Without a doubt, Mamoru Oshii is one of the most acclaimed and important anime directors around. His entire career has pretty much been a nonstop train of landmark works. After directing a few episodes here and there of various late 70s anime, he got his big break as director of Urusei Yatsura, the legendary series that put Rumiko Takahashi as well as himself on the map. Oshii directed just over 100 episodes of the show and then did 2 movies, the second of which, Beautiful Dreamer, is largely seen as the ‘birth’ of his career, as it was the first work to feature his signature mind-bending style.