It started watching anime forever ago. Like many people my age my first experience was from Cartoon Network's Toonami. I remember watching Dragon Ball, Sailor Moon, G Gundam, and Zoids. But at the time I had no clue that it was anime. Hell, I had no clue what anime was, I just thought it was all cartoons. I was kind of an idiot back then. Eventually I did learn the difference between western animation and Japanese animation, but I had yet to consider myself a diehard fan of anime. That all changed with two things, my discovery of manga, and my discovery of On Demand entertainment.
I discovered manga on my last day of sixth grade, during the height of the Yu-Gi-Oh craze. I was really into it, as were all my friends. One of my friends came in with something none of us had seen before. It looked like a comic book, but it was thicker, and everything was backwards. It was Shonen Jump.
Not the right one, but close enough.
One of the first few to be exact, as this was the first year Shonen Jump was around. None of my friends were really interested, the one who bought it only wanted it for the Yu-Gi-Oh connection, but I was automatically interested. The stories inside fascinated me. I saw that this was where anime came from. There was even a Rurouni Kenshin manga, and I use to love that show! I will always say that discovering manga became that significant turning point in my life. But it wasn't the last turning point.
Shonen Jump got me into manga, but what made me the anime fan I am today was anime On Demand. For those who don't know, On Demand is a cable television service which allows you to watch what they put on when you want to. It has a decent amount of programing on it, but what was important was that it had anime. I discovered it and binged on all the shows that they had. That was a mistake. You see, anime On Demand was like a coin toss for good anime. While sometimes they had incredible shows, like BECK: Mongolian Chop Squad, Baccano, Super Gals, Azumanga Daioh and Abenobashi Magical Shopping Arcade, it also had Magikano, Gundam Seed Destiny, My-Hime, Cutey Honey and Abenobashi Magical Shopping Arcade.
Still don't know how to feel about this series.
On Demand anime shaped my tastes in anime. It showed me the weird, the great, the terrible, the scaring and Magikano, a show I will forever hate. On Demand anime was the only place for me to get anime back in the day. I had no fancy computer to get my anime from. I did not have the money to buy anime. I was limited to what would be On Demand. This has effected me in strange ways. Mainstream shows have become something difficult for me to get into. The stranger the show the better it can be. And I am much more forgiving of shows that have overt over the top fan-service. That is not to say that I love the stuff, but I am more forgiving and I know that fan-service does not necessarily a make a bad show. It just usually does.
Since my harrowing days of On Demand, anime has become much more accessible for me. I am in my school's anime club. I have become a fan of tokusatsu, or live action special effects shows like Kamen Rider and Super Sentai. I watch a myriad of different series from across the spectrum of anime, from sports shows to harems, from deep philosophical pieces to mindless fighting. I like anime. And now I hope you know a little bit about what I like, and how I see anime. I encourage you leave a comment telling your own story of how you got into anime. I look forward to reading them!
I own nothing of any of the copy-written materials mentioned above. Thank you.
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