What non-JoJo anime series will give me the best JoJo-like experience?

[ninja666]

I just finished watching Jojo's Bizarre Adventure from 2012 and I really, really liked it. However, until I get my hands on Bluray versions somehow, I'm not gonna watch Stardust Crusaders. Why? Because Bluray versions are the only ones that are uncensored and every streaming site has the censored version (even paid ones, like Crunchyroll, which is kind of ridiculous), and imo, given the nature of the show, watching it censored is kind of missing the point.

Therefore I'd like to ask for some suggestions to hold me off for now. What anime series would give me the most similar experience? Here's what I liked about JoJo:

- It started out already being over the top and ridiculous, only to get even more ridiculous and over the top with every episode. Every character, every event, every fight was a festival of utter and sheer stupidity that they somehow managed to make super cool.
- It almost never took itself seriously. Sure, it had *some* serious moments, but even at its darkest, JoJo was still a ridiculously funny action comedy, playing around with tropes, filled to the brim with all kinds of humor.
- Every character was super stylish. They were designed so well, they could pull off the stupidest combinations of clothing and the dumbest of attitudes and personalities and make them appear as something ludicrously awesome.
- The plot and action twists. Every episode had at least 3 and every one was dumber than the previous one, oftentimes making me either burst with uncontrollable laughter or sit there utterly amazed by how it's getting more and more ridiculous by the minute.
- The gratuitous violence. The large amount of blood, gore, and overall brutality made the fights very entertaining to watch.
- No fanservice. I hate fanservice in anime and I really liked the fact JoJo didn't have any (unless you count that one moment a certain female character was taking a bath as fanservice).
- Really good pacing. There was a lot of content in every single episode and the series never felt drawn out. The fights also didn't last an extremely long amount of time, which often seems to be the case with battle-oriented anime.
- The highly stylized visuals, often playing around with color palettes, lighting, and filters. They way they pulled off that artstyle really made the whole experience even more enjoyable. It's not necessary for your suggestions to be this stylized though. I'm more about the content than the visuals.

Apart from that the anime has to be finished, be a self-contained experience (meaning I don't have to read any manga or play any game to understand everything in it), and must not have any sort of self-censorship (white blood and such).

What would you recommend based on that criteria?

I've already tried Gurren Lagann, but found it too childish and "typical" for my liking (I generally dislike typical shonen titles). Plus, I'm not really all that big on mecha. I've also tried to watch Fist of the North Star (both the show and the movie), but the censorship bothered me to the point it was unwatchable because of it.

 

[Benpasko]

I've already tried Gurren Lagann, but found it too childish and "typical" for my liking (I generally dislike typical shonen titles).

Did you finish it? It only gets better as it goes on, Season 2 is incredible. I pretty much hate the first half of S1, but 2 is in my top 3 anime of all time.

That said, I can't really help you find much that's like JoJo. It's so unique that anything that even tries to imitate it can't match its tone.

 

[ninja666]

I've already tried Gurren Lagann, but found it too childish and "typical" for my liking (I generally dislike typical shonen titles).

Did you finish it? It only gets better as it goes on, Season 2 is incredible. I pretty much hate the first half of S1, but 2 is in my top 3 anime of all time.

To be honest, I dropped it after 3 episodes because it really didn't seem like something I'd like. Approx. after how many episodes does this magical "it gets good, trust me" period vanishes and actual goodness starts?

 

[RaikuFA]

The animes based off of the Personal series should work.

 

[ninja666]

The animes based off of the Personal series should work.

Care to explain why, exactly? Also, since there's quite a few of them, which one should I watch first?

Also, do I need to play the games before watching their respective anime adaptations? Because if I need any knowledge from the games prior to watching the anime in order to understand the story, then I'm automatically ruling out this suggestion.

 

[Benpasko]

I've already tried Gurren Lagann, but found it too childish and "typical" for my liking (I generally dislike typical shonen titles).

Did you finish it? It only gets better as it goes on, Season 2 is incredible. I pretty much hate the first half of S1, but 2 is in my top 3 anime of all time.

To be honest, I dropped it after 3 episodes because it really didn't seem like something I'd like. Approx. after how many episodes does this magical "it gets good, trust me" period vanishes and actual goodness starts?

It takes a while getting there, unfortunately. I think it's episode 7 or 9? The series changes heavily at that point, and Simon stops being a shit.

 

[ninja666]

It takes a while getting there, unfortunately. I think it's episode 7 or 9? The series changes heavily at that point, and Simon stops being a shit.

It's not as bad as I thought, then. It's still kind of bad though. I'll consider giving it another shot if nothing better pops up, but for now I'll just wait for other suggestions. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

 

[RaikuFA]

The animes based off of the Personal series should work.

Care to explain why, exactly? Also, since there's quite a few of them, which one should I watch first?

I could be wrong but I think the people working on Persona said JJBA was an inspiration for the series. It has stands but they're instead called Persona and they're based off of famous mythological figures, like the main characters persona is Izanagi.

I believe you should just watch the one based off of the 4th game. I know there's supposed to be a movie based off of the 3rd game but I don't remember if it's on a streaming service or not. You don't need to know 1-3 to know about 4.

 

[Asita]

I've already tried Gurren Lagann, but found it too childish and "typical" for my liking (I generally dislike typical shonen titles).

Did you finish it? It only gets better as it goes on, Season 2 is incredible. I pretty much hate the first half of S1, but 2 is in my top 3 anime of all time.

To be honest, I dropped it after 3 episodes because it really didn't seem like something I'd like. Approx. after how many episodes does this magical "it gets good, trust me" period vanishes and actual goodness starts?

