When did you become an Otaku? Who was the one that got you into anime? or What was the series that made you into the Otaku that you are today?!
The first series I saw was Power D.O.L.L.S. on VHS (Detachment Of Limited Line Service) on the VHS tape I saw an old trailer for Evangeilon around the time it first came out .I was only a five or four years old that had no idea what it was and what I also didn't know was that it was rated 16 up :o there were no bad words but there was a scene with nudity in it, but since being only 5 I didn't care. Luckily my parents never saw it. But, even though it was my first, it wasn't what got me into anime. So I've seen DBZ, Pokemon, Digimon, a little bit of Sailor Moon, and Tenchi Muyo. But when I was in 3rd grade my cousin brought Princess Monoke to watch at my house and I was becoming intrested in anime after watching Princess Monoke. In 2006 my cousin showed me X and after watching it we looked at the trailers and that is when I discovered Hellsing.
After seeing X and Hellsing I was looking around the house for the Power D.O.L.L.S. VHS tape and found it, I still have it right now :P, I watched the trailers that were in it and I saw an old trailer for Evangelion (around the time it first came out) and immediatly started watching it and became a NGE fanboy.
So if it wasn't for my cousin, I wouldn't be an Otaku right now
I was ten, had moved to a new country, and it was there that I met my surrogate little brother. He was hardcore into anime for a little kid, and would frequently talk my ear off about the Guyver and other shows.
Eventually, he moved away. Now, I've watched anime shows before, but didn't become an otaku until he moved. I'll be honest, I missed him (he was the little brother and best friend I always wanted [I say little because he was both a little younger and shorter than me]), so in honor of him, I rented and watched the Guyver. I became hooked, looked up Fist of the North Star, Tenchi Muyo, and spiralled into anime fandom.
I then moved here and became truly hardcore otaku.
I think my roots date back to a mixture of times when I was little, one being the day my dad brought home "My neighbor Totoro." The next being my mom's discovery of Sailor Moon, and how it seemed to shut me up for several hours watching the movies and T.V. My best friend was an anime fan as well when I was little, I had never been into it like her, but that soon changed :
The day I met my friend lauren I got more into anime. She was asian. She was crazy. To top it off, she LOVES anime. To this day she is the only one that understands my random half-sentence way of talking.
So yeah, I guess you could say that I was set up to like anime and it just skyrocketed from there.
PLUS, not a lot of people around me like it so it makes me different and I like that =]
Me? Otaku? No, not raelly. A big fan, yes. A bigger fan than most people that claim to be an otaku? Yes as well.
The first thing I ever watches was Golgo 13 strangely enough? Other than that, Appleseed, Super Gal, Dragon Ball, and a bunch of old stuff. ESPECIALLY ANPANMAN. I used to watch it almost everyday via my friends VHS tapes that his family would record and send to him.
This was back when I first moved to California, so I was 3/4 years old back in '86. In '89 there was Bubble Gum Crisis and the horrible Dragon Quest cartoon.
Quote
(Definitions from UrbanDictionary.com)
A Japanese word describing a person beyond the realm of fandom but into mania that is improperly used by American fans.
When dealing with Japanese people, however, it may be best to keep in mind the modern Japanese image of an otaku -- Someone who only leaves their home to eat or shop, if at all, with an overwhelming and unhealthy obsession about something. It can as easily refer to a stalker or sociopath as it can to a harmless anime buff.
Okay, I have to address the term "Otaku". It's seen in a negative light by some people, and NO I do NOT associate myself with that connotation of the word. I would rather just simply say that I like anime. Not much of an otaku. I do have other hobbies. XD I know in this instance it is used in a more liberal sense, but I'd have to agree with pyron and say that I am not an otaku. I'm a fan.
I don't consider myself an otaku either..there is a pretty good discussion of that subject on the cosplay.com general board. Watch Genshiken..it seems from everything I've read that is a pretty accurate showing of how the Japanese feel about the whole "otaku" thing.
The first anime I saw was Akira..then Ghost in the Shell, Ninja Scroll. I remember renting those on VHS when I was like 13 or 14. But I didn't really get into anime like I am today until around early 2005.
I did watch Outlaw Star pretty much religiously when it was on Midnight Run on Cartoon Network..that was good stuff. Watched DBZ pretty much every time it was on as well.
