Nice Hat/Anime and Manga

A-E

 * Shalott of Air Gear has a Nice Hat and a Pimped Out Dress.
 * Angel Beats!: Yuri wears one while issuing commands at headquarters, Naoi has a nice one too, as part of his uniform, and Angel wore one in episode 7 in the garden.
 * Angel Blade: Phantom Lady's helmet is her most distinctive feature..
 * The Holy Roman Empire in Axis Powers Hetalia. Prussia has been seen with one during the War of Austrian Succession. Turkey also sports one alongside Mask Power. Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Sealand, and Egypt (if a keffiyeh counts) normally wear hats, and Liechtenstein, Sweden, Hungary, Poland, Switzerland, Finland, Norway, and Denmark have all had character designs with hats, though not all necessarily nice ones.
 * Baccano!:
 * What's the best part of rising up through the ranks of the Camorra? For Firo Prochainezo at least, it's the awesome new hat that they buy for him (a fedora, of course). Having a senior executive buy a new executive a hat the day before his promotion is a tradition of the Martillo family. It's such a nice hat that when he's goaded into a fight with Dallas and his thugs, he takes special care not to drop it, and returns it promptly to his head when he's finished soundly thrashing them.
 * Generally speaking the mafia place value on hats which, while not particularly flashy, are still quite nice hats. In the scene where Firo gets his Fedora, we also see Isaac and Miria buy off a huge stash of ludicrous hats and helmets.
 * Black Butler is full of nice hats. Considering the time period the series takes place in, hats were a must for men, women, and children when leaving the house, at least for the wealthy.
 * Ciel wears a top hat whenever he goes out, which often has a ribbon or some other decoration on it. The most memorable hat is probably the one he had to wear while crossdressing which included a ribbon, bow, and many flowers. There's also the adorable paperboy hat Ciel wears when he goes undercover.
 * Oh, and the hat from the Curry episode. How one can wear it without it falling off is anyone's guess. It must involve several hairpins and the will of God.
 * Undertaker's hat is also rather nice. It has that nifty ribbon thing flowing down off the top.
 * In Black Cat, Sven is almost always seen with his hat. It's become part of his Memetic Outfit.
 * Dr. Black Jack quickly acquires a black fedora in the Black Jack 21 series. There's no particular reason for it; it's just there for the sake of looking cool (which it [[media:fedorasareawesome.jpg|totally does]]).
 * Gretel of Black Lagoon wore a Nice Hat for a brief moment in episode 15.
 * Bleach:
 * Kisuke Urahara's stripy bucket hat has gotten quite a lot of respect from fans, as evidenced by this avatar
 * Also, Shunsui Kyoraku's straw hat.
 * Ulquiorra Cifer's half-helmet mask remnants may count.
 * Ruri'iro Kujaku's crested turban.
 * Among the Vandereich, Kirge Opie has one of these. A currently unnamed Dark Action Girl who was introduced  has a spiffy Commisar Cap.
 * The main character of Bodacious Space Pirates, Marika Kato, sports a bicorne in accordance with pirate tradition.
 * Yacht Club member Ai Hoshimiya wears a little hood-thing with a suggestion of cat ears that's very cute.
 * Genzo Wakabayashi, the SGG (Super Great Goalkeeper) from Captain Tsubasa always wears his trademark hat.
 * Cardcaptor Sakura has some nice hats from time to time, unsually but not always made by Tomoyo to match the outfits Sakura wore while looking for Clow Cards.
 * Mr. Tiellagory of Le Chevalier d'Eon has a sweet hat with a nice big feather in it. Durand is the first character to damage it in a Sword Fight, only to find that damaging the Cool Old Guy's hat is often followed by swift humiliation.
 * Later in the series, while fighting a pack of magically enraged dogs, a shot cuts to Tiellagory holding his hat, surround by them. When another character rushed to his aid, he turns to them and says, "My hat..." following which the dogs fall down dead.
 * After Code Geass's Lelouch Lamperouge, he makes himself the nicest hat in the world. It's got a freaking winged eye on it! The artbook version is even more extravagant.
 * Kotori from Da Capo sports a nice hat as part of her school uniform. Interestingly enough, her school uniform is different from every other girl, but no one seems to care.
 * The Millennium Earl of D.Gray-man wears a different one every time he shows up; there have even been contests for fans to design more of them. General Cross Marian has an epic hat as well, along with a Badass Longcoat and a mask covering half his face. You cannot find a more badass outfit anywhere.
 * Digimon likes hats, although not as much as gloves. Sora, Mimi, TK, Yolei. Hirokazu had a Nice Visor.
 * In one episode of Digimon Adventure 02 Takeru "TK" Takaishi's signature hat becomes an indicator of his state of mind when he crumples it and throws it to the ground in anger -- disturbing Cody who, prior to that moment, saw TK as a Cheerful Child -- just before he storms off on his own and physically attacks the Digimon Emperor. Later, once his anger had abated and his usual affable persona had been mostly restored, a still visibly shaken Cody gives him his hat back. About the only other time he takes it off is toward the end of the series as a solemn gesture of respect and mourning during the death of Yukio Oikawa.
 * Tommy from Digimon Frontier wears an orange hat 1.5 times the size of his head. In real life, that hat would be ridiculously ugly. He takes it off several times in the series. Every character except JP wears a hat or some type of headgear. (Takuya -- goggle hat, Koji -- bandana, Koichi -- baseball cap (in flashback scenes), Zoe -- purple cat-eared beanie)
 * Celty from Durarara!! has an awesome helmet – it has kitty ears! Also a bit of a plot point: it covers her lack of a head.

