What's the Most Brutal Anime You've Seen?

[Blackdoom]

I don't remember what the show was called but it had some very... interesting scenes to say the least with some very strong rape undertones to them.

Ninja Scrolls is also fairly brutal in terms of violence.

Future Diary I will give an honorable mention to however I have only seen the censored version and if the uncensored screenshots I have seen are anything to go off of the brutality goes up several hundred levels.

 

[HyRock]

I'd have to go with Elfen Lied also..
I can recall a scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euUUxg0XnDM


OFF TOPIC:

Rurouini Kenshin (AKA "Samurai X")

Thanks to you.. I found a good anime to watch..

 

[CrystalShadow]

Hmm.

Well, of the anime I've seen, Elfen Lied is definitely up there as being brutal.

'She, the ultimate weapon' (the title varies a bit, so I'm not entirely sure what to call it) is... Also quite messed up, though perhaps not in a way that could be described as brutal as such.

Oh, but going with 'kids' anime...

Naruto. Seriously, that's been heavily edited for western audiences to make it more child-friendly, but when you see the unedited versions, you see why.

Naruto (and many of the other characters) get the crap kicked out of them on a regular basis, and often in quite sadistic ways.
I mean, a lot of the core premise of the series (when it isn't being silly) is about using other people for your own ends, and whether or not you should care about what that does to them...

Naruto, when you look at it is really messed up.

Couldn't agree more, I mean when you really get down to it the main premise of the show [at least in part 1] is about CHILD SOLDIERS!!.
I mean just look at Gaara's back story as an example, when he is born he had a demon sealed inside him so he could be a weapon causing his mother to die in child birth-this lead for him to grow up alone while the sand controlled by said demon prevents any harm to him but also attacks and butches other's around him-because of this the only person who loved him his uncle is ordered by his father the head of the village to kill him-this all leading to Gaara who's only a child to love only himself and validate his existence through killing!

Yes. Exactly. You put it better than I could think of.

(I mean, my point seemed to have gotten a tiny bit lost in arguments about whether or not it had been edited, to what extent, and by whom), but this is exactly my point about the story.

I mean, it's just full of one kind of abuse or another of children. (And then the follow-up for the ones that get to be adults...)

You only need to listen to the speech Naruto makes regarding Haku in the very first season to know something is very messed up.
Even the relatively innocent (by comparison) leaf village is raising pretty much ALL of it's children from a very young age to be mercenaries whose only real loyalty is to whoever pays the most...

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I'd have to go with Elfen Lied also..
I can recall a scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euUUxg0XnDM


OFF TOPIC:

Rurouini Kenshin (AKA "Samurai X")

Thanks to you.. I found a good anime to watch..

You're welcome, glad you like it

 

[knight steel]

Hmm.
Oh, but going with 'kids' anime...

Naruto. Seriously, that's been heavily edited for western audiences to make it more child-friendly, but when you see the unedited versions, you see why.

Naruto (and many of the other characters) get the crap kicked out of them on a regular basis, and often in quite sadistic ways.
I mean, a lot of the core premise of the series (when it isn't being silly) is about using other people for your own ends, and whether or not you should care about what that does to them...

Naruto, when you look at it is really messed up.

Couldn't agree more, I mean when you really get down to it the main premise of the show [at least in part 1] is about CHILD SOLDIERS!!.

Yes. Exactly. You put it better than I could think of.

(I mean, my point seemed to have gotten a tiny bit lost in arguments about whether or not it had been edited, to what extent, and by whom), but this is exactly my point about the story.

I mean, it's just full of one kind of abuse or another of children. (And then the follow-up for the ones that get to be adults...)

You only need to listen to the speech Naruto makes regarding Haku in the very first season to know something is very messed up.
Even the relatively innocent (by comparison) leaf village is raising pretty much ALL of it's children from a very young age to be mercenaries whose only real loyalty is to whoever pays the most...

Just looking at the good guys [leaf village] you have the Uchiha slaughter, Hyuga subjugation, The Root organization which forcefully makes you remove your emotion and make you kill your fellow trainee's which become like family........and this is the "nice" village.
Then you look at other villages and well......child kidnapping.....eye stealing......slaughter exams....and these are still the neutral people.
And then you get the villains like orochimaru and *Shudder's*

 

[Ghaleon640]

I'm not going to go for 'most brutal' because some stuff is just... is just wow. Higurashi being the prime example.

But for being a shonen manga, I think Jojo's bizarre adventure had its moments. (I'm talking about the original anime since I haven't seen much of the new one, just haven't gotten to it yet.)

The last few episodes with Dio were pretty cool, and some stuff happens to some rather likable characters. Pretty brutal for something I believe is intended for kids. But still, very cool.

 

[GrimGrimoire]

In therms of graphic violence?

Spoiler: Baccano (minor spoilers)

Baccano is pretty brutal at times, I vaguely remember a kid being strangled, someone getting their face torn off, torture, and certain characters spending most of their on-screen time covered in blood.
Oh, and Chezlaw getting hot iron spikes pushed into his eyes.
Oh, and Chezlaw getting shot in the head.
Basically everything containing Chezlaw.
But it's been some time since I last watched it, so I can't recall too many details.

Spoiler: Bakemonogatari (minor spoilers)

Bakemonogatari isn't a brutal show, but it has the only scene I can recall actually disgusting me in terms of graphical violence. Just watch it:
The scene is amazing, it's extremely well made, but that entrail-flail part is just nasty.

Spoiler: Hellsing Ultimate (minor spoilers)

Hellsing Ultimate is in many ways about bloodshed. You grow accustomed to it.
Cannibalism? Sure.
Bloody mutilation? Go right on.
This is a series that has Nazi Catboys Battle KKK, and armies of undead flowing through the streets of London like tsunamis of blood. It's totally batshit insane.

