Experiences after watching more than 100 animes

After watching 100 animes you start to notice a few changes in how you think and act. Some of these experiences are good, others not so much.

I am far too lazy to organize my MAL, so I honestly don't know exactly how many titles I have watched. I would guess it is somewhere between 300 and 500. Compared to me, there are people out there with over 1000 animes under their belt, and I think I am just destined to keep climbing toward that number.

Not every shift is remarkable, but once you start reading other people's opinions you end up noticing things about yourself. Of course, you also notice your new tastes – tastes that are not always particularly refined. Maybe you know what I mean.

Not everyone goes through these changes exactly at 100. For some it happens earlier, for others much later. In my own case it was somewhere around 50 to 70, but I was not really paying attention in a critical way at that point.

This list is based on my own experience, and I also want to give credit to the site OtakuBFX, which served as the inspiration for the idea behind this article. So if you disagree with any of it, feel free to comment – please, no insults.

Anyway… this introduction is getting a bit boring, isn't it? Let's just get to the list.

Sanity, what is that?

Dear friends, this is something that happens to all of us at some point, whether we like it or not. If that is your case right now: take a break and set a real limit in your life.

When you first enter this wonderful world of anime, the most common thing is to start binge-watching frantically, with no pauses and no plan. Hours and hours of anime, full of magic and fantasy, that at some point starts attacking your brain. Some people try to summon portals, others try to cast a spell, some go with a simple KAMEHAMEHA, and the more hardcore ones among us try to awaken the Getsuga Tenshō or the Sharingan hidden somewhere inside them.

As I said, some pretend to be Chuunibyou. But others – and these are the most common, myself included – simply fall into deep emotional crises. Real little crises, actually: wanting to isolate yourself for no reason, crying over nothing, and in some cases treating a Waifu or a Husbando as your only friend and your only love.

Subtitles, why bother?

At the very beginning, without knowing a single word of Japanese, you feel completely lost in this world – until you discover subtitles. Eventually you stop needing them, but they are still there for you whenever you need them.

It is only natural: after you have watched a lot of anime, you start noticing that there are entire lines of dialogue you don't have to read anymore to know what is happening. In some cases you can read the next line straight off a character's face, or from the personality you already know so well – you know what they are going to say before you have even seen the episode.

Of course you don't throw the subtitles away entirely, do you? Not to mention those who eventually want to start reading Light Novels and Manga in Japanese…

A deeper interest in Japan

And that is how Japan becomes, for many of us, a wonderful country that owns a piece of our heart.

As a kid, I was always given a rather skewed idea of Japan – as if people there only ate Sushi or were all copies of each other. But once I started watching anime and being more strongly influenced by Japanese culture, I realized things were nothing like that. Because I wanted to know more and to learn Japanese, I ended up landing at Suki Desu – a site that today opens many different doors for me.

So: try to get to know Japan. Try to learn Japanese. Learning the language is not impossible – at least give it a try and don't give up. And if your dreams look completely different, keep at it. One of the things anime teaches us is exactly this – hold on to your dreams.

What about you? If you are a little afraid of diving into this world, don't worry. Japan is a country made for people like you and me – not because we watch anime, but because we simply feel at home in that unique country, completely ourselves.

Clichés you can spot instantly

Your brain slowly becomes a real machine, identifying the most tired clichés before the episode is even halfway over.

It is hard to create something completely new, but it is not impossible to make something that feels fresh. Take Re:Zero for example: after the huge success of the anime adaptation, a lot of authors started borrowing similar themes – and those authors eventually fall into the cliché trap.

Clichés are terrible, which is why a lot of anime also get dropped. But there are some you will love – like fan service – and others you will end up hating, like the same old stories told over and over.

Fillers become nightmares

Naruto fans will understand me right now.

Fillers are episodes that do not belong to the official story and break the chronological order of the canonical anime. It is a real shame that the Japanese industry still keeps investing in them – there are cases where a filler is needed to fill the plot, but those are the exception.

Over time you learn to spot a filler within the first few seconds. Most of us don't like fillers. In a perfect anime, there would be none at all.

A sharper critical sense

Every human being develops skills and knowledge in the things they spend a lot of time with. In our case, that means picking up a sharper critical eye, and our tastes slowly start to take shape.

