CaptainStarwind

Just cut out early then, no one is stopping you! Admittedly, I'm not happy Bebop is taking another run directly after the last, but it's all the way at the near end of the block, and to be honest with you if they didn't rerun Bebop there they probably wouldn't have the slot anyway, so it's not like it's taking up a premiere slot.

You're overreacting to this. What are you expecting? That Toonami is going to be putting out 5 new original shows a year? I doubt it. DeMarco may not make the best choices for the block all the time, but he isn't stupid. He isn't going to throw all the money the block has at producing original shows. They probably didn't even need to pay much at all for either Samurai Jack Season 5 or FLCL 2 and 3; it wouldn't surprise me if Adult Swim proper footed a large portion of the bill for both, especially in the case of the latter, since it's been stated numerous times that FLCL is Williams St.'s favorite anime. At best, I see Toonami being able to do one original series every couple of years with their current budget. They know they need to license anime to even have a change of surviving now.

Yeah, I'm aware of Nagato Yuki Chan, though I haven't watched it yet. I'm currently working my way through Welcome to the NHK, though I haven't watched it in like two weeks, since I haven't had much time. I was also watching Kimagure Orange Road, but I'm honestly considering dropping that one, or at least cutting back on watching it. The main character pisses me off to no end and I'm starting to get frustrated with his stupidity. Mind Games was also awesome.

So I was correct in thinking they would replace Outlaw Star with FLCL Season 1. Not the most exciting of choices, but it's the one that makes the most sense. I figured they would rerun Bebop. Given that they now have the space to do reruns again, I was expecting that they would do it eventually. I'm honestly surprised they pushed Black Clover back that far. I haven't been checking up on ratings since mid October, so is it really tanking that badly? Now we get to speculate about show replacements for DBZ Kai, Gundam, AND GITS. I'd be down for a Champloo rerun replacing GITS, at least.

I think it's a combination of factors that pushed it back. Ratings are definitely a part of it, but they probably also pushed it back in anticipation of whatever show is coming in to replace Gundam. One less schedule change they'll have to make.

I didn't think it was too bad. Sure, it wasn't like the first FLCL, but it's rare that a sequel can live up to the hype of the original. If people were expecting this to be exactly like FLCL then they deserved to be disappointed. If that makes sense I guess lol. My point is that I liked it, and at the end of the day it's my opinion that matters to me the most.

You're taking this far to seriously, man.

It was a half sarcastic suggestion lol.

Speaking of that I just finished watching that. I'm not sure why I haven't watched that before, to be honest with you. I watched The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya last when I was still in high school, which would have been 5 years ago at this point. The best answer I could come up with was it's length, or just wanting to give something else a try at the time. This probably isn't the thread to discuss this in but whatever. It was a good movie, I thought. I really enjoyed the drama with him making his choice, and how they leave it to the audience as to whether or not his choice was the right one to make. I honestly don't know what choice would have been the right one. But anyway, great movie and a great way to spend my last day off. To make this somewhat on topic, Toonami could air Madoka Magica on April Fool's Day with TOM 4 bumpers voiced over like they were airing on the KidsWB version of Toonami.

I've spent so much time trying to catch up on Toonami shows that that's about all I've been watching for now lol. I'll watch this tonight now that you've brought it up. I'm working third shift now but I'm off tonight, so I probably won't even attempt sleep until 7 in the morning.

But they did that in 2016, so you can even make an argument that them doing nothing is expected.

It wouldn't surprised me if they tried again. But with the way things are turning out it won't be just mature action shows they'll be looking at: horror and even thriller will be on the table. Which brings me to another theory: Toonami will try to air Death Note again.

While I would love for this to happen, I think something like this is too normal for an April Fool's joke. Even after the Rick and Morty prank last year, Adult Swim would still rather screw with people somehow, I think. Airing The Room with Toonami bumpers is something I could see happening. Personally, I don't think Adult Swim would ever air The Disaster Artist. Why air that when they can just air The Room? Airing a block full of Hamtaro is something else I could see possibly occurring. Or hell, maybe they'll just draw mustaches over everyone's faces.

