Anime & Manga What's your obscure anime/manga?

Space Dingo

Member
I see a lot of posts about animes that you started with or animes that you are currently watching/hooked on or series to reccomend, but what I want to know is what series have you read or watched that is obscure? Not commonly talked about? Let's talk about a series or movie or story that hardly has an active fandom and that you're burning to find other people with the same or similar interest. I don't want to see any mentions of the Holy Shounen Trinity (unless it's in reference to your obscure animu/mango)


Bonus points: write a review of the series you like in question and write why other people should watch or read it.


Ps: I'll allow series that are translated and may have aired on tv, but are just not as common or known and ended up fading into oblivion.




I'm pretty sure this series I will mention is as obscure as you can go.


It's called Soil and it's by Kaneko Atsushi.


Brief synopsis: I would call this the Twin Peaks of the manga world. What happens when an idealistic family disappears during a town wide blackout and the only thing to remain are piles upon piles of salt in their home? Not only that, but a lot more weird occurrences keep on happening within their town. Two detectives are deployed to solve the case, but what they find are more questions than answers.


Why I like it: the art style is not your typical or common style. The main characters are not beautiful or pretty to look at. Even the head detective is an older fat ugly man who does not have a likeable personality while his partner who is a younger woman is far from beautiful. That might be a turn off for some, but I think that is what makes the series highly interesting.


It sucks though, the series isn't complete and the last update I can find is from 2013.


Less obscure:


20th Century Boy by Naoki Urasawa


Synopsis: Childhood is fleeting. We all grow up. We all grow out of our childhood dreams. They often become forgotten. But what if your childhood is not dead? What happens when a new cult emerges drawing inspiration from your childhood? A fabricated story about destruction that only heroes can stop. Who is behind the mask of Friend?


Why I like it: it combines 70's rock and roll with 70's early shounen anime while remaining a serious and mature. What I really like is how it's kind of got this Shounen element without the superpowers but all the chapters are adults and eventually middle aged men. Middle aged men (and woman) trying to save the world.
 
Tiger and Bunny is a relatively obscure one that I like. The animation quality is kinda gross since they use some weird 3D stuff but the story is pretty okay
 
Yeah, I actually don't see people talk about Tiger & Bunny. I actually liked the animation. But yeah it seemed like a series thst would be really popular but it really has fallen into obscurity.
 
The sheer volume of series released over the years means that a lot of really good stuff falls through the cracks. With how beloved the works of Studio Ghibli are, I'm honestly surprised that Future Boy Conan is as obscure as it is, at least among the English speaking anime world. It's a show released in the late 70s directed by Hayao Miyazaki and it's definitely, without a doubt a Miyazaki work. Since it's a 70s TV anime it's not quite as gorgeous as the movies made by Ghibli but it still looks pretty damn good, at least in my opinion. Since it's unlicensed you gotta track down fansubs but there's a nice fansub of the blu-ray remaster that I recommend so you can see all the gorgeous backgrounds in colorful high definition.


The plot of the show feels a bit like an earlier version of Castle in the Sky. It hits a lot of similar themes and has the same big adventure feel to it, and some of the characters are similar too. I love it a lot because it's a post-apocalyptic show that doesn't depict the world after the apocalypse as a bleak brown and grey wasteland. Basically what happened was during a great war electromagnetic bombs were developed that were deployed and totally messed with the Earth, throwing it off its axis and causing all sorts of geological upheavals. Most of the old world was buried beneath the sea and what remains are mostly small islands. A group of people attempted to flee the disaster in a rocket ship, but the launch failed and sent them crashing down to a small island. The survivors decide to live on, and eventually a child named Conan is born.


When the story picks up the world has mostly recovered from the effects of the war. Many of the islands are overflowing with abundant greenery, including the one the survivors landed on. However, only Conan and his grandfather remain alive, and they have no way of knowing if there are any other humans left... until a girl named Lana washes up on the shore. Soon after, people from a country named Industria land on the island, and they really want to take Lana back...


If you've ever wanted to see a Ghibli adventure unfold over the span of 26 episodes rather than two hours, this is the show for you. I only have one complaint about it and it involves the ending of one character's storyline... but going into details would spoil quite a bit and the show's so obscure that I'd rather let people experience that for themselves.