13, Gundam Wing was on Cartoon Network and it was the first series I saw that kept the original Japanese ending theme.
All it took.
Honestly, I had watched Sailor Moon, Pokemon, and DBZ, and I did not even know that they were anime when I was younger. I am Japanese(born in US), so that makes it even more embarrassing! I think it was because my cousins introduced my to Hayao Miyazaki films that I got into anime. I just became so in love with the art form, and the art form was so unique in its own way. Also, my friends began to start drawing their own manga, and they encouraged me to read manga. Now, I am the happy owner of over 300 mangas and 120 anime DVDs. You cannot say that I am freak though! Anime is fantabulous!!!!!
Dragon Ball Z, but was hooked after Gundam Wing, Blue Submarine NO. 6 and Outlaw Star. That is what started my journey down the path of Anime and Mangas. My little had Sailor Moon and Tenchi Muyo but did not turn out to be as big an Anime fan as I.
Back when I was about two-three I used to watch Voltron all the time. I even have an old pic of me cosplaying as him. Back in grade school I used to watch speed racer, and around the same time dragonball came on at like 4 in the morning. And I mean, dragonball, not DBZ. I used to watch it before I helped my dad with the paper route, but all these times I didn't know what anime was, or that any of these were anime. It wasn't until toonami that I found out what anime was, so it was pretty much that stuff that got the ball rolling. DBZ, Gundam Wing, Tenchi Muyo, until I went to Jr. College, and then I found my clan. We were all fresh out of high school, and at the time none of us really wanted to go to school. We all hungout in our area, "locke lounge" everyday playing video games and watching anime.
Quote from: AnimeEmperor on May 16, 2008, 09:25:43 PM
13, Gundam Wing was on Cartoon Network and it was the first series I saw that kept the original Japanese ending theme.
All it took.
...! How could I forget to mention Gundam Wing!? That is still one of my favorites.
Quote from: Trumby on May 17, 2008, 07:56:24 AM
Quote from: AnimeEmperor on May 16, 2008, 09:25:43 PM
13, Gundam Wing was on Cartoon Network and it was the first series I saw that kept the original Japanese ending theme.
All it took.
...! How could I forget to mention Gundam Wing!? That is still one of my favorites.
I love Gundam Wing! I have Endless Waltz on VHS.
It started for me in 1991, with bubble gum crisis and akira on VHS. After that, I started to study japanese culture, language, and attempt to draw manga all the time. Posters ordered from Nikaku Animart and Right Stuf...getting a ride to San Francisco just for a gundam model...getting giddy as a school girl over a friends imported DBZ game for SNES...watching ALL of Fushigi Yuugi in one weekend while holding back tears...
I have watched so many anime series since then that I have lost count.
Anime has been such a big part of my life, and I treasure the opportunities to share my interests with fans and friends from all over.
I wouldn't call myself an otaku but I do enjoy watching Anime. A friend of mine back in 1999 first got me really into Anime by introducing me to Evangelion. Then I watched it on PBS every Sunday night and boom, from there I went.
Well, my original exposures to anime were as a kid, with Sailor Moon being my favorite show for a couple years, and then Pokeman for several years. I still love that old pokeymon show. I didn't really get into anime until about two years back, though.
Way back then, I was really into posting on forums, even though I wasn't a very good writer, and my favorite forum was about Fire Emblem, which is a Japanese video game for the one or two of you out there who don't know. Most of the on-topic discussion was centered on the games not released in the US, which were considered by the locals of the board higher caliber than the newer ones, and most of which have been fan translated. Needless to say, just about everybody was a complete nerd on that forum, and at least half had their main nerdy focus on anime.
I had a friend who I knew from all over the internet at the time on that forum, and after awhile he was absorbed into the whole anime fandom by the community there. Even though I'd resisted for nearly a year, I just noticed that the majority of off-topic discussion referenced anime directly or indirectly through channer jokes, and it couldn't be all bad if it was tantalizing my good friends to conversion. So I decided to watch the hugely popular show of the time, Haruhi.
I was pretty impressed by the sheer quality of the artwork and intricacy of the story--a TV show with a plot like a novel's seemed amazing to me--even though, with more experience, it no longer seems extraordinary. I went on to watch a couple more titles, including my favorite of all time Full Metal Panic, and was hooked. Recently, my anime stuff has even come to outnumber all of my other nerdy objects, including Star Wars figurines, model tanks, and Mudkip merchandise (Poke Mon is not animu, it's a field in and of itself ;)).
