Lighter And Softer / Anime & Manga

• Most anime adaptations of Osamu Tezuka's manga get this, as most of the great man's work, while having a generally cartoony look & feel with an uplifting message, still involved copious amounts of death and destruction (Lost World, one of his earliest forays into the world of boys' adventure stories, was infamous at the time for having the highest body count of any manga up to that point, with only three members of the cast surviving to the end of the book). In more recent years this has started to swing the other way, though (the Metropolis animé is far more bloody than the original, and the 2003 Astro Boy series' version of Dr. Tenma takes the Evilutionary Biologist gimmick that was only briefly touched upon in the manga and turns it up to 11).
• On the topic of Osamu Tezuka, while his Unico manga series and two feature films by Sanrio all carried a melancholy but optimistic tone combined with some dark themes. During the manga's run from 1976 till 1979, Tezuka made a version of Unico aimed at elementary school students and toddlers called "Unico Elementary School (Version)" where it's notably humorous with educational elements in the mix.
• Beast Machines is about planetary genocide, religious fanaticism and unceasing, torrential whining. Transformers: Robots in Disguise is about the wacky adventures of a put-upon space shark and the delightful things he does. In general, the anime series inspired in the Transformers brand tend to be much more light-hearted and comedy oriented, especially compared with Beast Wars, Beast Machines, Transformers: Prime and the live-action movies.
• Berserk:
  • The 1997 anime is filled to the brim with violence, screams, dismemberment, High-Pressure Blood, rape and other forms of sexual content, but when you consider that the original manga is more brutal in practically every conceivable way it doesn't look so horrifying in comparison. In particular, the anime toned down the scenes of torture and sexual violence, such as by removing being raped as a child from Guts' backstory and leaving Wyald and the Black Dog Knights out of the plot. Despite this, it still shows the Eclipse in all its horror.
  • Berserk (2016) makes the 90s anime look as dark as manga in comparison by toning down everything and even editing off female characters’ nipples. Also thanks to CGI a lot of the violence that was in the manga has little impact in the anime.
  • Kentaro Miura, on one of his breaks from Berserk, created a six-chapter long manga called Gigantomakhia which is considerably more lighthearted and idealistic than his main work.
• Beyblade Burst is noticeably more light-hearted and kiddier than the previous incarnations Beyblade: Metal Fusion and Beyblade: Shogun Steel. This includes having younger protagonists, brighter colours, and less Family-Unfriendly Violence.
• The Black Jack TV anime series adapted stories from the manga, but occasionally removed some of the downer material.
  • In the manga story "Thieving Dog", a dog dies saving Jack and Pinoko from an earthquake, while in the anime the dog survives the incident and becomes their pet.
  • In the manga story "Sometimes Like Pearls", Jack's killer whale friend dies of injuries acquired while attacking fishing boats and killing fishermen. In the anime adaptation, "The Gift From a Killer Whale", the whale was hurt fighting another whale who was attacking the fishing boats, and is proven innocent just in time for Jack to save him.
• Cells at Work! Series:
  • Cells at Work: Baby!: While not as quite as tame and fluffy as Friends! or Platelets!, Baby! is lighter than its parent series and infinitely less dark and depressing than the other seinen Cells at Work! spinoff.
  • Cells at Work and Friends!: Being a generally lighthearted Slice of Life comedy, Friends serves as this to the main series, which despite its younger-audience Edutainment leanings, could still be quite bloody and dark. Needless to say, it's a completely different beast from Cells at Work! CODE BLACK, the Darker and Edgier Spin-Off of the parent series.
• The anime and OVAs of City Hunter are this compared to manga, toning down several more inappropriate elements. Manga Ryo in particular goes beyond the usual Loveable Sex Maniac character antics with a Running Gag of him getting an outright Raging Stiffie around all beautiful women (some of whom were underage) along with more vigorous sexual haressment. The anime and later OVAs drastically tone down Ryo's behavior, with him being a cheeky Handsome Lech at worst and don't have him assault/and get an erection over every attractive woman he meets.
• Code Geass: Nightmare of Nunnally manages to be this for the original Code Geass. For starters, the cast and even the extras suffer FAR less physical and mental damage than their canon counterparts. Even the villains, for the most part, are significantly more sympathetic and less monstrous. Most of all, Euphemia, who was killed in the original, is given back everything she's due when she becomes Empress of Britannia. In a postscript, the author even mentions that he was impacted by the deaths of Euphemia and Lelouch in canon, which compromised his objectivity.
• Cross Ange is a very dark and depressing series about women who cannot use Mana being forced to fight against huge dragons coming from a different world just to pay for their upkeep. Cross Ange Academy meanwhile turns the episodes aired into one of the most light-hearted and funniest canonical spin-offs ever made. In fact, it's recommended to watch one episode of the anime then read the manga corresponding to the episode number.
• Every incarnation of Cutey Honey other than the original manga, even the darker toned Shin Cutey Honey doesn't escape from this. While most subsequent adaptations focus on Fanservice and violence, the original manga is full of Black Comedy that can get very dark, many characters died and it was played for laughs, many ugly girls tried to rape Honey's friend Natsuko and even the dirty jokes are far more kinky and hardcore: for example, towards the end of the manga Junpei, a 10-year-old boy licks Honey's crotch while she is naked and only covered in gold paint, and also everyone dies but Honey, the Hajami family and Panther Zora . Taken a step further with the 90s version, Cutey Honey Flash, as this version is a magical girl series in the same line of Sailor Moon.
