Many of the people make the mistake of thinking that Anime and Cartoon is the same thing but trust me it’s not( Don’t say the word cartoon to an Anime lover if you value your life). If you find the depth and the feel that a cartoon doesn’t provide. In the world of anime, there are many genres like action adventure, fantasy, Romance, and many more! But even in the anime world, there are some anime that you can’t just miss out on. So we present you top 10 anime that everyone should watch.
Dragon Ball
So first on the list is we have Dragon Ball, no surprises there really as this is the one Shounen genre that inspired many others. This anime is an adaptation of manga( Japanese comic book) with the same name is written and illustrated by Akira Toriyama. The Dragon ball series was premiered in Japan on February 26, 1986. So, you can guess it’s running for such a long time, but the hype of Dragon ball never ends even to this day. And Dragon ball recently makes another entrance in the form of Dragon ball Super.
The series follows a young boy name Songoku, who sets on a journey to find all 7 dragon balls along with a young lady named Bulma. They encounter many things along the way and meet many people good and bad alike. The perfect blend of fighting with super cool moves, along with fun elements and the value for friendship makes it perfect anime for anyone to watch.
After watching Dragon Ball you will be left wanting for more, so far, not Dragon ball has a vast series of its own that gets more heated and more serious as the time grows, we have listed all the series below.
Dragon Ball
Dragon Ball Z
Dragon Ball GT
Dragon Ball Super (You may find the timeline between GT and super a bit disoriented, but as you get into the anime you will get versed in the Dragon Ball Universe)
Naruto
Well, there was a tuff competition between two of my favorite anime for this spot Naruto and One piece (I prefer one piece on this spot but may say otherwise ). Many of you must have at least heard about these two anime at some point that’s because these two anime literally present the Shounen genre. Enough about that and let’s talk about why you should watch Naruto. Naruto is set on a ninja world, and this is a story about a 12 years old who is shunned by his birth village for having Nine-tailed Fox sealed inside of him, so to make the villages acknowledge the existence he promised to become a Hokage( Leader of the village). As he grew up, he faced many struggles in his path of becoming the Hokage.
Once Naruto Uzumaki become a Ninja he was sorted into a squad along with his two team-mates, Sasuke Uchiha, a brooding teenager who wants to take revenge for his family and Sakura Haruno, an annoying fangirl (literally can’t use another term for her, she grew up though… eventually) and an infamous Ninja Kakashi Hatake as their instructor. So join them on their journey as they grow up to become awesome ninjas themselves. This story is an awesome blend of fighting, coolest moves, emotions, comic, and value of bonds. Trust me when I say you will find yourself laughing one second and crying the other, It’s frustrating, but you will love it to death.
Naruto is also the adaption of a manga of the same name; It is written and illustrated by Masashi Kishimoto. Naruto also has two series:
Naruto
Naruto Shippuden
OnePiece
Now here we have our next anime of the Onepiece and my all time favorite. I can brag about why One piece is the best in this genre and never get tired of it, so we should get on with it. One piece is set on a fantasy world where the sea is divided between four blues East, West, North and South and the four blues met at the Grand Line. We have a young man of 17 year old who dreams to become the Pirate King, a title that was only given to only one man named Gol D Roger, who was executed years ago from the start of the story but before he was executed he revealed that he hide treasure at an island called Raftel and anyone who can find the treasure will be named the second Pirate King.
And Like so many our Protagonist Monkey D Luffy set sail to find the infamous treasure and become the Pirate King along the way he met some cool people and made them his crewmates and thus their journey actually begins with the dream of their own. You will get swept off your feet by the characters and their diversity, and it will teach you just how much you need different people in your life as you can’t do all the work by yourself similarly you can’t achieve your dreams by the help and support of others.
A truly heartfelt plot that touches the heart of many people as the plot thickens we get to see amazing fights, comedy, emotional moments, character growth as an individual and most of all you will see the bond between Nakama ( friends/comrades) and the crews unconditional trust for each other, sure they falter and make mistakes, but they still know how to forgive. This masterpiece is written and illustrated by Eiichiro Oda. It was first shown on TV on 20 October 1999 and its still on-going to this day.
Your lie in April
Now that I think about it, I feel like I’ve been writing a lot about shounen genre and not paying attention to the shoujo genre which has a great potential on its own. If I hear Shoujo somewhere Your Lie in April pops into my head, it’s really short anime with only 22 episodes in its bag, but the story is completed, so you don’t have to worry about that. This anime is about a young boy in his middle school named Arima Kousei who was a piano prodigy, but while he was young, he lost his ability to hear after his mother died and after that, he stops play the piano since he uses to play for his mother.
Then he met a pretty and eccentric girl named Kaori Miyazuno who is a violinist and don’t like to play what’s written in the score and play with giving a spin to whatever piece she performs. She helps bring back Arima into the music world and show him that perfection isn’t everything and he should feel whatever music he is playing, she taught him to live his life, not in a monotone sense but actually enjoy it, but everything comes at a price. This anime will literally leave you in tears as you finish the anime, and your appreciation for classical pieces will increase tenfold with the help of this anime. This amazing story is written and created by Naoshi Arakawa.
Yona of the Dawn
Yona of the dawn is like a revolution to the Harem (a lot of guy pinning over a girl or other way around) theme. In this anime, Yona, the female protagonist, was not a damsel in distress needing a prince to save her from the cruelty of the world. At the start of the series, Yona was a happy princess, blissfully unaware of the troubles surrounding her country. On her 16th birthday, her father was killed by her own close friend, and she has to run away to survive by the help of her loyal friend and Guard General Hak.
