How and why did you get into anime?

[xia]

Back in the mid 80s my father brought home Unico and Sea Prince and the fire child. I loved them immediatly and repeatedly watched them. That was my first exposure.

What turned me into an anime fan was back in 1995, when UPN started playing Sailormoon in the mornings. I became so engrossed with that show that I had to watch other more shows and soon was a big big anime fan. Still a fan after 13 years.

[Nemu]

I watched Sailor Moon when I was younger, I didn't refer to it as anime, just saw it as a "cartoon from Japan".

Somewhere in/around April 2007, I ran into an anime/RPG/Roleplay forum when surfing the internet. I ended up joining the forum, made friends there and stuff and while I was there I got into anime. =P I still go to that forum, by the way.

[xris]

Originally Posted by Aijou

I don't know if such thread is already made, I searched and didn't find.

I had a quick look and found a number of them, for example...

Your story
Anime that got you hooked
How and why did you get into anime?

Plus a number of others, anyway thread now merged with the last one above

[james0246]

I started out in Film. Specifically, for the majority of my life, I have been studying film and television or have worked in film or television, or have simply watched film or television. While I was formaly introduced to anime in the mid-80s (informally before then with dubbed anime), I was not that interested in the medium (outside of purely sociological/Mass Comm reasons (i.e. why create more animated shows than live action, etc.), But, then, I encountered Gainax, and my life was changed. When I saw Wings of Honneamise I was stunned. This was a mature, realistic, emotional, and thought-provoking anime with great visuals, wonderful music and superb voice-acting. All of this added together hooked me. I have been watching anime since.

[King Lycan]

._. hmm i don't know maybe tonami ...when they showed Gundam Wing and Big O

[Da~Mike]

Hmmm...
I never knew all those cartoons I watched when I was younger was anime (e.g. Voltron, Robotech). That said, they didn't cause me to watch more of the stuff.
I only became interested in anime and the lot when one of my mates lent me Evangelion (and I thought the EVAs were cool...) and that it was completely different from all the other cartoons I thought I had seen, or at least the demographic definitely wasn't 5 yr olds!

Then that same friend lent me the Love Hina bilingual manga 2 years later and that kicked it off. Love Hina was the first manga I read and compared to other things I've read now, was actually quite trashy... (but was rather funny nonetheless).

The good titles that come out every so often such as School Rumble, Haibane Renmei, Aria, His and Her Circumstances etc keep me watching anime.
At least things RomCom genres like School Rumble are funny (in a bizarre way) compared to all that needless angst and drama found in Gray's Anatomy....

edit:

Originally Posted by Kinku

Anime..hmmm i guess when i really got into anime is when i was about 16 years old.. up till than i usually watch cartoons .. like Batman... spiderman.. and other random stuff "Rugrats" "Darkwing Duck" ...etc

I remember Darkwing Duck! Then there's Danger Mouse, Ninja Turtles, Ghost busters, Transformers, Thunder cats.... oh dear... the list does go on...
That said, I think I'm more like Kinku: I've generally liked cartoons since I was young...

Thing is, I bought the box set for Danger mouse recently and found that I COULDN'T STAND watching it anymore!...
So in general, my taste in cartoons has matured over time (-ish) and I guess I'd rather keep most of them as "those childhood memories" as opposed to collecting the whole lot in BluRay format all over again...

Though I wonder whether I would have gotten into anime even if my mate didn't introduce me to it first...

[NorthernFallout]

Well, I watched anime without realising (Pokemon, Digimon etc) but when it got serious it was because of a friend...and now I'm more fanatic than any of them

[Nervous Venus]

I had a stigma about anime as a kid, so I never really watched anything more than chibi maruko chan (which doesn't really count). I was five (??) when it started airing. I used to read the comics, too.

First actual anime that I saw was Anne of Green Gables and My Daddy Long Legs, lol. But it was enough to keep me searching for more.

[Meirin]

The first anime I ever watched was Hana no Ko Lunlun (花の子ルンルン) in 1988. It's a popular mahou shoujo series from the late 70's, predating even Magical Emi and Minky Momo. The version I watched was the original run of the Chinese dub, which left the OP and ED intact, therefore I realised it was "anime" and made in Japan. It was also released in Europe several decades ago under the name of 'Angel'. After all these years it remains one of my favourite series.

