After his brother moved to America, Naota was left to his own mundane existence with his grandfather and father in his small town. However, one day while walking home with Mamimi, his brother’s ex-girlfriend, Naota is hit by a Vespa. Its rider, a crazy pink haired woman, gets off, kisses him, smacks him on the head with her guitar, and then speeds away. This marks the end of Naota’s boring life and the beginning of a never-ending string of weird events.
How do you give anime recommendations for a show when you are not particularly sure what the plot actually is? I guess that’s a “me” problem though, right? Anyway, if you are looking for more anime recommendations like FLCL, here are our best guesses.
Anime Like FLCL
For Fans of Abstract Craziness
Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi
Arumi and Sasshi have been friends since they were children, both living in the waning Abenobashi Commercial District of Osaka. However, things are changing in Abenobashi, due in no small part to the area being slowly being bought out to build a mega-mall. One day, after an accident, the two friends find that Abenobashi has really changed – into a medieval RPG world, a dating sim game, a space opera, or a film noir movie. It is one wacky adventure after the next as Abenobashi takes on the form of Sasshi’s otaku interests.
The spoofs, random craziness, just a touch of philosophy, and some major coming of age overtones are the similarities between these two series. However, the more pleasant thing about Magical Shopping Arcade Abenobashi is that you generally know what is going on and it establishes the why of it all pretty early in.
Excel Saga
Hyperactive Excel is a faithful servant of her beloved lord Il Palazzo, who aims to take over the world. Throughout her quest to help him achieve his goals, Excel and her partner Hyatt travel all over the world where there adventures often take a turn for the weird.
Consider the insanity and randomness in FLCL as an intermediate class to prepare you for Excel Saga. If you can handle the insanity of Excel Saga, you can handle the insanity of any anime. Like FLCL, Excel Saga has a lot of spoofs of other sorts of media, but if you thought FLCL was confusing, Excel Saga might be similarly hard to follow.
Panty & Stocking with Garterbelt
Panty and Stocking are two foul-mouth rebel angels that got booted out of heaven for being themselves. Panty likes sex, Stocking likes sweets, and their afro’d man companion Garterbelt has some pretty twisted fetishes. Together, the three travel the mean streets of Daten City getting into any and every bit of trouble they can find.
As they are both Gainax shows, you can be pretty certain that there is going to be wackiness within. Whether it is aliens, weirdly sexual situations, spoofs, or just general randomness, both series share it to the max. This makes both shows great to watch for nothing else if not the unpredictability. Get ready to be confused just like you were in FLCL.
Space Patrol Luluco
Living in the rather abnormal Ogikubo, the only Space Immigration Zone on Earth and a melting pot of aliens and humans, bubbly Luluco just wants to be normal. However, when her father accidentally eats a powerful sleep capsule that freezes him solid and she also accidentally breaks him, she rushes over the Space Patrol to take his place in the office. There, the chief Over Justice hires her as an undercover agent to sniff out crime at her school.
Despite the different settings, both series maintain that high energy, high weirdness, and the “what the hell is going on?” plot and pace. The nice thing is that Space Patrol Luluco is easier to get a grasp on initially and progressively flies off the rails later.
Space Dandy
The universe is a vast and strange place, full of even stranger beings. For a man named Dandy, his job is to travel around and register new species for a reward. What should be an easy job is made less so by a series of odd coincidences that happen along the way.
Compared to FLCL, Space Dandy has a much lower energy to it, but so does most anime compared to FLCL. As it follows a pompadour-sporting playboy and space bounty hunter, it does have that similar level of oddness, though.
Punch Line
Yuuta Iridatsu is your average high school kid, except that he faints when he sees a girl’s panties. However, on a chance encounter with a vigilante fighter called Strange Juice, his soul gets separated from his body. Not only does this allow him to go on panty adventures unseen, but it may make him the key to saving the world.
Both series have the unfortunate similarity of having a high bar of entry simply because they are often difficult to understand with one watch-through. They move at a clip, throw a lot of odd things at you, and in Punch Line’s case, are perhaps too ambitious with their plot.
Sarazanmai
One day, after a weird run in with his classmate, Kazuki and two of his classmates knock over a Kappa statue in Asakusa and meet a creature named Keppi. Before they know it, they are turned into kappa-like creatures and tasked by Keppi to destroy kappa-zombies if they want to become human again.
If you like anime that is incredibly energetic and fast-paced, but also stuffed to the bursting with symbolism and metaphors, then Sarazanmai is for you. Just like how taken at a glance FLCL is abstract oddness with something more under the surface, Sarazanmai houses something deeper in there as well.
For Fans of Over-the-Top Action
Toppa Tengen Gurren Lagann
Simon and Kamina were living boring lives in their deep underground village when, on an excavation dig, they find a mysterious object that turns out to be the ignition key to an ancient war machine. With their new weapon, the pair are able to fend off an attack from above, but upon catching a glimpse of the sky, they set off on an adventure that will take them out of this universe.
FLCL and Gurren Lagann share a certain passion for utter madness like many Gainax shows. They both excel in high energy and highly original fights, but also suffer from the occasional moment of “what the hell is going on?” Additionally, both series are highly focused on robots. In FLCL, they come out of Naota’s head while in Gurren Lagann they are head-shaped.
