Recommend Snake an Anime

[Solid Snake]

Now that I have an extensive amount of free time on my hands for at least the next couple months, I figure it's as good a time as any to see if there's a great Anime out there I can invest in that isn't Mawaru Penguindrum or Steins;Gate.

Here are the guidelines:

1: All other things being equal, I prefer Subs over Dubs.
2: I'm looking for something comedic and upbeat. I'm not really in the mood for anything too tragic or serious.
3: ...That being said, I really don't want (and I forget the Japanese word for this) one of those 'Boys' Animes' that follow all those standard tropes about young men battling and maturing and that go on forever and ever. In fact...
4: I'd prefer an Anime that's actually finished, rather than investing in something that's still ongoing.
5: I'd prefer to avoid giant robots if at all possible.
6: I'd also prefer to avoid the classic tsundere 'will she or won't she?' bullshit romantic tension. Like, there's gotta be an Anime out there with an actual kind-of-sort-of-realistic portrayal of what relationships actually look like.
7: While I understand there's no such thing as a 'perfectly' socially progressive Anime, I'd really prefer if at all possible to avoid any Anime with really glaring social justice issues; like, let's avoid for the sake of my heart pressure any Anime with an egregious stereotype of a gay guy or a racial minority.

I look forward to hearing your sales pitches.

[pochercoaster]

I was getting all ready to recommend you anime but then...

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

2: I'm looking for something comedic and upbeat. I'm not really in the mood for anything too tragic or serious.

Oh, damn. :/ Then I got nothing. Gotta think really hard about that.

That said, I still stand by the recommendation I gave in the open thread for Revolutionary Girl Utena. It's got some comedic episodes, and while it's serious and tragic it's often metaphorically so. It's about a girl who wants to be a prince and needs the power to revolutionize the world, I'll leave it at that. But it will punch you in the feels.

Hopefully I'll think of something that better suits the tone you're looking for.

Edit: I don't know if it's what you're looking for and/or if you've already seen it (cause everybody has), but One Punch Man is hilarious and awesome.

Samurai Champloo might also work.

Mushishi?

The Basketball that Kuroko Plays? Basketball isn't tragic, so.

Also, I can't fully vouch for it because I've only seen 4 episodes (I intend to watch more eventually), but I found Initial D enjoyable. It's an old anime about street racing. It uses really primitive 3D animation for the actual racing parts which I found jarring at first but didn't mind after I got used to it.

Edit 2: I totally forgot about the gay rapist felon in One Punch Man.

[phil_]

Ore Monogatari fills all your qualifications except 4, but the anime ends at a decent stopping point; it's not a cliff-hanger. If you're on board for some stupid cute cis-het romance, Ore Monogatari is golden. Spoilers: I've taken guideline 6 into account and it passes as well as any fiction does.

Alternatively, you could watch the unrepentantly stupid anime my avatar comes from, Zettai Bouei Leviathan. A trio of girls who are also dragons follow a fairy to save the world, except they don't because they're all looney tunes. The transformation sequences featuring teenagers in their "scales" and some gags in the same vein probably fail guideline 7, though.

I can probably come up with a lot more, but the sun has been down for a while. I'll have to get back to you.

Oh, Yama no Susume. It's about high-school girls climbing mountains. It fails in social-justice purity in that the one of the ending songs has a lingering pajama shot of the cast. And there's an episode where accidental pulling-down-of-skirts plays a role (you don't see anyones' underwear, though). But the show as a whole is feel-good stuff, but realistic feel-good stuff. If you're ok with skipping that end song (not all the endings, though, just the bad one), I'd recommend this the most.

Or watch Aria. The order is Animation -> Natural -> Arietta -> Origination -> Avvenire. Mars gondolas, basic moral principles, lion-soothing soundtrack.

Edit: I really enjoyed One Punch Man, but the only definitely gay character is a rapist felon (but also a hero), and perhaps you've seen Aerozord's posts on Tatsumaki/Tornado in the anime thread. So some of it will be less than funny, but the whole package is as good as anything I've suggested.

[Bard The 5th LW]

There is one character that'd probably turn you off from it, but if you somehow haven't seen it, I'd strongly recommend One Punch Man. Only 12 episodes (with a much longer manga, granted), but it restored my faith in anime.

Otherwise, Samurai Champloo was enjoyable. Big O is one of my personal favorites, but its not at all recent and was rather Western in style when compared to other animes.

Other oldschool anime I've been watching recently is Slayers and the dubbing is a bit suspect (especially for the villains) but the show is overall reasonably fun and I can imagine myself having been totally into it if I were watching it when I was a lot younger.

[Overcast]

You can prolly watch some anime films, if you ain't dipped into little witch academia yet then fuckin come on man do it.

If you want a more nuanced answer you might be into the Tatami Galaxy, not too long reasonably humorous, can be just a smidge difficult tto keep up with but with the time to try.

HunterxHunter will never be finished cause the creator is going to die during the current haitus but there is a real solid series available that while not tying up all loose ends will likely leave you as it did me at least feeling content. But this one is long, not as horrificallyas bleach and its contemporaries though.

