Thunderhorse94 said:
I want to start watching Hellsing, but don't know whether I should watch the original or the new OVA one which follows the manga more closely. What do you guys suggest?
If you have a group around to pan the crap out of it, Gonzo's 2001 Hellsing is a decent evening. If you want what the author intended, the OVA, for all their slow production, are much more satisfying.
Patrick_and_the_ricks said:
Full Metal Alchemist had filler, granted it was interesting.
Even more bizarre, a good half of the first TV series AND the subsequent moere was all original story ("filler" by some definitions). That it was interesting and hard-hitting, touching on important issues like sin, sacrifice, child abandonment, medical torture, and experimental ethics was completely unexpected.
Other notes:
When talking about One Piece/Naruto/Bleach, note that these are shounen fighting shows intended for young boys. While there's nothing wrong with liking it (akin to adults enjoying kids' shows in the Western world), if you don't that's not a failing of the show so much as general incompatibility with the targeted demographic.
Talking about Bleach, you can tell it has long passed the point where Kubo wanted to really end it, and the sales reflect this. In ten weeks, it latest volume has failed to match even the first-week sales of Naruto's latest volume. This is in stark contrast to One Piece, which recently surpassed Dragonball Z as the best selling shounen manga of all time.
Talking about the past, be aware that you're missing a lot of the context required to judge what is good and bad. For every Akira, there's a Dog Soldier and you would do well to not forget that. In reality, you need fairly a poor grasp of history to say that new things are worse than old things in many ways (not to make light of the existential crisis that the intersection of the Moé craze and fully-digital animation imposes on animators).