After some time of wallowing in self-pity, she vowed to get revenge on her father’s murderer and get her kingdom back. But before that, she has to get the help of the four men who have the blood of ancient dragons on their veins that are sworn to protect her kingdom. And to accomplish that she set on a journey to find them and get to see all the pain and suffering of the people around her.
Yona of the dawn is like a breath of fresh air with refreshing plot and most of all, Not useless female character. I love the struggle she has to face through while being on the road, far away from the castle. The anime will give you a good fight, a good amount of romance between Hak and Yuna and a list of amazing while mystery surrounding them on each path. Yona of the Dawn is written and illustrated by Mizuho Kusanagi.
Anohana: The Flower we saw that day
It’s been a long time since I’ve watched this anime but one that you’ll never forget once you watch it. Anohana presents a unique story with a set of really good characters. The plot surrounds a group of friends, but the Main protagonist is Memna who dies in an accident when she was young and come back as a ghost to haunt her best friend Jintan (Not in the bad way I’m telling you. It’s not a horror story). Neither of them knows how menma can go back to heaven , so they tried to fulfill Menma’s wish, but the problem was neither of them knew what the wish was.
Soon they were forced to involve their old friends in this mess who have drifted apart as they grew up, they all were forced to open their closed wounds in the wake of Menma’s death. The story tells us a lot about our real life as we all drift apart, seemingly getting busy with their own life. The slice of life factor was too beautiful to pass up, along with hurt and comfort this one will take you on an emotional roller coaster ride throughout the whole series.
Toradora
In the list of different genre, why leave the Rom-Com out. Toradora is one of the funniest anime I’ve watched, while it is the classic Rom-Com genre out there but it does make you wish for more. The story follows a small, petite young girl Taiga Aisake who has pretty aggressive nature and a boy named Ryuuji Takasu who has a face of a delinquent, but he is soft-hearted and gentle. When those two opposite personalities clash, it is a perfect recipe for disaster. One day Ryuuji discovers that Taiga is crushing on his best friend Yuusaku Kitamura and Taiga discovers the same about Ryuuji’s crush on her best friend, Minori Kushieda.
After knowing this, they thought of the apparent solution of helping each other out with getting together with each other’s best friends, but they didn’t consider getting feeling for each other, and this is what happened. It is a 25 episode long anime, but the slow and steady pace of their relationship makes it interesting, but the comedy is much more enjoyable when they help each other. Truly classic and timeless is Toradora.
Prince of tennis
We have seen many genres so far in the list, so the next is sports genre, there is much anime in this genre, but for some reason Prince of tennis stands out for me, maybe it was the diversity between the characters and the hard work they put into reaching on the top and more importantly it was the players passion to play the game is something valuable. This anime revolves around a middle school Freshman in Seishun Academy named Ryoma Echizen; he is the son of former Grand Slam winner and a tennis prodigy himself.
He moves back from America and enrolls in his father’s old school, which is famous for its strong tennis team. In the school, he meets the regulars of the tennis team and participates in tryouts to get the position of a Regular. his unique play style impresses the team and their captain Tezuks Kunimitsu, who saw a lot of potential in the young prodigy and take him under his wing. This anime will take you on a rollercoaster ride of excitement and despair while watching the matches, you would literally find yourself on the edge of the seat while the matches were being played, not only it also show us that how they made good friends through participating in nationals competition while sharing the same passion of Tennis. This series is also an adaption of the manga of the same name written and illustrated by Takeshi Konomi.
Steins Gate
Now that we are on the subject of different genres, how can time-travel can be left behind. But fear not Stein’s gate is nothing like the time travel stories you know where the protagonist of the series goes back and tries to change the past. Steins gate is the adaption of the game with the same name, It is set in the modern world and follows the life of a scientist named Rintaro Okabe, self-proclaimed mad scientist who runs a Laboratory named Future gadgets Laboratory along with his two friends. While he was attending a conference about time travel, he finds the dead body of Kurisu Makise; he sends a text to his friend about it. Later he discovers that Kurisu is alive and the text reached to his friend before he sends it.
Later on, it was proven that they could send a message to the while trying to create a cellphone-operated microwave. And the friends started to investigate it with the help of Kurisu with the strange phenomena that actually lets them time travel later on. The series is not long, but thriller and fiction put to use make it really in its genre. As Okabe has to time travel many times to set things right that have gone terribly wrong in the world.
Seraph of the end
A good list won’t end without the Vampires making an appearance and so we have Seraph of the End at the end of the list. It is a dark fantasy genre where everyone has a different motive of doing what the did, and the power play is not something to scoff at, at all. This series is set on a world where humanity has gone extinct due to a lethal virus spreading through like wildfire and killing of humans, the vampires have taken over the world and use humans as livestock for blood.
The series follows a young boy named Yuichiro Hyakuya, who lives in an orphanage along with his friends he considers family, as livestock in the beginning, then sick and tired of this they made a plan to escape this hell but that didn’t end well, and he was the only one able to escape. He soon joined the Japanese Imperial Demon Army, in order to get revenge on the vampires for what they did to his family. It is a good dark fantasy series that will leave you speechless with every revelation that happened throughout the series, the fighting is very good along with the character depth, I just love this series, and you’ll love it too if you are into the dark and serious stuff. If not, then there are many others that give you light and amusing feel along with good action.
Summary
Oh boy, I sure babble too much, but when you have a chance to talk about your favorite anime, then you won’t be able to st0p yourself too. There are many out there that you’ll love, but I try to make a list that at least consists of one anime from a different genre. I hope you all enjoy the anime that I listed above.