I was 10, and it was Ronin Warriors that got me hooked on anime. I remember getting up early in the morning just to watch it. I've been an anime fan ever since.
I'm a very very casual anime-watcher. :00
I watched Pokemon, Sailor Moon, Ranma, and Wedding Peach(kr) back when. (:
Brother sort of introduced me to Ghost in the Shell and Gundam Wing, I think.
:00
Well... I grew up on Transformers, Voltron and the Thundercats. Way back in the 80's... But this was before I knew what anime was. Then stuff was starting to show on TV like Sailor Moon and DBZ. I've been into those, but not really enough for me to go hard core. I've always been into American Comics and stuff, but never really read them, cos the stories just... well... sucked... I did like the drawings, as I was an artist myself. But DBZ got me to see that there can be actual story to the panels and, at the same time, be fun! After this period, Toonami sarted up their anime block and Tenchi Muyo was a big favorite of mine, along with Gundam Wing. Yes, I was into Pokemon too, still kinda am, it's fun... and that brought me to visit JTown in SF. This opened doors to JPop, like Ayu and Utada alond with Mini 4WD and random ANime paraphanellia. Art books, although expensive, were also very big to me. Then I went to College, an Art college in LA. Here, I was introduced to a lot of different anime, one in particular, Love Hina. My brother and I flew through our bootlegged copies in a weekend. Then came Noir, GTO and Naruto. And now, Transformers has came back to me, but, still... Anime has taken over. Genshiken has sealed the number 1 position for me and I just keep buying and buying new anime and anime things! Fun Stuff!!!
Quote from: PyronIkari on May 16, 2008, 06:50:13 PM
Me? Otaku? No, not raelly. A big fan, yes. A bigger fan than most people that claim to be an otaku? Yes as well.
That's about it for me. Higher than the general weeaboo/stereotypical demographic, lower than "True otaku" derogative.
Before Sailor Moon and Pokemon (Late Elementary), there was KTEH with Lain, Dirty Pair Flash, Please Save My Earth.
And before KTEH there were Cantonese dubs of Tonde Buurin (Boorin) and Dr. Slump (Early Elementary--).
I remember watching Dragonball GT as a kid and thinking it was complete garbage.
~Chun
I remember when i was about 7-8 years old(1994-1995) I went to the Philippines and saw some cartoons on the tv..and was like heyyy this is awesome being that was the dragonball series :] It was also all in badly translated english;...though after that I started watching anime..mostly whatever I saw on tv aka toonami until I got a laptop..in middle late school o_o;
I guess I haver always watched anime, sense I can remember anyway.
Than in the summer before going into High school, I had an urge to watch anime, like I need crack urge, and thus I became Otaku.
once upon a time my parents went to Mexico for some bizzaro reason and as night fell my cousins wanted to watch(mind u all of these were dubbed spanish)Saint Seya, DBZ, Dragon Quest, Doraemon, Dr.Slump, Capitan Tsubasa after all the manly shows were done i sat and watched Mikami the ghost sweeper, Ranma 1/2 and Ursei Yatsura and ray earth
thus since i was 10 ive been and otaku... watching all kinds of none mainstream anime in mexico oh when i got back id just watch my shows on telemundo
I started when Voltron and the Transformers and Robotech came out back in the 80's, I think I was about 4 or 5 years old, I remember watching Saint Seiya in spanish in telemundo. when I was 12 years old I remember FOX use to show the Ronin Warriors (Samurai Troopers) around 1:30 pm during the summer and fall. When I was 13 years old on sunday mornings on FOX they showed some DBZ eps and I use to watch them in spanish too. At the same time on sunday nights on KTEH around 9pm they used to show 2 eps of Robotech later it was Tenchi Muyo, Urusei Yatsura, Sakura Wars, Dirty Pair, Key the Metal Idol, Please Save My Earth, Bubblegum Crisis, Cat Girl Nuku Nuku, Neon Genesis Evangelion. My dad and my older brother showed me an anime that my older brother use to watch it was Star Blazers (Space Battleship Yamato) I did use to watch cartoon network when they showed Gundam Wing and Sailor Moon and many others. I remember TNT they showed Vampire Hunter D when I was 9 or 10 years old. From there I was starting to like anime very much.
