My favorite anime series of all time has to be Kosuke Fujishima's Ah! Megami-sama. It's the story of a college freshman, Morisato Keiichi, which dials a wrong number and reaches the Goddess Help Line. He is given one wish, and believing it to be a joke, wishes the attractive girl who came to grant his wish to stay with him forever. Unfortunately for him, the girl, Belldandy, is actually a goddess (that's why she came through the mirror!), and his wish is granted. Throughout the series, Belldandy's sisters, Urd and Skuld, join Keiichi as well, and wackiness ensues. The anime series takes a much more serious tone than the manga, due to it's extremely short length- only 5 episodes, coming to a grand total of less than 3 hours. Most OVA (original video animation, as in not made-for-tv) series go at least twice as long. This doesn't hurt the series, however. It still covers all kinds of things, from humor to romance to drama, all handled extremely well. Luckily, the series does not end there. In 1997 came "Ah! Megami-sama! Adventure of Mini-Goddess," a series of 48 7-minute shorts staring the Goddesses in the Handy Petite Size and a loveable rat named Gan-Chan in crazy stories, many parodies of movies or even other animes. No Keiichi here, but I personally like Gan-Chan better anyways. Oddly enough, I like Belldandy more in this series than in the OVAs. My favorite OVA character is Urd. But where oh where can you see this series? Come February 2002, Pioneer will be releasing them on DVD! It's true, it's true! And there's one on the Ah! My Goddess the Movie DVD! I guarantee you will love this series...unless you despise SD (super-deformed) characters. Since there's no Gan-Chan in the pic above (save for an evil-looking rat that may be him without the extra weight), I've provided two pics for you below!
My current favorite anime series (though AMG has the status of long-time favorite), this show consists of many short 4-minute episodes. While there is a main storyline, namely that Di Gi Charat and Petit Charat come from Charat Planet with their friend/pet/ball thing to the Akhibara district of Japan to become idol singers, but have no money, so they have to work at the video games store Gamers for money and a place stay. By the way, in real life, Di Gi Charat is the mascot of Gamers...anywho, while the basic story might seem somewhat normal to you, the storylines for each episode are anything but. The show is very funny, with a random sense of humor. It features such things as Godzilla attacking the city, a bear that no one can figure out what emotion it is expressing with apparently many special powers, a hooligan who visits the store to do some rampaging- but really does nothing, and a boy who eats food off the ground and gets diarrhea. There are many fart jokes, and other bodily-function humor, which very strange compared to virtually every other anime I have seen, but that is part of the show's charm. I recommend you check out this show. It's not licensed in the U.S., so I suggest you get the fansub from Kodocha Anime. You won't be disappointed. In semi-new news, Synch-Point has acquired the rights to make Di Gi Charat commercials for the U.S. branch of Gamers in California.
An anime with apparently not that widespread an American audience, Akihabara Dennou Gumi (Cyber Team in Akihabara) is an odd anime, but definitely one of my favorites. The story is extremely hard to explain- it is full of symbolism, and references to various cultures and uses many foreign words, both to the normal Japanese and English speaker. I guess one way to say it is that it is the story of five girls who find themselves part of a plan that has been building over the past few centuries. There are these Furby-like pets that are extremely popular with the kids known as Pata-Pies. The girls in question each have a Pata-Pie, which they can customize and make well-suited to their personality. All seems normal until a villain appears and draws them to an alley and tries to take the Pata-Pies from them. It's quite funny, since the bungling villains bring the girls to the same alley for, like, four episodes in a row! Anyways, when the girls are in danger, the Pata-Pies transform into defenders in angel-like armor called Divas, who like like the owner when she is grown up, who fight off and defeat the villains every time. I know this is a really dumb description, and it makes the show sound stupid beyond all belief, but believe me, this show is great once you see it. It is yet another of the great shows not licensed by any of the American studios, but there is a way to get a hold of it. Sachi's Distribution has fansubbed all episodes, and you can see how to order them by clicking on the link. Sachi also has a lot of other shows available, just like Kodocha Anime, so maybe you'll find something else you're looking for as well!
Tieing with Di Gi Charat as my current favorite anime, Kodomo no Omocha, also known as "Kodocha" or "Child's Toy," is yet another great and crazy show that for some reason no U.S. animation studio has liscensed, even though it has been around since 1996. My guess is that they are put off by its length of over 100 episodes. You can get every episode that has been subtitled so far from Kodocha Anime. Kodocha is the story of 6th-grader and child television star Sana Kurata, and her life at home, in school, and in show business. The main story of the show has serious tones to it, but the way it is presented is very lighthearted and downright goofy. My friend Salim said he felt like he was going to have a seizure when he saw the first episode. The show is very well paced, with flat-out hilarious episodes intersperced between a few episodes that a serious in nature and advance the story. When the story starts out, she is trying to get her class back to normal after nemesis, Akito Hayama, forces the teacher to let him do what he wants, because he has an incriminating picture. As the show progresses, the reason why Hayama acts this way becomes clear, and a friendship develops. There are many other topics and storylines occuring throughout the show, but if you ever have the desire to see the show, me mentioning them here will spoil it for you. I just highly recommend you check this show out. If you have a problem with some of the cruelty of the school bullies in the first story arc (like my friend Ghazi), all I can say is to hang in there, because the show gets funnier and much more lighthearted within a few episodes. Anyways, do yourself a favor and check out one of the many animes which haven't been licensed, but is infinitely better than 90% or more of the anime released here in the U.S.
Once my favorite anime series, from the same animation company as Ah! Megami-Sama (AIC) comes Tenchi Muyo! Unlike AMG, there is a buttload of Tenchi series, movies, and merchandise. There are two Tenchi universes, the OVA one, which came first, and the TV series one, which had enough changes made to it so it wouldn't rehash the same stuff those who owned the OVAs had already seen. The basic story is still the same, however: a boy named Tenchi discovers there is more to himself, his family, and their history than he ever knew before, and he encounters many aliens, demons, goddesses, and other such because of it. But if this sounds like a serious anime, you couldn't be farther from the truth. Tenchi Muyo! is one of the craziest, funniest animes I have ever seen. There's really something for everyone here: humor, romance, drama, action, mecha, space battles, and just about anything else you can think of, including a Sailor Moon parody series, Magical Girl Pretty Sammy. I recommend you check out this series, but make sure you start at the beginning of either the OVA or TV series (but not Shin Tenchi Muyo/Tenchi in Tokyo!). Jumping in the middle will do you no good, nor will watching any of the three movies prior to one of the series. And if you're a huge Mihoshi fan, like I am, come join the Knightly Order of Mihoshi Enthusiasts!
