The 1980s are still considered by many fans to be one of the golden eras of anime. It’s when the pioneering classics like Akira came out, Studio Ghibli was releasing seminal movies like My Neighbor Totoro, Castle in the Sky, and Grave of the Fireflies, and Vampire Hunter D broke new ground with North American audiences.
While many of the older 1980s anime series are still worth watching, they have a definite style and attitude that immediately shows when they were made. From big hair to padded shoulders, these series were all about the decade.
10 Magical Princess Minky Momo Helped Put The Magical Girl Trope On The Map
Momo is a princess of Fenarinarsa, called “the land of dreams in the sky” where creatures from fairy tales live. Momo is sent to Earth to help people get back their dreams and sense of magic—and if they don’t, Fenarinarsa is in danger of disappearing.
As an early magical girl anime, it helped set the tone for the genre with a distinctly pink-based color scheme, trendy clothes, and a raft of cute pets. She sets out to bring happiness to humankind, one person at a time.
9 Saint Seiya Is Like An ’80s Hair Band Of Knights
In the original Saint Seiya anime, the story puts an orphan named Seiya in a Sanctuary in Greece, intertwining elements of Greek mythology with cosmology and the Big Bang. When the Greek gods show up in the story, though, they’re the bad guys, except for Seiya and his fellow Saints, warriors for Athena who try to stop the bloodshed.
The mythology is complicated, and the style is all 1980s classic rock hair band, with a production design that adds violent battles and dubious motives to the mix.
8 Kenshiro Was A Classic ’80s Action Star In Fist of the North Star
Kenshiro, the feisty Fist of the North Star’s protagonist, is a brawny ’80s action hero in the style of Schwarzenegger, all muscles and martial arts prowess. He practices a bloody style of martial art called Hokuto Shinken, allowing him to locate and strike the secret vital points of his opponents.
Their deaths are often instantaneous and extremely violent, with the story set on a dystopian post-apocalyptic Earth. It’s no surprise that illustrator Tetsuo Hara was a big fan of Bruce Lee.
7 Dirty Pair Was Every Politically Incorrect 1980s Cop Show
The 1980s was a decade of classic cop shows, epitomized in Dirty Pair, about a couple of women cops called Trouble Consultants. Trouble Consultant team 234, Kei and Yuri, are code-named “Lovely Angels,” and their missions are usually disasters.
They might finally corner the criminal they’re after, but they’ve destroyed a few city blocks on the way. That’s how they got the name “Dirty Pair,” a nickname they both hate. The pair of cops loves to hit on dudes for dates as much as they love to tackle them as fugitives.
6 Legend of the Galactic Heroes Combined Glamor, Family Dynasties, & Space Opera
A raft of pretty people in uniforms with big shoulders, and a blend of Star Wars-style space politics mixed with GoT-style world of powerful families, give LoTGH its beloved place in anime history.
With designs and hairstyles that give away its decade of origin, the anime series is still considered by many to be one of the best ever made. The noble families form the Galactic Empire, set in opposition to the democratic Free Planets Alliance, sparking an endless conflict.
5 Maison Ikkoku Was A Popular Rom-Com/Slice Of Life Anime About Life In A Boarding House
This mid-1980s series was so popular it spawned a movie, three OVAs, a live-action movie, and specials. A rom-com/slice of life anime with some bittersweet moments, it follows Yusaku Godai’s and Kyoko Otonashi’s complicated relationships, and the other nutty inhabitants of Maison Ikkoku, an old rundown boarding house in a Japanese town called Clock Hill.
It’s a slice of life with all the fashions and tech from back in the day, when who to marry was the main preoccupation of the story.
4 Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam’s Complicated Politics & Drama Mirrored The Times
Already a sequel of the original, Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam captured the tone of the ’80s with its darker themes, and a concept of war and conflict that was complicated, and more realistic in the eyes of many fans. Politics, personal betrayals, and other drama entered into the action storyline.
American pop singer/songwriter Neil Sedaka, big during the decade, wrote the opening and ending themes for this mecha classic that debuted in 1985. Turtlenecks and cool sunglasses added to the fab look of the 1980s.
3 Super Dimension Fortress Macross Is An Early Mecha Classic
The tousled boy band hair, the awesome action soundtrack, the kitschy ’80s fashions (that are hilariously supposed to be worn in 2009, when the series takes place)—it all adds up to an unmistakably ’80s vibe in Super Dimension Fortress Macross.
In 1999, a giant alien spacecraft landed on Earth. In the decade since, humankind has reverse-engineered its tech to create the SDF-1 Macross, but now other aliens have arrived, and the first spacecraft belongs to their enemies.
2 Captain Tsubasa Helped Popularize Soccer In Japan With ’80s Style
Manga artist Yōichi Takahashi became a soccer fan after watching the 1978 World Cup, debuting Captain Tsubasa in 1981. It became immensely influential in popularizing the game in Japan, and in dubbed versions, it also became popular throughout Europe.
Pro players like World Cup-winner Fernando Torres have given credit to the story for inspiring them. The look is all ’80s, including a couple of fabulous mullets, and the city backdrops.
1 Dragon Ball Is A Nostalgia Trip For DBZ Fans
While it garnered most of the attention of international fans, Dragon Ball Z was actually a sequel to the original anime adaptation of the super-popular manga by Akira Toriyama. Dragon Ball, the anime series, premiered in 1986, depicting a time when Goku was just an unusually strong little boy who happened to have a monkey tail.
It’s a DBZ nostalgia trip, with more comedy than DBZ, and an attitude from a time when the idea of Dragon Balls was still new and exciting.
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