What was your first anime?

[Nyx 253]

Time for the nostalgia to hit you like a fastball! Now, I know you may be thinking stuff like "Pokémon", or "Yu-Gi-Oh!", or maybe even "Cory in the House". However, let's make things a little more interesting. What was the first anime you saw that wasn't because it was what was on TV? What's an anime that you sought after on streaming websites, YouTube, or even sevices like CrunchyRoll or Netflix?

[Blake 312]

It was either Digimon or Card Captor Sakura.

either way explains a lot

[Thar 502]

My Neighbor Totoro would be my best guess, cause that memory is kinda foggy. Either that or some episodes of Dragonball.

[yui 573]

[LordCowCow 839]

I was actually already gonna not include TV stuff cause when I first watched them I didn't even know there was a difference

That said....I can't 100% remember but I believe it was either K-On! or Haruhi.

[Nyx 253]

Well, I do like the amount of participation this thread has gotten so far! By now, I will say what my first anime was.

While technically, I watched the original Yugioh anime on TV (or really any anime that was dubbed for 4KidsTV), the first anime-related thing I saw that wasn't just because it happened to be on TV was Kiki's Delivery Service. However, I only saw part of it at the time. And even then, it wasn't something I purposely chose to watch. That honor will have to go to this:

Spoiler

 

Certainly marked a turning-point in my life. Well, media-wise anyways.

[Azure 72]

Excluding Pokemon and Yugioh it would probably be Bleach, since one of my cousins had DVD'S for it which ended up with my gran after they moved to England, then it would've been Naruto, Code Geass and Ghibli movies.

[radio414 903]

Apparently I was watching Sailor Moon on TV with my mom when I was two, though I have no memory of this. I have a little memory of going to a friend's house after school so my parents didn't have to rush to the school at 3 PM, and we'd watch Digimon at 4, and I definitely saw Ghibli movies growing up, so probably My Neighbor Totoro if we're going by that, but the first series was probably when I found Funimation had (still has? I haven't checked) Initial D episodes on their Youtube channel, so I binged those on a little iPod touch instead of sleeping.

[my name is a secret now :) 47]

in terms of actually properly watching it's fullmetal alchemist brotherhood, which set a very high bar

i don't even know for sure how i ever got into it exactly but i do remember discussing it on the schoolbus many evenings with this lad from the year above me who's gone on to be a competitive bodybuilder, he was actually key in my beginning to watch anime which is pretty funny now i think about it, we weren't really friends prior to this or since 

[Blake 312]

If we mean, like, consciously watching a show I could differentiate, then...

probably Naruto? I’d seen bits of others before I knew there was any difference, namely stuff on adult swim, but I never paid it any mind beyond it just being another show.

Naruto is probably the first one I actually followed and knew a difference tho, so yeah.

[The Chayncemaniac 108]

Digimon, easily. Yeah I watched all the way up to Tamers on tv, still kept up with the franchise even though I didn't watch any of the others... the Adventure tri was revealed... I didn't watch any trailers, except maybe the first trailer for Reunion... and as soon as the dubs were released, I got them... and love them, I need to get into Adventure 2020 but real life prevents that right now 

[(o ×) 228]

Well, first anime I streamed was naruto, on the fuckin naruto website (which was mirroring funimation) before streaming was such a big deal.

After that... Soul Eater? I saw the first episode on toonami, then binged it on funimation.

First show I watched on crunchyroll was TTGL, which I ended up watching in a single sitting. What a transformative night.

Then I went to see what other shows were popular on the site and watched the entire first season of sword art online. I got way too fuckin into it, read the gun gale light novel, and then five minutes into the first episode of gun gale, I went "wait a second... This is terrible." and never looked back.

First anime I bought on blu-ray was Evangelion 1.11

[Chaos Sonic 442]

Okay so generally not on TV? *Checks off a good portion of the 90s Toonami block as well as Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh! and the others that came after this* ...honestly I'd say any of these, since this was how my uncle got me into the realm of anime. I ended up watching Sailor Moon, Dragon Ball Z, Gundam Wing, G Gundam...these were my starters...but I didn't end up streaming them, no...they were just sort of on TV always for me. So for the sake of this conversation: they don't count.

I wanna say that the first anime I watched and sought after was Katekyo Hitman Reborn. Only sought after it once I got a bit familiar with it thanks to my subscription to Shonen Jump (the actual physical copies, not this digital crap...cause hey, this gave me free YGO cards as promos :3). I ended up watching all of that series on YouTube, back before the days where anime was scarce on the platform.

After I moved to Arkansas, I was introduced to the anime streaming websites (and all of their damn Pop-Up Ads, also before I had the general Ad Blocker). With that I watched all of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann, even No Game No Life. Sort of stopped using the website not long after (or rather was forced to stop given that the site sort of fell off the grid, probably stopped being used due to Crunchyroll and Funimation...honestly dunno), but about that time while in college my former roommate actually got himself quite a list of anime to watch and that's what we did some...many a sleepless nights were due to this.

Then I had the advent of VRV. With that I was able to finally sit down and watch the Fate series (after being referred to it by Sai), God of Highschool, Jojo's Bizarre Adventures, Rising of the Shield Hero, Bungou Stray Dogs and My Hero Academia. This is currently how I watch my anime now.

[Comrade Duck 178]

Evangelion, unfortunately. Took me down a rabbit hole.

[(o ×) 228]

1 hour ago, Comrade Duck said:

Evangelion, unfortunately. Took me down a rabbit hole.

Hol' up buddy, what do you mean unfortunately?

[Comrade Duck 178]

4 hours ago, (␀) said:

Hol' up buddy, what do you mean unfortunately?

It's a fucking terrible anime. That's what I mean.

[PhoenixOfCute 54]

Hmmm, first -anime- I watched without it being just cuz it was on TV? I want to say it was Naruto. Which is sadly, the boring answer but well I'm glad it got me into the medium. And it's an excellent starter anime that taught me when someone tells you to skip a large section of episodes, you -listen- to them. It was not fun to sit through 101-219. It was nothing short of torture and I now understand why you listen to people when they recommend things. Another show I actually went out of my way to watch relatively early on was Chaotic. Bit of a strange show but I definitely enjoyed the worldbuilding of it even if the animation was typically... meh. It was never ugly just felt a bit box-cutter with it's animation style. And beyond that the only other anime I think I really actively went out of my way to watch when I was younger was Black Butler but that was definitely after Naruto. And to this day I have not touched some of the other popular anime surrounding Naruto due to being terrified of getting stuck in that filler rut again, as I'm someone that feels they -have- to see every episode if they enjoy a show. Which is why I have not seen Bleach or DBZ, even though I've watched DB Super. xD