Anime/Manga we forgot about.

[Galeigh 284]

I was bored at work tonight and I remembered us being super into an anime years ago about a kid with a cursed eye. 

 

A quick google later: D. Grayman. Who remembers that? We were all super hyped about it then poof, nothing. 

[Anelle 784]

Man D Grayman disappointed me so many times. I got hyped up then it got weird then just ...wasn't accessible or on hiatus or something? Or maybe this was just when I wasn't reading as much stuff and had just dropped nearly everything but then I remembered it and saw more had happened so I was all ooooh but then once I actually read it I was all ehhhhhhhh and then was done

 

or something

 

SHIT I JSUT REMEMBERED ONE I WANNA CHECK ON

[Tassifox 413]

The manga was definitely way better than the anime for D Gray Man. I mean I liked the anime don't get me wrong but I think with it passing on without ending was just sad.

How about Fushigi Yugi? Anyone? That was like one of the first series that made me a weeaboo with Slayers.

[Anelle 784]

Dude, speaking of Fushigi Yuugi, I waited like 103242 years for Genbu Kaiden to finish being translated but official releases were SO SLOW i completely forgot about it.

[Galeigh 284]

Holy shit I remember watching both of those back in the day

 

Fushigi Yuugi kinda wore thin for me though, especially the 'second maiden' arc after she got back to her world and her friend(?) got summoned in her place. It was baaaaaad. 

 

Slayers was just dumb fun though, loved it. 

[Tassifox 413]

I liked that they were going over the previous maidens. Also yes Nelle I agree I only have up to the 11 volumes of the Genbu arc and I totally just lost track after financial stuff happened. I love the artist but OMG SO LONG OF SERIES! Same with Arata! 

After loading all my music library into a iPod classic I scored, I've been hearing music I haven't heard in forever from anime's I watched.

Loveless being one of them, Trinity Blood, MAZE (HOLY FUCK)

 

[Revolver 26]

D. Gray Man was pretty legit. Beautiful, noire artwork. Story was pretty good too.

 

The author became ill, which I think is really that they just got ground down by the intensity of a weekly series. These weekly series grind their creators to dust. They eventually moved it to a monthly but by that point there had been multiple hiatuses and it never got back back on track.

[Olly 39]

I have a real soft spot for Ranma 1/2. It was THE THING for a while there, so popular it even became cool to hate on it - now it never comes up. But it's hilarious. (At least the manga is - I never watched the show.)

[Tassifox 413]

So since there's nothing much on streaming right now, I decided to go through my DVD's and pulled out Tactics. I definitely remember loving the manga more but this is just as cute.

[Psycho666Soldier 271]

13 hours ago, Olly said:

I have a real soft spot for Ranma 1/2. It was THE THING for a while there, so popular it even became cool to hate on it - now it never comes up. But it's hilarious. (At least the manga is - I never watched the show.)

This is hands down one of my favorite anime/manga of all time.  Other than my introduction through Gall Force and the occasional Sci-Fi Channel Saturday night movies, this was the first non-DBZ/Pokemon/Sailor Moon anime when I was younger, and I fell in love.  I always loved the balance of comedy and martial arts, with a hidden romance plot becoming increasingly present as the series progresses.

 

Ranma 1/2 is a pinnacle for me.  And I love Rumiko Takahashi(even if Inuyasha is very bleh).

[Tassifox 413]

That's because with Ranma you had the main idea of the story and then just threw all the other stuff piling onto it. With Inu Yasha it felt like all the other stuff was being forced to fit into the storyline and how it had to connect to the characters somehow. Which is why I preferred the manga since less filler episodes

 

[Jane 100]

19 hours ago, Olly said:

I have a real soft spot for Ranma 1/2. It was THE THING for a while there, so popular it even became cool to hate on it - now it never comes up. But it's hilarious. (At least the manga is - I never watched the show.)

