How to know what's trending and what's not?

[GesuGesu]

I usually just look at the seasonal anime list, pick what I think I'll like, and start watching weekly.

After I watch each episode, I usually check out the episode discussion on Reddit's r/anime and see what other people think about it. Stuff like predictions, fan theories, favourite characters, catchy memes that started...

There's also a weekly anime ranking to go with it all, based on user votes to determine a show's popularity.

[Zugaikotsu]

You can check weekly shounen jump or other magazines ranks, what's hot in crunchyroll... I like to do it, and when I saw kimetsu no Yaiba was getting more and more positions, I thought "damn, this thing will get big..." xD

[DiegoPalacios]

The best way to know is to create said trends

[darthmongoose]

Adding to the chorus of people saying "don't chase trends", I'd say that if you're gonna do fan art, instead of picking something for its popularity, pick something you actually like, because it's more likely fans of that thing will like the stuff you make if they're like you in terms of the sort of things they like. Otherwise you get this weird frustrating disconnect between people who are fans of your fan art, and people who like your original works. Getting attention for fan art is nice, but when only your fan art gets attention, it gets kind of miserable. Ideally you want the fan art to be an accessible introduction to your work that catches attention and makes people want to look into your original illos and comics.

Also, sometimes you can make an absolute killing by being one of the only artist catering to a fanbase which craves content but not many people are making stuff for. I have a friend who was like... the only person doing high quality fan art of some obscure nickelodeon show I'd never heard of who built a super-dedicated fanbase of a few thousand really die-hard content-hungry fans.

[JRHoch]

Hey, where's the best place to go to streamed English versions of anime? Netflix has Soul Eater, but isn't as extensive as I'd like. Also, would love recommendations for good anime. I'm not big on romance or anything too silly.

[Cavechan]

This past anime season was a revival of Weekly Shounen JUMP series getting animated. Dr. Stone, Fire Force, and Kimetsu no Yaiba were all Shounen Jump magazine series that got an anime this summer.

I'm going to be that person and correct this - Fire Force is Shounen Weekly Magazine (Kodansha), not Weekly Shounen Jump (Shueisha).

As for how to get started in shounen manga fandom... I say just read as much as possible. Back in the day, we had to rely on scanlations to read manga. I would go around to various scanlation websites, download what I could, and read a lot. I learned about a lot of artists and their styles.

To get started nowadays, I recommend reading WSJ (Weekly Shounen Jump) via Viz at https://www.viz.com/shonenjump They publish the chapters the day they officially come out in Japan (mostly on Sundays but sometimes on Fridays. A few times a year it takes a week off) so you can always stay on top of what's new. I believe they do the chapters like the first 3 chapters and the most recent 3 chapters are free to read. It's something like $2/month to read the non-free chapters and AFAIK, it is available worldwide.

I also just want to say that Viz has some... questionable qualities though. Please keep in mind, that they have censored A LOT of manga in the past and are still doing it today (though from what I have seen it doesn't seem to be as bad as before. The most recent one was they just completely cut out a title page of Robo x Laserbeam because it was "racially sensitive" or something). Also, series where they use the graphic novel release will have really poorly translated SFX. Sometimes, they straight out butcher manga with this extremely outdated, pointless, and hated practice. For some reason, they haven't stopped doing it AFAIK. In the magazine released chapters though, they don't do that! yay

But thanks to this, I was able to know about Kimetsu no Yaiba/Demon Slayer the day it came out since they published the first three chapters as they came out. yay

[silacinnamon]

The best place to watch legally is probably Crunchyroll, I've heard Hulu has a lot of anime too but I never used it. If you aren't really interested in romance, I definitely recommend starting with some popular shounen/seinen series like Cowboy Bebop, Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, Neon Genesis Evangelion or Kimetsu no Yaiba

[Zugaikotsu]

Hmmmm I pretty much repeat everything sillacinnamon said, plus I also recommend some classics, such as fist of northern star, yuyu hakusho, record of lodoss war and ranma 1/2! And one punch man! I love one punch man! xD

[Ich-San]

Kimetsu no Yaiba is so darn popular right now that I refuse to watch it, its fanart is everywhere, it got to my nerves, like people said before, just DON'T. =/

[spicy_sweets]

I never really got that tbh. Why avoid something just because it's popular?

[joannekwan]

Some people might avoid a series just to stay away as far as possible from the fandom and its drama.

[Ich-San]

That never happened to me before Yaiba, everything else that's popular generally interests me, heck, my pfp is from an extremely popular cartoon all over the world, except maybe the USA, I guess when your feed only shows 1 anime, and nothing else, you kinda hate it? at least that's what happened to me, besides the premise isn't my cup of tea...

[Ich-San]

I don't avoid a series for that reason, I just avoid the fandom lmao.

[joannekwan]

I kind of do? Like I never throughly checked out Steven Universe or Voltron.
I can see the fear of enjoying the series and having no one to gush about it (or express any contrarian opinions) to without possibly getting caught up in drama.

Another case may be OVER-hype. And then the person is disappointed when they do check out the series to find out it's only ok at best.

[Ich-San]

Hmm, that's true, both S.U and Voltron have super toxic fandoms, specially Steven, but you can always go to safer places?!

[Ich-San]

About the over-hype thing, just keep your expectations very low, regardless of hype. xD

[silacinnamon]

I kinda feel the same way but with Boku no Hero lol, it's been everywhere for a while now, but neither the premise or the art style attract me. I actually wasn't interested at all in Kimetsu no Yaiba but decided to watch it just because of the art (I still don't think the story is all that much tbh but I'm not a big fan of shounen to begin with)

And I just avoid most fandoms... I love SU but never interact with anyone in the fandom, I just talk about it my close friends

[GesuGesu]

The premise was basic AF, but that's pretty much what you get with most shounen series. What made me decide to watch it was because UFOtable was the studio in charge of animating it. I am a diehard UFOtable follower.

[singsweetlorelei]

So it's really unpredictable what's going to hit big. Every publisher is trying to guess that and it's hit and miss a lot for them. So you can't be in early on something unless you are the creator or happen to pick something up early that you like by dumb luck.

So like everyone else says don't go chasing trends.

However, if you want more art practice and to be more engaged in fan communities there is one tip I can offer. That is asking for suggestions of what fan art your current fans might like to see. They will share your art and their friends might follow and throw out suggestions. By asking the crowd over time you'll notice what's popular because that's what you get asked to drawn. One day it's Naruto and then a month later all anyone wants is Groot or Levi.
The downside to this is not enjoying what you are drawing because you're not really choosing to draw what you want. Eventually that can really suck the fun out of an activity.

[IdiotWithPencil]

But how to know it........ SOONER? (use what magic?)

Go to your favorite manga site and watch the hot page
what is a hot manga will usually become a hot anime which, in turn, will
turn into what people call "Popular"

or you can do what I do and start checking the new sections and check out any series that catches your fancy, usually what I find and stick with turns popular in a year or so..