One Piece

Moving onto anime number 3 we have Eiichiro Oda's One Piece. Now unlike Naruto and Bleach, One Piece is funnier and not as serious when it comes to the story line. The story is easy to get as well; it is about Monkey D Luffy, a pirate who sets out to find the legendary treasure that the king of the pirates left behind “One Piece”, and to become the next king of the Pirates. Along the way he meets other people who he would join his crew and help him along the way.





Luffy's pirate crew (missing Franky, Robin, and Brook)

The powers in One Piece are weird and funny which is another reason I like the anime. The main powers in One Piece come from the “Devil’s Fruits”. When a person eats one of the devil fruits they gain a special ability (such as Luffy becoming a rubber man), but they loose their ability to swim. This is also a thing that makes the anime funny because some of the characters forget about that and just jump into the sea, but it also makes it interesting how they can be a pirate with the ability to swim take away from them. The devil fruits are usually called by what their ability is usually the word of the ability repeated twice, such as Gomu Gomu no Mi (rubber rubber fruit).

Gomu Gomu no Mi

The powers range from being able to split any part of the body to having control over sand. The fruits are separated into three main categories: Paramecia – the person gains supper human physical abilities and they can alters the features of the persons body (such as Luffy becoming a rubber man), Zoan – being able to transform into a animal and Logia – the most powerful of the fruits, this allows the person to generate, manipulate and transform themselves into a element (such as lighting, smoke, water etc). Not only are thier davil fruit users but some people with out them can still fight witch give the series more variety than everyone just having a power from the same sourse. Zoro (the swords man on Luffy's crew) fights with 3 swords while Sanji (the cook on Luffy's crew) fights using his legs and they are counted as strong as a Devil Fruit user which does not mean that the only people than can accualy fight are the people with the devil fruit.

A0kiji's Logia Devil Fruit






Well so far so good with this anime: it has variety of powers and it's funny. The one thing that i really like about it is that the fillers are not nororiouse long and boring like some of the Bleach and Naruto one's, sometime there would be like one or two episodes of a filler and then go back to the accual story line. The one thing i would say is that the fillers appear out of nowhere and they have no relevance to the story that was going on before it. Another thing is the main character Luffy (which most people that i know hate haha), i like him because of his care free personality and even thou he makes some stupid things (such as constantly jumping in the water even thou he can't swim, or he gets distracted during a fight by how "cool" the other persons power is) i still like him because he is not as seriouse as Ichigo or Naruto all the time and when he needs to be he does not go over the top, it's the perfect combination of Ichigo's seriouse personality an Naruto's funny moments. The other characters in it are also round up and make the situation that Luffy gets them in (most of the time into fights they don't have to) more funny, but over all they give they still respect him even though Zoro or Sanji could rival Luffy in combat. So here you have it anim enumber 3.

Bleach

The next anime on my list of top five is Tite Kibo’s Bleach. The reason that I chose this anime as my second one is that like Naruto the anime has a good story line but not as in depth as Naruto. Instead the fighting sequences are what I like about this anime. The story revolves around Kurosaki Ichigo, a high school student who can see ghosts. One day he meets the Soul Reaper Kuchiki Rukia who was on a assignment to destroy a Hollow, but because of Ichigo’s high spiritual pressure (the hollow’s eat the people with the highest spiritual pressure) the hollow attacks Ichigo’s family and when Rukia tries to defend them she is mortally wounded and is force to stab Ichigo with her Zanpakutou just off his hart to transfer her powers into him for a while, but Ichigo ends up and takes out most of her power and becomes a Substituted Soul Reaper and in dragged deeper and deeper into the affairs of Soul Society (the home of all soul reapers, a sort of after life).






Fish Bone D: The first Hollow Ichigo Encounters

The Soul Reapers have two main jobs: to perform Soul Burial on Pulses (good souls) which sends them to Soul Society (which is like I said before the after life in the Bleach universe), and Hollow Cleansing which means destroying the Hollows (souls which have lost their harts to despair and became evil) with their Zanpakutou.

