Recommendations for scifi anime or fantasy film cartoons

[TheMasterOfOrion]

What anime show have you seen?

I have some free time and what to know what series you have liked? I'm looking to catch up on scifi anime shows, or western cartoon scifi tv shows? almost any region or almost any style


I enjoy the retro, I have a wide taste like the original Trek, Twilight Zone, Babylon-5, Gargoyles, Avengers EMH, Batman TAS, Akira アキラ , Les Maîtres du temps, Terminator series, Battlestar, the Matrix, Outland, 2001, Barbarella, Mars Attacks! Starchaser the legend of Orion, Dark City, Star Wars, V the series, Dr Who, Moonraker, the Xmen movies, Defiance etc


I want to get into some other retro or cult scif, or maybe foreign cartoon shows
recently talked to friends about this genre and apparently there's a cool hard scifi anime set on a space station, another with a young blonde kid who has a strict father figure that Captains or Commodore's a ship across the stars and another two Japanese shows similar to the tv show Firefly. I tried Japanese media but I'm not really into Mecha, or school girls transforming in vampires, I don't like the gundam thing or big Godzilla stuff, but I will give some anime an honest try. I'm more looking for a show with science, fantasy planets, space opera and good character interaction?


Any ideas???

thank you

 

[sojourner]

Cowboy Bebop.

 

[clint g]

Macross. Even with the mechs it's pretty good space opera.

 

[bbjeg]

If you haven't seen Cowboy Bebop, it's a great series. Evangelion is pretty epic, Ghost in the Shell is good if you liked the Terminator series, Trigun is as fun as it is epic, and I was a sucker for FLCL.

 

[Admiral2]

Black Lagoon
Ah! My Goddess!
Daphne In The Brilliant Blue
Starship Operators
ARIA
Gatchaman

 

[TheMasterOfOrion]

thanks for the suggestions guys very helpful, i will check some of these out

 

[Noname Given]

The recently completed remake of "Space Battleship Yamato", namely:

Space Battleship Yamato 2199

 

[Kelthaz]

Legend of the Galactic Heroes.

There's your space opera.

 

[2takesfrakes]

HEAvy METAL
and its sequel
HEAvy METAL (2000)

 

[publiusr]

I rather liked Steamboy for all the flying contraptions.
In terms of live action, Battle Beyond the Stars, Message from Space, etc.

 

[Doctorwhovian]

The Leiji Matsumuto manga/anime are pretty good. Yamato/Star Blazers has already been mentioned but there's also stuff like Galaxy Express and Captain Harlock. He's also done some work for Daft Punk music videos. Pretty much all his manga/anime are connected in a sort of shared universe.


A gateway anime for me was Bubblegum Crisis, which doesn't feature giant mechs but is sort of a mix of Blade Runner/Akira type dystopian future with a bit of the stylings of the cult movie Streets Of Fire and perhaps a bit of sentai (Power Rangers) like stuff.

Evangelion is sort of a mecha show but it's not exactly like the Gundam or Macross franchises. It has a lot of semi-religious imagery/symbolism and a sort of X-filesesque 'mythology' conspiracy going on. Also fairly depressing at times but still worth watching.

 

[Marc]

Evangelion is sort of a mecha show but it's not exactly like the Gundam or Macross franchises. It has a lot of semi-religious imagery/symbolism and a sort of X-filesesque 'mythology' conspiracy going on. Also fairly depressing at times but still worth watching.

Evangelion has been redone (rebuilt is the term used) with a series of movies known.

Three have been done with the fourth and final to come.

Follows the story line from the anime but with a few extra pieces, a lot less of the angst and the religious symbolism.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

I know it's cliche but I'd say to try Cowboy Bebop if you haven't already. I wonder if Planetes is the hard-SF series on a station you mention.

If you're open to older stuff as it seems you are I think Robotech and Star Blazers might be good to check out. These are the US cartoon versions of Macross and Yamato and the purists will spit since they're dumbed down a little bit for domestic consumption. However, they're still good IMO and in English, and really cheap in the case of Robotech which might make them easy to try.