• The first manga adaptation of Darker than Black has much more stylized and less detailed art, a significantly less dark storyline, and does not share the original's determination to find every trope it can and kill it. The Properly Paranoid, stoic, badass Anti-Hero lets someone who knows who he is going back to her everyday life even though his survival hinges on maintaining his secret identity, the superpowered sociopaths are less involved in the plot than a former test subject with normal emotions and no remuneration whose main motivation is love, Generic Cuteness is in effect to such a degree that some characters are hard to recognize, and male characters who were already attractive were turned into Bishōnen. Somebody coming to the main series or second manga from this is going to be very surprised.
• In Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba, the world of Demon Slayer Academy is specifically made to be as lighter as possible compared to its main counterpart, the modern setting is focused on peaceful daily lives of school students, the school staff and some unique citizens; not a hint of tragedy, pain and horror from the mainline series is found in it, series author Gotouge Koyoharu really wanted a happier environment for the characters, where even some of the evil demons can be good humans in it, and even those who remain evil are evidently the kind of evil presented in stories for little children, not quite terrifying and sometimes quite comical. The actual spin-off manga series based in the Demon Slayer Academy original shorts is even lighter, featuring Super-Deformed designs and aimed at a younger demographic than the main series.
• The 1972 anime adaptation of Devilman was considerably lighter and softer in comparison with the original manga and later adaptations: Lots of changes to the story were made, the violence and nudity were considerably toned down, comic relief was included, and the most of the characters who died at the end of the manga are still alive in the last chapter of the first anime series, which also has a Bittersweet Ending instead of the tragic conclusion of the manga. There's one exception, however: the first episode has Akira and his father killed by Amon and other two demons, then Amon takes over Akira's lifeless body to basically pull a Dead Person Impersonation onwards.
• Digimon Frontier is this to Digimon Tamers in every possible way, though really, anything that followed Tamers while still being shonen would have been. Similarly, Digimon Fusion is this to Digimon Data Squad, and its sequel Digimon Xros Wars: The Young Hunters Who Leapt Through Time is lighter still.
• Dragon Ball:
  • Dragon Ball Super, despite the darker retellings of the movie arcs, is generally more lighthearted than Z, since Beerus wasn't particularly evil, Frieza's return wasn't taken completely seriously and he was killed before he did any lasting harm, and the Champa Saga had no primary villain and was a simple tournament. There are also the in-between Breather Episodes which are more comedy based. It's not until the Future Trunks Saga that the tone starts to match that of Z.
  • Dragon Ball Super: Broly is this compared to Dragon Ball Z: Broly – The Legendary Super Saiyan. Broly's entire character was altered so as to be less extreme and intense. While the first film shows us an horrific backstory of Broly being stabbed and dumped when he was a baby, his backstory is much more toned down here. Besides, instead of being the sadistic sociopath without redeeming features of the 90s, he is a sensitive, non-malicious man who was manipulated by the true Big Bads of the film.
  • In the original manga, the 23rd Tenkaichi Budokai arc is this compared to the Piccolo Daimao arc. While it does have one of the goriest battle wounds in the franchise, with Piccolo Junior blowing a bloody wound through Goku's shoulder, it has absolutely no deaths and there's greater focus on Goku's desire to win the tournament than on the prospect of the world being plunged into darkness by Piccolo. Indeed, the TV series may have made this arc even more light-hearted than the manga by adding in a short, goofy mini-arc about Goku and Chi Chi on a classic, early Dragon Ball-style adventure trying to save the Ox King from the burning castle. It even has Pilaf and his minions!
  • Then again the TV series did manage to make some arcs even darker compared to the manga. Like the anime 22rd Tenkaichi Budokai arc where Crane Hermit tries to assassinate Goku in the dead of night or the anime Piccolo Daimao arc where Goku and Yajirobe have to travel through a terrifying cave and get the Ultra Divine Water from a Eldritch Abomination, neither of which happened in the manga. Z did it too with the Hyperbolic Time Chamber being turned into a Eldritch Location that screws with people’s minds rather than just a useful training Pocket Dimension. The Goku vs Vegeta fight in Buu Saga was also darker than the manga with Vegeta trapping Goku to a rock and torturing him, whilst in the manga Vegeta just wanted to fight Goku.
  • The anime series especially in Z added Filler arcs which baring the Garlic Junior saga, were considerably more breezy and lighthearted than the violent and dark main arcs from the manga. Notably just after the foiled invasion of Cyborg Frieza at hands of Future Trunks who warns Z-Fighters about the Androids that will kill them all in the Bad Future, we get an arc where Chi-Chi demands Goku and Piccolo learn to drive and Hilarity Ensues. Similarly in the Buu Saga we get an expansion on Gohan’s High School adventures as Great Saiyaman and his struggles to live a normal life and keep his superhero identity secret acting as a big Slice of Life arc in between the extremely dark Cell and Buu Sagas.
  • A lot of dubs edit the violence, particularly the ones aimed at kid Gohan earlier on, as Raditz backhanding his nephew was changed in the Ocean Dub so that it cut away before Raditz strikes Gohan and it also claims that there were many survivors after Nappa nukes a city and blows up a news helicopter. Even the Dragon Ball Z Kai dub which is more accurate to manga, still changes the moment where Vegeta blows up a paper clip truck and it’s driver, in the Kai dub we hear the driver say “Dude my truck” implying he somehow survived in order to make Vegeta look less villainous. The DBZ anime in general censors the more brutal acts of violence e.g when Vegeta kills Guldo in the manga, he gorily slices off his head with his hand while in the anime Vegeta uses beam attack instead. Similarly Dr Gero brutally rips off a civilian’s head when he first appears in the manga as Android 20, in the anime he just pulls the man through the roof of his car and it cuts away to a woman screaming.
