Anime like Takahashi Rumiko Anthology

RAY THE ANIMATION

Also known as Ray.

Studio: OLM , Touhouku Shinsha , Maiden Japan
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Romance , Sci-Fi

If you have enough money, you can buy anything. So why wait for an organ you need to become available? Raised to be harvested for parts, Ray had already lost her eyes when renegade surgeon Black Jack rescued her. Now, ten years later, she has grown up to be a surgeon herself. And thanks to the unique artificial eyes she received as replacements, she has a reputation for performing incredible medical operations that no one else could even attempt. But unknown to any but a select few, her surgical endeavors are only part of a greater mission: to discover what happened to the other children she was raised with, and to find the men who stole the eyes she was born with and to bring them to justice.



Tags: Medicine , Primarily Adult Cast , Work , Love Triangle , Ero Guro , Cute Girls Doing Cute Things , Female Protagonist , Seinen

Ningen Kousaten

Also known as Human Crossing.

Studio: A.C.G.T. , OB Planning , Shogakukan-Shueisha Productions , TV Tokyo
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Slice of Life

Though seemingly unconnected, the characters in HUMAN CROSSING all have something in common. They are dealing with the sometimes joyous, but often horrific realities of everyday life. Set in modern day Japan, this compilation of short stories explores the lives of people from all walks of life. The animation used here is subtle, with realistic renderings that fully express the range of emotions experienced by the film`s characters. HUMAN CROSSING taps into the dramatic potential of reality, focusing on the isolated, sometimes lonely nature of urban life. Ultimately, however, the film suggests that perhaps there is an inter-connectedness between people that binds even the most disparate strangers together.

Tags: Episodic , Family Life , Coming of Age , Bullying , Philosophy , Boxing

Sennen Joyuu

Also known as Millennium Actress.

Studio: MADHOUSE , Genco , WOWOW , KLOCKWORX , Kadokawa Shoten , Bandai Visual , Techno Sound , Chaos Union
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Fantasy , Romance

Millennium Actress blurs the lines between the past and the present, and truth and fiction, when a documentary filmmaker fulfills his quest to find the legendary actress Chiyoko Fujiwara, and learn why she mysteriously vanished at the height of her brilliant career. When Chiyoko grants the filmmaker’s request, he, in turn, presents her with a token – a key she had lost and thought was gone forever. The filmmaker could not have imagined that the key would not only unlock the long-held secrets of Chiyoko’s life, but also his own.



Note: The film received an early premiere at the Fantasia Film Festival on July 28, 2001.

Tags: Acting , Biographical , Historical , Meta , Primarily Adult Cast , Female Protagonist , Work , Unrequited Love , Time Skip , Heterosexual , Coming of Age , War , Snowscape , Filmmaking , Denpa , Anachronism , Fugitive , Swordplay , Age Gap

Aoyama Goushou Tanpenshuu

Studio: TMS Entertainment , Kyokuichi Tokyo Movie Shinsha
Status: Finished
Genres: Adventure , Comedy , Mystery , Romance

GOSHO collection reveals the origin of the smash hit “Detective Conan.”
“GO” into his world, and we will “SHO” you SEVEN romantic and exciting stories created by GOSHO AOYAMA.

WAIT FOR ME (30 min.)
A genius inventor, who is still a high school student, has a girlfriend two years older than him. One day, he invents a time machine and attempts to go two years back into the past, to become the same age as her.
However, it is she who ultimately uses the machine to travel through time!

TEN PLANETS IN THE NIGHT SKY (10 min.)
Meet Baby Conan!
Yukiko Kudo is looking for her missing husband. The only clue to find him again is to decipher a mysterious message left for her. Their baby, Shinichi Kudo, one who later becomes the famous high school Detective Conan, will at this age already be offering some important hints for her.

THE WANDERING RED BUTTERFLY (7 min.)
A handsome detective, Yusaku Kitakata, receives phone calls from a mysterious woman day after day, with a new case each day. He of course solves them one by one. But the biggest mystery is who is this mysterious woman?

PLAY IT AGAIN (30 min.)
Thanks to the mystical powers of a Cherry Blossom Tree, a 70-year-old man with a secret sword technique goes back into the past and becomes the same age as his granddaughter. While enjoying his youth for the second time around, he notices that a player is after his granddaughter.

