Autobiography of How I Became an Anime Fan (2009 edition): chapter 4

Chapter 4 of my newly revised anime autobiography…

Upon entering high school, the only anime I was familiar with were Sailor Moon, Samurai Pizza Cats, Pokemon, Digimon, Cardcaptor Sakura, Jubei-chan, and Princess Mononoke…about seven. But by the time I finished high school, after making new friends and spending time in the anime club, that number increased to over thirty anime (and I had my anime web site, which I’ll discuss in chapter 5). Of course, nowadays that number doesn’t sound big at all compared to how much anime is in existence. But for someone who didn’t have cable TV or high-speed Internet at the time, I was able to watch a good variety of anime during my high school years from 2000 to 2004. In this chapter, I discuss six of those series, roughly in chronological order, that were the “biggest” ones for me.

Autobiography of How I Became an Anime Fan

Chapter 4 – The High School Years of Anime

Slayers Slayers was the first anime comedy series I watched, as well as the first new anime introduced to me since I started high school. After Amanda and I had become good friends, she invited me to her house one day and showed me an episode of Slayers Next. Even though it wasn’t the first episode in the series, Jubei-chan had been the only “non-kids” anime I had seen before, so I was very much interested in watching more Slayers. It’s just a very enjoyable and sincerely funny show.


The cast of Slayers Next

Every now and then, Amanda would show me an episode of Slayers when I went to her house. She even let me borrow some of her videos and DVDs. As I saw more episodes and got to know the story and characters better, I grew to love the series enough to buy it myself. I bought the first season dubbed on VHS, and seasons two and three on DVD. The Slayers dub held a lot of appeal to me because the main cast from the original Pokemon dub are in it. Even now, I still think it’s one of the better dubs, especially for an older series.

Slayers also introduced me to the amazing Megumi Hayashibara, who is one of my favorite anime singers and seiyuus. Her song, “Give a reason,” which was used as the opening for Slayers Next, is still one of my favorites.

Mon Colle Knights I don’t know why I liked Mon Colle Knights so much. The few people who actually watched it during its run on the Fox Kids block in 2001 to 2002 usually write it off as yet another game-based “battling monsters” series meant to mimic Pokemon. I could tell the dub was pretty bad and many of the episodes were skipped because of overtime sports broadcasts cutting into its time slot. I remember how I would eagerly wait for the new episodes, and then how frustrated I would get when sports came on instead. I was still watching the new seasons of Digimon on Fox Kids too, but Mon Colle Knights seemed to get its new episodes cut off more than any other Fox Kids show.


Mon Colle Knights characters

After Fox Kids aired the entire series (though many episodes never aired because of the overtime sports), Mon Colle Knights was abruptly taken off local channels. But I got so into it that I actually ordered a couple of the Japanese DVDs and a VHS online (the series was never released on video in the U.S). I simply liked the characters and character designs, and it has a great mix of humor, romance, and fantasy. The first Mon Colle Knights opening, “Just Fly Away,” was another of my early favorite Japanese songs.

Yu-Gi-Oh! Yu-Gi-Oh! was the next extremely successful anime franchise in the U.S. after Pokemon’s popularity started to die down. Lacking cable and high-speed Internet, I was desperate to watch any anime I could on local channels, so I decided to check out Yu-Gi-Oh! after seeing commercials for it on Kids’ WB in 2001. I could tell the dub was pretty poor (though who knew it would make a brilliant parody series years later?), but I continued watching it until it finished its 224 episode run in 2006.


Yugi vs Marik, from season 3

I was never a hardcore Yu-Gi-Oh! fan like I was with Pokemon, but the anime, despite having its share of flaws, especially in the dub, grew on me over the years (I never watched any of the spin-off series after Duel Monsters though). I also liked collecting the cards and playing the video games for a while. I’m still a casual fan of the card game and enjoy playing it, though I haven’t bought any new cards in years.

Tenchi Muyo! After Pokemon, I would say that Tenchi Muyo!, one of the original (and better) harem anime, is the next anime I became a major fan of. Since I didn’t have cable, one of my high school friends, Pamela, taped many of the episodes for me. Eventually, I loved Tenchi so much that at one point I had all the DVDs of the original three series (the OVAs, Tenchi Universe, and Tenchi in Tokyo), including the movies and the Pretty Sammy spin-off series. I also adored the Tenchi manga and for a while I collected all the new volumes that came out. In the summer of 2003, I even wrote a 30+ page Tenchi Muyo! fan fic.


Tenchi and the girls

Tenchi was my favorite anime from around mid-2001 to early 2003. However, I wasn’t big on the two TV series, Tenchi Universe and Tenchi in Tokyo. My main love for Tenchi lay in the original 13-episode OVA (it was two OVAs in Japan but was released as one in the U.S) and the manga, which is based on the storyline from the OVA. I watched my DVDs of the OVA many times, both dubbed and subbed. Unfortunately, the sequel to the OVA was on hiatus for many years, and by the time I heard about it a few years later, I had lost interest in Tenchi. But it was definitely one of my big fandoms. One of these days I wouldn’t mind getting back into the OVAs and manga.


Washu was always my favorite

Evangelion I first heard about Evangelion from some boys in my P.E class who were also anime fans. They kept saying how it was the best anime and you haven’t seen anime if you haven’t seen Evangelion. What they said about the story and characters sounded interesting, so for Christmas in 2002, I decided to get the Evangelion DVD box set.


