I would say those are my favorite animes of all time…they’re all different…and I love them for different reasons.
I’ve watched all of them multiple times..I would say I’ve watched each series at least 3 times each but I’ve watched the episodes I like, the non filler ones, probably over 20 times.

I think out of all of them, Hikaru no Go might be my favorite…there are so many great moments in it…moments that bring a lot of emotion…moments when I feel how epic the story is.

Initial D is great, it’s a typical underdog story except there are 2 parts to the underdog and the opponent: the driver and the car. The car is the underdog…and you think the driver and car are the underdog together because no driver can outperform the capabilities of the car..and Takumi, the main character, is no exception. He does however, maximize the potential of the old car…and that’s where the beauty of the series lies.

Gundam Seed is a great fish out of water story…the main character placed in a world he’s unfamiliar with and doesn’t like…but does what he does for the survival of himself and those he cares about. It’s a great story about characters and doing what is right as opposed to what you’re told to do/what you think you’re supposed to do. The mechs are kool but I really like Gundam Seed for the characters.

Get Backers is enjoyable because it’s fun…it’s a very fun series, great characters…I would say one of the main characters, Midou Ban, might be my favorite anime character of all time. He’s a lot like House…arrogant, cocky, egotistical…but rightly so, he’s highly intelligent and probably superior to everyone else in the series. If I could be anyone…I’d be Midou Ban.

Hikaru no Go…it’s a story about characters but also very plot driven as well…combining the two to create an epic journey. I would say in all 4 series, there are moments when I also tear up because of how good the moment in the series is…like, I FEEL it. These moments…they’re rare. Initial D and Get Backers both have a few….Gundam Seed has a few more but Hikaru no Go, for me, is filled with them. I think it might just be do to rewatching the series so many times that I really FEEL everything, like it’s more real to me. I’m emotionally attached to a few characters, specifically one…that…ah…I can’t talk about it! I don’t think you can really do a series justice by only watching it once. There are so many things that you miss or deem unimportant at the time of watching it because it is. But when you rewatch it, characters that get slight mentions to early on, foreshadowing, symbolism…they all make a whole lot more sense the second time around. That’s when you start feeling how epic the story is.

I’m rewatching Hikaru no Go again and wanted to write a little about it. All of the above are great animes. Gundam Seed and Hikaru no Go have a steady pace…Initial D has an interchanging slow/fast pace throughout the series…Get Backers has some filler eps (about….13/49 of them?). Overall they’re much better than say, Death Note, which was great but left me disappointed after 25…and even a little disappointed after 16 or so, when Kira lost his memory. Naruto and Bleach are just too damn long…the stories and episodes are inconsistently good and also paced very slowly at least compared to the manga. I really like Prince of Tennis but it was very…shallow. Not really deep at all, there isn’t much character development despite a lot of character interaction. Monster is great, a little slow and dark..I think you have to be in a certain mood or a certain type of person to enjoy that.

Anyways…just wanted to write about HnG while I’m watching it. I hope you try it out! :)

Oh oh ! Also, I really like how the character in Hikaru no Go visually evolves over the course of the series. Visually, he gets very slightly older each episode, you don’t even notice the difference as you’re watching it. Then, you compare how he looked in episode 1, 30, 50, 75….and they’re all very different. But you don’t notice that as you watch…it’s done very gradually. What other animes have that type of gradual growth? Initial D, Gundam Seed, Get Backers certainly doN’T. It’s that level of attention to detail…that makes this journey epic!