  • Dragon Ball GT was Lighter and Softer compared to Z early on in its run. Goku was de-aged into a kid and has wacky space adventures with his granddaughter Pan and Trunks, which was intentionally done as a Call-Back to the earlier, more light-hearted adventures of the original Dragon Ball series. This changed starting with the Baby Saga, which goes back to the darker and action-packed tone of Z.
• The anime adaptation of Drugstore in Another World tones down a lot of the violent, offensive, or black comedy of the original light novels as well as the manga adaptation.
  • Mr. Alf, the general store owner, is first encountered fleeing his home with a black eye and other serious injuries courtesy of his beloved wife. In the anime, he's first encountered in perfect health, begging Reiji to let Alf act as a distributor for Reiji's super (energy) potions, and at no point in time is Alf's wife ever portrayed as physically abusive.
  • When Mina accidentally gives Reiji her reminder to get woolen panties than a grocery shopping list, Reiji has an Imagine Spot of her putting them on. In the manga, Mina's skirt is raised and the panties are clearly seen, while in the anime, she slips them on while her skirt is still covering her.
  • During Feris and Zeral's introductory chase, in the manga, Noella wastes no time putting the basket over her head and pretending she can't see anything, leaving Reiji and Zeral to their fates. In the anime, Noella doesn't hesitate to put herself up to protect Reiji.
  • In an attempt to "motivate" Reiji to do a good job reversing aging or giving the appearance of it, Countess Flam Valgas relays to him all the insults and mean-spirited talk that other nobles have made at Lady Valgas's expense. Reiji believes it's more depressing than anything else but is wise enough not to say it out loud to his client's face.
• Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA is a Magical Girl manga set in an Alternate Universe Fate/stay night, a universe where none of the main characters have surviving parents, siblings often attempt to murder each other out of jealousy, and Ilya is a 19-year-old homunculus who looks ten, and will die of Clone Degeneration before she is twenty. She also has an odd sort of familial relationship with her stepbrother Shirou. In Fate/kaleid liner PRISMA☆ILLYA, everybody's parents are still alive, Ilya is a normal 13-year-old with the expected life span, and evil is defeated by turning into magical girls using Zelretch's Kaleidostick. Incidentally, Ilya still has an odd sorta sexual/maybe family relationship with her stepbrother Shirou. This is probably Shirou's own fault.
  • Not quite to the same degree, but the manga adaptation of Fate/stay night itself is leaning in this direction. It was already focusing mostly on the 'Fate' route of the visual novel, which is notable for being the most idealistic of the three routes, but then went even further by removing the multiple rapes and other trauma in Sakura's backstory, and humanizing and sparing the life of Shinji.
  • And now we have Carnival Phantasm, which is a straight-up Gag Series.
• Franken Fran has the sequel series Franken Fran Frantic serve as this. Both the original series and Frantic are unabashed Horror Comedy manga that share similar levels of gore, violence, and general horror, but the latter series has more of its stories end on some positive or optimistic note. That said, the circumstances surrounding said endings are still as disturbing as ever, such as a woman covering her body in lactating breasts or a man turning his paralyzed, brain-dead fiancée and stillborn child into fleshy androids.
• The 2001 anime adaptation of Fruits Basket is this in comparison to the original manga. Aside from trimming some drama here and there and putting more emphasis on comedy, the anime only covered about a third of the manga's plot and never adapted the rest of the story which gradually became darker. The two darkest characters were also the ones whose personalities deviated the most from their characterizations in the manga: Akito was simplified into a fairly standard villain, and Shigure was relegated to comic relief. The 2019 anime adapts the manga more faithfully, with the story's darker undertones being present even in the early episodes.
• Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu:
  • The series itself is a lighter and more comedic anime spinoff of the light novel series Full Metal Panic!; while the original series has both serious mecha action and wacky school hijinks, Fumoffu puts much more emphasis on the latter.
  • The primary mech is a ridiculously cute mascot character named Bonta-kun, which can only "speak" by squeaking a high-pitched "Fumoffu!" Sandwiched between the first two seasons of the original light novels' anime adaptation, it makes the differences all the more pronounced. It's also quite literally both lighter and softer than the huge metal mechas from the original series.
• The Getter Robo 70s anime series removes the batshit insane elements the original manga had. Ryouma becomes a virtuous, Hot-Blooded straightforward hero, while Hayato becomes the archetypical 'cool guy' loner... all in high school setting. They're still Hot-Blooded, though. But just try to compare that version to the latter closer-to-manga versions (Shin vs Neo, Armageddon, NEW)... where they're both Ax-Crazy Sociopathic Heroes with the side order of Hot-Blooded.
• Believe it or not, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex is softer and brighter than the original manga. Not by much, admittedly, but Section 9 doesn't steal cars or torture criminals any more (just threaten to do so). Then again, neither is a happy idealist heaven, so you'd hardly notice.
• SD Gundam Force. It's Gundam, but all the characters are chibis, everything is completely light-hearted, and hardly anyone ever dies. Though it can have its Nightmare Fuel-like moments. That said, it's only slightly lighter and softer than some of the SDGundam stuff that preceded it...
  • Model Suit Gunpla Builders Beginning G, an OVA that celebrates over 30 years of Gundam models, also qualifies. It's a fitting thank you gift to the fans who support one of the most legendary mecha series of all time.
  • Gundam ZZ, G Gundam, and Gundam Build Fighters were created intentionally this way as lighthearted breaks from their grim predecessors Zeta Gundam, Victory Gundam, and Gundam AGE respectively.
  • After War Gundam X is probably the most optimistic series in the entire franchise besides the below mentioned Turn A. The entire main cast survives, the two broken birds of the cast completely heal their emotional wounds, the protagonst finally earns True Love... even the villains do not die but are merely arrested, a first (and so far the only time it has happened) for the franchise.
