There’s a couple really cool old anime forums I’ve found before. This one is definitely the coolest, but it’s in French so I don’t really understand very much of it:
https://www.dessins-animes.net/

I’ve been studying Japanese for almost six years now and I would say YES kanji is difficult, but it’s not insurmountable. It’s also one of the most interesting and fulfilling parts of learning the language.
There’s a certain level of “you have to know the rules before you know how to break the rules” but kanji can often be used in interesting nonstandard ways in literature & manga and just in general carry so much meaning and depth.
There’s always something new to learn. Did you know that there’s another version of 探す (to search) that has a slightly different connotation? 探す is usually used to search for something you want, but 捜す is used to search for something that’s missing.

By the way, do we have a Japanese learning community on Lemmy?

Depends on what you mean by “similar”. If you’re looking for the right thing, there are often a lot of phonetic hints in kanji.

For example, 矢 and 夫 sound completely different, totally unrelated. These are pretty basic kanji though; I think it’s analogous to how O and Q are totally different, or i and j.

If there’s more complex similarities though, then yeah there can be an implied phonetic relationship. Look at: 同胴洞銅恫桐粡. These can all be pronounced the same: どう (dou). Though, many of them have kunyomi readings that are totally unrelated.

I’m a MAL user but I love how quirky Kitsu is, like their broad definition of anime including My Little Pony and the top ranking being like 90% Demon Slayer recap movies (it’s an exaggeration now but a few years ago it would not be)