More Anime Washing Ashore In 2001

da3dAlus writes: "Gundam Wing has been pulled from the Toonami block on Cartoon Network, and the 4th season of DBZ is coming to an end--but that's not nearly the end of the anime hitting U.S. cable TV. CNX: Toonami Revolution has more word on series to premiere on Toonami within the next 4 months. These include Outlaw Star (which is supposed to air as early as January 15) and the original Mobile Suit Gundam (which is set to air in mid March). Among the possible future series are Cowboy Bebop, Magic Knights RayEarth, and Rurouni Kenshin. In the meantime, you can catch an encore presentation of Blue Submarine #6 on January 5, and take heart in knowing that CN has the rights to air the remaining DBZ episodes when they're ready."

Comments

why anime on tv is good.

[bludstone]

I see alot of people in this thread complaining about mangled and edited anime on tv.

Anime on tv, regardless if its edited or not, is a good thing. Its not like they are keeping you from seeing the original un-edited versions. Just go out and buy the dvds. What these tv showings of Blue6 and Tenchi do is expose more people to anime. More anime fans (even newbies) means more money for anime companies, which means more money for buying rights to shows like vandread! (good thing)

Ive heard of a few experiences of people liking escaflowne on fox (even the mangled version) buying the first dvd and being amazed by it. (esca first episode was basically skipped by the fox broadcast).

If it makes you guys feel better, anime companies are not part of the MPAA, and after talking to some of the studio peeps, dont even like region encoding or macrovision.

So please stop complaining. America already has the least expensive anime in the world. Titles are upwards of 60$ a disc in japan. You also get both audio tracks and some other bonuses.

December was qiute the month in the anime dvd area.

Re:why anime on tv is good.

[ProfKyne]

If it makes you guys feel better, anime companies are not part of the MPAA, and after talking to some of the studio peeps, dont even like region encoding or macrovision.

I hate to be a pessimist, but if anime gets greater widespread appeal, how long do you think it will be before the MPAA subsumes anime companies? Or they just create their own anime companies, and use the leverage of their resources to win out on import rights? Or, in characteristic MPAA fashion, use their leverage to keep small-time anime companies from getting access to airtime?

I hate to say it because it iselitist, but the fact is that the widespread acceptance of a cultural product (such as anime) usually ends up watering it down. Not that widespread acceptance inherently must dilute culture, but rather that big-time businesses take an interest and then exercise their typical "lowest-common-denominator"ing on the products in the process of capitalizing on them.

Anime on tv, regardless if its edited or not, is a good thing. Its not like they are keeping you from seeing the original un-edited versions.

I'd rather see a few high-quality UNEDITED anime shows on the Midnight Run than a whole bunch of Sony-mangled cartoons on a few channels. Why? Because pretty soon, Japanese animation studios will have to consider the almighty American Market when making new shows, and will start censoring themselvesto ensure that there is no problem in exporting the shows to the States. And if that happens, we won't have to worry about getting the unedited version, because the unedited version will have been candy-fied to American standards.

This process of intentionally or unintentionally changing other cultures' cultural products, often for the worse, is known as American cultural imperialism.

Bebop? On CN?

[Microlith]

It's a virtual impossibility, unless they plan to air it only on the midnight run. Even then, it faces heavy editing.

When Cowboy Bebop aired in Japan, they only aired 12 episodes on TV Tokyo, because many of the episodes were deemed too violent (if you've seen any of the Spike v. Vicious episodes, you know).

If it couldn't air in it's entirety except on Japanese cable, there's no chance in hell it'll survive the knife on CN.

Kenshin, too, will face a hard time. And that aired untouched on japanese broadcast (though you'll never see the OVA series on CN). They'll probably get some lame Sony-mangled version.

I fear for Bebop and Kenshin appearing on CN, unless they get real brave and show 'em only on the midnight run.

Diversity

[robbway]

This thread is going to rapidly devolve into "My Favorite" vs. "Show X Sux." I'm glad anime is going (sort of) mainstream. Although many anime series are animated better than their American counterparts, most are cheaply animated, simply drawn, and generally lesser quality animation. However, they are different. I especially like how many anime series and films won't hand the plot directly to the viewer. The Tenchi series are great examples of that.

I like it. I like it a lot.

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After Tenchi On CN

[tenchiken]

I really doubt that CN is going to let Bebop thru. As it was, the best Bebop episodes (IMHO) did not even air in Japan due to timeslot considerations. Also, for the most part, the series we have seen so far have had typical "happy" endings. Several of these Animes do not.

Which is not to say that this is a bad thing per se. But...

The real question imho, is why someone has not yet picked up a series that is taylor made for America, plenty of explosions, slapstick humour, real plot and no nudity. Slayers.

(Rumour had it Slayers was picked up by SCI-Fi, but so far nothing).