My favorite western cartoons are the ones animated in Korea.

kinda hard for me to pick

Abuse of backgrounds, typical stereotype Americans (look it up), colorful hair colors, inaccurate age depictions, etc. etc. etc. Next!

Anime sucks. It will never reach the groundbreaking popularity of American cartoons such as Spongebob or Adventure Time. The sheer creativity and variation in animations styles, designs, settings, character development, and hard work us Americans put into cartoons outmatches most if not all Japanese anime out there. That's the cold, hard truth.

Don't be a JumpMad, Smexi, lol.

You used 12 Oz. Mouse in your defense of western animation O_O

I get where you're coming from, but c'mon, 12 Oz. Mouse!?! Surely you can come up with something better than that.

While I do prefer anime, I do understand why some would disagree (and I certainly appreciate your argument), & I personally do love a lot of western cartoons (Futurama, Dexter's Lab, King of the Hill, Venture Bros., Sym-Bionic Titan, Avatar, American Dad!, Teen Titans, Garfield & Friends, ect.), but I personally consider it a grave insult to those shows, to even mention the pile of s*** that is 12 Oz. Mouse, like it's in their league.

(I didn't even know there were people that liked it O_O)

I like how it's turned into another debate entirely whether or not cartoon and anime are essentially the same thing.

What kind of horrible, second rate anime are you watching. I'll give you hair color and your somewhat right with age depiction for some but what you have there is a recipe for something terrible thats only worth watching to laugh at. Any good anime should have those things at a minimum, take a look at something like Spirited Away and see how much of that there is. As for art style being too similar compare Yu Yu Hakusho, Dance in the Vampire Bund, Full Metal Alchemist, and any of Hayao Miyazaki's work, not saying its perfect but its not like the western animation is leagues better either.

@SMEXIZELDAMAN Ever thought that maybe Western animation is more popular over here because its made with Western tastes in mind?

Well, you must be implying that most anime is second-rate then

And yes, I love Miyazaki's works. I'd never insult them, just the crap that comes out of Japan (which is most anime imo)

I really can't stand most anime/manga/whatever. Most of them look the same to me and they take themselves too seriously.
I will say that some older shows like Pokemon and Dragonball Z were pretty darn good. They tended to have a lot of the same type of humour and personality that many of the great western cartoons possessed.

I like power puff girls
Also @smexi of course westerners will say western anime is better, only makes sense, I just hate the technical names of shows and games
COD is literally what the title says, but Kirby mass attack
As for shows family guy is ironic since its not family friendly but basicly says what it is, but full metal alchemist (while it is saying a full metal alchemist, you wouldn't know what it is exactly just by name)

12 Oz. Mouse is freaking awesome. If you don't realize that, then you're missing the point of the show.

Also, She-Ra > All.

I've tried REALLY hard to get into anime. I just can't. I did like Spirited Away though, and I'd probably like other Miyazaki films if I watched them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anime

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartoon

There we go.

The ignorance about anime here is astounding.

"Anime all look alike". Yes, because Dragonball Z, Shin Chan, Lupin III, FLCL, Cowboy Bebop, & Yu Yu Hakusho all look alike -__-. I'm not saying that anime styles are more diverse than western animation styles, but both have their fare share of diverse styles. What I will say, is that anime tends to be much more detailed (which is one reason I prefer it). That's not very surprising however, as again, most western animation is either aimed at kids, or is a comedy, so it doesn't need to be detailed.

"Anime is too clichéd". Guess what? Everything (no matter what form of entertainment it is) has loads of clichés. For example (one of my favorites), in western animation, the father figure is usually stupid, obsessed with sports, or both. Again, I'm not necessarily saying anime is superior in this regard, but both have their fair share of clichés.

"Anime is too formulatic". O_O, really? Yes, because the 90% of western action cartoons that use a "monster of the week" formula with a non evolving plot are so much better than even the most clichéd shonen series (which, while are clichéd and mostly predictable, actually have a plot that moves forward). In recent years, there have been western cartoons that do have an actual plot, but the most notable of these I can think of (Teen Titans, Avatar: the Last Airbender, 2011 ThunderCats, Sym-Bionic Titan) are heavily influenced by the storytelling & art styles of anime. This is the one area, I'll say anime is vastly superior than western animation (it's kind of hard to argue against, IMO, when most western action cartoons don't have any depth, and most of the ones that do, are trying to copy anime). Watch Cowboy Bebop, Ghost in the Shell, Death Note (not personally a fan of this one), & Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, and say anime is too formulatic.

I do prefer anime and its cliches and stuff. Not every cartoon should try to be funny because of a lot them...um...aren't. Also I love epic story arcs and cartoons hate those a lot which makes me sad.

that's my only opinion of this other than "apples and oranges" or something similar

No, just all the ones that manage to include all the things you listed, something tells me you'd have to actually try to pull that off though. Not saying most anime don't do some of that stuff just that is not as bad as many people make it out to be. I'd say for every cliché anime has western cartoons have one thats just as bad, so theres really no point in complaining about it.

@WesCash has a point a lot of the older anime had a more western(or maybe less eastern) vibe to them outside of the setting, especially the ones aimed at a younger audience such as Pokemon, Digimon, and Yu-Gi-Oh. Maybe thats why they were so popular at the time, Full Metal Alchemist even has an English vibe.

I can respect the man Miyazaki, but most anime just doesn't have the "oomph" to it that american cartoons do. It doesn't feel like there was enough creativity or effort put into it. Miyazaki knows what he's doing though.

@smexi I don't even watch a lot of anime (shocker) and I still think there all quite different

I don't put one over the other. I watch far more western cartoons than japanese cartoons, but both are great. Besides, this form of arguement is purely opinion. It is a good debate though.