Quote from: Shinsengumi on June 09, 2008, 12:55:15 AM
I started when Voltron and the Transformers and Robotech came out back in the 80's, I think I was about 4 or 5 years old, I remember watching Saint Seiya in spanish in telemundo. when I was 12 years old I remember FOX use to show the Ronin Warriors (Samurai Troopers) around 1:30 pm during the summer and fall. When I was 13 years old on sunday mornings on FOX they showed some DBZ eps and I use to watch them in spanish too. At the same time on sunday nights on KTEH around 9pm they used to show 2 eps of Robotech later it was Tenchi Muyo, Urusei Yatsura, Sakura Wars, Dirty Pair, Key the Metal Idol, Please Save My Earth, Bubblegum Crisis, Cat Girl Nuku Nuku, Neon Genesis Evangelion. My dad and my older brother showed me an anime that my older brother use to watch it was Star Blazers (Space Battleship Yamato) I did use to watch cartoon network when they showed Gundam Wing and Sailor Moon and many others. I remember TNT they showed Vampire Hunter D when I was 9 or 10 years old. From there I was starting to like anime very much.
hey you remember Super Campiones?(captain Tsubasa) XD
Quote from: rubymoonIII on June 09, 2008, 07:59:17 PM
Quote from: Shinsengumi on June 09, 2008, 12:55:15 AM
I started when Voltron and the Transformers and Robotech came out back in the 80's, I think I was about 4 or 5 years old, I remember watching Saint Seiya in spanish in telemundo. when I was 12 years old I remember FOX use to show the Ronin Warriors (Samurai Troopers) around 1:30 pm during the summer and fall. When I was 13 years old on sunday mornings on FOX they showed some DBZ eps and I use to watch them in spanish too. At the same time on sunday nights on KTEH around 9pm they used to show 2 eps of Robotech later it was Tenchi Muyo, Urusei Yatsura, Sakura Wars, Dirty Pair, Key the Metal Idol, Please Save My Earth, Bubblegum Crisis, Cat Girl Nuku Nuku, Neon Genesis Evangelion. My dad and my older brother showed me an anime that my older brother use to watch it was Star Blazers (Space Battleship Yamato) I did use to watch cartoon network when they showed Gundam Wing and Sailor Moon and many others. I remember TNT they showed Vampire Hunter D when I was 9 or 10 years old. From there I was starting to like anime very much.
hey you remember Super Campiones?(captain Tsubasa) XD
Yeah I remember Super Campiones ;D
Its really hard for me to say when did I got into anime?
I was like probably around 4 years old when I was hooked up wit beta tapes watching Doraemon. I was fascinated wit anime as a kid including the tapes recorded from japans like Dragon Ball, Crayon Shinchan, Nintama, Ninja Hatorikun, etc... When I barely attended community college, I recently got into fansubs, magazine, and conventions. Now I like to share anime fans and otakus of old anime and kids anime back when I was very young. DDR community was part of what got me more into the anime community.
mm otaku first anime shows i watched was sailor moon then DBZ and other shows
but when i first saw naruto the english dub premier thats when it piked my interest to check out the japanese version with subs and from then on i started watching alot of other shows including death note and bleach i hate english dubs of some animes one exception is the inuyasha english version is ok....
9000!!!
i remember inuyasha dubb when it forst came out.. i was one of the first ppl to get into it then i spread it like an std
Quote from: rubymoonIII on June 15, 2008, 09:47:46 PM
i remember inuyasha dubb when it forst came out.. i was one of the first ppl to get into it then i spread it like an std
Oh ya, because it totally wasn't popular until you started telling people about it. No one ever would have watched it if it weren't for you, you are such the original Inu Yasha dub fan and America should thank you for spreading the word about the series...
...
totally.
::)
lol, I know this girl who is a big fan of Inuyasha who was like three years younger them me and was taller than me :( I've always tried to get her into Evangelion and Hellsing. She quit on the the Hellsing TV series because of the first few minutes of the first episode, if you've seen it before then you know what happened in the first few minutes. We would argue from time to time about which series was better
QuoteMe: Hellsing is not a sick anime! Its full of awesomeness!