That's all I can remember for now.

 

[Groenteman]

Hmm, measured purely by the amouth of blood and gore, Hellsing Ultimate. However, its so over the top and full of silly cliché (baby eating nazi vampire...) that I couldnt help but laugh. Not that thats a bad thing, twas a good laugh.

As for actual impact, Mnemosyne no Musume-tachi (forgot the translated name) takes the cake. It seems to make a point out the protagonist, a young woman, dying horrably every episode. Its not over the top, giant blood fountain giblet soup death, which realy serves to make it a lot nastier.

Claymore, Texhnolize and Blood-C deserve a mention. Didnt like blood-c that much, but it had violence allright.

Havnt seen Elfen Lied or Higurashi. They are somewhere on the to-watch-list but not very high up due my dislike of angsty storylines.


As for kids stuff, stuff thats been mentioned lots. Its kind of what got me into anime, not that im a violence fetishist, but the whole 'safe-for-kids' thing western cartoons do so much put me off even as a kid.

 

[Mitchell Bishop]

most people would say Higurashi is the most violent anime out there but as someone who has watched thousands of anime series it is not the most violent but is defiantly in the top5. The most violent would be Violence Jack (note its the only anime to be band in some counties just for violence). My top 5 would go something like this (4 and 5 could easily be swapped as they are pretty close to each other)

1. Violence Jack
2. Boah
3. Hellsing Ultimate
4. Black Lion
5. Higurashi no Naku Koro ni

Honorable mentions would go to Shigurui: Death Frenzy, Genocyber, Amon: Apocolypse of Devilman, Uncensored Hokuto no Ken, Elfin Lied

also if you was to include Guro Hentai then Violence Jack would be the only one that would make this list.

 

[FireAza]

Elfin Lied and Higurashi are the obvious choices. But, I'm going to give Another a special mention since it offs characters who you wouldn't expect to die. The fact they often die in horrible, freak accidents, just adds to the impact.

 

[DasDestroyer]

The most brutal one I've watched so far is Fate/Zero, but I am also currently reading the Higurashi no Naku Koro ni visual novel, and there's an anime adaptation of it. I'm pretty sure that once I get to the anime, it will dethrone Fate/Zero.

 

[Moderated]

I dunno, Hellsing? Elfen Lied? Deadman Wonderland? I don't really know.

I'd have to go with Elfen Lied also..
I can recall a scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euUUxg0XnDM


OFF TOPIC:

Rurouini Kenshin (AKA "Samurai X")

Thanks to you.. I found a good anime to watch..

Oh my god, why did you have to remind me of that.
Those people....I wanted them to suffer more than that quick death.
I am choosing that.

 

[Moderated]

Double post

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

Hellsing Ultimate. If Genocyber wasn't so short I would say that, but really a lot of that is cussing, nudity and extremely revolting cyborg/biotech/ewwwww kinds of transformations than buckets of blood.

I don't particularly enjoy brutal gore for it's own sake, even if that is what made the genre stand out so much when it came to the West originally (My 13 year old self: Holy jeez, the characters are allowed to swear and kill and there's tons of blood! This show is x1000 better than Disney!). Both of the above seem to place greater emphasis on that than coherent story or characters at times, though I do like Alucard and Seras.

 

[Vegosiux]

Probably Akira. I don't watch much anime, though.

This, right here and I'm amazed that it took a page and a half to get to it.

I'm going to go with Akira. Sure, there are more gory or violent anime, like Elfen Lied, but the OP asked for "brutal". The violence in Akira is brutal. The most innocent or undeserving characters are victims to most unpleasant and visceral suffering. Elfen Lied opens with exploding heads and gratuitous fan service, so it feels like a childish cartoon. Akira has a character step on a piece of glass with his bare foot, or a blameless girl getting her nose punched in - and it looks ten times worse.

Well, and without it being a hyperbole, violence in Akira can be gut-spillingly brutal. Especially that...that...thing at the end, that bloody thing was the stuff nightmares are made of. And no, I can't find any adequate expressions for that...thing so I'm just calling it that...that...thing.

 

[Johnny Impact]

Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne is full of rape, blood, torture, bloody rape-torture, and general nastiness. It treats the bloody rape-torture the way most people treat porn: get in real close, savor the moment, yeah that's the way, slice her nipple reeeeeeal sloooooow. I don't know if I'd call it brutal in the way a God of War game is brutal, but it's violent, evil, sadistic, and not for the kiddies.

Folks already mentioned Ninja Scroll, Samurai Champloo, Akira and Hellsing.

EDIT: And I see Rin already mentioned too. Crap.

 

[R4ptur3]

For me It's Deadman Wonderland. I thought It was a bit more brutal than Elfen lied.

 

[Julius Terrell]

Some of the most violent shows I've seen were the classics. Fist of the North Star,Violence Jack,Vampire Hunter D,Legend of Galactic Hero,Berserk,Grave of the Fireflies . Hell, a lot of the older movies from the 80s and 90s were damn violent. I've seen so many violent titles. Sometimes it was hard to watch. Most of you people just don't get that there are PLENTY of realistic titles that show violence REALISTICALLY.

I'll never forget seeing the young female at the beginning of Jin Roh blowing herself up with a bomb. It shook me to my core. It took a while for me get that scene out of my mind. How about seeing how war is realistically portrayed in Grave of the Fireflies. There was bodies stacked up like firewood and body parts EVERYWHERE after the bombing.

Don't let your inexperience with the artform blind you to the fact that there are plenty of realistic titles that pull no punches. I've been watching anime nearly my whole life. That is why I know.

 

[Angie7F]

Just popped back to add Hellsing.
Also, Jojo.