One detail I did forget is it's based on a book called The Incredible Tide but apparently the story of the book and the show differ quite a bit. As an aside, this show is apparently very popular in Arabic-speaking countries as it was licensed there and dubbed as Adnan wa Lina, with the names of the two leads changed from Conan and Lana to Adnan and Lina. I always find it fascinating how old anime of the 70s and 80s that were very obscure in English-speaking places often found popularity in different languages.
 
Oh wow!! I'll need to check this out when I get off work! It looks really good I'm so excited. I was about to say I can't believe a Ghibli work had slipped by, but upon looking it up, it is definitely not Ghibli. I'm surprised though companies didn't want to license/dub something that Miyazaki worked on.


Speaking of early works, I've got another obscure-ish title.


M+W by Osamu Tezuka.


Surprisingly Tezuka work that are not Astro Boy or Black Jack often go unnoticed by anime fans, but a really good story by Tezuka would be M+W. It's a VERY mature story and rather dark and twisted. I will give a trigger warning for pedophilia though. I think at least this story was revolutionary for it's time. Also forgot to mention it's been licensed and is out in English but I hardly see on any bookshelves.


Basically the story is about a wealthy little boy who visits an island on a trip with his father (?) But a lethal gas was unleashed on the island. It's been a while since I read it, but a juvenile delinquent kidnaps the boy into a cave and that's how the two were the only remaining survivors on the island. Flash forward to the future, the juvenile delinquent has come to terms about his ways and becomes a priest while the young boy grows up to be an extremely charismatic man who works in a law firm? Bank? Again it's been a while since I've read the book, but the boy has not forgotten his past and ends up becoming a psychotic killer and takes revenge on the people who released the gas on the island. A very good read.
 
radiochai said:
Oh wow!! I'll need to check this out when I get off work! It looks really good I'm so excited. I was about to say I can't believe a Ghibli work had slipped by, but upon looking it up, it is definitely not Ghibli. I'm surprised though companies didn't want to license/dub something that Miyazaki worked on.
Speaking of early works, I've got another obscure-ish title.


M+W by Osamu Tezuka.


Surprisingly Tezuka work that are not Astro Boy or Black Jack often go unnoticed by anime fans, but a really good story by Tezuka would be M+W. It's a VERY mature story and rather dark and twisted. I will give a trigger warning for pedophilia though. I think at least this story was revolutionary for it's time. Also forgot to mention it's been licensed and is out in English but I hardly see on any bookshelves.


Basically the story is about a wealthy little boy who visits an island on a trip with his father (?) But a lethal gas was unleashed on the island. It's been a while since I read it, but a juvenile delinquent kidnaps the boy into a cave and that's how the two were the only remaining survivors on the island. Flash forward to the future, the juvenile delinquent has come to terms about his ways and becomes a priest while the young boy grows up to be an extremely charismatic man who works in a law firm? Bank? Again it's been a while since I've read the book, but the boy has not forgotten his past and ends up becoming a psychotic killer and takes revenge on the people who released the gas on the island. A very good read.
I forgot to clarify that it was made before Ghibli came into existence but it feels like one of their works thanks to Miyazaki's involvement. There are a few other older anime like that where Ghibli staff were involved before the studio was founded but I haven't watched them all yet. Also I looooved 20th Century Boys when I read it a few years back so I'll have to check out these other manga you're recommending once I get in the mood for another manga binge again.


I'll come back in a while with another write up about a favorite series of mine that tends to get overlooked.
 
[QUOTE="Negative Zone]I looooved 20th Century Boys

[/QUOTE]
Have you read any other Naoki Urasawa's works? Monster is definitely essential and Pluto is really good if you like Astro Boy. There is also Billy Bat, but I haven't finished it since it seemed weird and convoluted when I read it. Also I hear Master Keaton is pretty good too but I have trouble getting into it.
 
I don't know exactly how much of a following this anime gets, but a while back I watched a series called Dog Days. It's about a Human boy who gets transported into a world of kemonomimis (I think, that's the correct term right?) to help the Dog kingdom of Biscotti fight a war. Oh, and in this land, 'War' is less of a bloody mess and more of a sport, where the majority of combatants turn into animal balls when they're defeated, and main characters lose their clothing when they're hit. It's... Kinda weird if you think about it xD But I liked it.
 
