Shows like Pokemon, Digimon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Dragon Ball Z are some of the biggest reasons why anime exploded in popularity in America back in the late 90s and early 2000s. Their unique art styles, ongoing stories, and expansive universes offered western kids an animated experience the likes of which they had never seen.
While these shows and a few more were certainly the biggest catalysts though, they were definitely not the only shows that had a hand in anime finding an American audience, nor were they even the first. Not even close, really. In fact, a lot of twentieth-century anime series aired on American TV and were loved by viewers, but some have since faded from the anime conversation.
8 Ronin Warriors
Cartoon Network deserves a lot of credit for bringing anime to the American masses with their Toonami blocks of the late 90s, but there were other networks who saw the potential in Japanese animation back then too. In fact, Ronin Warriors, which started airing on Toonami in the fall of 1999, had been on both USA Network and The Sci-Fi Channel before Toonami even existed.
This shonen series originally aired in Japan from 1988 to 1989 and had found its way to syndication in America by 1995. It followed five samurai warriors who possessed armor with mystical powers on their journey to defeat a demon bent on ruling the Mortal World. More than a few kids got turned on to anime by watching their story play out.
7 Belle and Sebastian
Belle and Sebastian offered a rare and interesting blend of international storytelling flavors to kids who watched it on Nickelodeon between 1984 and 1990. It was created by Toho Company and is based on a beloved French book about the adventures of a young boy and his big white dog. This means that the creators were Japanese, the source material was French, and the viewers, of course, were American.
This heartwarming adventure show is one that is remembered quite fondly by the few who haven't forgotten it. Although the source material has seen multiple adaptations in recent years, the anime has remained almost entirely in the past over on western shores. If the 52-episode run can be located, it’s absolutely worth a watch.
6 Medabots
Of all the anime that featured cool little battle buddies and emphasized collectability back in the early 2000s, Medabots may be the one that has been most unjustly forgotten. It swapped out the monsters of Pokemon and Digimon for some awesomely designed robots that characters would pit against one another in “robattles.”
Medabots could easily be accused of mindlessly jumping on the Pokemon bandwagon in order to ride that behemoth’s long and sweeping coattails, but that doesn’t mean it was a bad show at all. Its world was interesting, the humor was decent, and the robots looked exceptionally cool. There was even a pretty enjoyable Medabots game for Game Boy Advance that made it to North America.
5 Monster Rancher
The Monster Rancher video game series hasn’t necessarily been forgotten, but the 73-episode show it spawned back in 1999 probably isn’t finding its way into anime conversations all too often today. The show followed young Genki Sakura as he finds himself transported into the strange world of his favorite video game, Monster Rancher. There, he must find a legendary monster to help him in the battle against the evil Moo.
Monster Rancher aired on a number of American networks in the early 2000s, including Fox, Fox Family, and the Sci-Fi Channel. It may not have taken off into the stratosphere like Pokemon, but there’s plenty there for fans of the stranger-in-a-strange-land adventure.
4 Samurai Pizza Cats
Shows about anthropomorphic creatures that wield Japanese weapons and love pizza were well-known to glue swarms of young eyes to television sets in the early 90s, so it must have seemed like a no-brainer for Saban to import Kyatto Ninden Teyandee, aka Samurai Pizza Cats, over to the U.S. back in 1996. However, while the show’s animation, character designs, and overall premise could almost certainly appeal to American fans of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the writing presented some significant issues.
The original Samurai Pizza Cats was based largely around satirizing and parodying Japanese culture, which is something most American kids were probably not all that aware of back in the pre-internet days. To remedy this issue, Saban’s team completely rewrote every script for their dub based on what they thought would make a good story. That was a blasphemous act in the eyes of many anime fans to be certain, but it was still a pretty enjoyable little show.
3 Kimba The White Lion
Sometimes, it can be easy to forget that anime like Astro Boy and Speed Racer made it to America all the way back in the 1960s, decades before the art form would become both a vibrant subculture and a tremendous industry in the west. It can be even easier to forget that they weren’t the only anime around back then either.
Made by famed former studio Mushi Production, Kimba the White Lion was one of the earliest anime imports to America, coming to television in 1966, a full year before Speed Racer’s stateside debut. The show was quite popular back then but hardly gets any mention today except in the occasional discussion about whether or not Disney ripped it off when they made The Lion King.
2 The Big O
It’s totally normal within the anime world for shows to closely emulate one another, but it’s not quite as common to see an anime that is as clearly influenced by American television as The Big O was. This awesome mecha show set in a brutal corporation-controlled city standing on the outskirts of an apocalyptic wasteland was clearly intended to be the anime version of Batman: The Animated Series with its distinctive noir tone and art deco design. It does an impressive job of living up to that concept.
The show did not fare well at home in Japan which led to its second 13-episode season being canceled. However, after it aired on Toonami in America a resurgence in popularity led to the second season being produced with Cartoon Network’s involvement: a true testament to the network’s influence on anime.
1 Hamtaro
Anime can be deathly serious, brutally violent, exceedingly dark, and achingly sad. It can also be absolutely adorable. Hamtaro, which falls decidedly into the latter category, is a low-stakes, super cute, warm and fuzzy hamster show that may not appeal to the palate of an anime fan who's looking for something sophisticated and thought-provoking. Even so, it has captured the hearts of many fans over the 20+ years that the franchise has been around.
This show is certainly not forgotten in Japan, but it’s been many years since it aired on Cartoon Network and well over a decade since the release of a new Hamtaro video game. It’s safe to say that this show has begun to fade from the American cultural consciousness, which is a crying shame because it is wildly lovable.