F-J

 * Veronica from Franken Fran sports a snazzy black fedora number.
 * Juvia and Bisca from Fairy Tail.
 * And from Hiro Mashima's earlier work, Rave Master, we have Deep Snow and his ginormous hat that is in the realms of "Pope or Not Pope."
 * The H-manga Fudotei Student Academy (by Unagimaru) plays with this trope hilariously, as the confident, powerful, and dictatorial student council president becomes incredibly shy and meek when her German Officer-style hat is removed. Fortunately, the protagonist falls in love with both sides of her, so it's okay.
 * In Fullmetal Alchemist (Brotherhood), Kimblee is never seen without his fedora and white suit.
 * Future GPX Cyber Formula:
 * Asuka wears a rather impressive sun visor in races, complete with pink hearts on each side in the first two series (and in the first episode of ZERO). Miki, the series' resident Wrench Wench, wears a nice cap with her name on it.
 * Gudelhian wears a cowboy hat most of the time when he's not racing.
 * In Galaxy Express 999, both Maetel and Tetsuro wear distinctive hats. Maetel's is a tall, almost cylindrical fur hat, Tetsuro's is low, rumpled, and very wide-brimmed. Tetsuro's hat was made by the mother of Tochiro, who wears a similar hat.
 * Gankutsuou:
 * The Count frequently wears a nice top hat.
 * In episodes 4 and 5 Albert wears a nice pirate hat.
 * Kuroudo "Doctor Jackal" Akabane from GetBackers always wears a wide-brimmed hat with a cut in the brim. All damage Kuroudo's clothing ever sustains quickly regenerates except for that one cool cut. The creator lampshades this by mentioning how the hat brim (along with his hair and coat) seem to get longer every time he shows up.
 * Zangetsu the Midday from Giant Robo: The Day The Earth Stood Still only appears for about ten or fifteen minutes, in the final episode. However, fans of the show have taken quite a liking to him, if only because of his nice hat.
 * Quite a few people were concerned that, three hundred years into the future, the United States Navy may tailor fanciful hats as part of an officer's standard uniform, as evidenced in Gundam 00.
 * Van from Gun X Sword sports a nice hat with a Jigen notch, a ring on one side (which he spins the hat around with to indicate its Humongous Mecha time), and is apparently pretty precious to him, considering we never see him without it.
 * Hell Girl (a.k.a. Jigoku Shoujo):
 * Wannyuudou has an awesome wide-brimmed hat. In the first two seasons, he's rarely seen without it -- which is understandable since he's bald underneath. In the third season, Ai's helpers are usually seen at school in disguise, so the hat appears less often.
 * Ai herself has been known to wear a baseball cap with her symbol on it.
 * The "Girlycard" version of the protagonist of Hellsing in the prequel The Dawn wears a white pillbox hat that at least once fanartist has shown being eaten. Alucard's and Alhambra's awesome fedoras ain't no slouches, either. Have a look.
 * Higurashi no Naku Koro ni:
 * The main villain in Kai instantly gets a nice hat (a beret, which could be a subtrope in itself) following The Reveal.
 * Rena's white cap that she wears in her "casual" outfit could also count as a Nice Hat.
 * Iono Mito Archeline of Iono the Fanatics. See [[media:iono_cover_v1.jpg|here]].
 * JoJo's Bizarre Adventure:
 * Baron Will A. Zeppeli in Part 1 has a rather awesome checkered top hat. After, Speedwagon wears it for the rest of the part. In the second part, Zeppelli's descendant Caesar has apparently inherited the hat, though he sadly ditches it after his introduction.
 * By the third part, both Joseph and his grandson Jotaro have picked up nice hats -- Joseph with a tan-colored Panama and Jotaro with a biker's cap that seamlessly blends with his hair at somewhere around his ears.
 * And nearly everybody in Part 7 Steel Ball Run has a hat of some sort. Most notably, Gyro Zeppeli's cowboy hat, and Johnny's hat with a horseshoe adorned on the front.
 * Every Jojo fan knows that Part 2 Joseph is the king of nice hats: in one of the Part 2 chapter covers he wears at least three at the same time. Joseph's "hat stack" is something of a meme within the fandom.

