[Ginkasa]

Up until recently I'd mostly been watching Gundam with a smattering of some other stuff in between. Recently, though, my wife and I picked out four shows to watch in a "block" and sort of recreate an old school, weekday Toonami experience, lol. Right now what we've got going is:

Gundam Seed
Excel Saga
Revolutionary Girl Utena
Nier: Automata

Gundam Seed is just me continuing to watch Gundam. My wife and I really enjoyed the recent Witch from Mercury show. We want back and watched Turn A Gundam (my favorite; second time for me but first for my wife) and enjoyed that too, so figured we'd move forward. I started watching Seed when it came out on Toonami nearly 20 years ago, but that's about when I started adulting and got pulled away from Toonami. We're enjoying it so far but it definitely feels more like a generic shounen anime compared to Turn A (the A stands for Art, lol).

I was a fan of Excel Saga back in the day. One of the few anime I experienced outside of Toonami. It popped back in my brain and I was wanting to revisit but also kind of concerned I would find it more cringy than funny now. Fortunately, my wife and I are both enjoying it and its absurdist humor.

I first heard of Utena recently in reference to the aforementioned Gundam Witch from Mercury which took a lot of inspiration from Utena. Everyone who was talking about spoke very highly of it and, again, my wife and I really enjoyed WfM so we thought to check this out. Its really hitting for me so far. I'm maybe 60% through so I'm hoping the back half continues as strong, but if it does this might be one of my favorites. A little upthread (like a year ago, lol) I was asking for some recommendations and this show fits right into what I was hoping to find.

Nier: Automata is based off of the game and I really liked the game so we watched the anime. We actually finished it (or, finished the first season or whatever) our last "block". I thought it was a great adaptation (so far; just got to ending A of the game) and look forward to more.

We need to pick a new show to add to our block. I found a large list of "best anime" on reddit that was compiled from like 50 other "best of" lists from different sources and that seems good. The top ones are ones I've seen that are really good (like Cowboy Bebop and Evangelion; Utena is at 4!). And most of the stuff seems like stuff I'm looking for. Contained anime that aim a little higher than, like, DBZ or Naruto or something. Gurren Lagan is the highest I haven't seen so that'll probably be our next pick.