Spec me - Japanese TV series

strumpusplunket

strumpusplunket

strumpusplunket

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I'm trying to find some Japanese TV series I can use to practice my Japanese listening/comprehension, and would appreciate suggestions.

I'm open to anime or live action series.

But - I'm not really a huge fan of anime or manga in general. I've tried several of the popular anime series and just bounce of the style, content, language... I just find them ridiculous and unengaging. I had a watch of an episode each of Dandadan and Jujutsu Kaisen recently. Gah! I couldn't get on with Death Note, and a few other series whose names I can't even remember, but which always seem to involve high school students, some weird powers or something, destiny to save the world, and a load of overwrought and overanimated nonesense :)

Also, supernatural language and vocab is not especially useful. I don't need to learn the words for demons, magic, elemental and made-up fantasy stuff.

On the other hand, I love everything Ghibli, and I thought Shirokuma Cafe was just wonderful. So, there's definitely anime out there that will pull me in. Maybe it's specifically the teen-oriented fantasy anime that turns me off. I love the slice-of-life humour and gentle charm of Shirokuma Cafe.

In terms of live-action TV, I enjoyed Alice in Borderlands, Midnight Diner and Samurai Gourmet. Toyko Swindlers is okay, but not massively loving it. Whenever I search for stuff, I seem to get flooded with the kind of anime I know I am not going to enjoy...
 
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something daft already!! said:
The newish Godzilla film. Great film and all spoken language is in Japanese with English subtitles.
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Is that Shin Godzilla? I did see that one, and liked it. Have a feeling there is another godzilla film I am forgetting about, though.

montymint said:
If you want a slow anime, try “monster” is a long slow burn. It's very mundane compared to a lot of more modern anime, but it might give you what you need.

www.imdb.com

Monster (TV Series 2004–2005) ⭐ 8.7 | Animation, Crime, Drama

24m | 15
www.imdb.com www.imdb.com
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Yeah, that looks much more like the kind of thing I could get into! And I'd never heard of it before. Cheers.
 
strumpusplunket said:
Is that Shin Godzilla? I did see that one, and liked it. Have a feeling there is another godzilla film I am forgetting about, though.



Yeah, that looks much more like the kind of thing I could get into! And I'd never heard of it before. Cheers.
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I really enjoyed it, just took an episode or two a night :).

I also promise no high school setting and no super powers!
 
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strumpusplunket said:
Ah yes, I watched that one too. Surprised I forget in my post, actually.



I know that's very popular, but I had imagined it would be more the type of anime I am not too keen on - all supernatural, superhero, earnest fighters type thing. Maybe I am wide of the mark?
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There are "monsters" but they're giant humans, which do look odd/weird but other than that it's not really super hero although there is a lot of fighting.

I've asked an expert so will return with some more suggestions!
 
GarethSouthgate said:
There are "monsters" but they're giant humans, which do look odd/weird but other than that it's not really super hero although there is a lot of fighting.

I've asked an expert so will return with some more suggestions!
Click to expand...

:D Cheers!

On another note, I just watched the first episode of Monster and think that is looking interesting. Japanese not too hard to follow either, apart from a lot of surgical terms, so that's a bonus.
 
I'm completely out of touch with anime these days, but if fantasy/typical shounen with flashy fights involving powers etc aren't your thing, maybe something a bit more grounded in the real world like Initial D (street racing) Hajime no Ippo (boxing), Berserk (there are smatterings of fantasy later on, but most of it is in a medieval setting, and it was a big influence on Souls games, if those are your thing), or Great Teacher Onizuka (comedy/school drama) might be better.

I'll also shout out the live action series Pachinko, although there's little Japanese (at least early on) - it's more a split between Korean, English and Japanese (in that order of frequency), but it's become one of my favourite series ever.

A bit of a left field suggestion, but whatever hobbies you have, you could maybe try to find a Youtube channel that specialises in that (like a camera review channel, or cooking/sushi/fish prep (quite popular), or game reviews, or a channel that focuses on one particular game you like, etc)., or even browse random Japanese Twitch channels.
 
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Anyone remember the old JSTV satellite channel on them Pace satellite boxes back in the early nineties? I actually got quite in to Japanese stuff back then, actually became a full on Japanophile for a while by watching this channel. It had dramas and news and that. Ohayo Gozaimasu. I remember there was a show which was clearly aimed at teaching kids english, with various puppets etc doing skits, but the Japanese girl fronting it was absolutely flipping *gorgeous*. And it wasn't at all weird because it was all in Japanese and so I couldn't understand a word, so I could easily disassociate it largely being a kids show, and was actually a gorgeous Japanese woman delivery system. Not in the slightest your honour.
 
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