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Best anime for anime watchers is Cromartie High. It is near perfect in pacing, absurdity and meta-jokes about anime as a medium to begin with. The english dub is actually better than the sub simply because the ridiculousness of the voiceover heightens the comedy, even when relatively subtle wordplay (rare) is involved. Konosuba achieves largely the same and is a good rip on the extremely tired Isekai power fantasy genre.
Otherwise for seriousness I found Gundam Witch From Mercury one of the best examples of longterm psychological manipulation presented in any medium, all while wrapped in an enjoyable high school drama with good action and decent worldbuilding. Last 2 episodes compressed a season into 2 episodes which is nuts but otherwise it was pretty excellent. A good lighthearted series is Dungeon Meishi which makes an attempt at internal consistency and logical subversion/adherence to fantasy tropes, so its a good time there.
Slice of life isn't quite my style, though I think I watched an odd episode of Azumanga Daioh and liked it.
I'm a bit confused on where to get into Gundam, I've heard that the different series can be very different, and I'm looking for a good mecha anime in the first place.
I would give a slightly unusual but wholehearted recommendation to start with Gundam 00 (my personal favorite of the franchise, and probably one of my favorite anime series in general).
It is fully standalone, so you don’t need to worry about Gundam continuity— while you’ll inevitably miss some of the thematic callbacks to the overarching franchise, the only one that really matters for understanding 00 is that the timeline is pointedly set in terms of “A.D.” time (where other continuities are given alternative labels like being set in “the year 0079 U.C.”), meaning it is supposed to be set in the future of the real world as opposed to a more vague sci-fi future; this is thematically relevant in that the show is really trying to say something about the structure of the world and about the trajectory and nature of humanity. Having been made in the mid-00s a lot of the themes and morals are, in my opinion, notably prescient and are still relevant today.
Without spoiling anything, I think the reason I like the show so much is that it’s one of fairly few anime (or any pop-cultural media really) that you can watch with your “literary analysis brain” engaged and actually get a payoff for it. Damn near every creative decision, plot development, and character arc is meaningful and analyze-able in a way that connects to the central themes and plot. For example this is the reason why my fiancee, who very rarely likes mecha anime, thoroughly loved it— there was always something to talk about after every episode, often something meaty too. I’d caution that it is a bit of a slow burn, but this is deliberate and the pace does pick up as it goes on. It’s definitely not a perfect show, there is filler (although less than in a lot of similar shows, and there’s never an outright wasted episode) and there were some production issues that do show at times, but never anything bad enough to really drag the show down.
Very strong recommendation as an anime in and of itself, regardless of being a Gundam series really.
You've got me sold, thank you for taking the time to review it. Despite my hard scifi fetish, I can occasionally ignore the square-cube law and enjoy a good mecha brawl!
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Best mecha anime was Macross Frontier, honestly. Others mentioned Code Geass below as well, which works. Both have good mech animation, good characters, good pacing. Most of the gundam examples have moments of brilliance bogged down by oceans of slog. The ones cited by others have great scenes or episodes and then multiple filler or slogs that just make it unwatchable.
But the true best robot anime ever is Megas XLR. A giant death robot with a hotrod for a head and a hotter redhead as the boss of the mechs 2 idiot pilots? Pure joy.
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Gundam has a bunch of alternate continuities called "timelines", each of which is canonically independent of the others even though they tend to reuse the same story elements (giant robots, space colonies, a masked antagonist, etc.); think Final Fantasy or Fire Emblem.
The first timeline has the best OVAs (War in the Pocket, Stardust Memory, and The 08th MS Team) but the problem is that the original show which establishes the timeline is a fucking mess. Mobile Suit Gundam has shitty animation, padding, stupid gimmicks designed to sell toys, etc. It's not really worth watching.
I'd recommend starting with Gundam SEED instead, which is basically a modern remake of Mobile Suit Gundam with much better production values, and is a genuinely decent show. Just make sure you watch the original version instead of the HD remaster, and for the love of God avoid the sequel Gundam SEED Destiny.
Which is the one with the national stereotype gundams, ie mexico gundam with the sombrero?
G Gundam? It’s fun, but even by gundam standards pretty goofy.
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Thank you. But Jesus Christ, I really want to know how this particular state of affairs arose. I feel like I'd get a more canonical answer if I earnestly asked what is current Marxist canon.
The exact same thing that happened with Fate.
It turns out that people give you their money if you keep re-imagining the Pacific War in space with giant robots, so when Philip J. Otaku says "Shut up and take my money!", the market responds by supplying as much Gundam as can be sold.
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If you haven't watched it yet, I suggest give Code Geass a try. Although people often say Code Geass is actually not a real or true Mecha anime. I hate the art style and character design and I still watched the whole thing and don't regret it. It's widely considered to have one of the best endings in anime and I have to agree. Also the OST is great.
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IMO:
Of the three core Universal Century series: The original Mobile Suit Gundam has intolerably bad animation; Zeta Gundam is peak; and Gundam ZZ insults the viewer by failing to become good until almost literally the halfway point (episode 23 of 47). But starting with Zeta Gundam while having zero knowledge of the background provided in MSG probably would be a bad idea. I dunno, maybe watch the MSG compilation movies, or play the MSG campaign in an emulated Dynasty Warriors Gundam game (which is how I got into the franchise, sans emulation).
Gundam X is pretty good.
G Gundam and Build Fighters aren't really the same genre as the rest of the franchise, but still are quite fun. (The other Build Fighters and Build Divers series are not nearly as fun, IMO.)
It's been a while since I tried watching Gundam Wing, Turn A Gundam ,Gundam SEED, and Gundam Iron-Blooded Orphans, but IIRC I didn't like them much.
The first Gundam I watched was probably SEED, but my personal favorite was Gundam 00. Wing was okay, and I won't recommend Iron-Blooded Orphans because I really didn't like the ending.
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