Shonen anime needs more than a good story and sharp dialogue to entertain fans — the art style counts for a lot, too. Above all, animation is about the visuals, so a good shonen anime needs a distinct art style to immerse fans in its world. Plenty of shonen anime look good but are also generic, so their visuals don’t stand out too much. By contrast, other shonen anime have distinct visual flair to give them a personality on the screen.
Fans can name a variety of shonen anime series, both classic and recent, that have well-defined art styles everyone loves. These recognizable art styles may help shape the tone and attitude of the anime, too, such as robustly-drawn characters for a martial arts anime or large, expressive eyes or even a cartoony style to add some charm to the anime. There are also a few cases where a distinct visual style in shonen anime helped inspire a new generation of anime.
10
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Features Thick Lines & Iconic Poses
Streaming on Crunchyroll
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure is easily recognizable thanks to its vivid visual style, complete with broad shoulder pads, overly muscular men, colorful lips, and of course, the iconic poses. Author Hirohiko Araki clearly took inspiration from Fist of the North Star early in the JoJo’s manga, but by this point, both the manga and anime version of this franchise have their own visual style. Notably, the style has evolved from Phantom Blood to Stone Ocean, but remains recognizable.
The visual style of JoJo’s is so clearly defined, anyone knows what they’re seeing when other anime parody the artistic flair of this anime. Series ranging from No Game No Life to Food Wars! have entertained fans with JoJo’s-inspired moments, complete with the trademark katakana sound effects drift around on-screen. Most of all, fans love JJBA‘s memorable poses, many of which are inspired by Italian statues.
9
Gurren Lagann Is a High-Octane Mecha Anime With Cartoony Visuals
Streaming on Crunchyroll
While mecha anime like Gundam and Neon Genesis Evangelion remain the most iconic mecha anime, the mecha anime with the most unique visual flair is Tenga Toppa Gurren Lagann. This anime treats fans to slightly rough yet gorgeous visuals with a cartoony edge, making this anime absolutely feel like the exciting adventure that it is. Grim and gritty visuals would have made Gurren Lagann a totally different anime, and fans probably wouldn’t have liked it as much.
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Gurren Lagann can be serious when it must, such as the tragic death of Kamina and the Anti-Spiral assault on Earth, but it always feels hopeful and charming with Studio Gainax’s eye-popping artwork. Most of all, Gurren Lagann is a mild and heartfelt parody of mecha anime, so cartoony visuals like these are a must. No other art style would do when an anime like Gurren Lagann goes hugely overboard to sell the idea of giant robots fighting.
8
Dr. Stone Features Lush Backgrounds & Expressive Faces
Streaming on Crunchyroll
Dr. Stone is compelling partly because it’s an excellent edutainment anime with great humor, and partly because of its memorable visual style. To begin with, Dr. Stone takes place in a future Stone Age where the natural environment means everything, so the backgrounds are some of the industry’s best. Dr. Stone immerses anime viewers in its pseudo-isekai narrative.
In addition, the character models in Dr. Stone are easily recognized thanks to their widely spaced eyes, their thick and lushly drawn hair, and the rich color of their eyes. These are highly expressive characters in a variety of ways, from Senku’s stern scowl or humorous faces to Kohaku’s intense looks while she’s fighting. Dr. Stone also has a slightly cartoony look to maintain its light-hearted tone, since this Stone Age adventure is meant to be fun, not grim.
7
Fist of the North Star Is a Product of 1980s Machismo
Streaming on Crunchyroll
Fist of the North Star is, in many ways, one of the first true modern shonen anime, alongside the original Dragon Ball. Fist of the North Star is a product of its time, featuring burly martial artists in a Mad Max-style world where raiders and thugs make the rules and everyone else cowers in fear. In that context, anime fans met one of the coolest man’s-man heroes, Kenshiro the martial artist.
Kenshiro helps encapsulate what makes Fist of the North Star such a visual marvel. Kenshiro is a wall of muscle and attitude, from his hard jawline and stern scowls to his sleeveless outfit and his cool poses. This anime is unapologetically a product of the 1980s, when musclebound macho heroes were common. Looking back, it’s an entertaining time capsule of how anime used to be, and it feels rather nostalgic now.
6
Yu-Gi-Oh! Stars Slender Characters With Colorful Hair & Accessorized Outfits
Streaming on Crunchyroll
Yu-Gi-Oh! stands out in a variety of ways, including the fact it’s a multi-media franchise where the anime and the real-life card game are closely connected. Even the card illustrations themselves feel distinct and are pop culture icons, such as Blue-Eyes White Dragon and Dark Magician from the old days. As for the anime, no one would mistake Yu-Gi-Oh! for any other anime thanks to the way those characters are drawn.