  • ∀ Gundam is decidedly less (visibly) brutal than many of Tomino's other Gundam works, with more lighthearted and very optimistic (or at least hopeful) themes. Not surprisingly, Tomino worked on the series after recovering from depression.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury would later follow suit. Despite the Downer Beginning and Cerebus Syndrome in the second half, there are fewer known fatalities here than in the previous Gundam entries from the 2000s-2010s and has one of the sweetest endings in the franchise since X and ∀: most of the cast didn't die, but instead get close calls, though some of them are either recovering from the drawbacks of piloting Gundams (Suletta) or receiving prosthetic limbs as replacements for their original ones (Petra) in the epilogue.
• The three OVAs of Gunsmith Cats, in addition to telling their own storyline rather than risking trying to adopt the manga storyline, also toned a lot of things down. May Hopkins' status as an underaged child prostitute and her sexual fetish for explosions and the scent of gunpowder, Rally Vincent's tendency to stop her opponents by blowing off their fingers or arms, the firepower of May's hand grenades, the general copious amounts of death—all of it went out the window. It is still pretty violent, though.
• Hetalia: Axis Powers:
  • The series does this for all of history. The anime took it even further. But it still applies to the comic itself; the earlier strips had a lot more dark humour.
  • In-universe, the character of Russia has gone from a Stepford Smiler Yandere to a pretty harmless Manchild over the course of the series, and history.
• Highschool of the Dead is typically known for its narrative about a Zombie Apocalypse and graphic depictions of death, but the "Drifters of the Dead" OVA is utterly devoid of such scenes. Instead, it's a Beach Episode that focuses entirely on liberal amounts of fanservice, innuendo, and sex related humor.
• Higurashi: When They Cry: Rei and Kira. Before they came along, Higurashi itself was about murder and mystery, and had various recurring characters beating other people to gory pulps. Rei becomes much lighter in tone after Takano's defeat at the hands of the club and their friends in Matsuribayashi-hen, especially with the hilarious pool episode. And then Kira comes along, and it's much lighter than Rei in every way, with things ranging from Rika and Satoko becoming Magical Girls to hilarious and absurd situations happening during dates between Keiichi and the Sonozaki twins along with the other female protagonists, and even Keiichi ending up dating Oryou, Mion and Shion's grandmother. To say nothing of the KeiichixSatoshi yaoi joke from Kira. No, really. Just compare the openings of season 1 and Kira (season 4). Warning: watching them in succession can result in Mood Whiplash.
• Ie Naki Ko Remi is much lighter in tone than Sans Famille, but it doesn't stray away from the hardships Remi has to face, like starvation, harsh winters, and most of all, abuse from an evil caretaker.
• I Married My Best Friend to Shut My Parents Up is this in comparison to some of Kodama Naoko's other work. While NTR: Netsuzou Trap involved the main character's best friend offering her "practice" for kissing and making out with her boyfriend, only for said practice to become a serious relationship, this work doesn't feature any adultery whatsoever, even when Hana meets up with her ex. While the manga is relatively serious, it never gets dark or angsty.
• JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Diamond is Unbreakable is this alongside Denser and Wackier. While Battle Tendency was when the series embraced the camp with the wisecracking Confusion Fu Joseph Joestar, stakes were still extremely high, and Stardust Crusaders was pretty dark save for the more comedic minor villains. Part 4 however features an even wackier cast of minor villains, a high schooler protagonist who invokes no killing and Defeat Means Friendship, while being set in a small town in Japan. While stakes can be raised alongside plenty of darker moments, much of the episodes focused on the wacky hijinks from main Power Trio with lots of Slice of Life thrown in.
• Kaguya-sama: Love Is War is mostly comedic, though it definitely knows how to get dark during the serious moments. Its spin-off We Want to Talk About Kaguya on the other hand is pure comedy all the time.
• Laura, the Prairie Girl: As a Kodomomuke, the anime refrains from mentioning Freddie, the Ingall's deceased little brother.
• Kaze no Shōjo Emily is this to Emily of New Moon by L. M. Montgomery.
  • In the book, Dr. Burnley believed that his wife ran off with another man, only to find out she actually fell down a well. In the anime this is changed to her dying in a storm.
  • In the book, Dean had a romance with Emily, and was waiting for her to come of age so he could marry her. In the anime their relationship is strictly platonic and Dean is already married to Nancy.
• Kimba the White Lion:
  • The 1980s remake of Kimba the White Lion. This does not apply to the dub, however.
  • The original manga was filled with some heartbreaking scenes, horrible events happening for no reason, and one of the most infamous endings to a shonen manga ever. As for the anime series? It still edges into some pretty sad territory, but things don't self-destruct this time around.
• Despite opening with a quite massive Downer Beginning that isn't in the manga, the Kotoura-san anime is this overall, significantly toning down certain parts of the original yonkoma.
  • Episode 3 has Manabe beaten up significantly in the anime. In the yonkoma, he got stabbed, and was not conscious when Kotoura came to check on him. Also, Hiyori convinces the thugs to go after Manabe by telling him that he's stalking her. In the yonkoma, she tells them he raped her.
  • In the anime, one story arc has a criminal prowling the streets savagely beating up schoolgirls, resulting in them getting hospitalized. In the yonkoma, the criminal actually rapes and murders them.
• The anime adaptation of Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear keeps the series as lighthearted and whimsical as possible, cutting out the unexpectedly darker aspects like the sheer depravity of a corrupt noble, and hiding or avoiding showing any gore or blood while the manga was unafraid to show monsters being decapitated and the resulting blood splatters.
