h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

http://neomag.co.uk/

Has reviews of some stuff, but it is primarily UK oriented and US DVDs and stuff might be different. The magazine its self always has a list of the essential 25 anime, manga, and asian films.

Sweet! I'll check that out!

Inu-Yasha has an awful lot of series discs, so I may stick the films. Sounds cool, though.

Have either of you seen any of Paniponi Dash? I've got it (and The Twelve Kingdoms) in my queue in addition to the R.O.D., Dragon Ball and GiTS:SAC stuff you suggested.

not but I'll see if my library has it.

I've recently (earlier this week) purchased "Boogiepop Phantom" and "FLCL", and have watched the first two episodes of each. I quite like both. Has anyone else seen either, or both, and if so, what're your thoughts?

Foolie Coolie (or Furi Curi(or FLCL)) was fun. The studio that makes it is well known for putting out some rather good shows. If you like it, you might also like Neon Genesis Evangelion and Nadia, both are Gainax productions.

I've heard of the "Evangelion" one- I may add that to my list of ones to see, thanks!

Evangelion is one of the very best series out there. You should check it out.

Macross is another important and good series and the latest, Macross Frontier is one of the best series I've seen recently.

However I think only Super Dimension Fortress Macross and Macross Plus have been released in the US and it's only Macross Plus that's been released in the UK. Admittedly the first series of Robotech will give you a rough idea of the SDF Macross story, but it's not quite right.

Personally I have all of Robotech and all of Macross and I prefer Macross.

More good stuff is Bubblegum Crisis, there are two versions of that too, the original version and Bubblegum Crisis: Tokyo 2040 which is a remake. The original one also has an OVA sequel, Bubblegum Crash.

If you can find it Madox-01 is a decent OVA for fans of Mecha.

I'll have to look and see if any of those are available from Netflix. Thanks for all the suggestions!

Has anyone seen Kino's Journey? Netflix have that and I was thinking of checking it out...

For what it's worth, I think that the story is better in Bubblegum Crisis 2040.

If you like mecha series check out Raxephon and Escaflowne. Also look for Martian Successor Nadesico (my favourite series).

You can't go wrong with Cowboy Bebop (best soundtrack of anything) and Trigun as well for the western flair.

Gosh, some of these series have a half dozen or more discs... I don't know if I'll live long enough to watch them all.

Have heard of Cowboy Bebop, but none of the others you mentioned... I'll check Netflix for availability. Thanks so much for all the recommendations!

If you're buying these on disc it's going to get expensive. I tend to use download sites to view the series then buy the disc if it's a show worth keeping. There is far too much barely average stuff out there to chance a purchase without knowing what you're getting first. The site I use most will let you download as much as you can cope with for $10 a month. As soon as the shows get picked up by a US distributor they take them down and ask you to buy the dvd instead. There are other sites of course, some less concerned with the legalities than others, but I use Anime-Direct because they have always seemed to be reliable and virus free.

I second the suggestion of 'Macross' btw. I've just started watching the whole lot starting with 'Macross Zero', which I'm led to believe is sort of a prequel to the rest in the set. Fantastic quality of animation

'Otome Wa Boku Ni Koishiteru' is worth seeking out for a giggle. It's all about a boy who has been left a fortune but he can only claim it if he successfully spends his final school year dressed as a schoolgirl in a girls school without being detected by the others.

I use a sort of simmalar settup with my schools anime club and have been useing it catch up on seires that I really should have watched earlier which reminds me add Fullmetal Panic! to the list of stuff to watch.

Fortunately, Netflix has many of these titles available on DVD, so I haven't needed to buy many at all. I may look into the Anime Direct site- thanks for the suggestion. The only DVDs I've bought recently were Boogiepop Phantom and FLCL.

Will look out for 'Otome Wa Boku Ni Koishiteru' .

Saturday was Free Comic Book Day, so went to a comic shop that opened fairly recently and to which we'd never been yet. I picked up Junji Ito's "Museum of Terror" vols 1-3. I'm almost finished with vol 1. Quite good. I've seen a movie based on one of Ito's manga, called "Uzumaki". I quite liked it.

I'm told that 'Kenko Zenrakei Suieibu Umisho' has been out on DVD for about a month. I haven't seen it on sale yet but it's one I will add to the collection when I do, I must have watched the downloaded files about a dozen times so far.

'Rosario to Vampire' is the latest one I'm getting into, also 'Allison to Lillia', which is a bit like Tintin meets Biggles(I've got the soundtrack on the computer).

Has anyone seen 'Capeta'? It's an anime about go kart racing. Looks quite good from the eps I've watched, but I wondered if anyone has seen it all the way through.

not heard of it, busy watching all of Slayers OVAs, series and films at the moment... bought some of the books too.