K-O

 * Cornelius Alba, a magus from Kara no Kyoukai:, wears a [[media:corneliuschool_9289.jpg|distinctive red top hat]]. It's never commented on, but he does seem to be the type of person for which it would pass without comment.
 * Katekyo Hitman Reborn:
 * Uni wears the same Nice Hat that her grandmother, Luce, wore.
 * When Tsuna and his guardians get, the Varia have another illusionist by the name of Fran who is wearing a frog-shaped hat that is so large he can't even get his arms over it. We learn later when the Varia first went to recruit him, he's always had an odd taste in hats, as he was wearing a giant berry-shaped one...
 * And what about the titular character of the show? Surely Reborn's signature fedora counts.
 * Nonon Jakuzure from Kill la Kill is Never Bareheaded, even while "wearing" her Nudist Beach outfit (which is little except two holsters and a bandoleer, other than the hat); usually wears a black or pink cap with a skull on the front.
 * Kobato.'s hat (and outfit) changes every day mysteriously (considering she has little money and no possessions) and there are hints that Kobato should never take off her hat for reasons unknown as of yet.
 * Mama from Kodomo no Omocha is never without a hat that provides a perch for her live squirrel, Maro-chan. And she never wears the same one twice.
 * From K-On!, resident straight-woman Nodoka Manabe's police hat, worn once during one of the school festivals, which shows up in a disproportionate amount of fan-art despite its ridiculously short-lived appearance. Some claim it adds to her hot nerd appeal.
 * Ritsuko's German army helmet from Kujibiki Unbalance.
 * Lupin III:
 * Jigen's hat, in addition to being a fedora and therefore granting instant coolness, also holds the secret of his superhuman marksmanship -- he sights along its brim.
 * Lupin also wore a fedora once in the manga when not in disguise. Also, many of the covers for the original manga series featured him in one.
 * Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha:
 * Vita, from A's and StrikerS has a stylish red hat complete with stuffed undead bunnies on each side, and quickly got serious when Nanoha tore it.
 * In that same incident, the first clue that the Wolkenritter aren't all bad is when Signum shows up and the first thing she does is repair Vita's hat. The hat was a gift from their master, and they all love her very much.
 * Hayate has her beret, which Evil Twin Material-D conspicuously lacks.
 * In Mahou Sensei Negima, Natsumi gets a nice hat as part of her artifact.
 * MIYU's Traveller's Hat from Mai-Otome, so spiffy her canary made of Nanomachines could sit on it.
 * Himari's hat in Mawaru Penguindrum is an impressive piece penguin-themed piece of headgear. It's also a character in its own right and kick starts the plot by bringing Himari back from the dead and then commanding her brothers to find the "Penguindrum" if they want her to keep Himari alive.
 * Shirogane from Monochrome Factor, especially when combined with his hair and Badass Longcoat.
 * Yoite from Nabari no Ou has a pretty nice gatsby. Enough that quite a few people recognize it as "The hat anime." Reportedly, Yoite's hat is what caused many fans to begin the series in the first place.
 * Naruto:
 * Each of the five Kages sport a Nice Hat that is color coded and bears a kanji that matches the village they represent.
 * The Akatsuki used to wear nicely-designed, traditional Japanese-style straw hats.
 * Since it is a pirate manga/anime, there are a lot of Nice Hats in One Piece:
 * Monkey D. Luffy wears the straw hat Shanks gave him . One of the most memorable early moments was when he put it on Nami's head before storming off to liberate her island.
 * This is a bit of a subversion, as it's a very ordinary-looking straw hat that doesn't do anything special (as far as we know), and Luffy values it for sentimental reasons. Still, god help you if you damage it.
 * As for the rest of the Straw Hats: Zoro puts on a black bandanna when he gets serious about fighting. Tony Tony Chopper has a pink top hat the size of his head that his antlers can somehow poke through (After the time skip, he put a blue cover over his top hat that has antler holes AND ear holes). Robin occasionally sports a cowboy hat. Brook has a top hat that he wears ON TOP OF HIS AFRO.
 * Rob Lucci, uses a distinctive top have that he never removes, even while on a secret mission.
 * Admiral Sengoku, who has a whole seagull on top of his hat, presumably stuffed, although the author is crazy enough that it might be alive and calling the shots.
 * All but two of the Eleven Supernovas have very distinctive headgear. Kidd has a pair of studded goggles, Bonney has a turban-like hat, Benge has a mafia-style cowboy hat, Apoo sports a pair of headphones, Killer has a full head sports-helmet looking thing while X. Drake wears a white-plumed cocked hat AND a mask.
 * Ace has a cool hat, too. Fittingly, so did
 * Big Mom's pink pirate hat is actually alive, and it talks! How cool is that? And it can turn into a sword! Her Devil's Fruit power lets her bring ordinary objects to life (her "hommes" as she calls them), her hat (or "Napoleon" as it is named) being one of her favorite and most powerful.

