There were plenty of Americans working in the entertainment industry at various points in the 20th century who saw the incredible potential that anime held, but it would take a number of flops and false starts before the medium would finally take hold. They may not have all been smash hits, but those early anime entrants into the American market deserve their credit for paving the way to what western fans get to enjoy today.
8 Magic Boy: The One That Started It All
Toei Animation’s tale of a young boy’s battle against a demon woman in medieval Japan was released in American theaters in June 1961, marking the very first time a Japanese animated production would make it onto screens in the United States.
The film was an original story told in the style of old Japanese folktales with the intention of mimicking Disney’s approach to retelling well-known fairy tales. This is one of many examples of western animation influencing anime, which would subsequently return to the west to inspire a new generation of creators.
7 Panda And The Magic Serpent: Japan’s Disney Before Studio Ghibli
Released in July 1961, a little more than two weeks after Magic Boy, this retelling of a famous Chinese folktale was a notable feat of Japanese animation. It pushed the limits of Japan’s current animation technology while also serving as one of the earliest anime exports to America.
Known in Japan as Hakujaden, Legend of the White Serpent, the film was legendary animation studio Toei Animation’s very first, and much like Magic Boy it aimed to take the successful Disney formula of combining cute animals, fun songs, and a classic tale into a movie that could be enjoyed by people of all ages. The film may be over 60 years old, but it still looks beautiful.
6 Astro Boy: Japan’s Take On The American Superhero
The first anime to ever come to American television is also one of the most influential and successful ever created. The show was Astro Boy, and it premiered in September 1963, only about nine months after its premiere in Japan.
Astro Boy may seem like something of a Japanese Superman, but he was actually inspired by a parody of the DC Comics Hero: Mighty Mouse. It began like most anime now do, as a manga that ran for 112 chapters between 1952 and 1968. The success of the manga and the anime would be one of the primary inciting incidents for the explosion of the Japanese subculture that would follow in subsequent years.
5 Gigantor: The Earliest Of All Giant Anime Robots
Known as Tetsujin 28-go in Japan, Gigantor is considered the first mecha anime ever created, making it a tremendous series in the history of the art form. It might be surprising, then, to learn that it was also one of the first anime in America, meaning the U.S. has had giant animated robot battles flashing on their television screens for just about as long as Japan.
Of course, the robot hero in this earliest of all mecha shows was quite a bit different from the Gundam mechas that would come to define the genre years later. Still, for a 1964 black and white Saturday morning cartoon, it offered a reasonable facsimile of the supersized, mechanized action and adventure of its successors.
4 Kimba The White Lion: Simba’s Grandfather?
By 1966, color TVs were starting to become the norm in American living rooms, and so the time was just right for an anime to cross the black and white threshold into the modern multicolored era. That anime was Kimba the White Lion, and while being the first color anime in America is a notable achievement, it’s not really what it was remembered for.
Many likenesses have been drawn between Kimba and Disney’s The Lion King over the years, and there are enough there to assume that there was some heavy inspiration involved. Fair enough: creator Osamu Tezuka also created Astro Boy, and the inspiration from American superheroes is quite heavy there, too. Some may call it plagiarism, but others will just call it the nature of art and creativity.
3 Marine Boy: Batman Of The Sea
Marine Boy, the second color anime to hit American TV screens may draw a lot of comparisons to Aquaman, but its eponymous protagonist is actually a lot closer to a Bruce Wayne with SCUBA training. Rather than being imbued with mystical ocean powers, Marine Boy is blessed with all kinds of incredible underwater equipment gifted to him by his father for the purpose of helping him protect the world’s oceans as a member of The Ocean Patrol.
Marine Boy isn’t just a privileged kid with a bevy of awesome gadgets, though. He’s also super sharp, a gifted athlete, and an experienced martial artist. All in all a precocious and powerful kid whose adventures beneath the sea are not as fondly remembered as some other anime of its era, but are still worth checking out for anyone who’s interested in aquatic action tales.
2 Speed Racer: The One That Hit It Big
The most successful anime in America before Dragon Ball hit our shores has to be Speed Racer. This high octane racing adventure was perhaps better suited to an American audience in 1967 than any of the other anime fare available at the time, but that didn’t save the show from being heavily edited and rearranged to appeal more to an American palate. This contributed to a trend that took many years to be curbed by mass outcry from fans who preferred to enjoy their anime as intended by the original creators.
Speed Racer became a big hit in America, heavy edits and all, leading the show to become a notable part of American pop culture in its own right. The franchise has given birth to American Speed Racer comics, multiple American TV series’, an animated movie, and a live action feature film by the Wachowskis. There’s even a live action show produced from J.J. Abrams currently in development for Apple TV+.
1 Star Blazers: A Bridge To The New Era
The earliest anime to make it over to America are decidedly different in both look and feel than the shows that would conjure up the tidal wave of content that would begin making its way out west in the late 90s. However, after a fairly long semi-hiatus of anime imports, Star Blazers would hit America in 1978 and begin to set the stage for the many, many shows of a similar style to come.
This early space opera had a more dramatic, mature flavor to it that will certainly be familiar to modern anime fans, but was likely jarring to those who had only watched Astro Boy and Speed Racer as they premiered in the U.S. It also introduced the now-standard concept of telling a continuing tale from episode to episode, rather than the self-contained stories told by earlier shows. The show was fairly groundbreaking, and it has since led to various new series’, movies, spin-offs, and more.
More: The Best Anime of the 1960s