I've a theory about this. When Toonami first relaunched, I think DeMarco did make an effort to find and air shows different from what Toonami used to air. Deadman Wonderland was definitely more violent and gory than anything Toonami had aired before. Casshern Sins, for all that people found wrong with it, was still a very depressing show, one that would not have found it's way onto Toonami or even ASA in the past. Samurai 7 was definitely lighter in tone, but I wouldn't go so far as to call it a shonen. Eureka Seven was (barring the ASA leftovers) the first show on the revived Toonami that you could accurately call a shonen, and even then, it doesn't follow a typical shonen formula. This seems to indicate that DeMarco's initial intent was on keeping his promise that the new Toonami would air more mature shows, different from the ones that aired on the Toonami of the past. The only problem with this was the ratings. I'm sure that everyone can remember that the initial ratings of the revived Toonami weren't the greatest. Better than the remnants of ASA, for sure, but not by much. I can't really say for certain what happened, but this is my theory: Since the ratings for the block didn't show much of an increase over the autopilot ASA ratings, DeMarco and crew were struggling for a justification to keep doing the block. Initial viewer enthusiasm would have worn off by mid summer, so the block would have settled into normal viewer ratings by August, I think. They can say all they want about how "they did the block as a bonus to their regular duties" and how they "weren't being paid for it", but if the ratings for the block got too low, Adult Swim almost certainly would have pulled all the anime for comedy; they may hold some goodwill towards anime fans, but they're, at the end of the day, a business. DeMarco and crew had to find some way to increase ratings. First, they got rid of the rerun block. Even if the last three hours of the block were just three hour long blocks of reruns, at least they weren't reruns of show that aired that night. I think DeMarco knew that would help slightly, but not much in the long run. So, he turned to shonen. Despite his initial statement that Toonami would air more mature shows, the fact of the matter is that shonen is higher rated than other anime. While the block already had a shonen (Bleach), ratings tended not to hold well after the first show after the shonen. Add to that the fact that Bleach was going on hiatus for two months (which they certainly had to know about beforehand), and Toonami had a ratings crisis. They needed another shonen for the block if it was to survive. If they had the option, they would have went for DBZ Kai. I'm certain of it. Nicktoons had that at the time, though, so anything Dragon Ball related was off the table. So, they went for Naruto. It was less expensive than Shippuden, and they probably figured they could get people to watch using the nostalgia factor. I'm willing to bet they picked up Tenchi GXP with the same reasoning. While Tenchi wasn't exactly successful, Naruto was... After that Toonami focused on picking up shonens to bolster the ratings. Soul Eater, One Piece, IGPX, SAO, Shippuden, and AoT are all proof to this. When Toonami finally got the point where they could try more mature shows again (Black Lagoon, Hellsing), their mismanagement of the block led to it being cut in half for 2015. With the reduced block that was left, they figured that they'd rather get the best ratings for it possible, rather than keeping to their promise of airing more mature shows. We still got mature shows in the succeeding years, but they all tended to be more optimistic than the shows we got in the past. It wasn't really until Tokyo Ghoul that we got another really dark show, and we all know how well that went over on here. But in the years since 2015, online and streaming have largely been supplanting cable as the primary method for watching TV. Ratings for TV shows are down across the board, and Toonami is no exception. They've gotten to the point where even shonens can't keep the ratings up anymore. So they decided to "shake things up" by airing things other than shonens. That's my theory. I apologize for the wall of text but I can get wordy when I really get into something. TL;DR: 2012 ratings forced Toonami to abandon it's promise to air more mature shows. When they tried to do it in 2014 the block got cut and they aired more shonens to keep the ratings up.

Personally, I don't mind watching anime (pretty much the only TV I watch other than ESPN anymore) either online or on TV, but I always enjoyed watching it on TV just a little bit more. It feels like it's a bit more special to me that way, if that makes sense. I'm also not a huge fan of being able to watch whole seasons of shows at once. It works for some shows where the pacing drags (Shippuden being a good example), but it's completely unnecessary for most shows.

I would love to see anime on weeknights again. While I don't think Toonami would actually go for it (DeMarco seems to prefer running Toonami on Saturday nights only), I'm confident in saying that if it we're to happen, now would be the most likely time for it. I'm really glad to see that Toonami is willing to pick up something other than action shows. Admittedly, it would be a bit odd for me at first to see something other than an action show on Toonami, but I think the time has come where Toonami has to evolve somewhat in order to survive. Toonami is really the last place on basic cable where you can watch anime anymore, so I think it was inevitable that we would get to the point where Toonami would show things other than straight action. I'm actually kind of excited to see what they pick up. As long as nothing is live action. I'd rather Toonami end than air anything live action.

Actually I was able to tell he was being sarcastic pretty easily...

Okay even I can't deny that line is pure gold.

Some would say that Aliens is a pointless sequel too. Just because there's no need for a sequel doesn't mean it won't be good. I'll wait to judge it until after I see it.

Kari's voice for Haruko has definitely changed, but I think I can get used to it. June 2 for the Season 2 premiere makes sense. Assuming they start on April 7, that gives them 8 weeks, one of which will be a marathon for Memorial Day. Hell, if they were so inclined they could probably just hold off on airing FLCL until Memorial Day itself, and have that for the marathon.

I'll be glad for Toonami to air anything different, at this point. I'm getting tired of seeing the same shonen tropes being played out over and over again for every show that the block picks up. I don't hate shonen, far from it, but I think I'm overdosing on it. I'd be up for seeing more horror oriented shows, personally. Of course, if Toonami takes this in the OTHER direction (live action), then I probably won't be so happy.

Bite me

By that logic the block should never have aired Kill la Kill. Was the show animation cartoony enough that it didn't count as boobs to DeMarco?

I really do hope airing double Bebop from the start is just an April Fools joke. I don't mind Bebop airing on the block but it's had a run and it needs a rest. Six months at least, if not a full year. Airing FLCL from the start is something that they should do anyway in preparation for the new seasons, so I can see that as a possibility. There's also the option (if the new show is going to be airing at the top of the block) that they can pull another rerun out. Even assuming they don't get some other old Toonami show, they still have some show contracts left so they can do a rerun if need be. Or they can show Big O Season 2. Personally, I think we'll see Re: Zero premiere at the top of the block, and a rerun of FLCL at the end of the block. Alternatively they could double up on FLCL and get a 4 airings of the show in 12 weeks, but I don't think they'd be willing to do that.

Yeah this is why I don't write posts when I'm sleep deprived lol. Shift the dates but my point still stands. If we don't see a show promo or hear something this Saturday, next Saturday at the latest, I think we can assume double Bebop is going to be a thing for a while.