• Les Misérables: Shōjo Cosette. Surprisingly shiny in the first half, and there are a few notable changes made in the (otherwise surprisingly faithful to the Brick) timeline to make it suitable for a younger audience:
  • Fantine doesn't become a prostitute.
  • While living at the Thénardiers', Cosette and Gavroche adopt a dog named Chou-Chou, which provides a spark of happiness in this otherwise terrible situation.
  • Said dog shows up just in time when Gavroche gets shot to rescue him, resulting in his canon death being fixed.
  • Javert's death is also fixed; there's all the build-up to his canon suicide, but at the last second he realises that redemption is possible and then proceeds to get a redemption arc
  • Due to the above, Thenardier doesn't end up a Karma Houdini like in the book, but instead gets arrested by Javert when trying to blackmail Marius
• Japanese fans of Lupin III were quite nonplussed when The Castle of Cagliostro hit theaters, as Miyazaki had made the normally-obnoxious Lupin and his cohorts unrecognizably nice. The film originally flopped at the box office. It took the passage of years, and fans who were able to see the movie on its own merits, for it to gain the popularity and critical acclaim it has today.
  • The same could be said of the second Lupin anime series, which is a lot goofier in tone than the original comics and 1971 anime series. Not to the degree of Cagliostro, but it definitely fits this trope.
• Lyrical Nanoha:
  • Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha ViVid, which is in sharp contrast with the Darker and Edgier Magical Record Lyrical Nanoha Force, the other Season 4 manga of Nanoha. To start with, there are no villains after two volumes, with the closest one being Einhart Stratos, who quickly became a more friendly rival after her first appearance ended with her getting befriended. No looming threat to The Multiverse, no undercurrents of a Government Conspiracy, just Vivio having fun with her friends, joining a magical combat sports tournament, learning about the life of her Ancient Belkan ancestor, and maybe rekindling a Reincarnation Romance with Einhart.
  • Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha INNOCENT is even lighter and softer than ViVid. Not only is it placed in a normal setting where the characters are only concerned with a new hit Card Battle Game called Brave Duel, but in this continuity, various dead characters such as Precia and Alicia Testarossa, Rynith, Reinforce Eins, and Grantz Florian are shown to be alive and living perfectly normal and happy lives with their families.
• The anime version of Magic Knight Rayearth does this with Alcyone's death. Not only does Alcyone not die after the first failed attempt at killing the Magic Knights, but she actually gets to redeem herself and save Cephiro in the second season.
  • Subverted when Presea is actually killed off. In the manga she never dies though so naturally the anime fixes that.
• Majestic Prince is rather light and soft after Hirai's previous works. It has some of the most adorable funny expressions to grace a Hirai anime.
• Manyuu Hikenchou's anime adaptation tones down much of the sex and violence seen in the manga.
  • The first chapter begins with Kagefusa raping a local village girl simply because she was a commoner with large breasts. A few pages later, the girl tells Chifusa that Kagefusa's squad also raped her mother to death and killed her father afterward. In the anime version, Kagefusa spares the girl's family and only takes her breasts from her.
  • The anime also censors Kaede's rape scene by using her fundoshi to cover Kagefusa's hand as she's fingering her. Then quickly cutting away to a shot of the night sky as Kaede screams. The manga version has Kagefusa pull Kaede's fundoshi aside so the readers can see that her fingers were inside her.
• The Melancholy of Haruhi-chan Suzumiya, a Gag Series spin-off of Haruhi Suzumiya, seems very much a lighter and softer take on its source material, rendering every character as a Super-Deformed version, recasting Yuki Nagato as an eroge-obsessed otaku, and generally coming across as the original series' writers, animators and voice actors just having fun with the source material.
• The Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch anime is a lot more child-friendly than the original manga. No cannibalizing of one's own Quirky Miniboss Squad, for one.
• Mischievous Twins: The Tales of St. Clare's: The anime lacks many of the mean-spirited moments from the book, like everyone agreeing Alma deserves to be bullied and the girl's tendencies to be heavily judgmental.
• Miss Kobayashi's Dragon Maid is already a lighthearted Slice of Life series for the most part, but it's spin-offs take this several steps further due to them lacking the main series' darker story lines. This is especially true for Kanna's Daily Life, which is told from the perspective of the childlike Kanna and has a Puni Plush art style to accentuate its fluffier tone. The anime adaptation also plays up the family aspect of the Kobayashi household far more than the manga did.
• Mon Colle Knights is this to the rest of the "Monster Collection" franchise, with Cartoon Physics and Puni Plush kid characters, although it still does have its share of relatively dark episodes.
• In the My-HiME manga, the only person who dies at any point is an Asshole Victim who previously tried to sexually assault Shiho. After the characters work through their competing approaches to fighting Orphans in the first arc, they work together against common enemies, instead of being manipulated into fighting each other like in the anime. The characters also suffer significantly less emotional trauma than they do in the anime. A notable example is that Akane is able to win her fight and profess her love to Kazuya without her CHILD (and Kazuya by proxy) being killed and her descending into an Angst Coma.
• My Otome:
  • The manga has Nina remaining emotionally stable and loyal to the heroes the entire time, largely related to Erstin surviving, and Arika and Mashiro never quite sink to the depths of despair that they do in the darker parts of the anime. On the other hand, several characters who survive the anime are killed off, and Sergay is more evil than the Otome anime version of Nagi.
  • The anime is lighter and softer then the My-HiME anime, as while the story is, in the best of times, more serious, it never seems quite as dark or hopeless, and there are fewer character deaths, although they are more often permanent.