P-T

 * Pandora Hearts:
 * Gil has a very nice hat. He's also a bit overprotective of it; he once released the Power Limiter on the resident Person of Mass Destruction just to make sure he got it back. And it was riding on an arm-wrestling contest.
 * Then there's Break's Nice Hat... the Eldritch Abomination. He also wears a pretty cool top hat in a few chapters. Though what would you expect from a manga heavily based on Alice in Wonderland?
 * Paradise Kiss Isabella and George often include hats in their many outfits. George usually settles for cowboy hats, while Isabella wears spectacular picture hats with ribbons and flowers most of the time.
 * Pokémon:
 * Hero Ash has had his hat stolen by his Aipom, a Mankey that he later caught as a Primeape, and his own Pikachu in the second movie (in order to make Ash follow him). The very first hat he is seen with was said to be earned by tirelessly sending around two hundred coupons to win an official Pokemon League contest, and the other two were given to him by his mom. He has a habit of turning his hat backwards when he's about to get dangerous. In fact, this hat is so Nice it has its own Bulbapedia article.
 * In the Electric Tale of Pikachu manga, Misty used Ash's hat as the goal for the Cerulean Gym battle... against his will. Then it got sillier.
 * Assuming the thing on Brendan's head is hair (seriously, even the artists seem to get confused), his counterpart Ruby from Pokémon Special has a nice enough hat for the both of them.
 * Word of God, it's a hat.
 * Red from Pokémon Special also counts. He had his hat on while swimming, taking a bath, and even when he's literally half-naked in FRLG. It never fell off even in the most dire of consequences only on the last part of FRLG because the writer wanted both Pikachu to return it in the Emerald Saga.
 * There is also Yellow's hat, which she was given by Blue to disguise her identity and had feathers from Ho-oh and Lugia, which came in handy much later.
 * Other main character also have nice hats. Crystal has that weird bowl-shaped hat and Green/Blue has Leaf's nice hat after they were updated to match their game counterpart. Gold has his ball cap, Ruby has his weird hat that appears to be his hair (it isn't), Sapphire has her bandanna, Diamond has his hat and Platinum has her beanie.
 * In the anime, Nando and Riley both have very nice hats.
 * Protagonists all have their own Nice Hats, though May has a bandanna which is a fence example. As of lately even rivals are catching up on the phenomenon. Quite a few NPCs have Nice Hats too, including the first few trainer classes we meet.
 * Shin from Prétear has a nice (turban-style) hat.
 * In The Prince of Tennis, one of Ryoma's trademarks is his Nice White Cap. Sanada has his contrasting Nice Black Cap, Kaidoh uses a Nice Bandanna (or several), Wakato from the anime also uses a Nice White Cap, and the Kisarazu twins started using Nice Headgear (a white cap for Ryo, a red headband for Atsushi) after
 * Puella Magi Madoka Magica's Tomoe Mami has a rather nice beret in her Magical Girl form.
 * The title Oriko Magica has an... interesting and difficult to describe hat. Quite nice, though. Yuma gets a cat-eared hood thing. This is what happens when you have a Touhou fan do character design.
 * Ranma ½ has several instances of this. Shampoo has her odango covers. Multiple characters have headbands or bandanas of some kind. In fact, Ryoga wears several layers of bandanas, and will often attack with them. Ranma's pig tail is bound with
 * Juliet, aka The Red Whirlwind, from Romeo X Juliet. Also sports a billowing cape and Cool Mask.
 * Yukari from Rosario + Vampire is almost never seen without her pointy witch hat.
 * Jin of Samurai Champloo often wears a nice kasa. He uses it to demonstrate just how Badass he is by tossing it into the air before a fight, invariably finishing his foe(s) in time to catch it before it falls below chest level.
 * Some of the headgear of the soldiers of Seirei no Moriboto is quite impressive, in both looks and elegance.
 * Hecate of Shakugan no Shana is lookin' kinda stylish, but where would she be without that huge hat?
 * Knuckles the Echidna of Sonic the Hedgehog fame randomly got a Nice Hat in the Sonic OVA. For the sadness of many (okay, some), the OVA is the only time where he wears the hat. The hat also made an appearance in the Archie comics, and was worn by an ancestor of his. He only wears it in stories set in a future timeline; according to a letter page it's because he doesn't want it to get damaged.
 * Soul Eater:
 * The Thompson sisters Liz and Patty are rather fond of fancy hats.
 * The witches have quite appropriately themed, usually pointy hats.
 * In Star Driver, Takuto's cybody Tauburn is a rare example of a mecha with a nice hat. So does Reiji's Reshbal in a similar fashion.
 * Strike Witches: While it's not something she ever wears in the anime itself, Yoshika Miyafuji has been portrayed in the occasional bonus art and some toys with a nice sailor's cap. It also appears briefly (0:50 to 0:55) in the Over Sky ED.
 * Given that they have the traditional detective ensemble, the four girls of Milky Holmes in Tantei Opera Milky Holmes have colorful deerstalker caps on their outfits. Bonus points to Nero, who wears a similar hat as part of her school uniform.
 * How nice is Kotetsu's hat in Tiger and Bunny? So nice that the fandom rejoiced the moment Sunrise announced that they'd be selling them.
 * In Tokyo Babylon Subaru is always seen in somewhat extravagant hats, all proudly picked out by his sister Hokuto.
 * Lala of To LOVE-Ru certainly has a Nice Hat, nice enough to be pictured on this page. It has wings. It also happens to be an intelligent robot that functions as her clothing.
 * Any high-ranking person in Trinity Blood, most notably the vampire Empress.

