November 23rd, 2020 
AstroNerdBoy First Anime Crushes
Sometimes, I see silly little things going around social media. A recent one was, “Without stating your age, name your first anime crushes.” And it was limited to four. So I thought I’d play along, via the blog. I really don’t have 2D crushes, though as a teenager, I really liked Magik from X-Men/New Mutants. But I will admit there have been some anime (and manga) babes that I’ve thought, “If she were real…” π
Yuri — Dirty Pair
I was first introduced to anime when I lived in Japan. My best friend and roommate rented the Dirty Pair TV series from the big video rental place in Fussa. I laughed out loud at the absurdity of Kei and Yuri’s standard uniform. However, while I couldn’t understand anything being said in the anime, Yuri opened my eyes to the concept of finding a 2D animated girl HIGHLY attractive.
Belldandy — Ah! My Goddess
When I rented the original, 5 episode Ah! My Goddess OVA series, I understood why Keiichi liked Belldandy so much. On one hand, she’s a very attractive goddess. On the other, she’s the perfect wife. As such, Belldandy was like the ultimate, battle-babe wife character. I can’t say I had a crush on her, but I did like her a lot.
Deedlit — Record of Lodoss War
Deedit is the best elf babe bar none. #ChangeMyMind! When I first watched Record of Lodoss War OVA, Deedlit charmed me like no other animated character has. She had an enchanting smile and was ultra kind. However, when it came to combat, she was all business and ranked very high on the list of battle babes. As such, I thought she paired well with the human knight, Parn.
Saber (Artoria/Altria Pendragon) — Fate/stay night (et al.)
As I stated, I don’t really have 2D crushes. But it is becoming clear to me that I tend to favor battle babes. As such, it should be no surprise that when I finally got to watch the original Fate/stay night anime adaptation, it was the Saber character that I liked a lot. Indeed, when I started playing Fate/Grand Order, she was the 5-star Servant that I wanted. And I scored three of her in one pull.
So popular is Artoria (or Altria as her FGO spelling goes), her presence is felt in most of the Fate franchise. As such, in Fate/Grand Order, she has three Saber forms, two Lancer forms, two Rider forms, a Caster form, an Archer form, a Ruler form, and as Mysterious Heroine X, she’s an Assassin and a Berserker. I predict that before the game ends, she will have a form in all of the remaining classes except maybe Moon Cancer. And even then, I think they could come up with a way to make Artoria part of Moon Cancer.
So there you have it. Leave your first anime crushes in the comments below.
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Sailor Jupiter, easily. I was sorta into the Sailor Moon anime as it came out but I always really liked Lita…. errr, Makoto. Next to Yue she’s probably my favourite anime heroine, and right up there with Zoro in my all-time favourite anime characters.
Yeah, I can see that. Of course at my age, the Sailor Sentai are all massive jail bait. π
As to Yue, that doesn’t surprise me, considering your Internet name. π
Misty from Pokemon, Pixie from Monster Rancher, and Sora from Digimon. Coincidently Sora’s Japanese VA was the same as Mihoshi’s, who is my favorite Tenchi girl.
I never watched Digimon, so I’ll have to look up Sora.
As for Misty (Kasumi), I can understand the attraction.
For a monster girl, Pixie was a babe for sure.
Enter here?
If you have a list, sure, put them here.
I’ll just start with the last one about Nakatani-san’s “BiY Illustration Works.” It’ll just be a direct copy. OK? I’d have to dig for references of others.
Oh. I thought you were going to list anime crushes. You don’t have to relist old comments.
There’s only one word to describe Nakatani-san’s new picture book, “Bloom into You Illustration Works.” GORGEOUS. It’s a full-sized 81/2 by 11 paperback with 128 pages on heavy, archival, semi-gloss paper, packed with very high density, full-page color panels by her. Unusually for a paperback it’s Smythe bound! The stitching is only about one centimeter apart. It comes in a plastic sleeve-box that is transparent to exhibit the beautiful, specially created cover art.
All the good stuff from”Bloom into You” is included, so literally all the color pictures of Yuu and Touko appear, along with all of the black and white illustrations on the title page of the 45 chapters. Many other characters also appear, including most of those in her “Eclair” work. The real bonus is the many portraits of Yuu and Touko that are NOT in BiY. Also, she includes a sequence of 12 panels showing the stages of creation for the cover illustration. Her rough drafts are so good they don’t need much adjusting, and as I suspected she uses many hues of grey to get that great variety of shading in her work. The sequence begins with a very high density photo of her workspace.
Text has been limited to a couple of lines for each picture and it’s all in Japanese, but that’s no problem for us BiY otaku. We know the whole story, so you can easily fit all these beautiful images into the context. For example, I was always disappointed that we didn’t get to see the girls exiting the train after their ride from the aquarium in volume 5, but a two-page panel showing Yuu pulling Touko out of her seat on the empty train in prep for disembarking is included in this picture book. Both girls wear the same clothing that appears nowhere else. Great stuff.
You can order it directly from kadokawa.co.jp. I paid $20, which is a big bargain. It would be at least $40, and probably $50, if printed in the US. Miss Nakatani-sama must be very proud of this top-of-the-line book. “Bloom into You Illustration Works,” that contains so much of her magnificent art work.
Looking into the more distant memories, I will say Shinobu from Love Hina and Sakura from Card Captor Sakura.
Haha. The years pass quickly. π
Looks like my response didn’t work…either that or I’m blind (viewing this on the back end). Thanks for the list. π