I see suggestions for FLCL and Evangelion but I think those might be too much for someone just starting to explore these things. A lot of anime can be really stylized and over-the-top if you aren't (or even if you are) familiar with it and could be off-putting if you are just starting out.

 

[Hound of UIster]

Cowboy Bebop
Space Battleship 2199
Bubblegum Crisis
Ghost in the Shell (Stand Alone Complex, 2nd Gig)
Super Dimensional Fortress Macross
Gunbuster

In current flavors of the week anime there is also Knights of Sidonia, which takes place on a generational ship of post-humans that have left the Earth and now fight the aliens who destroyed the Earth thousand of years ago.

Evangelion is sort of a mecha show but it's not exactly like the Gundam or Macross franchises. It has a lot of semi-religious imagery/symbolism and a sort of X-filesesque 'mythology' conspiracy going on. Also fairly depressing at times but still worth watching.

Evangelion has been redone (rebuilt is the term used) with a series of movies known.

Three have been done with the fourth and final to come.

Follows the story line from the anime but with a few extra pieces, a lot less of the angst and the religious symbolism.

The problem is that once Anno strayed from the original tv show, the movies went to shit since he no longer knew from prior experience what could work and what didn't. The entirety of Eva 3.0 was one long snorefest that absolutely minimized storytelling and characterization. If anything it was a fundraising venture for his new company after he had parted ways with the leadership at Gainax.

 

[Marc]

Cowboy Bebop

For some reason could never get in this once but not sure why.

Bubblegum Crisis

haven't seen the original so how does it compare with BubbleGum Crisis: Tokyo 2040 and having seen the later is the original worth watching?

From reading the wiki it seems the original never reached it's conclusion due to legal issues

 

[Hound of UIster]

The original six was always open ended and just cases where the Knights Sabers go against a boomer of the week

I haven't see the 90s version though people tell me it's pretty bad.

 

[Marc]

The original six was always open ended and just cases where the Knights Sabers go against a boomer of the week

I haven't see the 90s version though people tell me it's pretty bad.

Hmm I didn't think it was bad (and there was an ongoing story line that reached it's conclusion as opposed to a boomer of the week). Hell I watched all 26 episodes

 

[Doctorwhovian]

The OAV Bubblegum Crisis, is extremely 80s-especially in the music animation (Good detail and movement but some sloppiness) and character designs. The 'Boomer' robots in particular have mixtures of the Terminator Endoskeleton (although much more 'muscular' with a touch of Giger's alien. There was a short OAV sequel called Bubblegum Crash, but many feel it was not as good.

The TV series (2040) is extremely 90s. The animation is more static and digital-looking, the character designs more angular...and the Boomers far less cool looking IMO. The music, which was very pop in the OAV, is mainly metal and techno. Part of this could be due to budget, since it was a TV series.


In a sense the second series is a remake/reboot, as it's set in a different countinuity. The suits the girls wear are more or less the same basic design though.

 

[Hound of UIster]

^The 80s version is very much a product of the popularity of 80s Science Fiction flicks in Japan.

How faithful in terms of character is the reboot to the original? I'm especially leery given the the recent planned Light Novel reboot, which sounds absolutely terrible. Japan's ideas of reboots makes some of Hollywood's worst stuff look sane.

 

[Blamo]

^The 80s version is very much a product of the popularity of 80s Science Fiction flicks in Japan.

How faithful in terms of character is the reboot to the original?

It's... Iffy.

As you said above, the original BGC (and 80's Japanese animation) was influenced by American movies, so the characters were also rather Americanised.

BGC 2040 isn't... It's far more rooted in Japanese culture and it follows the trends of mid 90's Japanese animation. Priss was hit the hardest by the changes, becoming more meeker, rather emo and less of a hardass (her reason for hating the ADPolice made me facepalm). Sylia is a nutcase, Nene is annoying and Linna is written as an everwoman(which isn't actually that bad).

The Voomers meanwhile are more like the voomers from Bubblegum crash. Not remotely sentient and rather non-human looking.

The story arc itself is what you would expect from mid-90's Japanese animation, being pretentious and all in all rather empty. The series itself isn't bad bad, but it's not exactly good either.