U-Z

 * Umineko no Naku Koro ni
 * A few of the witches have Nice Hats, and Erika has a Nice... Doily?
 * The furniture also count, such as Gaap, the Eiserne Jungfrau, and.
 * Kanon, with his nice beret.
 * Amakusa has a military-style hat that he's almost never seen without, complete with bandanna.
 * Kurusu Shou from Uta no☆Prince-sama♪ is often, and perhaps the only one, seen wearing hats.
 * Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust:
 * The title character has a nice Cavalier-style hat with a neat mother-of-pearl pin.
 * The trope title is used as an actual line when Action Girl Leila sees the portrait of Carmilla, whose [[media:carmilla_hat.jpg|hat]] resembles a large red sausage placed on her head, made of part of her hair and odd, cap-like things on the end.
 * A few characters in Victorian Romance Emma can be seen wearing nice hats, mostly the nobles.
 * The outrageous headgear used by both heroes and villains in Violinist of Hameln (manga and anime):
 * Hamel's pointy, wide-brimmed feather hat is a huge plot point, even, since
 * Raiel's hat is even more epic, but it just underlines his usual dorkery. Sizer's dragon helmet is awesome. And Tron wears a very frugal crown. Even Flute's hat becomes iconic. This manga knows about nice hats, evidently.
 * In the Korean comic Witch Hunter, a witch's powers come from her magical hat. Also,
 * Darcia's bejeweled, feathered headdress in Wolf's Rain, complete with White Mask of Doom.
 * Lilith's giant Traveller's Hat with a Great Big Eyeball from Yami to Boushi to Hon no Tabibito. Heck, the Hat is in the title: "Traveller Yami, Hat, and Book".
 * Slyly subverted in Yotsuba&!, in that Yotsuba's most awesome adventures are signaled by her putting on a hat that can be charitably described as a pudding with a brim. Ena's hat, seen occasionally, looks even more like a pudding, without a brim. Not at all nice hats.
 * Yu-Gi-Oh!
 * A minor joke among the fandom: when the monster called Cosmo Queen is played, it is greeted with "Nice hat."
 * Less memetic and more nice: the Dark Magician family all wear stylish headgear.
 * In Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal, Cathy uses an Xyz Monster called Cat Girl Magician. The Cat in the Hat has nothing on this Cat Girl.
 * Yumekui Merry loves her hat, to the point that she panics blindly the first time we see her lose it. This could be an injoke -- her creator was formerly best known for drawing Touhou doujinshi.