I have been watching anime for a few years now – I am no expert, but I can judge an anime I am watching reasonably well and clearly name what I like. These traits we develop are unique, and in some cases almost divine.

If you are good at this, invest in your own website or write for an existing one – like Suki Desu. Your talent is appreciated, you can develop different skills – such as languages – and learn an enormous amount along the way.

Strange new preferences

Japanese culture has plenty of unusual preferences, that is something nobody can deny. And when you watch anime, it is only natural that you end up adopting some of them along the way.

This is not an easy topic to comment on, but at the end of the day it is really about new discoveries. Some of them are not suitable for minors, others are simply strange practices when you look at them with foreign eyes.

Waifu and Husbando

A Waifu or Husbando is basically your spouse from anime, in other words, someone from the 2D world. At the hardcore level, the word is used mostly by weeaboo types – but at its core, it is simply the love for an anime character.

It is only natural that you end up with a Waifu or a Husbando – whether it comes from a more general taste or from something completely your own. You cannot help loving that favourite character. Whether it is a Vocaloid like Hatsune Miku or a bloodthirsty vampire girl, the choice is yours.

The love for them is ruthless, undeniable, and platonic. If you want a bit more of my view, you can read this article on the most charming characters in anime.

After watching more than 100 animes, you start to realise just how much you love those wonderful characters. Kawaii desu, right?

Excitement over 10/10 animation

Just imagine that absurdly good animation in every single episode. I am not trying to be a fanboy here – but think about Fate and draw your own conclusion…

I am not telling you to draw a conclusion, but rather to find a consensus with your own emotions. It is a unique feeling: your pupils dilate, you get a wave of euphoria when you see that much beauty at once.

It is impossible not to feel good – because we are alive to see something this great, this carefully made, this free of budget limitations.

Becoming the expert

After a while watching anime, you stop wanting to be the clueless one in the room. So you want to know more about genres, terms, and backgrounds, and you dive deeper and deeper into this world. Not many people do that – but if you are one of them, congratulations!

You become an expert and keep earning the respect of your fellow otaku friends. When they want a recommendation, they ask you – and you are the one who suggests a title and lists its pros and cons. The more anime you watch, the more time you invest, the more research you do, the better you get at this world.

Getting tired – and coming right back

There comes a time when you feel like giving this whole thing up. Some of the reasons are reasonable – the criticism you get, family, or other things in your life.

You quit, and then you realize that your life without this wonderful world no longer makes sense. Some people fall into depression or isolate themselves once they have started anime – that is not good, but afterwards you start to see your pre-anime life differently, and you realize that previous life was pretty boring. At least that is how it went for me.

If you manage to step away for good, just know this: eventually, something will be missing.

Inspirations and the essence you keep

Every anime, every character, every author has a lesson to teach. The essence of certain moments becomes part of you – and you carry it with you forever. New lessons, new perspectives, imaginative or not. That is what stays in the end.

It is also striking how many fans start to model themselves on their favourite characters, or borrow their strategies – in love, in everyday life, or anywhere else. That is something I really love: having inspirations. And over time, you take your own with you wherever you go.

New dreams

You start to fall in love with Japan – and new goals and dreams come with it. At least that is how it went for me.

There is the desire to live in Japan, or at least to travel there, to get to know the Japanese people and to connect with them, to learn Japanese, and to keep gathering more knowledge about anime and the otaku world.

It doesn't matter what your dream looks like exactly – you will keep at it, otherwise those countless hours of anime about self-overcoming would have been wasted. This topic has a lot to do with your own dreams, so interpret and reflect on it however you like.

Breaking barriers… 1000 animes?

Organizing all those titles is the biggest challenge of all – so use MAL as often as you can.

Just like with the Kitsune: at 900 you are a great sage, at 1000 you become a divine being – at least in the chuunibyou way of thinking. But no matter what, just think of yourself as a true lover, a true fan, and a true sage of anime.

By that point, you will have gone through all the experiences mentioned in this post – and many more that only you and other people who have been through the same thing can really share and describe properly.

So don't waste your life – set limits for yourself. Drop a comment with your own experiences and the number of animes you have already watched. Not that the number really changes whether someone is a real fan, haha.