SANTA CLAUS IN SUMMER (30 min.)
Keisuke, a young man of 17, accidentally activates the Earth Destruction System. The destiny of the Earth now depends on whether he can stop the system within 24 hours. However, suddenly amnesia strikes him and he forgets the pin number to stop the system. The time is running out...

DETECTIVE GEORGE’S SPECIAL CASE (30 min.)
A girl is fleeing from men in black. She runs into a detective agency and discovers that the detective there is a super-miniature-size, cool dude. He risks his life trying to solve a case for this client. Will they come through in the end?

MAKING OF DETECTIVE CONAN (7 min.)
Do you know how to make animation?
Everybody wants to see the workings of an animation studio.
Based on the concept of Detective Conan, the three sub-characters visit the animation studio of Detective Conan. This episode will surely catch the hearts of Detective Conan fans!
[The actual animation is also involved in this special.]



Tags: Detective , Episodic , School , Male Protagonist , Ensemble Cast , Time Manipulation , Amnesia , Age Regression , Anthology , Shounen , Swordplay , Meta

Otona Joshi no Anime Time

Studio: bones , NHK , Ashi Productions , The Answer Studio , WAO World
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Romance

A series of animations based on prize-winning short stories for women.

Kawamo wo Suberu Kaze (January 7, 2011)
In the story, 33-year-old Kanazawa native Noriko had decided long ago not to accept an ordinary, provincial life for herself. So, she had gone to college in Tokyo, worked on her own, married a man at an elite trading firm, and had a child. She has just returned home from five years abroad with her husband and four-year-old son. However, she senses a large emptiness in her heart since coming back. Moreover, there is a man who shares a big secret with Noriko.

Yuuge (March 10, 2013)
Mimi, a wife in her late 20s, leaves her family and begins living with a young man.

Jinsei Best 10 (March 17, 2013)
Hatoko, a business woman, faces her upcoming 40th birthday and reunites with the person with whom she shared her first kiss in middle school, over two decades ago.

Dokoka Dewanai Koko (March 24, 2013)
A 43-year-old housewife gets a glimpse of a complicated relationship between a mother and a daughter.



Tags: Female Protagonist , Anthology , Primarily Adult Cast , Episodic , Primarily Female Cast , Family Life , Heterosexual , Food , Work , Marriage

Genius Party

Studio: Horipro , Studio 4°C
Status: Finished
Genres: Action , Fantasy , Mecha , Music , Psychological , Romance , Sci-Fi

An anthology of seven short animated films from Studio 4°C:

1.) Genius Party (directed by Atsuko Fukushima)
A bizarre bird-like creature runs through a barren desert and finds what seems to be a smiling egg lying on the ground.

2.) Shanghai Dragon (directed by Shouji Kawamori)
An imaginative Chinese boy finds a futuristic device that can make his own drawings come to life. After discovering the device, the town he lives in is about to be invaded by spaceships and machines of mass destruction that are all centuries ahead of Earth's time.

3.) Deathtic 4 (directed by Shinji Kimura)
A tale set in a world full of zombies, living their normal zombie lives. A living frog falls from the blackened sky of the zombie world, and a little zombie boy with his friends try to bring the living creature back to its own world.

4.) Doorbell (directed by Youji Fukuyama)
The main character is a ghost in his own world. He must outrun the other versions of himself, or they will take over his life.

5.) Limit Cycle (directed by Hideki Futamura)
An existential examination of the world as seen through the lens of a man seemingly trapped in an endless cycle of work.

6.) Happy Machine (directed by Masaaki Yuasa)
An infant who is happily secured in his own nursery suddenly discovers that everything about the nursery is fake. Soon the infant is forced out of the nursery into the world that exists outside, where adventure awaits, and there are many alien-like creatures to encounter.

7.) Baby Blue (directed by Shinichirou Watanabe)
A small adventure of two young students who decide to go anywhere they can for just one day, to enjoy that day without caring about the rest, and simply be together.



Tags: Anthology , CGI , Zombie , Aliens , Nudity , Episodic

Ojii-san no Lamp

Studio: Telecom Animation Film
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama

A boy finds a strange object while playing hide-and-seek. His grandfather tells him the story of his own youth, and the important role the old lamp played. This story is about the modernization of Japan and the changes that came with it.

