10 Earliest Anime To Come To America

The explosion in popularity that anime saw in America in the late 90s makes it easy to think that that’s the point when Japanese animation first started making its way to the other side of the world, but in reality, anime had been airing stateside for a few decades before Pokemon and Dragon Ball Z turned it into an outright phenomenon.

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 some flops and false starts before the medium would finally take hold. Today, the term “anime” is used to refer to various kinds of serialized animated movies and shows, but correct use of the word is still reserved for cartoons made in Japan. ​​​

Updated on March 8, 2024, by Kristy Ambrose: Anime didn’t enter the mainstream of American media until the 1990s, and when it first appeared decades beforehand, the localizations were almost unrecognizable from the original product. Modern dubs and subs, on the other hand, prioritize authenticity, so it’s easier now than ever to find and watch older anime from the earliest days of the genre. They may not have all been smash hits, but those early anime entrants into the American market deserve credit for paving the way to what Western fans get to enjoy today.

10 Magic Boy (1961)

MyAnimeList Score: 5.9

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 original title is Shounen Sarutobi Sasuke, and it was released in Japan in 1959.

The film was an original story told in the style of old Japanese folktales to mimic 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.

9 Battle Of The Planets (1978)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.9

• Studio: Tatsunoko Production

Also known by its Japanese name, Kagaku Ninja-tai Gatchaman or simply Gatchaman, Battle of the Planets told a now-familiar story. This movie is about a group of superheroes who were recruited as a team by an older mentor to fight a global threat. The show aired in Japan in 1976 and was imported into the United States two years later.

The combat squad is called Gathaman, and it was created by the brilliant Dr. Nambu of the International Scientific Organization to fight Gallactor and his creator, the nefarious Generallissimo X. Each of the superheroes is based on an animal and has similar powers, like Ken, the leader, who has the power of an eagle, and his second-in-command, Joe, the condor.

8 Panda And The Magic Serpent (1961)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.0

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.

7 Astro Boy (1963)

MyAnimeList Score: 7.1

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 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.

6 Gigantor (1968)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.4

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.

5 Kimba The White Lion (1966)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.6

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.

4 Marine Boy (1971)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.1

• Studio: Tele-Cartoon Japan

Marine Boy, the second color anime to hit American TV screens may draw a lot of comparisons to Aquaman, but its eponymous protagonist is 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 to help 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 interested in aquatic action tales.

3 Speed Racer (1967)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.6

• Studio: Tatsunoko Production

The most successful anime in America before Dragon Ball arrived 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 a 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 2008 movie that was directed by Lana and Lilly Wachowski.

2 Belle And Sebastian (1982)

MyAnimeList Score: 6.7

It was part of the early wave of anime that came to the United States via Canada and was originally dubbed into both English and French for audiences on both sides of the pond. Younger viewers might be more familiar with the more recent live-action adaptations of the popular stories of Meiken Jolie, or Belle and Sebastian. The most recent was a 2013 French film, Belle et Sebastian, about a boy and his Great Pyrenees helping some local Resistance fighters.

A unique entry in this era of the anime library, which was mostly robot-related at the time, this was a story that took part in the French countryside in the early 20th century. Sebastian was a young boy of Roma descent who made friends with a stray dog named Belle.

1 Star Blazers (1978)

MyAnimeList Score: 8.3

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.