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Yugi Muto the protagonist is a good example of this, being a slender youth who is mostly expressed with his wardrobe, hair, and face. Yugi’s physique is practically featureless, but he makes up for it with his vivid “anime hair,” large eyes, small mouth, and his heavily accessorized outfit. Other Yu-Gi-Oh! characters of the time had a similar visual style, and the same is true of Yugi’s successors, such as Yuki and Fudo.
5
Attack on Titan Entertains Fans With Intense Facial Expressions & Extreme Gore
Streaming on Crunchyroll
Attack on Titan made a name for itself in a variety of ways when it first aired, including the sheer brutality of the fight scenes and the burning questions about the Titans and the world beyond the walls. On a visual level, Attack on Titan established its own voice with its incredibly detailed character models and settings, a richly immersive gaslamp fantasy world that anime fans won’t soon forget.
Attack on Titan also treats fans to highly expressive characters, whose faces are now legendary for their intense expressions. Fans won’t soon forget the hard glare Yelena made in the last season, not to mention Eren’s hardened scowls or bared teeth. Attack on Titan features some of the most visually memorable villains as well, with nude Titans eating people with their large mouths and countless teeth.
4
Dragon Ball Z & Dragon Ball Super Set the Standard for Burly Shonen Anime Warriors
Streaming on Crunchyroll
In countless ways, the Dragon Ball franchise gave modern shonen anime its shape, especially Dragon Ball Z, which shares a visual style with Dragon Ball Super. The late Akira Toriyama did a fine job drawing characters with tough yet simple looks that made them easy to follow in battle, and the anime captured that essence well. These characters’ eyes, hair style, and outfits won’t ever be forgotten.
Aside from how the characters are drawn, Dragon Ball Z also has iconic visuals thanks to its trend-setting ideas. Going Super Saiyan and transforming into new modes helped define modern power systems, such as new hair colors, glowing auras, and the like. Even today, anime fans are excited by the legendary Super Saiyan transformations, always waiting to see new forms of Super Saiyan or related concepts, such as Ultra Instinct.
3
Pokémon Has a Lovable Cartoony Look With Large Eyes
Streaming on Netflix
Pokémon is an anime and pop culture landmark the entire world knows and loves, and for many fans, Pokémon was their introduction to the world of anime. Notably, thanks to its cartoon-like visuals and relatively tame anime tropes, many non-Japanese fans might not have recognized Pokémon as anime at all. To them, it was simply an incredible cartoon, one with charming visuals and cool creatures.
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Pokémon doesn’t seem to have a special visual trick for making its characters so visually distinct, but anime fans know it when they see it. It’s simply “the Pokémon look,” with tall eyes and simple but distinct hair styles to make Ash, Brock, and Misty such icons in the early days. The overall franchise has come a long way in the last 28 years, but fans still love the classic Pokémon look and still think fondly of it from their childhood memories.
Pokémon
- Release Date
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1997 – 2023-00-00
- Network
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TV Tokyo, TV Osaka, TV Aichi, TVh, TVQ, TSC
2
Bleach’s Characters Have Lean, Angular Builds to Look Tougher
Streaming on Hulu
Of the original shonen “Big 3,” Bleach has the most mature-looking character models, regardless of the actual content of these three anime series. The characters in Naruto and One Piece both have a slightly cartoony anime look, with or without comedy and Gear 5, while Bleach‘s own character models have a distinct motif. Both male and female characters have lean, angular builds which make them look tough and slightly more realistic.
Bleach‘s characters feature hard cheekbones, sharp jawlines, lean yet well-muscled bodies, and sharp and intense eyes to really sell the idea of Soul Reapers fighting for their lives against the likes of the Arrancars and Sternritter. These characters also look taller than average for anime characters, with long legs and widely-spaced feet to give them more presence in a scene. The only drawback is that the Bleach anime lacks the rest of the source manga’s visual flair, such as its use of hard contrasts between black and white to make the characters pop more.
Bleach
- Release Date
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2004 – 2023-00-00
- Network
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TV Tokyo, TV Osaka, TV Aichi, TVh, TVQ, TSC, BS TV Tokyo
1
Demon Slayer Is a Visual Marvel With Stunning Colors & Animation
Streaming on Crunchyroll
Few modern anime have a more impactful visual style than Demon Slayer does. Whether or not this anime is trying to compensate for an average narrative with its animation, no one will deny Demon Slayer is a visual treat unlike any other. The character models feature thick lines and rough features to make them seem hand-painted at times, but they also look gorgeous and lushly detailed.
Not just any anime can make characters look rough but beautiful at the same time, but Demon Slayer manages it with both its heroes and villains. The visual charm extends to the attacks, too, which feature incredible details and motion to make all breathing styles look stunning and all demon attacks look terrifying. This animation style is also conducive to great humor, too, with the chibis looking unlike anything anime fans have ever seen.
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