Orphans don't get a chance at life. However, Judy Abbott appears to be the exception. She was just living her life as a poor orphan in New York when one day, she's given a scholarship by an unknown figure. His only request is that Judy writes him letters every month. She catches a glimpse of his shadow and notices his abnormally long legs, henceforth dubbing him “Daddy Long Legs”. Now Judy's got to figure out how to live at the classy Lincoln Memorial school and make sure she doesn't miss out on this opportunity!

Watashi no Ashinaga Ojisan is actually an adaptation of Jean Webster's novel Daddy Long Legs. It changes a few key aspects of the plot, but it does remain one of the only anime adaptations of early 1910s New York that doesn't involve organized crime! Also, due to this adaptation being written long after the 1910s, the writers were able to sneak in more references of major events of the era to make it feel more alive and consistent.

The name “New York City” is just a piece of trivia for most these days. Now it goes by a different name: Hellsalem's Lot. Why? Because all the strangest creatures in the world reside there now. Fishmen, vampires… you name it and you can find them. This is because, three years ago, New York City inexplicably got caught in an interdimensional shift and now residents of both realities are stuck living together. Kekkai Sensen follows the adventures of Leo Watch making use of the power of ultimate sight to save his blind sister from her fate!

The original Kekkai Sensen manga comes from author Yasuhiro Nightow, who avid manga readers might recognize as the author of Trigun. It feels only appropriate that the only returning entry on this list comes from source material that's from an author so enamored with American media culture. This time, he moves away from Spaghetti Westerns and finds familiar ground in police dramas. It's a perfect combination of procedural and supernatural like Trigun was Western and sci-fi!

Gorou’s finally getting out of his slump after his depression over the results of the Baseball World Cup. He’s just been signed on as a pitcher to the Hornets, a real American Major League team! Gorou packs up his things and flies out to Indiana and diligently prepares for his first game. Everyone from back home in Japan comes out to see Gorou’s big debut, but it gets overshadowed by an incredible twist of fate no one sees coming…

What’s more American than baseball? Honestly… quite a bit. Nowadays, American Football and Basketball are far and away the more popular sports. Meanwhile, it would be safe to say that baseball has largely become the favorite Japanese national pastime. But baseball still serves as an important cultural foundation of America, as it’s representative of the country’s export culture. That’s what’s so great about Major Season 6: it showcases the symbiotic relationship of Japan and America that sprung up due to baseball.

The Marches were just perfectly happy living right outside of Gettysburg. However, it’s unfortunate that they just happened to be living in 1863 as well. This does not end well for them, as Union forces end up destroying their home while stealing anything of value within. Now they’re living in Newcord with a crotchety aunt and her greedy, antagonistic son David who both make life hell for them. Can the girls make due with their new life?

Yes, you’re reading this correctly. This is, in fact, a loose anime adaptation of Louisa May Scott’s famous Civil War era novel, Little Women. Ai no Wakakusa Monogatari was actually made as part of Nippon Animation’s World Masterpiece Theater program, where they would take famous stories from other worlds and adapt them into anime for kids to enjoy. Dog of Flanders and Heidi of the Alps were also part of this initiative, but Ai no Wakakusa Monogatari is the most famous and regarded of the stories that actually took place in the USA.

A loving family, a fabulous mansion, good friends… Angelo Lagusa had it all. There was just one catch: his father was a mob boss. During some turf warfare, Angelo’s family was shot down in their home by the Vanetti family and, perhaps by miracle, only Angelo was able to make it out alive. For the past 7 years, he’s been living in isolation, but Angelo’s brought back out when he receives an anonymous letter that requests his presence. Now he’s returned home to Lawless, Illinois under the pseudonym Avilio Bruno with the hopes of infiltrating the Vanetti family ranks and taking his revenge from within.

Prohibition era America is a common setting for anime, as with many other entries that made our last list! This might be due to the fact that drugs are still an incredibly taboo subject in Japan, with many people pretending that they don’t even exist. However, that doesn’t erase the problem of actual drug crime, so many disguise these stories as period pieces set in the US as a reflection of a current problem in Japan. 91 Days itself is a classic mob revenge tale based on the intertwining politics of mob rule, making it an extremely unique story to find in an anime.