Lea: At the first few minutes I was like :O
Me: You barley gave it a chance: You judged it entirely by the first five minutes! So what if you saw a tiny part of her ass? Chobits has it worse!
Lea: But its still too explicit.
Me: How would you know? You never read the manga and barley saw the anime?
Lea: You showed parts of the manga to me and I've heard you talk about some of the violent scenes, you even reenacted a part!
Me: Heh, oh yeah ;D
I remember when showing the manga to my friends...
QuoteMe: Hey Fletcher, check this out!
*I hold it open to him showing a part with Alucard eating people*
Fletcher: Dude you read some freaky shit!
I want to show them the stuff in volume 6 through 8, I like seeing they're reactions its so funny.
Oh, I just remembered the first manga I read. I was in summer school and I saw a kid reading
Is, so I came over to him started having chat with him, he let me read only if I don't let any teachers see it during break. I soon found out why (for those who have read, you know what I'm talking about) so one day a teacher come by, she came over and asked to see it he handed it to her, we both kept giving each other these "Oh shit, we're in trouble" glances while she was looking through them, he even started to sweat because he was borrowing them from a friend. And amazingly she gave them handed them back as if there was nothing perverted in there.
I was smack dab in the middle of the targeted age range for the first season of Pokemon. Even caught the first episode when it came out. I've watched anime before then, but that's when otakudom started sinking its treacherous claws into my psyche.
I've not yet found it in me to forgive Nintendo.
Quote from: JohnnyAR on June 22, 2008, 06:02:50 PM
lol, I know this girl who is a big fan of Inuyasha who was like three years younger them me and was taller than me :( I've always tried to get her into Evangelion and Hellsing. She quit on the the Hellsing TV series because of the first few minutes of the first episode, if you've seen it before then you know what happened in the first few minutes. We would argue from time to time about which series was better
There was a guy at my college a couple years back who had seen, like, InuYasha and then Fullmetal Alchemist. And he kind of liked them. Then - and mind you, he was a senior econ major with no thesis, with ungodly amounts of spare time - he discovered my anime stash. In two semesters he watched an amount of anime that took me three years go to through.
I am not an otaku...I can't afford the fandom crack, but it was in 2nd grade watching Tonari No Totoro for Japan Week. Then shortly after it was cartoons like Samurai Pizza Cats and stuff like that as I went up in grades.
i remember samurai pizza cats... oh how they years have flown by... :'(
I remember back in high school when I was 14 or 15 I think, when I had CineMax as a cable channel at that time, they showed a couple of anime movies, I remember one of them was Vampire Hunter D I forgot the rest but they use to show it every friday I think but late at night around 12 am. I remember that plus I remember one time on Showtime they showed macross plus but around 6 am on saturday just once.
ah i remember watching the Rayearth movie in spanish... good times goooood times :)
I'm not exactly an otaku, but my interest roots go back to the very beginning XD Before I was in grade school, I of course watched all of those series shown on cable like Sailor Moon and Speed Racer (haha), but I also have an old and dusty copy of Bubblegum Crisis on VHS! Later on, I started watching Yu Yu Hakusho in 1st grade and things just got rolling even more from there ;D
I started off with Sailor Moon, then moved onto Tenchi, fansubs of Rayearth and Fushigi Yuugi, and DBZ. From there, it just exploded into a full on obsession. Though nowdays I'm not as much as a rabid anime fan, but I still like to be around it and watch it as much as I can. :3
I never posted in this thread, and since I'm bored enough to... nerdpost ahoy, rage away.
The definition of "otaku" varies amongst different groups, whether it be used correctly or incorrectly. The title is loosely defined, and from what I've witnessed, the standards are set as low as "you watch anime, you like it, you're an otaku", and some are set a lot higher whereas no matter what you do, if it doesn't impress, you aren't an otaku. I've watched Japanese cartoons for pretty much my entire life. Watching things like Doraemon, Miyazaki films, Anpanman, Ararechan, Crayon Shinchan, and a medley of kid-styled mahou shoujo series was common for Asian kids my age. Watching popular series like Voltron, Slayers, Rurouni Kenshin, Yuuyuu Hakusho, Macross, Dragonball, Sailor Moon, and whatnot for a young kid at the time was also considered very normal.