Arakawa Under the Bridge (or as I felt like watching it Intro to Studio Shaft) might also do something for you, but it could also just annoy you. Like Shaft itself it can be a bit polarizing.

[phil_]

Inferno Cop opens rather weakly with a pregnant woman being menaced by thugs (requirement seven, why must every show fail you!). It quickly becomes so unhinged that comparisons between what's happening on screen and our reality become difficult. A useful description I've seen repeated about the show is "It's the writers playing with their toys for ten minutes, then animating whatever made them laugh." If you want some quick, low-brow humor, it's good. Here's a pretty representative shot from the first episode: http://imgur.com/9SXDAky

Daily Lives of High School Boys is slower low-brow humor, but it reminded me of my high school life more than anything else in any form of literature I've ever experienced (as long as we reign in the definition of "literature" to not include one's own lived experience). It really captures that sense of high school boys as being just large boys, playing stupid games and having pointless conversations until they're overheard and have to drop it to be cool. But we run into req. 7 again, in that the show strongly rejects the typical anime depiction of high school girls as being flawless angels in favor of depicting all girls as savages and bullies. But the show tries to present the girl characters as sympathetic for their own reasons, so it's less red-pill PUA MGTOW etc. than I'm making it sound. It's funny. You probably won't get mad unless you over-think it like I have here.

Reinforcing Overcast's recommendations of Little Witch Academia and its sequel. They're rather pretty cartoons with actual animation™ that tell simple stories about girls in a witch academy. Also going to second Arakawa Under the Bridge if you can deal with idealized homelessness and mental illness.

Slayers is kinda long. I fizzled out after Try (which is the third TV series, with like two OVA series and four-ish movies before that), and after that there are still two TV series and a movie. On the other hand, I suggested Aria which is also kinda long and doesn't have sword fights or dragons (so far, I haven't watched Origination yet). Aria also doesn't have all the boob jokes. Still, Slayers does give what was at-the-time a unique perspective on fantasy adventure stories, and is still imitated for a reason (the reason is fun. And money). Heck, Leviathan that I recommended earlier owes at least some second- or third-hand debt to Slayers as a slapstick fantasy.

I'm really complaining and nit-picking a lot. I actually have enjoyed everything recommended here except the few I haven't watched, and I'm pretty sure I'd enjoy those. Except Puri-Puri-Prisoner, that really is a messed up character and doesn't add anything good to OPM. And yet I still like that show, too.

I've been at this for over an hour, I'm done.

[Tev]

Here are some suggestions:

-Food Wars! (Shokugeki no Soma): Imagine if Food Network cooking competitions like Chopped and Cutthroat Kitchen got folded into a high school anime and half-baked. There is fan-service, but it is surprisingly progressive in its approach (to said fan-service) with full gender equality. Season one is 24 episodes long and season two will be kicking off soon.

-Is it Wrong to try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon: Sounds corny, is actually kinda cute. Has some genre inconsistencies that you'll probably pick up on really fast, but over all it's an enjoyable romp watching a young man gather some friends and fight some monsters for the glory of his goddess.

-Cute High Earth Defense Club LOVE!: May or may not be your cup of tea. Most certainly is a comedy or sorts. Basically about the trials and tribulations of a group of guys who are ambushed by a talking koala and given magical girl powers to defend the world for truth and love. They are still guys, but they get the outfits and the powers and decide to roll with it.

---------- Post added at 04:04 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:02 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Bard The 5th LW

Big O is one of my personal favorites, but its not at all recent and was rather Western in style when compared to other animes.

Big O was "What would Batman the Animated Series look like if Bruce Wayne had a mech and Robin was a robot maid?" Turns out it was lots of fun.

[Bard The 5th LW]

Originally Posted by Tev

Big O was "What would Batman the Animated Series look like if Bruce Wayne had a mech and Robin was a robot maid?" Turns out it was lots of fun.

I recently made my friends watch it and I forgot to mention it had giant robots, so when the robots came out in the first episode, they fucking lost it. It was amazing.

[pochercoaster]

Just my 2 cents: when I tried to watch Food Wars I could barely nake it through because in the first 5 minutes if the first episode it has tentacles groping on a female character. Like wtf I came to watch food anime not hentai Also the main characters seemed boring. Idk.

OMG WAIT HOW COULD I FORGET: FUCKING SILVER SPOON. SILVER SPOON IS TEH BEST. It's an anime about high schoolers learning to farm. (It makes fun of a fat female character though and its pretty shitty about that, but otherwise i cant recall it being shitty.)

Honestly silver spoon is kinda cool in that the main character strugglrs with his privilege as a kid from an affluent family thats mad he went to farming school instead of university when hes aming some poor farm kids, i think the charactets are pretty realistic.

I am on my phone so deal with my typos, k. I cant use touchscreens.

[Overcast]

I have the same problem with touch screens, and had the same problem with Food Wars but the series kinda warms up to you over time. I wouldn't suggest it to Snake though because of his sensitivities. Even if it shifts from beautiful food making and equal opportunity foodgasming you have to kinda have a willingness to put up with that aspect or find it amusing. It is good if you keep it up though. Doesn't really start to flow until like episode 5 though.