Ichigo performing the Soul Burial on a Plus.

Guess I should explain what a Zanpakuto is now. A Zanpakuto is born with the soul reaper, it is part of there soul and cannot be replaced. Each Zanpakuto is unique in their abilities; they are in the shape of a sword but while they are in the soul reaper’s “inner world”, but they sometimes take a physical form (such as Ichigo’s Zangetsu). Their shape and ability is based on the soul reapers soul and once they learn the Zanpakuto’s name they can grow stronger together. They have two stages of release: Shikai – is when they soul reaper learns the Zanpakuto’s name and is able to change the shape of it a little and gain some of it’s powers, and Bankai – which when release not only does the Zanpakuto changes but in some cases the soul reapers cloths as well. In Bankai the soul reaper power increases 5 to 10 times.

Ichigo in Shikai

Ichigo's Bankai

Right with all the explanations out of the way time to say why I like it. Like I said before it is a good anime when it come to the story line but I don’t find it as good as Naruto. The main reason I put it in second place is that it has good fight scenes and again like Naruto it has a variety of power’s that keep it interesting. One thing I will say that is annoying is the fillers (the anime story lines that have nothing to do with the manga)

Naruto

My first choice of my top 5 anime is Masashi Kishimoto's hit manga Naruto. The reason I chose this to be my first is because Naruto was the first anime I have ever watched and this is how I got introduced to anime. Naruto is sent is the fantasy world of ninjas, (also reffered to as a shinobi or a kunoichi for the females). The story is based around Naruto the main character as he tries to work his way through the rank of ninja and become the Hokage (the strongest ninja in his village). The whole world of naruto is set in a fictional continent that is split into a number of different countries, each of which has a Hidden Village which is where all the ninja operate. There are 15 Hidden Villages but only a few of them are present in the anime and only their Hokages are talked about, these are: Konohagakure (Hidden in the leaf, where Naruto is from), Sunagakure (hidden in the Sand), Kumogakure (hidden in the clouds), Iwagakure (Hidden in the stone), Kirigakure (Hidden in the Mist).

A map of the Naruto univers.

The reason I like this anime is that it has a very complex story line to it and it does not focus on the main character all the time but it also has some episodes dedicated to expanding some of the minor characters. Another reason is the powers that are used in the anime. The whole anime is based around the idea that people have chakra which is the mixture of spiritual and physical energy in the body; with this the ninjas are able to perform jutsu’s. Jutsu’s are the techniques used in the Naruto universe and are performed by hand signs and use up chakra.

The two elements that make up chakra: Physical and Spiritual Energy

There are different types of jutsus from the one that create a water dragon that lunges at the enemy to, ones that causes the enemies body to be paralyse in a illusions, and the one that Naruto himself uses a jutsu that he is able to multiply himself with. I like this because it gives a variety to the series and it does not get boring like seeing the same technique done over and over again (maybe a bit when Naruto at the start of the series can only use the Shadow Clone Jutsu which he uses to no end).

Naruto's Shadow Clone Jutsu












Water Dragon Jutsu







Also the main reason i like Naruto is because i like th main character the most. He started as a drop out but as the series progreesset he became more powerfull and even though i know most anime series do this to their main character Masashi Kishimot does is so well that i can't stop watching it. If only they would get rid of the fillers then the show would not have to deviate from the manga so much.

Anime History

The anime genre started in the 20th century with the Japanese experimenting with the western style of animation. With this the first widley popular anime was Osamu Tezuka's, Astro Boy (in 1963). Anime is besically Japanese animation and created from the western animation and addapted into other genres such as mecha. Anime are usually adapted from a manga of the same name such as Astro Boy being adapted from the manga called Astro Boy. Some fallow the story in the manga while other deviate from them and creat their own stroy such as Fullmetal Alchemist Anime was not only limited to series such as Astro Boy but it also had some succsess as animated films such a Spirited Away.




The first volume of the Astro Boy manga