• Naruto:
  • Though the intro in episode 1 promises that the series will eventually get hit with Cerebus Syndrome, Boruto starts off this way compared to Naruto. It's justified in that the characters are living in an era of peace. They start off as academy students rather than genin, so they don't have any worries, and the episodes have light-hearted stories with no dangerous fights. Even after becoming ninja the main cast lack the Dark And Troubled Pasts of their predecessors. According to Boruto: Naruto the Movie even their chunin exam is a walk in the park compared to their parents (having no apparent deaths or serious injuries and featuring a game of catch the flag rather than dropping twelve year olds into a dangerous forest). The Tailed Beasts, are also far softer than they were in the original series as seen when Shukaku (the monster who tormented Gaara and swore to kill everyone in his village if he ever fell asleep^note  which is the reason why Gaara has deep rings under his eyes plays with Naruto's daughter Himawari like a cuddly pet. Word of God is that Boruto is aimed at a slightly younger audience than Naruto Shippuden.
  • Rock Lee's Springtime of Youth is a goofy gag series starring Rock Lee that has almost no violence (except for countless Amusing Injuries) and has a Super-Deformed art style.
• Neon Genesis Evangelion:
  • While it still has dark elements, Neon Genesis Evangelion: Angelic Days is set in an alternate Neon Genesis Evangelion universe, the major difference from the original being that everyone involved has substantially better mental health. Because the original cast of Eva was a collection of horribly, horribly damaged souls, this turns everything on its head.
  • Girlfriend of Steel does this too, obviously. Everyone seems to be alive and flourishing. Rei is a Genki Girl. Yikes. Oddly enough despite that Rei has the exact same backstory.
  • Dual! Parallel Trouble Adventure takes the general characters — a brown-haired boy with parental issues, a complex soul tie to a giant mecha, and rare hallucinations, a tsundere girl trying to prove herself, and a partially alien 'soul' inhabiting an artificial body with the resulting identity and self-worth issues — and setting of Neon Genesis Evangelion and looks at how it'd perform if everyone involved was at least sane enough to have not taken a pencil to their eyeballs long ago. Given that it belongs to the Tenchi Muyo! Multiverse it's hardly surprising.
  • Rebuild of Evangelion apparently was headed this way... but then 3.0 came out and obliterated what little lightness was featured. The fourth one surprisingly manages to give an Earn Your Happy Ending with less Mind Screw than the original, so overall it's a Double Subversion.
  • Argento Soma, another Take That! series, is still fairly grim, and its heroes are still full of issues, but overall seem to cope pretty well, up to making the half of the cast Warrior Therapists, as the authors believed that being badass makes wonders with one's mental health.
  • Probably the best example of this trope in regards to EVA spinoffs is Evangelion @ School (or Petit Eva), where there are chibis of MASS-PRODUCED EVAS!
  • The Ayanami Raising Project games, where the player takes the role of a 2nd lieutenant at NERV and helps raise Rei (or Asuka, depending on the campaign). Despite running concurrently with the anime series and occasionally going through its events, the games are light, fluffy and absolutely adorable.
• Night Warriors: Darkstalker's Revenge while it's much more violent and dark than the 1995 cartoon and does kill off several Darkstalkers in the finale, is still nevertheless much more lighthearted than the games. Morrigan (while her Fanservice remains) has her sexual exploits drastically toned down. Donavon and Anita's bond ends with Donavon accepting his demonic blood and bringing a smile to Anita's usually emotionless face after he defeats Pyron, unlike the games where Donavon gives into bloodlust and Anita is forced to bring him down. Also Demitri's relationship with Morrigan becomes darkly romantic in the OVA unlike the games where Demitri just wants Morrigan to be his mistress and in Vampire Savior she even turns herself into stone rather than let him have her, though this lighter approach to their relationship became the norm in future crossover and guest appearances.
• While the anime of the One Piece can get pretty dark at times, some of the darker and shocking moments from the manga are toned down or removed. The most notable instance is Zeff who in order to save a young Sanji breaks his leg off with a rock and eats it to avoid starving while he gave Sanji his rations. In the anime Zeff gets his leg stuck in the sinking ship and rips it off with an anchor to save a drowning Sanji, Oda confirmed Toei changed this as they believed cannibalism would be too much for young viewers.
  • Similarly Whitebeard has half his freaking face blown off by Akainu in the manga, in the anime he just gets lava-punched in the chest.
  • The Boss Luffy Historical specials are quite tame compared to the main series, with the empathise being on humour. Despite being set on Feudal Japan (a setting similar to Wano arc), nobody dies or gets terribly injured and Luffy is a policeman instead of a wanted pirate.
  • In the manga minor character Cosette gets horrifically beaten up by Niji to point of her face being bloody and swollen and her teeth broken (this level of violence rarely happens to female characters in the series). In the anime she has a few slight bruises on her face.
  • Played with in regards to Kuina’s death, in manga we (and Zoro) see her corpse with a sheet covering her eyes. In the anime we just see the funeral, however it’s manages to have more weight and be more sad than the two pages of manga.
  • Justified for Episode 359, in the manga Sanji gets stabbed in the back by Absalom, the Japanese Broadcast edited this having Sanji just get hit really hard. This was censored due to the resemblance with the Akihabara massacre in 2008, in which a man stabbed at least 12 people with a dagger, killing 4 of them. The DVD, Funimation and some of the international releases keep the stabbing intact.
  • The Chopperman spinoff much like the Rock Lee’s Springtime of Youth example has none off the violence and dark moments of the main series, just being about Chopper having wacky superhero adventures.
  • 4kids infamously took this up to eleven with initial American dub: flintlocks were replaced with water pistols (and pointing fingers), blood was removed from fights, knives were replaced with rubber ones, spears were replaced with poison suction cups and characters were just “thrown in the dungeon” rather than being shot in the head.