Same, Lucy and I read loads of the manga - absolutely loved it, it's genuinely hilarious at times. We had quite a few of the American Viz volumes (Lu still has most of them somewhere I guess), and it was a well-written, funny translation which really helped. I don't think I ever got to the end, but as it had such a sit-com feel it didn't really matter.

I was so happy when Rumiko Takahashi was finally honoured at Angouleme this year: https://www.comicsbeat.com/rumiko-takahashi-wins-the-grand-prix-at-angouleme/
Maison Ikkoku is one of my very favourite manga ever, and lots of her other stuff is good too - I actually really liked the Inu-Yasha manga at the start and was disappointed when it dragged on so much, as it took her folklore-inspired stuff and made it into a creepy-but-not-too-scary and quite engaging action story (basically took some of her Mermaid Forest creepiness and geared it to a younger audience).

[Tassifox 413]

Since this pushes it into so many things. What about CLAMP? I seriously loved these artists and I can't recall anything after XXXHolic other than the revamp of Cardcaptor for anything new for them. Which is sad because I love their art style.

[Galeigh 284]

Omg Cardcaptor. I haven't heard that name in a looooong time. 

[Tassifox 413]

I loved the new series! It made me re-binge the previous series and seeing the story continue the way it has is perfect!

[Olly 39]

Yeah, whatever happened to CLAMP? Cheesy as hell, but I still kind of loved "Tokyo Babylon" in all its gothic sexual violence, gender-bending glory.

[Tassifox 413]

According to Wikipedia they really only had the revamped Cardcaptor in 2016 they haven't had anything mentioned as to what they're doing now. Considering they've been going since 1987 I wouldn't be surprised if they're just laying low or thinking of retiring.

[Woofie 7]

I never watched the anime, but the D.Gray-man manga was pretty good for quite a while. I only stopped reading it when the releases became too erratic (I guess it started to feel a bit directionless around the same time). But the concept was cool, the art was nice for a Jump series, it had a good set of characters.... it's a shame how things turned out, really.

 

As for Clamp, I wish they had stopped working in about 2002, most of what they've done since then has been kind of bad. Honestly, in my mind Tsubasa doesn't even exist. The new Sakura manga is ok so far, but I'm not really sure it was necessary; the original series ended so nicely.

[Lucy 108]

CLAMP are on almost permanent hiatus on everything as usual lmao. Tsubasa frustrates me because it's the sort of thing I would have enjoyed more if it wasn't "derivative of our other characters AU fanfic" nonsense; the best part of it for me were the completely original characters, Kurogane and Fai D. Flourite, whose stories were cool and their interactions interesting.

 

On topic: my problem with an anime I forgot topic is that... well, I forgot them.  Once I see an image of them or hear their name I'll go OH YEAH but my memory is absolute trash.

 

On theme, I can actually think of a couple of CLAMP works that have been left behind, forgotten either in general or by CLAMP themselves to start off with:

 

- X

Put on a hiatus at the climactic point of the manga because the publisher was getting antsy about the violence and depictions of mass disaster, and rather than censor CLAMP walked away into a hiatus. They were looking for another magazine to publish it, but never found one.. It was visually stunning and I miss it a lot, it's sad to know it'll probably never end.

 

- Clover

Minimalist (for CLAMP), stark and tragic, I honestly think this is CLAMP's forgotten magnum opus. The magazine it ran in was discontinued, and they never found a place to republish it. I don't know how hard they tried, but it's been literally 20 years at this point so I don't think it will ever continue and this absolutely boils my potatoes every time I think about it. 

[Tassifox 413]

Oh yea for sure. X made almost no sense to me and the movie made even less sense. I was sad about clover. Blood C though was a total train wreck. Especially near the end.

[Anelle 784]

CLAMP has made some of my favorite shit but they NEVER FINISH ANYTHING and at this point I'm kinda bitter about it all tbh

[Tassifox 413]

I think Magic Knight Rayearth and Chobits were like the closest to finishing one of their series yes? With xxxHolic being a close 3rd

[Galeigh 284]

A fail is a fail. 

[Tassifox 413]

Yea true.....

