The Story Behind 1001 Anime to See Before You Die

Unlike its siblings, this journey isn't drawn from a published "1001 ... Before You Die" book -- no such volume for anime exists (yet). It's a fan-curated list assembled by listchallenges.com user Michellecrihfield, who set out to imagine what one might look like: "I looked for a book of 1001 anime to watch and was disappointed one didn't exist. So I scoured the internet, and the third edition of the anime encyclopedia, and did my best to compile a list of titles that might be included in such a book."

The result spans nearly every era and corner of anime, from feature films to obscure OVAs, refined by thousands of list-takers since it was first published. We track it here as our first unofficial journey -- same tracking, same completionist itch, minus the publisher's imprimatur.