• Oresuki: It tones things down quite a bit in comparison to the light novel and manga. Especially notable in the brief period where Joro is being bullied by the school for his supposed mistreatment of Cosmos and Himawari. Shoes filled with thumbtacks? Nah, just decorate them real cute. Desk vandalized and covered in all kinds of gunk? Nah, just have them turn it into various artworks like a model golf course. Beatings behind the school? Toilet water dumped over the stall on his head? Just cut it out completely.
• Pokémon: The Series is considerably lighter and softer than the games, as while the games are generally light, they do delve into dark elements, especially in the villains and Pokédex entries. The anime doesn't have that. Some dark elements still show up on occasion though, especially in the movies. In the show itself, they just don't stick very long.
  • Example A: Due to trauma stasis, the two episodes involving Team Plasma fighting Team Rocket and creating mass destruction in Castelia City were not aired, and the Team was introduced in a different way in their less morally ambiguous Black 2 & White 2 forms.
  • Example B: Almost every single criminal organisation or villain either has limited screen time, focuses on Team Rocket or are dealt very quickly without any meaningful impact to the plot. And all of them have unsatisfying defeats. A prime example comes with Team Galactic, a villain group from the video games that were pretty dark, who show up in the Diamond/Pearl series in an even Darker and Edgier form....but in just 10 episodes out of 191. Pokémon Black and White are considered the darkest titles by many fans however the anime all but ignores the game's plot. Team Plasma appeared sparingly and was mostly watered down. Pokémon Sun and Moon also features a dark plot, however the anime watered it down by leaning towards comedy and changing the main villain Lusamine from an emotionally abusive mother to a loving-but-neglectful one
  • The anime itself has gotten lighter and softer over time. It's most noticeable with the violence. Violence against humans, comedic or otherwise, isn't as common (or as graphic) as it was in the first seasons. Battling is also less violent.
  • The games make it clear that Pokemon eat each other and many Pokedex entries are quite dark. The anime, early episodes aside, avoids implications of eating Pokemon and often changes Pokedex entries.
• Powerpuff Girls Z, the anime adaptation of The Powerpuff Girls, lacked all the Family-Unfriendly Violence and Nightmare Fuel elements of the original cartoon, being mostly a Magical Girl series.
• Puella Magi Kazumi Magica is this to Puella Magi Madoka Magica, which in the time of its viewing was so notorious in making Magical Girls suffer so much that the viewers themselves behind the fourth wall wanted to call "FOUL!" unto what was done to the Magical Girl genre. Okay, The Power of Friendship is heavily emphasized, they know that witches came from Magical Girls and best of all a happy ending all rolled into one manga series.
• As both series are intended to be comedies to the core, it would be inaccurate to claim that either version of Ranma ½ is Darker and Edgier then the other. The anime version can still be seen as lighter and softer then the manga. Not only does it lack the somewhat darker storylines that the author created after the anime was cancelled... which includes, among other things, a Villain of the Week whose father was technically killed by Genma, Ranma meeting his mother — and then being threatened with Seppuku because Happosai dressed him in girl's clothes, Ranma being trapped in female form by a group of more powerful and much more vicious martial artists, and Akane being kidnapped, near-drowned and then changed into a doll, an almost fatal experience, over Jusenkyo... but also removes several of the more Comedic Sociopathy moments from shared storylines. Examples of this include Akane's viciously vindictive speech to Ranma after the first Nekoken incident, Happosai's attempt to murder what he believes is baby Pantyhose Taro because he thinks Taro will become an even better Panty Thief then himself, and the ending of the Hypnotic Mushrooms story, which in the anime ends with a gag and in the manga ends with Akane surrounding herself with weapons to use against Ranma if he "tries something" while Ranma gives her a Deadpan Snarker response.
• Princess Diana: The anime omits some of the more....grisly bits of Diana's life, such as the death of her brother John and Camillagate.
• The anime adaptation of Rosario + Vampire definitely is this. It cuts out most of the darker story arcs that crop up later in the storyline, while considerably softening many of the earlier ones, and generally portraying a lot of antagonists as less evil than their manga counterparts. For example, the Attempted Rape element of Mizore's introductory arc was removed completely, while Ruby's master Yukata, a notable Knight of Cerebus, was reduced to a tragic Posthumous Character. Finally, Tsukune's ghoul transformation, a major contributing factor to the series' Cerebus Syndrome, was ignored completely.
• Sailor Moon played this straight for Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon. Some elements were toned down in the anime compared to the manga, but it wasn't lighter. For instance, in the first story arc, only Usagi dies (from using the crystal's full power) and Mamoru revives her with a kiss; whereas the anime version had everyone brutally die in pure Nightmare Fuel.
  • The Sailor Moon SuperS season was hit with this trope pretty hard. This is mostly because the S season was incredibly dark and people actually complained. The Outer Guardians were Put on a Bus, Chibi-Usa became the focus character and the Myth Arc concerning Pegasus is turned into a Filler Arc of sorts with the two Quirky Mini Boss Squad groups being a lot more quirkier than they should be. Sadly, this hurt the franchise badly and the season was Cut Short, forcing its sequel, Sailor Stars to start off by tying up the last loose end the previous season left.
• Saint Seiya Omega is noticeably much less violent and gorier than the original Saint Seiya, having also a more light-hearted tone.
• While School-Live! is still a pretty dark and depressing series, the anime softens up the tone considerably by having even more lighthearted and comedic moments then what the manga already had, as well as having more emphasis on the Slice of Life element of the series. Plus the anime ends on a bittersweet but optimistic note. The anime leaves out some of the really dark events, such as extra casualities for some Red Shirts that Miki and Kei met at the shopping mall, Yuuri having a massive mental breakdown that wrecks her sanity completely, and the implications that the cure used on Kurumi needs to be taken weekly or she'll become a zombie again. The anime ended before the University arc, which was the point when the manga got really dark.
