:
Tokyo Ghoul. This one, I'm mentioning because it's kind of trendy right now
and lots of people like it. It's basically set in Tokyo where there some people called ghouls,
which are basically super-powered cannibals... who eat people.
Incredibly violent. Scary. Depressing. But totes edgy!
I don't rate it THAT highly, but everyone thinks it's really cool, so that's that.
Phil—this is one of his favourite animes ever. It's basically about modern-day Japan
when alien bacteria come down from space, crawl inside the human body, and take over their bodies
and can, like, turn their cells into, like, razor-sharp edges that can cut people up.
Like the other two I just mentioned, scary. Harrowing. Lots of death and violence.
But it's good, one season, and it's got the Phil Stamp of Approval.
Right—this one here—this, I would say, is the closest thing to Fullmetal Alchemist,
which is a quite lighthearted, easy-to-watch, almost-quite western,
epic—you know, adventures around the world with a bunch of characters, like Pokémon,
that you fall in love with.
It's basically set in, like, the world of mythical Arabian Nights and Chinese mythology
and Sinbad the Sailor and stuff, and it's about magical powers and old-school adventures,
BUT, it's-- incredible.
I—this—I just finished watching all the most recent episodes with Phil—ruined my life.
Everyone in the world, watch Magi.
It's just frickin'—
And now I will end this short little list with two which I consider the greatest of all time—
which, you know, as a person of eclectic taste who usually agrees with critics
and ends up being quite fond of the things that are critically acclaimed—
the first one I'm gonna mention is
Cowboy Bebop.
This is a space western. So it is about bounty hunters IN SPACE that capture criminals across the galaxy,
but it's kind of stylized like a Western.
Now, I will say this is a very mature anime. It's not very teen-y or cartoon-y or accessible,
but people that really appreciate art, style, and film making and animation and production quality,
this is probably the best thing. The animation, the style, the creativity that goes into it,
the quality of the characters—everything about it is incredible.
It doesn't have the easy, accessible, emotional storylines a lot of the TV young, easy animes have,
but it's just—if you want to be mind-blown by how incredible something is in terms of quality...
Cowboy Bebop.
And lastly, one of the most classic ones of all time,
Neon Genesis Evangelion.
Seen this guy in a meme? He's Shinji. Iconic main character.
This is about a world where giant monsters from outer space are coming to destroy the Earth,
and the government of Japan has built GIANT ROBOTS to fight the giant monsters.
But only young teens can fight in the robots. And it kind of starts off like, "Oh, cool, so this is, like,
monsters versus robots and some children and some drama and stuff,"
but ends up being, like, questioning religion and the meaning of life
and space time and the biggest questions that face our existence,
'cause the maker of it kind of had a bit of an existential crisis halfway through,
and it ended up becoming one of the most epic things of all time.
It's so confusing, and it's a complete mess—like honestly, it's a complete mess—
BUT you can really tell how it influenced so much else. Very iconic.
Good luck working out how the hell to watch it—what to watch, what not to watch, what episodes, what seasons,
what movies, 'cause it's a complete mess. Basically, just watch the TV show and then the movie
that came out afterwards, 'cause the last episode was a bit of a train wreck.
And 'cause this was supposed to just be a quick ten-minute video talking about anime,
I am gonna stop there. Check out those first-time ones if you haven't. If you don't like things that are too stressful
or violent, or too weird, check out those sporty, easy ones.
If you want to know what cool, great ones are, check out those.
If you want to see the goats (?), then, you know, check out these.
As I said, I will link to all of these animes down in the description below.
Most of them are on Crunchyroll, so if you sign up to the free trial that I was giving away—uh,
—then you can watch them for free.
If they're not on Crunchyroll, then buy them, like we have,
because the anime industry really suffers from pirating.
I will put a link down in the description to a blog post that really kind of spells out how harmful it can be.
Support artists, guys.
And maybe I'll chuck in some honourable mentions down there as well,
in case you watch all of this in a week.
So there we go. This was just a casual, boring side channel video about anime
for the people that wanted to know what I was interested in.
Watch the danisnotonfire (Daniel Howell) video.
See you next time...
interesting-ies! (What?)
That's not a thing.
Bye!