alright so I've read through/am all caught up with The Big Three ™️ (One Piece, Naruto, Bleach) which I really enjoyed (especially One Piece), only Bleach didn't really do it for me after a certain point. I've also read Shaman King and watched both Fullmetal Alchemist and Samurai Champloo, which I found pretty good all around. However I am now looking for a new meaty, long manga/anime to fill the hole that those series left. Anybody got some recommendations? So far my list of series that are supposed to be pretty good consists of HunterxHunter (although I've read that it hasn't gotten any new content in a long time), Cowboy Bebop and Death Note. My friend keeps telling me to watch Attack on Titan but I've read that the mangaka is a huge reactionary dweeb so I haven't given it a shot so far. Any other recommendations that hit a similar spot as those titles?
It’s not necessarily in a similar spot, but definitely Evangelion. Everyone should watch evangelion. It’s good, folks
Watch the real Big Three:
Neon Genesis Evangelion
Revolutionary Girl Utena
Serial Experiments Lain
More serious suggestion: if you're into the Shonnen stuff try Demon Slayer, very popular and very good.
Well, the struggle session on whether AoT is reactionary or not still hasn't concluded, but instead of having others think for you, why not watch a few episodes and decide for yourself? I personally could never really see any overtly fascist or reactionary subtext myself.
I went through stages of "Wow, this is a really fashy show" to "Wow, this is a brilliant subversion of fascist shows" until I read a comment here that convinced me that it's at least cryptofascist. Regrettably, it's still a well crafted story and I'd like for someone to convince me that I'm still wrong about it, and my second take was correct.
For "still shounen but a bit different":
The Promised Neverland
Made in Abyss
Manga is much longer than the anime for both of these.
The Promised Neverland manga just wrapped up at about 200 chapters iirc; Season 2 of the anime begins airing in January.
Made in Abyss is much slower going and shorter (only 50ish chapters in the manga so far), but very much worth it. The anime has 1 season and an OVA out.
For "very shounen in a stereotypical way"
Absolutely second all the votes for My Hero Academia
Demon Slayer
Food Wars!
Haikyu!!
Food Wars and Haikyu are definitely less thematically heavy than other suggestions here and elsewhere in the thread. They're really just fun, popcorn watches. A nice palate cleanser between heavier shows.
Other Suggestions:
Gurren Lagann
Space Dandy
FLCL - very short, very absurdist, very worth it
re:Zero - Incel NEET learns he's not actually the center of the universe and that his actions have consequences in the most gruesome ways possible? yassss pleez. Technically a light novel series with anime and manga adaptations. light novel is quite long, anime is at 1.5 seasons long right now, with cour 2 of season 2 starting on january 6th
Yona of the Dawn: Anime only has 1 season, but the manga is still ongoing and hnnng so good, especially recently. good if you like political maneuvering and machinations and morally grey character. it is technically a shoujo series (yes, there's a love triangle) but it is well written and the art is fantastic so I'm throwing it in here.
cowboy bebop is fantastic and you should definitely watch it. i like attack on titan too.
but if you want a long series there's always dragon ball. I've been rewatching the original dragon ball series, and maybe it's just my nostalgia, but it's so good. yeah there's some pervy stuff that i don't like, and the first tournament is kinda boring but it picks back up again after. i never got very far into dragon ball z though so i can't tell you if it stays good or not, but dragon ball z kai is a remastering of dbz and they cut out a lot of fluff.
Everything about Dragon Ball that I've seen so far reminded me of the experience I had when watching the first Blade Runner movie: Sure this stuff is well made, but it's mostly just tropes that I've already seen a thousand times and then realizing that "Oh, you're just thinking that because the thousands of times you've seen these clichés was them just emulating the original" but I still couldn't get into the original version.
aw that's fair. I'm just like a casual watcher of anime and out of the big three you listed the only one I've watched even a part of is bleach, so I'm not really aware of all those cliches. but I'd still recommend cowboy bebop and giving attack on titan a chance, and death note is pretty good too
Berserk is fucking amazing, just don't watch any of the newer seasons, watch the 1997 season of the anime and read the manga to get the rest of the story.
Devilman Crybaby for the laughs and cries.
or Black Clover, I guess if you want another long serial shounen.
Future diary too.
My Hero Academia is definitely up your alley then, long-form shounen with a well animated anime (and they have a really good spin off manga which is also worth a read!). I would also like to recommend Log Horizon, they do some anime tropes but its a really neat show that tackles an isekai premise as colonialism. It also has a new season coming out this year for the first time in years.
I saw Evangelion in the thread and would also recommend. Watch it slowly, I was really greatful I took the time to watch it one ep/day.
It hasn't been recommended yet, and while those are not long form shounen shows, PsychoPass and Code Geass both are great shows with strong leftist themes. IIRC those are both original animes (i.e. not manga adaptations) and that translates to a satisfying ending unlike most adaptations nowadays.