• In some ways Shiki anime is this compared to the manga and, especially, the original novel. At least one character had his worst traits from the manga sanitized in the anime to make him more sympathetic, and in the original novel Natsuno never rises from the dead, while in the manga and anime he does. Of course, even if this is true, the anime itself is still really, really dark!
• The anime adaptation of the original Slayers novels has its fair share of emotional turmoil and grisly moments (enough to be denied the right to air on the old Fox Kids network back in the late 90s, believe it or not), but in general it is much lighter in tone and sillier (replacing the female protagonist's First-Person Smartass humor from the novels to slapstick). Also, the character Xellos, an Affably Evil demon-priest, is far more sadistic in the novels, whereas his affably-evil attitude in the anime makes him comical. A story involving a cult supporting the world's Big Bad was also never bought into anime form. Most of the manga and video games that followed are also this trope.
• Soul Eater's sidestory manga from the same mangaka Soul Eater Not! appears to be a twist of this from the first three chapters. It is focused on a period prior to Sid becoming a zombie (an event from Chapter 1 of the manga) and looks at how new normal academy students (instead of how badass seniors) fit in. Along with how students can raise money, waste money, get their names (Eternal Feather for example) and live in academy quarters.
• While the games aren't much darker than most Nintendo properties, the CoroCoro Splatoon manga is a lighthearted gag comedy that downplays — if not outright ignores — the Backstory Horror and darker plot threads from its source material in favour of focusing on a team of underdogs playing in various tournaments.
• Stitch!, the anime adaptation of Lilo & Stitch and Lilo & Stitch: The Series, is not just more lighthearted than the originals, but also replaced the human characters, and is possibly an alternate version of the series entirely.
• Tekkaman Blade OVA sequel was much softer, D-Boy's mental wounds have healed up (And kicking ass), Everybody Lives in general and it also has quite the Hotter and Sexier makeover (more female transformations than male transformations.)
• Tentai Senshi Sunred's anime incarnation removed all references to sex in the original work, toned down the language and turned all the beatings Sunred causes into Amusing Injuries at worst. This made the show palatable for the same audience that would normally watch the genre it's parodying and it ended up being broadcast in the afternoon (most anime is aired post-watershed).
• The 1977 animated short The Rose Flower and Joe (Bara no hana to Joe) by Sanrio Animation and Takashi Yanase is the most lighthearted work compared to the studio's works. While it does share a similar melancholy tone as Ringing Bell, the Unico films, and The Kindly Lion. It's entirely lifting since it's about a homeless brown dog developing a romantic crush on a rose flower and protects it from a black crow. While it does have a Bitter Sweet Ending where Joe and the rose flower both die together. It's more positive, since Joe (now an angel) actually manages to reunite with the flower by hugging and kissing it, before the two are lifted up to heaven by a cloud.
• Thumbelina in comparison with the original fairytale. Every unpleasant or outright villainous character gets heavy Adaptational Heroism (or, in the Scarabee’s case, Adapted Out), and the heroine’s only major problem is surviving through the winter until she gains access to the elf kingdom where her prince lives.
• The Ultra Series has this with Ultraman Kids, a Spin-Off Babies anime entry in the franchise.
• Variable Geo:
  • In the original H-Game series, there was only one penalty for losing which applied to all matches: the victor had to leave the ring, while their opponent was publicly raped by members of the audience, or the tournament committee.
  • The OVA adaptation nixes this aspect altogether. Instead, the loser simply has to strip, which only applies to matches at level-3 and above^note Jun's match with Yuka was only at level-4, making it a preliminary, so she didn't have to strip. Jun chose to, because she felt not doing so "would be weak". Though the penalty for losing at level-1 mandates they have to strip and masturbate for the crowd. Such scenes are either censored, or occur just off-screen.
• The Ultimate Muscle anime adaptation downplays the bloodbaths in most of the really violent matches seen in the manga, the stronger sexual jokes are absent such as Mantarou having erections, and the times where Rinko/Roxxane was captured and had her clothes torn apart, to the point her bra and panty are shown, were changed so her clothes were mostly kept together.
• Yu-Gi-Oh!:
  • The original Yu-Gi-Oh! manga was quite violent and bloody, especially in early chapters when Duel Monsters wasn't as big of a thing. The second Yu-Gi-Oh! anime has less death and violence and more card games, albeit with lives and the fate of the world at stake, and characters still die in backstory. Yu-Gi-Oh! The Dark Side of Dimensions, though manga-based, has characters sent to other dimensions and bloodlessly attacked by shadows.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! GX was more upbeat than the original series, at least until season three began.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds, which had a gritty apocalypse story, was followed by Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL, which is a much more optimistic series with a space-age theme and more focus on comedy.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V focuses on entertainment duels, with many hilarious scenes, and the whole show centers around the five summoning methods, including a new method introduced in the show. And then, it all goes to hell.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh! VRAINS was an extremely bleak Cyberpunk series due to most of its Duels having much higher stakes than usual, so Yu-Gi-Oh! SEVENS revisits the "children's card game" aspect of franchise and has a Denser and Wackier feel due to its characters being Affectionate Parodies of various character and deck archetypes commonly found in the previous six installments.
• Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead takes on a more comedic and interesting approach to the Zombie Apocalypse genre: the main characters see the apocalypse as both a massive improvement over their old lifeless jobs and a once-in-a-lifetime quest to do things that truly made them happy. The anime takes it further by painting the zombies' blood with multiple colors to match the overall themes of the story.

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