There’s an illegal weapons shop set up in America run by 2 former criminals. There’s Rally Vincent, who’s a master of gunplay and works as a bounty hunter on the down-low. Then there’s Minnie May, who just loves a good explosion. And while she doesn’t technically work for them, they’ve also got Becky Farrah in their pocket, who seems to know a little something about everything. Together, they form the Gunsmith Cats.

Despite this OVA coming out in the mid-90s, Gunsmith Cats feels right at home with 80s action cheese shows like The A-Team. This might be due to the fact that the author of the original manga, Sonoda Kenichi, was a huge fan of Western police dramas and wanted to give that genre a shot with his own style. Gunsmith Cats would go on to inspire the moodier late 90s/early 00s anime scene with shows like Cowboy Bebop and Trigun, making it a symbol of the West’s influence on Japanese animation.

It’s so easy to dream when you’re a child. That’s why Mutta Nanba once boldly proclaimed to his brother Hibito that one day he’d become an astronaut. But, of course, as Mutta got older, he realized that adult life would just get in the way, and somehow lost the drive to pursue his childhood dream. Now he works at a car company as a salaryman while Hibito is actually living Mutta’s own dream as an astronaut. So you can understand why, when Mutta’s boss starts bad mouthing Hibito to Mutta’s face, Mutta had no choice but to headbutt him. Now without a job, Mutta decides on a whim to submit an application to NAXA (Japan’s version of NASA), only to be shocked by the results!

While Uchuu Kyoudai often takes place in Japan and space, quite a bit of it takes place in the US too! Mutta and Hibito take frequent trips to the John F. Kennedy Space Center and the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center, with a shocking level of accuracy to boot. This is not your average “This is what Japan thinks the US is like” story, but a near perfect recreation of Florida and Texas. That alone makes it a notable.

Doesn’t the Mafia just pervade every aspect of American life? Murder is everywhere, and hits are taking place out in the streets! However, there’s one company you can blame for that: Inferno. They’ve got an upper hand in the crime business too with their superior product, Phantom—an unstoppable killing machine that works as an assassin. One day, a random Japanese tourist catches Phantom on the job and sees that they’re actually a beautiful young woman. Rather than dispensing of him, she captures him, brainwashes him, and turns him into her assistant, Zwei.

While Isekai are the new hotness, there was a very strange period of time in the mid-to-late 2000s when adapting honest-to-God adult Visual Novels was the major trend. Studios would take the base story, remove the juicier bits, and turn it into a perfectly coherent story. Phantom: Requiem for the Phantom is one of the best from that odd period of time, and it’s an American story too! The plot revolves around the main characters attempting to escape America and get home to Japan, using the scope and size of America as a backdrop for just how unreasonably difficult this task truly is.

Naegino Sora has dreamed of performing with the California-based Kaleido Star production troupe ever since she was a young girl. She’s trained to become an acrobat, and finally, she’s booked herself an audition! She travels across the sea just to perform, but, as she learns, basically nothing works out as she wants it to. That doesn’t mean she’s giving up, though! In fact, for some reason, only she can see a strange spirit named The Fool, who informs her that she’s been chosen by the stage as a woman of destiny.

Kaleido Star is novel for being a series that takes place in the US that’s not about gang warfare. In fact, it’s the incredibly rare series where it’s a story in the US that wasn’t designed to appeal to boys! However, Kaleido Star’s message is exceptionally earnest and can appeal to anyone beyond its target audience of teenage girls. Really, even though Kaleido Star takes place outside of Japan, it feels like a very universal story that could be set anywhere, but they chose California because it was an area very familiar to a Japanese audience but still far enough away that Sora would feel like a fish-out-of-water without any safety net.

Just what exactly is Banana Fish? It’s not just a reference to a J.D. Salinger short story. It’s been 12 years since the end of the Iraq War, and that’s all Griffin Callenreese can say since he got back. His younger brother Ash Lynx (real name: Aslan) wants to know why exactly his brother is constantly repeating this strange phrase over and over. This question is eventually answered once Ash gets his hands on a drug of the same name. Ash begins his investigation, but his boss, Dino Golzine, does not approve. This sets off a chain of events that will alter the course of history forever.

Even though the anime was made in 2018, Banana Fish’s legacy extends a little further back than that. The original manga was written way back in 1985. This might explain the extremely goofy names of its American characters that can only be explained if the original author read the works of C.S. Lewis thought those were still current English names. However, disregarding that, Banana Fish’s legacy extends far beyond silly names and is an intense crime thriller that would get Richard Castle hot and bothered.