[Tassifox 413]

Okay todays music listenings at work on my ipod reminded me of this one.

WHO REMEMBERS UTENA!?

[Lucy 108]

Utena's a masterpiece, I can't think of anyone who's forgotten that one

 

 

[Olly 39]

Uh...

 

osht I can't point to my name/ava anymore xD

[Galeigh 284]

3 hours ago, Lucy said:

Utena's a masterpiece, I can't think of anyone who's forgotten that one

 

 

I did

Utena was never a big one for me or my group of friends.

[Vic Boss 610]

I've never seen Utena but I have a simulwatch friend who considers it one of their favourite animes they've watched while growing up, so I am gonna get around to that one day

[Tassifox 413]

I legit think that this was one of the first animes that hinted/implied incest to my molding young mind in the world of weaaboos

[dr. b 486]

Here's one I haven't thought about in a long time but I think I really enjoyed when I watched it: .hack//Sign. I guess it's been nearly 15 years since I watched it; hardly remember a thing about it in terms of specific characters, plot points, etc. But I recall liking it. I don't think I went on to watch anything else in the .hack franchise though. This was back in the bad old days when I didn't always know where to look for anime online, still had spotty Internet access, etc. I'm not even sure how I lucked into finding the whole series available for download.

[Tassifox 413]

That franchise was all over the place though. After //Sign I could hardly keep up since the animes after that would be tied to either games or other manga that would "hint" or mention //Sign but were off on their own thing. Makes me wonder how I stayed hooked onto Fate/Stay so well

[dr. b 486]

Fate/Zero and Fate/Stay night UBW were both very good, but I'm totally unfamiliar with any of the other anime, VNs, etc. in that franchise

[Tassifox 413]

See? Same concept.  If anything Fate/Encore confused the fuck out of me because it had a few of the same chars from Stay Zero and Stay UBW but totally different storyline that was like being on acid.

[Vic Boss 610]

I think about .hack//SIGN every once in awhile because I keep up with Sword Art Online.

 

 

[Galeigh 284]

No matter how fractured, .Hack will ALWAYS be better than ANYTHING from SAO

[Vic Boss 610]

Buh?

[webhead 518]

I've been meaning to watch .hack//sign one of these days.  Hard to watch anime with the baby since I have to actually sit and read subs lol.

[Tassifox 413]

You you CAN watch it dubbed since you have babeh duties now right? Not everyone would judge.

[webhead 518]

No.  Gross.  I rarely ever do that.

 

Cowboy Bebop, FMA, DBZ, and randomly SAO are the only ones (my cousin and I started watching the dub on Hulu and that got me stuck on it).

[Tassifox 413]

True weaboo till the end. Got it.

[webhead 518]

Anything with Steve Blum also gets a pass.  Forgot I was watching Samurai Champloo in English as well.

 

I'm less of a weeb than most tbh but I don't usually do a dub unless there's a reason.

[Tassifox 413]

Yea we were in the generation where good dubbing was far and few in between

[Olly 39]

.hack//sign was consistently disappointing. Terrific premise, no execution.

[Vic Boss 610]

I remember really liking the contrast between IRL, a drab black-and-white silent-movie where things suck, and Online, a full-colour living and breathing world, but also remember waiting for something to actually happen most of the time (which I might be chalking up to being in high school at the time and being more about the shounen action, I'll have to rewatch to see if I still feel that way)

[Tassifox 413]

Nah I think that's a good way of summing it up. I rewatched it at some point and found not much different from that.

[Anelle 784]

.hack/sign missed a lot of beats as far as having like.... stuff happen but goddamn I loved that shit. I still listen to the soundtrack all the damn time. It did a really good job of feeling surreal, but sooo much fell flat and then when I went to take a look at other .hack stuff to try and get some story it was all so convoluted that I just NOPEd out

[Tassifox 413]

Totally loved the soundtrack and still listen.

[webhead 518]

So what I'm getting is that...I should probably just not bother.

[Tassifox 413]

If you're really bored? Maybe? Just don't make it in your to 10 to watch.