Evangelion, my first mecha/military/psychological anime

Like a lot of newbie anime fans who watched Evangelion for the first time, it totally blew me away. It was the most horrifying, thought provoking, and overall intense anime I had seen at that point in my fandom. For a little while in my junior year of high school, I was completely Eva obsessed; I watched the episodes many times, dubbed and subbed, bought the movies, started collecting the manga volumes (though I never finished), and scrutinized Evangelion web sites to try and understand this complex series as much as I could. The same summer I wrote my Tenchi fan fic, I wrote an equally long Evangelion one. I eventually burned out on Evangelion, but it still remains one of my favorites.


I loved Asuka

Inuyasha As of my writing this, out of all the anime I’ve seen, not just the ones in high school, Inuyasha was my favorite for the longest amount of time – from late 2002 to mid-2007. When it started airing on Adult Swim in 2002, I got my first look at it via tapes from Pamela and a slumber party at Jessica’s house. However, I didn’t like it that much until I saw episode 13, the first episode where the growing bond between Inuyasha and Kagome starts to really show. From then on, the series became increasingly fascinating to me as more characters were introduced and the storyline got more complex.


The main protagonists in Inuyasha

At first, I was suckered into buying bootleg Inuyasha DVDs that had episodes not yet released in America, but with terrible subtitles. Finally I started buying the episodes and movies on official DVDs, though I never came close to completing my collection. I also watched the series by borrowing recorded episodes from friends until I could finally tape them myself when I got cable. I didn’t get into the manga until the first 167 episode TV series ended and the manga was the only way to continue the story.


I loved the Inuyasha series in general but I was especially into Inuyasha+Kagome pairing

Inuyasha was my unfaltering favorite anime for nearly five of my ten years as an anime fan. It’s the only long-running shonen series where I’ve watched all the episodes and read all the 558 manga chapters. I love the well-developed, likable characters and the many relationships between them, the intricate plot, the talented voice actors in both Japanese and English, the music, the art, and almost everything else. However, my interest in the series finally started to dwindle as the quality of the manga declined in 2007. However, it will always be a special favorite of mine.

High School Years Conclusion My years in high school are definitely what turned me into a true anime fan, mostly due to the friends I made. In addition to introducing me to Slayers, Amanda also showed me Sorcerer Hunters, Escaflowne, Trigun, and Record of Lodoss War. When the International Channel began showing anime, Pamela taped many episodes of Fushigi Yugi and El Hazard for me. In addition to taping Fullmetal Alchemist for me, my friend Jennifer introduced me to Naruto via burned CDs of fansubs since my dial-up Internet connection was too slow to download them. I even got back in contact with one of my friends from middle school, Natasha (who was the only one who didn’t make fun of me for liking Pokemon). Like me, she had gotten her start in anime through Sailor Moon and she later became a big fan of romance/shojo anime and manga. She showed me many series, including Magic Knight Rayearth, Chobits, Revolutionary Girl Utena, and Love Hina. The anime club at my high school was also a big influence, and I probably would have become the president if I hadn’t graduated when I did.

Next time, I’ll discuss the creation of my now 7+ year old anime web site, when I finally got cable and high-speed Internet, as well as my early college years.

Click here to return to chapter 3.

Click here to go on to chapter 5.

No Comments… read them or add your own.

  1. Saere says:

    Ah, you’re a YGO the Abridged Series fan, too? I think I’m going to break down and sob when that’s finally over. It’s such a huge part of my life. LK is a genius.

  2. 2DT says:

    I’m waiting for you to get to the best part.

  3. Dragonliger says:

    OMG!!! you are kidding right? Mon colle knights? IT WAS ONE OF MY FAVORITES. Really XP we have identical minds. though i never saw it complete and to the moment haven’t found any episode on english nor spanish i still want to see it.

    oh yes! got to ask, because nobody really seems to have a proper answer for me. What does eva has of special? I am watching it and until now it hasn’t gotten any different, or way better than any other anime, i even see it a little poor because of the lack of continuity it has on some explanatory episodes. don’t hate me It’s my opinion. And (If you have watched it) why soukyuu no fafner isn’t that recognized? at my opinion it was more intense and easier to understand than eva. XP that’s all for now, I’ll leave my website so anybody with an answer or something wants to contact

  4. Yumeka says:

    @ 2DT

    By “the best part” you mean my university years? =P Should be coming up in chapter 6 or 7 (BTW, glad to know you’re still reading my blog XD)

    @ Dragonliger

    You have to watch all 26 episodes of Evangelion plus the movies to get the most out of it. If you still don’t like it after that, then maybe it’s just not for you. Don’t worry, there are plenty of other fans who don’t like it either.

  5. Firechick says:

    You saw Escaflowne too? Awesome. Unlike you, I didn’t get into it until about two years ago, but I’d like to hear your thoughts on one thing: what’d you think of Dilandau’s English dub voice? It’s too squeaky and chirpy for me, even though he’s voiced by one of my favorite Japanese (Minami Takayama) and English (Andrew Francis) actors.

    • Yumeka says:

      I watched Escaflowne almost 15 years ago so I honestly have no recollection of what his voice sounded like (I never watched the English dub either). So yeah, sorry I can’t help you there =P

      • Firechick says:

        That’s okay. I probably should have asked something different. Thanks, though! Glad you’re an Esca fan like me! Plus Dilandau is awesome!

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