astro boy and doraemon for sure
for our generation... i'd say as children: sailor moon, dbz although i think their animes had more of an impact

and personally, love hina and fushigi yuugi for me bc that's what got me into manga.

and to be really recent
sadly, naruto is probably one of the biggest influences i know of. even random ppl know about naruto.

Quote from making_mooz

astro boy and doraemon for sure
for our generation... i'd say as children: sailor moon, dbz although i think their animes had more of an impact

and personally, love hina and fushigi yuugi for me bc that's what got me into manga.

and to be really recent
sadly, naruto is probably one of the biggest influences i know of. even random ppl know about naruto.

Well, that may be true, but I think the OP means influential in the industry and not in pop culture. So One Piece, Naruto, and Bleach wouldn't count.

While we're at I'm pretty sure Pokemon started the whole "monsters" thing.

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I think those influential in pop culture can be mentioned too. I don't know whether MIYAZAKI Hayao's works are influential in the anime/manga industry, but they had an impact as part of contemporary mainstrem cinema.