Kill la Kill
Ryuuko Matoi is on the hunt for her father’s killer, and her only lead is the missing half of his invention, the Scissor Blade. On her quest, she arrives at the prestigious Honnouji Academy, a school that is ruled over by the super powerful Satsuki Kiryuuin and her Elite Four. Believing Satsuki knows who killed her father, Ryuuko challenges one of the elite, but gets beaten due to their special uniforms. After receiving a special uniform of her own, Ryuuko sets plans into motion to dominate the school and find out what happened to her father.
If you enjoyed FLCL for those high energy scenes, whether it was fighting or just having a conversation, Kill la Kill is a good anime to follow up with. As you can likely tell by the concept, it is not quite the normal plot and the art style almost matches FLCL stroke for stroke. It has got the same kind of explosiveness that made FLCL so intriguing to watch.
Diebuster
After the events of Gunbuster destroyed the alien’s star system, the intergalactic war still rages on. Now humanity’s only hope lies with the Topless, an elite group of kids that possess supernatural powers and powerful new Buster Machines. Diebuster follows Nono, a rookie recruit and her team of ace pilots as they fight to protect humanity.
While Diebuster and FLCL actually share a director, fans should also be aware that this is technically a sequel to Gunbuster, though it feels like its own series. Regardless, Diebuster shares FLCL’s colorful and complex animation, though it has been shined up a bit. It also shares the same love for fast, vibrant, way over the top action. With crazy mech designs and a similar style of humor, this is a similarly short series for FLCL fans to love.
Kyousou Giga
In ancient Tokyo, there was a priest named Myoue who could bring anything he drew to life. He drew a black rabbit who also fell in love with him. Borrowing a body of a goddess to be with him, they started a family with three children. However, it was decided that the family was causing too many problems, so they fled into the Mirror World full of the priest’s drawn creations. While everything was peaceful in this world where no one dies and no one is born, the parents of the family had to leave. Awaiting their return, the three children are shocked when a girl arrives from another land in the Mirror World sharing the name of their mother and looking for both of their parents.
Whereas FLCL is high energy action with a sci-fi plot, Kyousou Giga is high energy action with a supernatural plot. However, unlike FLCL which has aged, Kyousou Giga is as slick as they come.
For Fans of Coming-of-Age Stories
Eureka Seven
Renton Thurston hates his boring life in the backwater town of Bellforest. He wants nothing more than to have an adventure, but his grandfather insists he become a mechanic. However, one day adventure literally falls through his roof in the form of Eureka, the pilot of a Nirvash Type Zero and member of mercenary group Gekkostate.
Both stories have the main character swept up in something larger than his old boring life. As it is much longer than FLCL, Eureka Seven presents a much more complex coming of age story. Both main characters end up becoming slightly less weak through the help of infinitely more interesting female protagonists, and both feature a lot of similar tropes like alien girls, giant robots, and epic battles.
Blood Blockade Battlefront
Vampires, fishmen, supersonic monkeys – They are all normal residents living alongside humans in Hellsalem’s Lot, formerly known as New York City. When a gate between Earth and the Beyond popped up there three years ago, old NYC became dominated by monsters, and now Libra, a secret organization, is tasked with keeping it in order. After hobbyist photographer Leonardo Watch obtains the All-Seeing Eyes of the Gods, he finds himself recruited into Libra.
Both anime series feature a normal boy that, for one reason or another, finds his life turned upside down by a situation that is out of his control. Suddenly their lives become about enduring one odd event after another alongside a cast of quirky characters. Both feature great animation and fast-paced battles, but FLCL is more on the abstract side.
Tsuritama
Yuki Sanada is a socially awkward young man that, due to his grandmother’s job, has to move around a lot. He has all but given up on making normal friends until he moved to the town of Enoshima. There he meets a man named Haru who claims to be an alien. It turns out Yuki was right on one account, he would never make “normal” friends.
Although only a fraction as incomprehensible, Tsuritama shares a good deal with FLCL. Both ultimately feature a story about coming of age that is supported by some impressive artwork and a top-notch soundtrack. However, while both share the plot of a bored boy having an encounter with an alien, Tsuritama lacks the complexities and symbolism of FLCL.
Neon Genesis Evangelion
The world is on the brink of destruction following the landing of the Angels, massive monsters that want nothing more than to kill and destroy. The only hope lies with the select few that can pilot government agency Nerv’s special Evangelion-type mechs. The pilot must be compatible in order to pilot the Evangelions, and for Nerv leader, Gendo Ikari, one of those compatible few is his son, Shinji. With the fate of mankind on his shoulders and fights that often mean death for the pilots, is 14-year-old Shinji up to the task?
At a glance, this might seem like an odd recommendation given that NGE’s reputation is well-known. However, while Neon Genesis Evengelion does indeed get pretty heavy and philosophical, it is ultimately a coming of age story framed as a sci-fi mecha action series. Both series feature boys struggling to understand who they are.
Mob Psycho 100
Kageyama Shigeo, otherwise known as Mob, is a young psychic with a wide range of blossoming abilities. Despite having this incredible power, he just wants to become friends with Tsubomi, a girl in his class. Due to negative reactions to his psychic abilities in the past, he now tries to keep them in check. In an effort to learn to better control his abilities, Mob becomes the apprentice to Reigen Arataka, who claims to be a psychic, but is actually a con artist that exploits Mob’s very real powers for money.
Underneath all the odd animation and high intensity action scenes, both FLCL and Mob Psycho 100 are ponderous series about male adolescence. They both occasionally focus on what it means to be an adult, but also people are probably distracted by the insane action scenes.
Do you have more anime recommendations like FLCL? Let fans know in the comments section below.