I'm back with a twofer this time. The first probably isn't super obscure but it's one of those works that I think was more popular years ago but sort of faded into the background over the years. It's a seven part OVA series released in the 90s called Giant Robo: The Day the Earth Stood Still.


It's a really interesting work as it's loosely based on Mitsuteru Yokoyama's manga called Giant Robo but it actually takes a bunch of characters from all of his works and adapts them into the universe... kind of like what Tezuka did with his Star System, in a way. The setting is this cool retrofuturistic world, where just about every bit of technology is powered by this miraculous source of energy called the Shizuma Drive. There's a mysterious group of villains called the Magnificent Ten that work for this organization called Big Fire, and they square off against the International Police Organization's Experts of Justice. If you can't tell, it's kind of... over the top. Everything in this show is super dramatic, and it takes a lot of influence from the wuxia genre, likely because a lot of Yokoyama's manga works were adaptations of classic wuxia novels.


I haven't watched it in a long time so my memory of a lot of the details isn't the greatest but the show oozes style and the plot that unfolds is really interesting. Apparently it was meant to be but one part in a larger saga, sort of like how the original Star Wars was retroactively called 'Episode IV' but the series kind of didn't sell well in Japan so nothing more was made. It does stand well on its own, though. The show was written by Yasuhiro Imagawa who is probably more famous for G Gundam. He's done a few other shows too like an adaptation of Tetsujin 28 (also originally by Yokoyama, and the source work of at least one of the characters in the Giant Robo anime) and Shin Mazinger Z Impact, but I haven't watched those shows quite yet.


Giant Robo used to be licensed by Media Blasters but I believe the license lapsed. The DVD set I bought back when it was licensed actually has two different dubs on it, one made in the 90s and a more recent dub produced in... I think 2004, which is an interesting curiosity.


The other series is a medical manga called Jin, by Motoka Murakami. It's about a brain surgeon named Jin who is sent back to the Edo period after a really unusual accident after operating on a patient. He gets involved with different historical figures of the period and sets up his own medical clinic. It's really fascinating as he has to deal with things like the prejudice against western-style medicine, different historical events, and the ongoing mystery of why and how he traveled back in time. As it's a medical manga there are some very detailed drawings of surgeries and the like so if that's something that makes you squeamish it's worth keeping in mind. I don't think it's licensed and last I checked it hasn't been fully scanlated yet either.


And I have read Monster! I keep meaning to check out the rest of Urasawa's works but I haven't quite yet.
 
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I really enjoyed reading this manga called Oyasumi Punpun (Goodnight Punpun) and binged it in a few days. Let me copy and paste the summary from myanimelist.


"Punpun is an ordinary young boy growing up in Japan whose age of innocence has reached its end after his father is arrested for spousal abuse resulting in putting Punpun's mother in hospital. With his uncle looking after him, Punpun grows into adulthood facing a series of events which change him, for better or worse, forcing him to contemplate just what it means to be an adult."


It sent me into a deep sadness for a couple weeks. It's honestly a really dark manga and it affects you negatively, but you won't regret reading it.
 
Oh man! Oyasumi Punpun! I've been wanting to read this for a long time, but I keep forgetting about it. I seriously love the artstyle.
 
Aoi Bengaku, I haven't really seen anyone talking about this anime but it is definitely one of the best anime I have seen recently.
 
radiochai said:
@Aine
Is the art style/character concepts done by Takeshi Obata?
Yup! The main character (for the first arc) resembles Light from Deathnote so much you get confused sometimes.
 
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Ik it is popular over in Japan. But over in the west, I barely hear anything of it. I may be wrong and just not finding the right people xD


But Fuuka by Seo-sensei who did Kimi no Iru Maichi(THE best romance manga) again obscure for me cause I FIND NO ONE who talks about it...but again I may be wrong.


Also I know a very good series that is underrated maybe not obscure but severely underrated...and that is Hajime No Ippo.
 
Vexxum said:
Ik it is popular over in Japan. But over in the west, I barely hear anything of it. I may be wrong and just not finding the right people xD
But Fuuka by Seo-sensei who did Kimi no Iru Maichi(THE best romance manga) again obscure for me cause I FIND NO ONE who talks about it...but again I may be wrong.


Also I know a very good series that is underrated maybe not obscure but severely underrated...and that is Hajime No Ippo.
He also did Suzuka right? Damn, that brings back a lot of memories.
 

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