General consensus there tends to be somewhere between 8 and 16 episodes, with at least some minority consensus that the first three episodes[footnote]And believe me, I'm just as surprised as you about how that lines up with the number of episodes you watched[/footnote] are comparatively lacking. At the low end of the estimate, the 8th episode marks a significant twist that inspires a decent amount of character development. At the high end of the estimate, episode 16 marks the end of the first story arc, and the second arc is generally seen as superior to the first.

 

[Blitsie]

It takes a while getting there, unfortunately. I think it's episode 7 or 9? The series changes heavily at that point, and Simon stops being a shit.

It's not as bad as I thought, then. It's still kind of bad though. I'll consider giving it another shot if nothing better pops up, but for now I'll just wait for other suggestions. Thanks for clearing that up for me.

Give it another three episodes, I promise you it may look typical shonen kid stuff for those first few episodes (I also gave up on it during my first watch actually, so I understand where you're coming from) but holy crap you're close to the point where the show gradually starts cranking up everything to 11 and you have no idea how unpredictably crazy it gets. Like Simon? He actually becomes one of the coolest characters in the show.

Seriously, keep other suggestions for later, watch more Gurren Lagann.

 

[ninja666]

I could be wrong but I think the people working on Persona said JJBA was an inspiration for the series. It has stands but they're instead called Persona and they're based off of famous mythological figures, like the main characters persona is Izanagi.

I believe you should just watch the one based off of the 4th game. I know there's supposed to be a movie based off of the 3rd game but I don't remember if it's on a streaming service or not. You don't need to know 1-3 to know about 4.

So, basically you're only recommending it because it has totally-not-stands? Or does it also have the same over the top campiness JoJo has? Because if it doesn't, then it's not really something I'm looking for.

 

[Asita]

I could be wrong but I think the people working on Persona said JJBA was an inspiration for the series. It has stands but they're instead called Persona and they're based off of famous mythological figures, like the main characters persona is Izanagi.

I believe you should just watch the one based off of the 4th game. I know there's supposed to be a movie based off of the 3rd game but I don't remember if it's on a streaming service or not. You don't need to know 1-3 to know about 4.

So, basically you're only recommending it because it has totally-not-stands? Or does it also have the same over the top campiness JoJo has? Because if it doesn't, then it's not really something I'm looking for.

Eh...I found the Persona 4 anime to be a bit lacking. It kinda ended up with a bit of Yu-Gi-Oh's "new problem, new power" issue due to the protagonist's "Wild Card" ability. While that ability worked for the game, I found that it drained the tension because it meant that Yu always had the tools needed to deal with a given threat and the character interaction wasn't strong enough to make up for it. (Whether or not the Golden animation did a better job at this or not, I cannot say)


Though if you want an idea of how the fights looked, here's the first one in the series

Spoiler

 

[RaikuFA]

I could be wrong but I think the people working on Persona said JJBA was an inspiration for the series. It has stands but they're instead called Persona and they're based off of famous mythological figures, like the main characters persona is Izanagi.

I believe you should just watch the one based off of the 4th game. I know there's supposed to be a movie based off of the 3rd game but I don't remember if it's on a streaming service or not. You don't need to know 1-3 to know about 4.

So, basically you're only recommending it because it has totally-not-stands? Or does it also have the same over the top campiness JoJo has? Because if it doesn't, then it's not really something I'm looking for.

Some of the shadows(the bosses in the game) have over the top looks but no one is really an agent peacock.

 

[ninja666]

Kill la Kill, though it has fan service (but it's equal opportunity, and in general Jojo is laden with male fanservice).

While I kinda noticed that thing with male fanservice in JoJo as well, it didn't really bother me at all, unlike female fanservice (maybe because male fanservice is less obvious and blatant about itself? I dunno).

While I'm okay with having some female fanservice in anime, Gurren Lagann levels is probably as much as I can take (and it's still almost crossing the line of "it's too goddamn much" for me). That's why I'm not even going to touch Kill La Kill with a 10-foot pole. Sorry.

Did they cut scenes out of the Stardust anime? Since the Japanese censoring wasn't too bad and just didn't show excessive gore.

Afaik no, but even the obscuring of the gore bothers me because JoJo is almost all about over the top fights where everybody gets horribly mutilated in one way or another and if you take that away from me, you lose my interest instantly because for me this show can't survive on campiness alone.

 

[ninja666]

Do you have any other suggestions? Because I still haven't found anything fitting myself and the suggestions in these thread haven't proved to be what I'm looking for.

 

[Mechamorph]

Try the Bastard!!! anime. It has very much the same vibe as Jojo being a tongue in cheek send up of high fantasy anime. The main character justifies his victory once with "its because I am a handsome guy and you are ugly. It is a law of the universe that the ugly guy loses!". It does have some fanservice but then again it is an OAV from the 90s. Not too gratuitous and mainly is seen at the earlier episodes. Another one I can recommend is Gakuen Campus Guardress which is a parody of the typical "teenage superheroes guard against dark forces from another dimension" premise. It goes all the way to silly though and does not take itself seriously AT ALL. Dragon Half is the fantasy counterpart so if you are just looking for some chuckles its worth it. How silly? One villain introduces himself and declares revenge against the protagonist. Protagonist has no idea who he is. The villain then watches the OAV on a television set and realizes that all his scenes from the manga had been cut.

As for a full series, try Rune Solider Louie. Has some plot twists, character development and plenty of humor. It features an apprentice mage whose build looks like the typical meathead and whose first instinct when meeting a monster is beating it to death with his fists or (very expensive) magic wand. It is based on D&D so it has the typical cleric-mage(?)-thief-fighter dynamic which will be very familiar to any tabletop roleplayer.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

Well, if,you want an anime similar to the first two seasons of JoJo, I recommend Fist of the North Star.

(Runs off giggling, sure he made a funny joke)