NDK - Ten Must See Streaming Anime
/A short update for this one. I attended a panel led by Jason Moses of Otaku-USA magazine. To open the panel, Jason described the major services available for watching streaming anime. The big three services are Hulu, Netflix, and Crunchyroll. Of these, Jason recommended Hulu as the service with the best variety of shows. He also noted that last year, Netflix had a very strong selection of anime available. However, the selection on Netflix has been reduced lately. Finally, he discussed and showed short clips for ten shows that he recommended watching. Here are the shows that he recommended watching along with a brief synopsis. I have included a link to the show on Hulu or Crunchyroll where available. Both of these services are free on PC, and available on other devices for a subscription.
- Tiger and Bunny - Superheroes in a reality TV series, competing to do heroic deeds.
- Chi’s Sweet Home: Chi’s New Address - The damn cutest animated cat ever moves to a new house. A slice of life anime.
- Riding Bean - 80’s OVA, from the creator of Bubblegum Crisis. This OVA is somewhat of an homage to Blues Brothers and other American action movies. It focuses on a driver with a fancy car who promises to deliver anything.
- Princess Jellyfish - A house full of various outcasts learning to be adults in the world.
- Mushi-shi - This was a room favorite as much of the panel audience had already seen this. Mushi are a ‘more pure form of life’. Typically not malevolent, but sometime parasitic or otherwise inconvenient to humans. Mushi-master Ginko helps people with problem mushi.
- Macross Plus - A feature length movie. Giant robo, directed by Shinchiro Watanabe and music by Yoko Kanno
- Monster - Suspense, cliffhanger type series, involving a neurosurgeon’s choice to save a boy rather than a Mayor.
- The Tatami Galaxy - A man relives his first year of college and makes different choices each time. The animation style for this series was unique and looked very interesting.
- Space Brothers - Two brothers who longed to become astronauts when younger. One has done so. The other is fired from his regular job, so applies to be an astronaut.
- Kids on the Slope - Directed by Shinchiro Watanabe and Music by Yoko Kanno, A boy moves to new town/school, makes friends and plays jazz. One big musical number per episode.