By most standards, in America and the rest of "normal people", then I could've been considered one from the days of Voltron and the like, rather than it just being considered "being a kid and watching cartoons". A lot of girls and women also choose to watch series like Karekano, Kimagure Orange Road, Hana Yori Dango, etc etc are normal and aren't considered otaku. By the standards of some people, and other hardcore fans, what I did was normal.
My family shared bits of their fandoms with me as I grew up. My mum loved reading josei manga and has an extensive collection of them laying somewhere that she'd show me, and she also liked series like Initial D and Fushigi Yuugi. My uncle was into comic books, action figures, and introduced me to Power Rangers, Voltron, Transformers, Slam Dunk, and whatnot. My other uncle was a huge Kamen Rider fan, and he'd collect all sorts of merchandise. Another uncle was into military stuff, and collected airsoft guns, surplus uniforms, model fighter jets and everything. My grandfather was really into feudal Asian films and kung-fu. All of these sorts of hobbies can fall into "otaku", or they can be taken as hobbies. The original meaning of what an otaku is, is a fan of a particular thing, and can be applied to almost any hobby, and even have it become something as extreme as a manic. The meanings and connotations have changed from its original meaning though, and all above relatives would have been insulted if one were to approach them and tell them they are an "otaku". It is also observed that an "anime-otaku" and others relative have a different understanding and sentiment for the title. It feels that, to be a fan, you express your fandom in a different way, and contribute back to it because you love it, but being an "otaku" can be considered something beyond that.
It wasn't until I became really interested in the seinen genre did I become anything remotely considered an "otaku". Sure, I may have been exposed to some To Heart and popular harem series like Love Hina as a kid, and maybe even more mature/violent seinen series like Golgo13, Bubblegum Crisis, and Hokuto no Ken(which I had ironically watched much later than the former.) but I didn't UNDERSTAND the obsessions with any of it until middle school, when I pushed my hobby to something beyond just watching cartoons and having it become a lifestyle, watching series, loving characters, playing galge, and being a loser. I've had feelings for all of them before, but they're incomparable from the slight difference of just watching cartoons and loving it to being an otaku. I can't explain the difference, but it's there.
But anywho, compared to the super hardcore people (with money), I may not be completely up to par, but am knowledgeable enough to feel somewhat prideful for my fandom. I don't know as much as I'd like, but my fandom is present enough to make me happy, which is the initial reason why I even got into it in the first place. I may not broadcast it as openly and enthusiastically as some people, but the love is there. It wasn't an escape from anything, nor was it an attempt to be original, and though it may have felt a bit competitive at times, having this fandom in the purest sense has done what it initially intended to do-- to make their fans happy. Admitting the title of "otaku" is bittersweet. To some, I may just not be nerdy enough, and to others, I may even deserve it, whether it be a positive or negative connotation, but it's just another one of those cheesy scenarios where it pretty much sums up to "I am me and this is who I am."
My memory's a bit vague on just when I started watching anime. I remember, as a youngster about 9 or 10, watching series like Speed Racer, Marine Boy, Prince Planet, 8 Man, Raideen. Some were shown on the local channel (I think KTVU Chan 2 Oakland) after school, or on KBHK Chan 44 San Francisco) and some on the Fuji Channel, I think it was either channel 20 or 26. Great fun and the violence was unedited. Some of them had English dubs, but Raideen and a few others had subtitles.
I'm pretty sure I watched other series in the ensuing years, and one of my greatest pleasures was visiting my cousins in Japan and seeing Mobile Suit Gundam and Cyborg 009 in 1981. I don't think I became as hooked as I am now until 2004 or 2005. I was on business travel and happened to catch YuYu Hakusho on Cartoon Network. When I got back home, turned out my mom was also watching YuYu Hakusho. Around the same time, my nephew introduced me to Trigun and things just sort of exploded from there. My mom's a big fan, now, too, of anime and manga. Most of the dvds and manga I buy, I use the excuse that I'm buying it for her (except for the yaoi ;D - I don't think she's old enough for that yet).
I wish I could find Raideen, it was one of my favorites.
I was in kindergarten, and my aunt thought that it would be a good idea to expose me to Ranma 1/2 (yay, otaku relatives!). But I pretty much pin the reason for my lack of a life outside anime on her (not that I'm complaining).