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For the longest time we would see things like energy drinks and other such
items in the mornings with anime now the big one is toast. How long ago did
this start and how did it get so popular?

![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/WNuMg.png)


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2013-07-16T21:31:50.343
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2015-10-18T04:36:16.177
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question
tropes anime-history
When was the anime toast in the morning trope started?


This is a pretty common trope which, I dare say, predates energy drinks and
the like. From [TV
Tropes](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LateForSchool):

> A common device for a series opening or Establishing Character Moment.
> Things begin in a frantic rush which usually results in taking short cuts,
> such as eating breakfast on the run. The classic image is of someone running
> down the street with a slice of toast hanging out of their mouth, dragging
> their backpack with one hand while trying to put on their jacket or sweater
> one-handed with the other, bumping into important people in a manner that
> gets the plot started.

> In manga and anime, this is associated with the shoujo (girl's) genre, where
> the original intent was to establish the protagonist as cute but clumsy, or
> give her a minor flaw. Overused to the point of becoming a Discredited
> Trope; current Japanese "How to Become a Shoujo Manga-ka" books specifically
> advise against using this trope, and more recent manga even lampshade how
> much of a cliche it is.

The answer to the question of when this trope exactly started is currently
unknown. But there's a [tumblr dedicated to
it](http://fuckyeahanimutoast.tumblr.com/) and the current candidate appears
to be 1986's [Project A-ko](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_A-ko) which
is part-parody. It is said to parody Gundam and according to the afore-linked
tumblr, the first episode of [Mobile Suit
Gundam](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_Suit_Gundam) includes a scene with
Amuro Ray chewing on a sandwich in a car:

[![enter image description
here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/cs5L3m.png)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/cs5L3.png)

I expect that earlier instances of this trope very likely exist in manga.


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2013-07-19T06:09:04.193
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2013-07-19T06:09:04.193
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answer