The Agency of Cultural Affairs of Japan invested 214 million yen ($2.26 million) in "Young Animator Training Project" and entrusted the execution of the project to Japan Animation Creators Association (JaniCA). JaniCA produced four original anime (23 min long with OP and ED sequences) in cooperation with four production studios. Ojii-san no Lamp was one of these four projects.

Tags: Historical , Coming of Age , Male Protagonist , Rural , Tanned Skin , Outdoor , Work , Marriage , Agriculture , Family Life , Heterosexual , Orphan , Time Skip , Economics , Youkai , Revenge

Shouwa Monogatari

Studio: WAO World
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama

Dramatic story of the Yamazaki family during the year Showa 39 (1964), the year that Tokyo hosted the Summer Olympics.

Tags: Historical , Family Life

Aoi Bungaku Series

Also known as Blue Literature Series.

Studio: MADHOUSE
Status: Finished
Genres: Drama , Psychological , Thriller

The series consists of adaptations of six modern classics of Japanese literature: Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human (Ningen Shikkaku) & Run Melos! (Hashire Melos!), Natsume Soseki’s Kokoro, Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s Hell Screen (Jigoku Hen) & The Spider's Thread (Kumo no Ito), and Ango Sakaguchi's In the Forest, Under Cherries in Full Bloom (Sakura no Mori no Mankai no Shita).

No Longer Human (Ningen Shikkaku) - A high school student becomes lost and alienated. Despondent and aimless, he falls into a cycle of self abuse, depression and drugs that taints his life for years. Told in three chapters, each chapter deals with a different point in his life and the final chapter leaves him standing alone - an empty and hollow charicature of his former self.

In the Forest, Under Cherries in Full Bloom (Sakura no Mori no Mankai no Shita) - A love story between a 12th-century woman and a mountain bandit who abducts her.

Kokoro - A 1914 tale of a young man's life journey during the Meiji era. The work deals with the transition from the Japanese Meiji society to the modern era, by exploring the friendship between a young man and an older man he calls "Sensei". It continues the theme of isolation developed in Soseki's previous works, here in the context of interwoven strands of egoism and guilt, as opposed to shame.

Run Melos! (Hashire Melos!) - An updated retelling of a classic Greek tale of the story of Damon and Pythias. The most prominent theme of "Run Melos!" is unwavering friendship. Despite facing hardships, the protagonist Melos does his best to save his friend's life, and in the end his efforts are rewarded.

The Spider's Thread (Kumo no Ito) - The Buddha Shakyamuni chances to notice a cold-hearted criminal suffering in Hell. But this criminal did perform one single act of kindness in not stepping on a spider in a forest. Moved by this selfless act, Shakyamuni takes the silvery thread of a spider in Paradise and lowers it down into Hell, but it falls upon the criminal to seize the opportunity and pull himself out - if he can.

Hell Screen (Jigoku Hen) - A famous artist is commissioned by a great lord to create a series of paintings depicting scenes of the 'Buddhist Hell'. The artist is unable to paint scenes that he has not seen himself, prompting him to torture and torment the Lord's staff to create his imagined images of hell. His creative efforts taint the household, as the story descends into madness and destruction.



Tags: Classic Literature , Tragedy , Philosophy , Anthology , Historical , Suicide , Autobiographical , Urban , Primarily Adult Cast , Drawing , War , Gore , Trains , Politics , Rural , Demons , Ojou-sama , Female Harem , Writing , Fairy Tale , Afterlife , Delinquents , Psychosexual

Monkey Punch Manga Katsudou Dai Shashin

Also known as Mankatsu.

Studio: WOWOW , TMS Entertainment
Status: Finished
Genres: Adventure , Comedy , Ecchi

It's an animated variety show featuring the works of Monkey Punch that aired on WOWOW with the episodes being 52 minutes long. 12 episodes were aired between July 31, 2004 to June 25, 2005 and received a DVD exclusive 15 minute long special called Crime Mate. Each episode is divided into Mini Stage lasting 15 minutes and Grand Stage lasting 30 minutes mixed with 60 second segments. The Lupin characters appear in small 60 second segments called The Lupin Gang however they are voiceless as it relies on visual gags, they also appear in the Mankatsu Monkey segments featuring a monkey that only says "Mankatsu".

Tags: Nudity , Parody , Episodic , Seinen , Primarily Adult Cast , Crime , Samurai , Ensemble Cast