When You First Saw Dragon Ball/Z...

[LordCrumb]

I knew it was from Japan since I already seen anime before long before DBZ. My first anime was My Neighbor Totoro at three or four and I knew it came from Japan because the Japanese writing. I knew it was from Japan because I was already a big fan of Godzilla and I knew Godzilla was from Japan.

Oh please, 3/4 year olds don't know what Japanese writing is.

As a little kid I was like "It those letters are from the Godzilla movies!!!" when I saw them on screen. I knew Godzilla was from Japan as a little kid after all.

Well I guess you must be one smart cookie to know the difference between Japanese writing and just scribbles at 3 years old. I give your parents props for teaching you about Japan at the same age.

[Retan]

It's Japanese!!!? Since when?

[UpFromTheSkies]

I knew it was Japanese, it was one of the reasons I was drawn to it in the first place. When I was a kid, I was interested in anything from Japan because it was where the best video games, cartoons, toys, and comic books came from.

[dario03]

Pretty sure I knew. Or at least I knew it wasn't local and I probably guessed Japan because family would always go on about my video games being from Japan or maybe the end credits or something.

I could tell instantly it was Japanese, as most of the american cartoons had really sucky art and animation besides of series like Batman TAS or Thundercats, that were made by Japanese studios (with western looks tough).
Btw. my approach was pretty close to that of fadeddreams5. Western cartoons were shit and Japanese rocked. Funny thing is, that I didn't cared about Dragon Ball at first and was waiting for Digimon that ran right after when in 3rd grade.

I don't know I think there was a decent bit of well animated cartoons at the time. Plenty of stuff that wasn't especially older stuff in reruns that weren't but I think Disney and WB had some well animated shows that were on TV in the 90's, 2000's.

[Retan]

I don't know I still prefer Disney cartoons, like Ducktales, and Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers and most of there movies to most of the stuff japan produces.

[dario03]

I don't know I still prefer Disney cartoons, like Ducktales, and Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers and most of there movies to most of the shit japan produces.

Yeah its the same as I was saying for cartoons. Not everything from either area is going to be super high quality. Its not like every anime is animated as well as DB. Heck even DB isn't animated as well as DB at times But yeah after my last post I went on youtube and looked up clips of those and some other shows like Gargoyles (dat intro...).

[Retan]

I don't know I still prefer Disney cartoons, like Ducktales, and Chip & Dale Rescue Rangers and most of there movies to most of the shit japan produces.

Yeah its the same as I was saying for cartoons. Not everything from either area is going to be super high quality. Its not like every anime is animated as well as DB. Heck even DB isn't animated as well as DB at times But yeah after my last post I went on youtube and looked up clips of those and some other shows like Gargoyles (dat intro...).

Yeah animation studios today don't usually get the work because of there talent it has more to do with there price tag.

[MrWalnut4]

I got into the series a lot later than most so I knew full well that is was a Japanese anime going into it. I had seen my fair share of Pokemon when I was little and got into some of the bigger anime when I got older. It was only a few years ago that I finally decided to check it out after constant nagging from one of my friends who loved the series. I think it was right at the end of the Kai broadcast on Nicktoons.

[theoriginalbilis]

I already figured it was a Japanese anime when I first started catching random episodes back in the syndication/UPN days. Having seen shows like Macross, The Guyver, Project A-Ko, and Sailor Moon a couple of years before seeing DBZ, I was already noticing some of the "traits" associated with anime: larger eyes, slightly more realistic human body proportions, mouth flaps, etc...

[Basaku]

I knew what it was going to be, it was a big news in geek world in 1995 that it was going to fill Sailor Moon's slot after final episode on Polish TV. Eventually the decision was changed and the show didn't premiere till 4 years later on a different channel. By then I knew even more about the show and various spoilers what would happen in DB and DBZ

[Gaffer Tape]

Yeah, I immediately recognized it as Japanese. I'm not sure exactly when or how I first learned to recognize such things, but it wasn't as if Toonami had never aired anime before. I'd seen Voltron and Robotech and knew those were Japanese. As a much younger kid, I'd been obsessed with Power Rangers and had always known a lot of its footage was Japanese. I also have always watched and read the credits for every show I watch for literally as long as I can remember (I remember being thrilled at 4 or so to find in the end credits of The Super Mario Bros. Super Show the names of the actors who played Mario and Luigi), so that probably helped too.