I was exposed to several other late 70's anime as a small child, namely World Masterpiece Theater shows such as Dog of Flanders and 3000 Leagues in Search of Mother. In primary school I grew up watching popular series such as Saint Seiya, Hokuto no Ken, Mashin Eiyuden Wataru, more mahou shoujo and several Studio Ghibli movies.

[KaneDragon]

Have I not posted in a thread such as this before? >_> Meh.

My memory's not very good when it comes to past events, but I think my earliest experiences were with old anime movies shown on the SciFi channel. Then there's stuff like Robotech, Pokemon, Sailor Moon... and snippets of anime shown on Cartoon Network, like Gundam Wing and Dragonball Z. Love Hina, Ah My Goddess, and Naruto were among the first subs I downloaded (I think), once I got my first taste of broadband. I wonder how I got from there to here...

[TenguFrog]

Lol my way of getting into anime was pretty weird.

When I was a kid, I used to visit Japan often in the summers, and sometimes I watched T.V. and I got into some kiddie shows (anpanman, doraemon, crayon shinchan) and then I began to ask for my grandparents to send video tape recordings (I think that's what they're called) of the shows to me.

Then anime slowly grew on me and now, in a highschool where we all get laptops I'm addicted, lol. I've moved from old tapes to the internet now.

[X207]

i first got hooked by gundam seed se1 then inuyasha when i was bored when watching tv one day, then initial d bc i played the 2nd version of the arcade game. after that any slice of life or comedy anime that caught my attention came along.

[Samurai Panda]

Outlaw Star done the trick. After months of ignoring Dragon Ball Z, I was persuaded by a friend to give OLS a shot and I've gotta say, it still impress' me to this day. Afterwards I moved onto Neon Genisis Evengalion and other anime series that I can't remember. A few months later, I gave Manga a try and found it better at keeping me occupied, so that's my Anime craze in a nut-shell.

[HayashiTakara]

Dodge Denpai, back in the 80's when I was visiting my grandparents. If anyone else have seen this anime, I'll be completely shocked! There was only one other person that I've met in the states that know of this show, and she's from korea.

[squezey]

when I was in 6th grade. I just discovered the website youtube because someone linked me to that video "waka-laka for osaka". I thought the music video was pretty crazy and funny so then I actually checked out the anime Azumanga Daioh. I hought it was awesome. So then after watching all of that anime, I found out about lucky star my current favorite anime and from that i found alot more anime's that I liked and I was hooked.

[nines]

i got into japense anime when gundam seed came out i watched gundam wing in english when i was a kid but gundam is what brought me to anime all and all. Why i got it into anime i love it

[GuidoHunter_Toki]

I've always thought of anime as just another thing to watch for entertainment. To me its just like any other TV show and I'll watch it if I like it. I find the plots and characters in anime to be a lot more enjoyable to most of the stuff on TV nowadays. Seriously its nothing, but Crime and Hospital dramas. The only American shows I really watch at the moment and consider masterpieces are House and LOST.

As for anime the art defenitley gets me into it as well because I've always loved art and animation. What really introduced me to anime (When I actually knew what I was watching was anime) was when I first saw Inuyasha and DBZ. I remember when I was younger and I would always try to stay awake late at night long enough to catch the latest episode of Inuyasha on Adult Swim. And of course Toonami got me into it as well with stuff like G Gundam and Tenchi Muyo.

[HayashiTakara]

I don't watch TV anymore, nothing worth watching for the past decade... Anime is the only thing I watch now... well, I do watch the occassional "Everybody Loves Raymond" and "Home Improvement" lol, XP

[GuidoHunter_Toki]

Originally Posted by HayashiTakara

I don't watch TV anymore, nothing worth watching for the past decade... Anime is the only thing I watch now... well, I do watch the occassional "Everybody Loves Raymond" and "Home Improvement" lol, XP

I occasionally watch sitcoms like those and such, but the thing with sitcoms after I've seen most of the episodes a few times the jokes just don't do it for me anymore and I get bored of the show.

[HayashiTakara]

Originally Posted by GuidoHunter_Toki

I occasionally watch sitcoms like those and such, but the thing with sitcoms after I've seen most of the episodes a few times the jokes just don't do it for me anymore and I get bored of the show.

Frank and Marie are awesome, they never stop making me laugh.