I prefer late '80 and early '90 anime made during the "OVA Boom!".
The reason is simple: there was tons of money going around, and it really shows in the productions quality. Some of the shows made nowadays may be more "shiny" (...and some of them I love like Kara no Kyoukai, GITSSAC, Makoto Shinkai's work etc.) but if you go for sheer artistic effort, a great portion of the winners and runner ups would be from the era of the "OVA Boom!".
Beyond mere prettiness there was still a lot of room for experimentation. With the advent of direct to video (OVA) sales the directors were freed from the grasp of syndicated television and a lot more varied and mature (...and not strictly in a violent or pornographic sense) were explored.
Stuff like:
- 3x3 Eyes
- Akira
- Ayashiro no Ceres
- Armitage III
- Blue Submarine No. 6
- Bubblegum Crisis
- Cyber City Oedo
- Detonator Orgun
- Gall Force (in some of its various iterations!....there are a lot!)
- Gun Smith Cats
- Gunbuster
- GUNNM (aka Battle Angel Alita)
- Heroic Legend of Arslan
- Iczer 1
- Key the Metal Idol
- Macross Plus
- Mobile Suit Gundam 0080
- Nausicaa
- Ninja Scroll
- Serial Experiments Lain
- Slayers
- Sol Bianca
- Soul Taker
- Starship Girl Yamamoto Yohko
- Record of Lodoss War
- Robot Carnival
- Roujin Z
- The Cockpit
- The Five Star Stories
- Toward Terra (...that old movie, not the brand spanking new, shiny series)
- Vampire Hunter D (...once again the old one)
- Vampire Princess Miyu
- Venus Wars
- Wings of Honneamise
I also intentionally left out a lot of titles from the ealry '90 and concentrated on "old-school stuff".
Some of these shows were genre defining, others were superb executions of earlier conventions with a care and sheen unseen to date. Others introduced new themes, some were very raw or sophisticated in their narration. Even old school "legends" of the industry like Leji Matsumoto put something brand new on the table while the now "venerated" new legends like Ghibli or Gainax were getting their feet wet in this period.
Simply put, there a plethora of ideas and themes, a myriad modes of expression, genres and artistic styles in use. Even animes from the same studio (or even episodes in the same series like the slow in making BGC OVA) could have a "very different look" as time went on and artistic techniques and concepts evolved over the years.
This eventually spilled over into TV broadcasts as well and is the prime reason why I find an interesting anime show every once in a while, whereas it can take decades before I find something so captivating from the vaults of western animation that is still hamstrung by its conventions and strict adherence to syndicated television codes of conduct.
To me, an anime enthusiasts and affenctionade, watching this transformation on and of itself could be entertaining enough, but it never was and never has been a singular movement, different styles and techniques are in use to date.
This is something that western animation never possessed until the CN & Nickelodeon advent of "wacky" shows. Even today western shows are a lot more uniform in their look and styles than anime has ever been.
However anime is not "superior", it's merely different. Anime shows today tend to show a lot less variety, producers rarely take risks and therefore most shows are just reruns or remakes of old ideas and themes...entertaining but not that interesting or evoking.
It's also possible that I'm merely perceiving the accumulated gems from an era and am yet to find the gems made right now, but all in all I still find more "great" titles from that time than now.
The difference is almost a whole magnitude, so I still believe I'm onto something.
