Ask John: Are There Any Multi-Generational Anime?

Question:
While watching the second half of Allison and Lillia recently, it occurred to me that generational stories in anime (i.e. ones where the character focus later in the series/franchise shifts to the children or descendants of the characters who were the heroes early on) are very rare. Can you think of any other examples of this?

Answer:
Multi-generational narratives aren’t especially difficult to compose or create, but they remain infrequent in cinema because they inherently risk alienating viewers. Viewers that feel as though they’re missing part of the story by being unfamiliar with an earlier series may be put off the sequel. So most anime series that have a multi-generational theme, like Mamono Hunter Yoko, Naruto, Major, Miracle Giants Domu-kun, Heartcatch Precure, Katanagatari, and Natsume Yujincho, only depict their earlier generations in flashbacks or references rather than extensively illustrating one generation then a decendant generation. However, Allison to Lillia isn’t the first anime to distinctly, comprehensively illustrate subsequent generations. Some earlier anime have incorporated a degree of this characteristic while other have fully exploited this concept.

Most anime fans are aware that the Dragon Ball franchise incorporated a prominent multi-generational theme. While Son Goku did star in all three series, 1986’s Dragon Ball featured Goku as a boy and as a teenager. 1989’s Dragon Ball Z introduced Son Goku’s two sons, Gohan and Goten, and made a significant effort during the mid-series Cell saga to transition the leading role from Son Goku to his son Gohan. The 1996 Dragon Ball GT series co-starred Goku’s granddaughter, and the 1997 Dragon Ball GT Special starred Son Goku’s great-great-grandson.

In the 1992 Tetsujin 28-gou FX television series Shotaro Kaneda, the child protagonist of the 1963 series, is a middle-aged man, and his preadolescent son Masato takes over as the operator of the new Tetsujin 28-gou FX robot.

The 1994 Macross 7 television series is set 35 years after the events of the original Macross television series and co-stars Mylene Flare Jenius, the seventh daughter of original series’ supporting characters Maximilian Jenius and Milia Fallyna.

The 2002 Kinnikuman Nisei television series stars Mantaro Kinniku, the young adult son of Suguru Kinniku who starred in the original 1983 Kinnikuman anime series.

The 1998 Popolocrois Monogatari television series starred young prince Pietro. The 2003 sequel simply titled “Popolocrois,” starred Prince Pinon, Pietro’s young son.

For many years there was rampant speculation that Crusher Joe was the son of the Dirty Pair’s Yuri. However, I believe that close examination of relative ages and dates has proven that theory impossible. Joe’s mother is named Yuri, but she’s probably not the same Yuri that worked as a WWWA trouble consultant.

I’m sure that there are other multi-generational anime series, ones that I’m either unfamiliar with or ones that have just temporarily slipped from my mind.