Cowboy Bebop (ESPECIALLY the dub) was very much written and "acted" in a "western" style. Same with contemporaries like Outlaw Star and Big O (which is very much a referene to Batman).

In general? Rowdy Roddy Piper once said (paraphrasing) that pro wrestling is about explosive acting and emoting and film is about implosive acting and emoting. And ask anyone who has done theatre (which pro wrestling basically is)) and they'll say something similar. Because when the camera zooms in to that single tear in Ryan Gosling's eye? We can see it. When Ryan Gosling is on the stage behind twelve layers of plexiglass so we don't try to lick his sweat? We can't see that tear and he needs to make a big gesture to make it clear he is having an emotional breakdown.

And that applies to animated content. With very few exceptions (almost all short films), you can't have the level of detail where such a subtle response will be noticed. Even the truly amazing finales of Cowboy Bebop was built on us having learned enough about the characters to fill in the gaps by that point.

So you get the very over exaggerated "acting" styles so that you know this fairly hastily drawn person is really feeling it. And that is true regardless of the country of origin for the cartoon.

Dorohedoro is definitely one of the stranger anime I've seen in recent memory and even they managed to fit noses on their characters. Caiman also technically has a nose, I guess, or at least he's got nostrils.

I'd also strongly recommend it and it's supposed to get a second season at some point.

This could turn into a thread of its own of people just recommending stuff, but I'm curious if you've looked up any of the current more popular series like Chainsaw Man, Dungeon Meshi (aka Delicious in Dungeon), Jujutsu Kaisen, and the recent Netflix animes like Cyberpunk: Edgerunners and Terminator Zero. I'd say all of them feel like the late night anime that was aired on Toonami back in the 2000s.

I also recommend the movie Redline to everybody because it's such a visual and audio treat. It's like if Hanna Barbera had hired somebody like Studio Ghibli to make a Wacky Racers movie.

There's some anime I've watched and loved but I had a revelation two years ago about why I was so put-off by the cutesier stuff. My niece was a toddler and we were goofing around with Snapchat filters. She was loving the anime filter and it dawned on me....

...Adult women in a lot of anime have the mannerisms of a literal children. And it certainly didn't help the ick factor when I also realized these are the characters a lot of weebs want to fuck.

Ew ew ewwww. If an anime with an adult cast is described as kawaii, you cannot convince me to watch it.

My biggest issue is that I'll start one highly rated anime which is serious and artistic, and then the moment I invite friends over Netflix decides to fill my recommendations with a bunch of boob service thumbnails.

Look into western anime like Arcane, Avatar, DOTA: Dragon's blood, things like that.

It doesn't feel so... anime. And some of them have legit amazing and "grounded" character design, movement, expressiveness and such.

You can go far enough but Cowboy Bebop is still the best. Not because of it's graphics.

I was just about to say "I seem to recognize this single frame, it's Golden Boy isn't it?" Lmao one of the best animes ever.

👃🚽

I watched it for the first time last week, I watched it dubbed on accident, and I'm so glad I did.

I’m not one to shame others for their appearance but groin hair extending to the outer hips is a bit odd.

I actually really love Birdie Wing.

To be fair, the boy is the exact same shape, which I would describe as a weeble wobble with the limbs and head of a kewpie doll 😂

The scope and ambition of certain animes like Legend of the Galactic Heroes and Berserk I can appreciate. I was never a weeb, but I barely watch any anime these days. My kids got me to watch Demon Hunter (which I've only seen like a single movie of and didn't see the point) and My Hero Academia which is also not my cup of tea.

Studio Ghibli is pretty good, though. I like the depth, but sometimes they are so abstract and ethereal that my brain decides I'm already asleep and I just nod off. It's usually worth it to watch a few times to try to get everything. Princess Mononoke was really a struggle. It's a great anime, but I had to watch it a good 6+ times before I could stay awake through it.