Anime to get carried away with!

Sometimes your job or school work is just a never ending parade of stress. Sometimes your family is just not listening or understanding you. Sometimes even your friends are just being a little too annoying. Sometimes, don’t you just want to get away from it all? Wouldn’t it be great to find adventure, meet new friends, and put your daily grind on hold? Though traveling isn’t going to work for everyone, especially in the current times of lock-downs and travel restrictions, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t find a whole new world in a far off place. In fact, there are many anime characters that are more than willing to go to all those far off places for you, maybe even ones that are out of this world! So if you’re feeling a little bit of mid-Winter cabin fever and just want to get away from it all, these anime are for you!

Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle

This Clamp studio gem features the Cardcaptor Sakura duo Sukura and Lee Shaoran as teens in a completely different story. Sakura is a princess of a desert world and Shaoran is the adopted son of a scholar. As small children they became close friends and as they grew up together Shaoran becomes quite protective of the princess. Well, one evening something happens at an archeological site near the royal castle and Sakura is in a terrible accident! With a little help of magic, Shaoran with injured Sakura in tow, is sent across dimensions to Yuuko the trans-dimensional witch.

To Shaoran’s surprise two other travelers appear on Yuuko’s door step at the same time. One is a rather angry samurai and the other is a quite joyful wizard. Shaoran is told that Sakura’s spirit as been shattered and if he wants to put it back together again, he has to travel from world to world and find all the pieces. Yuuko is willing to send all of the travelers from world to world, but in return they have to give up what is most precious to them. With that heavy price, off the team goes visiting one unique world after another slowly bringing Sakura back to life.

Kino’s Journey (2003)

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Kino’s journey is a quite unique anime. Every episode starts with a Haiku that reflects the paradigm of each new land that Kino travels to. The main character Kino is a traveler, and that’s basically all there is to this anime. Kino goes from one strange country to another every three days. While Kino is going from one new country to the next, they are also seeing each different culture objectively through the eyes of an outsider.

The series can seem a little episodic because each episode begins in a new country and there is very little continuation from one country to the next. Many of the stories in this anime have a mind bending cyclical structure to them which might seem a little confusing for casual anime viewer. Likewise, this anime covers some oddly serious topics like the morality of the death sentence, the nature of generosity, the pointlessness of a never ending task, and even the automation of humans out of relevancy. So if you like getting away by diving deep, than this is the anime for you!

King of bandits Jing

Jing, a notorious thief, yet also probably one of the nicest people in this weird and mixed up world that he travels across. His only companion is his friend Kir, a talking bird that doubles as Jing’s powerful weapon (an arm mounted death ray thing). As Jing travels from one weird and slightly psychedelic city to the next he is driven to steal the priceless treasures he hears about, more for the thrill of it than for any need of money. But conversely, Jing isn’t interested in being a villain. And though his crimes often include overthrowing and evil mayor or governor or minor king, Jing is never really interested in ruling these city states either. With each of his thefts, Jing unlocks a puzzle, frees a trapped maiden, and even re-unites a mother and daughter. He might not be Robin Hood, but with each new city he visits, new treasure he discovers, and new daring theft Jing commits, he is often doing more good than anyone.

Flint the Time Detective

If Kino’s Journey is a little too serious for you to be swept away with, maybe something with cute monsters and a nostalgia feel is more your thing? Flint the Time Detective might be just what you were looking for. This is a definitely not too serious, time traveling anime with a Saturday morning cartoon feel. The main character Flint is a caveman (boy) that was accidentally brought to the future and is quickly recruited into the Time Detectives.

It’s the Time Detective’s job to ensure that the time line remains unchanged and to save the cute little super powered monsters that are scattered throughout history. As a newly badged Time Detective, Flint travels across the globe and through time with his two friends (who are also Time cadets). Of course, no Saturday morning cartoon would be complete without a proper villain. Petra with the help of her two henchmen is a hilariously evil character, who tries to manipulate historical figures so she can be a queen and fabulously rich where ever and when ever she happens to be. She also likes lying, tricking, or hypnotizing the time monsters into doing her bidding. And why does she do all this crazy evil stuff? So she can show off to her crush with the hopes that he will notice her more.

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Do you have a favorite anime that takes you to another world? Leave a comment below!