For many Western fans of anime, their first exposure to the medium was through Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim block, which featured action-oriented anime series airing late at night, as often as six days a week at some points. Adult Swim’s offerings have often been some of the most popular, classic series of their eras, meaning that the Adult Swim line-up has aged exceptionally well.
Adult Swim not only helped these hit series to gain a foothold in the West, but effectively brought a new generation of Millennials (and later, Gen Z) into the anime fandom. Many of these series ran for years on the network, helping them to become both mainstays of the schedule and fan-favorite series. Adult Swim’s influence on the anime scene even extends into the modern day with its revitalized Toonami block, which has helped more recent hits to find bigger fanbases.
10 My Hero Academia – One of Today’s Biggest Hits
Produced by Bones, based on the manga by Kohei Horikoshi.
My Hero Academia is a modern series, as new episodes have aired on Adult Swim since 2018. My Hero Academia follows Izuku Midoriya, a young boy with no powers, born into a world where nearly everyone has a special ability of some sort. Midoriya meets his favorite superhero, All Might, and winds up inheriting his superpowers, determined to become the next great hero that the world can rely on. From there, the story spirals out into an epic tale of good versus evil, following Midoriya’s entire class at hero school as they face a villainous threat that could erode the fabric of society.
9 Made in Abyss – A Mature Adventure That Pulls No Punches
Produced by Kinema Citrus, based on the manga by Akihito Tsukushi.
Made in Abyss is a dark fantasy series that follows Riko, a young girl who dreams of being a “cave raider,” a type of adventurer who explores the dangerous underground region known as the Abyss. After coming into contact with a robot boy named Reg, Riko decides the time is right to strike out on her own and begin the adventure that she’s been waiting her whole life for. Made in Abyss is a brutal series to watch at times, showing no mercy to its child-age protagonists as they make their way through the deadly depths. Still, this serves to make it an incredibly compelling watch, with each moment leaving viewers uncertain if they’ll make it to the next.
8 Outlaw Star – A ’90s Classic Given New Life
Produced by Sunrise, based on the manga by Takehiko Ito.
Outlaw Star is a sci-fi anime series based on a seinen (young adult male) manga by the same name. The series is very much ’90s in terms of its production value, but there’s a certain charm that hand-drawn ’90s series like this one possess which hasn’t always translated to newer series with their abundant use of digital animation. Outlaw Star‘s manga only lasted 21 chapters, so the anime helped to breathe new life into what might otherwise have been a forgotten series. It was one of the earliest anime series to appear on Adult Swim, and its late-night showings helped the series to find a fanbase that still adores it to this day–prompting Outlaw Star to return to the block in 2017.
7 Dragon Ball Z Kai – The Anime Classic Reborn
Produced by Toei Animation, based on the manga by Akira Toriyama.
The original Dragon Ball Z was a mainstay for Toonami, so when Toonami made its way from regular Cartoon Network to Adult Swim, Dragon Ball came along for the ride with its most recent iteration, the heavily re-edited Dragon Ball Z Kai. Kai removes a lot of the filler and padding from the series for a more streamlined experience that’s closer to the original manga, cutting the original 291 episodes down to just 167. Kai aired on Adult Swim’s Toonami for around six years, and always drew in excellent ratings despite its age.
6 Death Note – A Thriller Fit For Late-Night
Produced by Madhouse, based on the manga by Tsugumi Ohba and Takeshi Obata.
Death Note tells the story of young Light Yagami, a high-performing high school student who discovers a notebook called the Death Note, which has the power to kill anyone whose name is written in it. Light decides to use the Death Note to rid the world of crime, and in the process arouses the suspicions of the world’s greatest detective, L. Light must evade L’s investigation as he attempts to impose his new world order, but who’s right and who’s wrong isn’t so clear-cut. The series’ intense tone made it quite the heart-racing watch late at night, and it quickly found a fanbase on Adult Swim.
5 Neon Genesis Evangelion – The Most Twisted Mecha Anime of All Time
Created by Hideaki Anno, produced by Gainax.
Neon Genesis Evangelion debuted on Adult Swim in 2005, at which time the series was already considered a classic of ’90s anime. In a time before streaming, however, this airing on Adult Swim was the first opportunity that many then-teenagers had to see the series for themselves. Evangelion follows Shinji Ikari, who is recruited by his father to be the pilot of EVA unit 01, battling to save the Earth from invading Angels. Shinji is reluctant to get involved and has complicated feelings about his father, but ultimately agrees to stop the suffering of another pilot, Rei. It’s impossible to sum up all of Evangelion‘s crazy twists in one paragraph, but the series left viewers stunned each week as the world of the story slowly unraveled.
4 Trigun – A Pacifist Hero Unlike Any Other
Produced by Madhouse, based on the manga by Yasuhiro Nightow.
Trigun is another ’90s anime series that became a classic in Western fandoms largely because of the exposure that it received on early Adult Swim. Set in a desert world far from Earth, Trigun follows two insurance adjusters, Meryl and Millie, as they chase down the “Humanoid Typhoon,” also known as Vash the Stampede. Vash turns out to be a very different figure than they expected, however–not a destructive force, but a pacifist who is constantly targeted by evil forces who want to rid this world of the humans who live there. Vash is one of the must unique protagonists in all of anime, and Adult Swim helped to introduce his particular form of non-violence to the world.
3 Fullmetal Alchemist – Fantasy Anime at its Finest
Produced by Bones, based on the manga by Hiromu Arakawa.
Both Fullmetal Alchemist and its counterpart series Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood are excellent anime fantasy adventures, and they were already gathering some buzz in the West even before debuting on Adult Swim. Both series follow Edward Elric and his younger brother, Alfonse, as they struggle to restore their bodies to the way they were before attempting to bring their mother back from death. While many fans will recommend just watching Brotherhood these days, the original 2003 anime shouldn’t be ignored, as it goes in a very different direction that has its own merits.
2 Ghost in the Shell: Stand-Alone Complex – The Perfect Expansion of the Movie
Produced by Production I.G., based on the manga by Masamune Shirow.
The 1995 Ghost in the Shell film is a classic of anime cinema, but the TV series known as Stand-Alone Complex may be just as much of a masterpiece. The series follows Major Motoko Kusanagi and her team, Public Security Section 9, as they investigate a complex case known as the Laughing Man incident. It accurately reflects a world in which humans are permanently connected to the internet by having in-depth conversations about everything from politics to philosophy, making this show a real thinker. It also features one of the greatest dubs of all time, perfectly capturing the characters and the complexities of their discussions.
1 Cowboy Bebop – The Masterpiece That Defined Adult Swim
Created by Shinichiro Watanabe, produced by Sunrise.
Cowboy Bebop is one of the greatest anime of all time, but, likely, it never would’ve been recognized as such if it weren’t for its time on Adult Swim. Cowboy Bebop follows a ragtag crew of bounty hunters on their adventures capturing criminals, which often end with them earning no money (or barely enough to cover damages). Spike Spiegel is one of the coolest protagonists ever, a master of martial arts and a crack shot to boot, but his backstory that slowly unravels over the course of the series is what makes him truly interesting. Cowboy Bebop helped to define Adult Swim just as much as Adult Swim helped to bring Cowboy Bebop to the world.
