For many Westerners, Dragon Ball Z was the first anime they fell in love with, or at the very least, this was an introduction into the medium. What was amazing about the show in the mid 90s was the violence. See, many may not realize this, but censors were pretty crazy about what cartoons could and could not show. Let’s look at Batman: The Animated series. It still holds up tremendously well and yes there is action, but I urge you to watch it again knowing this now. They have some really weird practices in regards to how Batman could react to villains in terms of direct contact. Point is, even with Dragon Ball Z also getting censored, it was way crazi♋er than Batman, again, ju🤡st for an example.

Personally, this was not my first anime. That award goes to Pokémon, followed by Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z close behind thanks to Toonami. Point is, they were all clumped together in my head as something new and foreign, literally. I wanted more, and now it's so easy for people to get into thanks to streaming services like Crunchyroll and even Netflix. This is the golden age of anime, but here's the dilemma. What shows are good and which should you avoid? Well, with this list, I put together a bunch of action anime similar to Dragon Ball Z in terms of style and energy. I🅰f you liked that as🌞 a kid, these picks are even better. I also threw in some duds for good measure.

25 Better: Tiger And Bunny 𒐪 ꦏ

When you get🐟 right down to it, manga and Western comics are very different. Comics sort of idealize superheroes while manga rarely does in the traditional form.

Tiger and Bunny seemed like the first manga/anime to buck the Japanese trend in favor of real superheroes. It stars the unlikely pair of both the new and old guard trying to get along all while saving their city from certain destruction. There's pꦰlenty of action, along with a lot of heart, too.

24 🧸 🅰 Aren’t: Black Clover

I'm always looking for the next big Shonen hit. My friend had talked up the Black Clover manga for a while, so when it was announced that there♋ was going to be an anime adaptation, I wa𝄹s in to finally get started.

I know a lot of the medium can be derived from other🐻 stuff, but even with familiar tropes, I can find the good in the originality. This is just another weak kid who wants to be the very best. It's just so bland.

23 𓃲 🌟 Better: Soul Eater

What if Tim Burton made anime? I'm talking about peak 90s and early 2000s Tim Burton and not his current form. Well, that's what Soul Eater feels like. It's about a school of grim﷽ reapers, moreꦬ or less, in training.

The visuals🏅 are unlike anything out still to this day and it's very manageable at a mere 51 episodes. It kind of got rushed toward the end, but overall, it's a gorgeous and imaginative woꦦrld.

22 ꧂ Aren’t: Bleach ♉

I feel bad for putting Bleach on here. It wasn't the first manga I read, but it was the first series I started buying 🐽for myself. It's also about grim reapers in their eternal war with lost souls transformed into m🐻onsters called Hollows.

Well, that's the initial pitch, and then it goes complete Dragon Ball Z wherein much like Goku, Ich🌞igo Kur༺osaki, the main character, is seemingly the only one that can save the day. It started off so good and then fell into familiar territory. It was so bad that the anime was canceled just before the manga’s final arc.

21 Better: F💫ooly Cooly 💛

Putting Fooly Cooly, or FLCL, on this list may seem like a stretch. The original series was only six episodes and while it had action, that wasn't really the main focus akin to a Shonen anime like Dragon Ball Z.

I wanted to put it on here because it does have th🅺at chaotic, random ene🍸rgy. That, and it's just one of the best shows ever produced. Yes, it's only in a 4:3 ratio, but the Blu-ray is still gorgeous despite that flaw. This is a must watch.

20 Arenও’t: Hunter X Hunter

If you read my piece on the video games that copied Dragon Ball, then this entry may not come as a surprise. Like a lot of these other shows, Hunter x Hunter started off super strong in one of the best ways possibl♒e: a tournament arc.

After that, it was still good even though the main four split up. Then, it got to the Chimera Ant arc, which featured a rip-off of Cell. It was all over the place probably because the creator, Yoshihiro Togashi, has gone in and out of hiatus. It’s ✃so bad that fans even .

19 🥂 ☂Better: One Piece

Okay, and now it's time for an obvious pick. There's been a lot of Shonen anime since Dragon Ball ended, the first time, but there's been none more popular in Japan than One Piece. It's been going steady ꦬsince 1997! That's over twenty years of solid s﷽tuff.

The thing I like most about One Piece is the whimsy and adventurous nature of the series. Yes, there is plenty of action, but there's also a lot of comedy and intrigue, too. Eiichiro Oda, the autho🦩r, is 🏅a top-notch power and character; his designs never cease to amaze me.

18 Aren♊’t: Fairy🅷 Tail

I have a friend, the same one that likes Black Clover by the way, that refuses to watch One Piece because it looks like a copycat of this anime, Fairy Tail. It's useless to explain to him that One Piece came first. He's one of those stubborn types.

Anyway I do, or I should say, I did like Fairy Tail, but it too succumbe🌸d to tedious and repetitive story arcs where action seemed to happen for no reason. And then the time jump happened, which broke me.

17 Better: Cast♕levania ꩵ

The Castlevania anime on Ne💞tflix is probably the best video game adaptation in any medium. It does its own thing while borrowing elements from the source, specifically the third game.

The first season, if you can call four episodes a season, is slow, but once you get into season two, it's full steam ahead until the very end. It's dark, gory, and faithful to the source. Best of all, it has somethi🔯ng to say while not coming across as preachy.

16 🎃 Aren’t: I꧃nuyasha

Dragon Ball Z and Inuyasha have a lot in common in terms of their status in Western- localized anime. Dragon Ball Z was one of the first to hit Cartoon Network's Toonami block and then later on, Inuyasha was one of the first to usher in the ൲Adult Swim era on the channel.

They were also overly repeated with years going on before new episodes were finally brought in. I got so bored the fourth time through reruns that I didn't even care to finish it. Is that the anime's fault? I guess not, but I still don’t care🙈.