Blatch

Girls' Last Tour 4 Last Period: the journey to the end of the despair 8/9 And no, I didn't forget to black the text this time. 😎

Woah nelly, got a lot to unpack here. First of all, I'm happy we're getting MiA S2 and I'm okay with the movie not airing on Toonami, which I had doubts about from the start. At least DeMarco told us it was out of their hands. So, you think we should hold a groupwatch of Dawn of the Deep Soul on this forum? It can be either on Halloween, or in early November (maybe even the night before the show returns to Toonami) if that's too quick. A few other miscellaneous thoughts: I feel like they could've reran Housing Complex C, even though it's only four episodes, but I think the crew is counting on it being written off pretty soon. The upcoming marathon will probably be your only other chance to catch it, is what I was implying in the other thread. Primal reruns are a nice move; frankly, I wouldn't have cared if they lead off the block again. This is probably not gonna happen, but I'm hoping MHA S5 reruns are a placeholder for Bleach: TYBW and they're still ironing out the contract for that one. Don't know where the former would move to or how worthy the latter would be at more than a one-day gap following the premiere, but it's fun to hope. Only one episode of One Piece is looking sus. Hope it doesn't mean bad things for this show on Toonami yet again. Hopefully it's just a budget-saving move, or maybe stalling as Toonamiguy321 mentioned. I should said this earlier, but for DST this year, I was hoping they'd do a stealth premiere of the new Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. It would be fitting given that the first one aired on April Fools Day in the past (complete with tiny size and loud banner ads), plus it also popped up after Toonami in the past. Still, more Primal? Hard to complain about that. At this point, I'm just happy that we're not taking a mulligan on the rest of the year. But 2023 better be a big year for Toonami, Zaslav's fiscal chainsaw be damned, just like it should be for my favorite band ahead of their 40th anniversary. [24-year-old anime fan marcus esquandolas]

Okay, so... I kind of loved that finale? Yeah, I know, this show has the morality of an edgy teenager, but there's something about Kimi being a god in loli clothing (as a Touhou fan, I've seen it), and then feeling so spiteful over her friend being a worshipper of some other god and wanting to kill her that she decides to wipe out all of humanity that's so satisfying. And so was Kimi dismembering Yuri's parents with limbs coming down from the fleshy ceiling, followed by showering her with blood in the grand 90s Nickelodeon tradition, a scene I remember from the very first promo they showed for this series. And hey, I'm glad Kan survived all this too. He seems like a nice guy. There were definitely some problems with this show. I don't think it's an effective horror anime, and I'm not even sure if this finale made the rest of the show worth it, but it's definitely something I'll remember for a while. The show looks good (which, interestingly, has been a trend with all the recent Toonami originals), the voice acting is solid, and it seems like there will be some things that stand out on a rewatch, not like this show is going to get another rerun after the marathon next week. I would personally say Shenmue is the best of the recent originals, although I actually didn't connect with that one as much as other people did. (Mostly, I thought the pacing was a bit mechanical, the plot got too convoluted in the Hong Kong arc, and the ending is a gut punch now knowing that we're probably not getting a second season.) This one was far from bad; I'd give it a 7/10, mostly dependent on the finale. One last thing: in regards to the pacing, when I found out there was going to be a 10-minute infodump (more like eight minutes, after personally timing it) in this episode, I braced myself for the worst. But it at least managed to be compelling. I wonder if the production team wanted six episodes for this show and were only able to get four. That would explain why they stuffed all this lore into the finale like clowns piling into a small car. There were also certain things that could've gotten a little more fleshing out, methinks, like Kimi having reality warper powers (which feels like it came out of nowhere, although I wouldn't be surprised if this was teased at some point), the ancient society that worshipped her (and the analogues for Yuri and Kan within it, who were spotlighted in the OP), an explanation of how the time loop works... but hey, it's not a terrible thing that all of this went unexplained.

Oh wow, thanks for catching that. It's weird for me to not do it, even considering that I'm often caught up in fine-tuning certain parts of my posts and might miss some big errors.

Touhou Hifuu Club ~The Sealed Esoteric History~ Episode 2: "Wish"

I think it's funny that this is happening now given the newest series made a big point of not elaborating on Lupin's origin, not like a savvy viewer couldn't have predicted it. Could this show (which is only half a cours) be Toonami bound? Weirder things have happened, so I'm not doubting it. And HIDIVE will be streaming the series, but nothing has been said about a dub.

It might have been the real unholy megabomb, failing so hard it needed an exorcism. Too bad Toonami had already taken Hellsing Ultimate. Speaking of niche attempts at specialty networks airing anime on TV in the mid-2010's, while I never made it to Chiller's anime block, these comments gave me nostalgia for when Mnet America aired the original Love Live! anime. I feel like I'm the only person who remembers that happened. I have no idea what the reason for it was, being a Japanese series aired on a network that specializes in K-pop. Maybe NIS America's dub came with a requirement to air it on TV? Except I feel like that would've been the case for future installments of the franchise; at one point, I was genuinely expecting (or rather, hoping) to see Sunshine pop up on TBS. Either way, they exited the anime licensing game after that and Funi -> CR have gotten the rest of it. And I wonder what the ratings were for this weird experiment... probably a 0.0 household rating.

As far as new content is concerned, I'm ride or die with Bleach: TYBW. Not sure what else could fill midnight, though I'm also wondering if Toonami has enough left in the coffers to be able to get it. What might replace the reruns is a topic I find more interesting. I have a feeling we're going to get TPN S2, maybe restarting from the first episode of S2 because why not, and then an immediate rerun of either HCC or Lupin. Other options they could throw on include the FLCL sequels (seriously, we're overdue for a rerun of those), Ghost in the Shell: SAC, or even Attack on Titan from whatever season they want. Related to the last one, I think now is the time for [as] to consider giving the show a long-awaited weekday strip ahead of the really-definitely-final season (we mean it this time) coming next year. Now here's an idea: go to Sentai and ask them for HD tapes of both seasons. We need another excuse to use those sweet pillarbox space graphics. If that doesn't work, this is one way they could stall for time.

Yeah, he's always been a bit abrasive when it comes to sharing his opinions on social media. But he supposedly has great taste in music, so I assume that's what anyone else would want to hire him for, assuming they can get past stuff like this.

Ooh, I loved that part. They didn't give him a major role in the plot, but it wasn't necessary. I just wanted some sort of payback after the abrupt shift in plot at the halfway point of the season. Holmes and Lily coming back also would've been cool, though I didn't have it in mind mostly because, well...

Don't mind me, just slipping in to steal the last discussion thread for this show. Kind of remarkable that we've now had three complete Lupin series air on Toonami after [as]'s first attempt at showing the franchise didn't do so hot. So, how do you think this one is gonna end? If Holmes shows up one more time, I'm gonna wild out.

The only bump music I've found annoying is the first one they did for Made in Abyss, and that was more because I thought the track itself was unfitting. (BTW, I just combed over said set of bumps, and outside of that little circular display at the end they used in this packaging to show additional clips, they didn't even feature Reg! How weaksauce.)The second one they used was better, but then they started alternating them, which was weird because the music for Lupin and the like didn't change. Primal had this too, to the point where it used bumps from different seasons. I don't know why they didn't alternate between the two sets they made for the one-hour premiere, but on the plus side, they kept TOM explaining how Primal has won an Emmy right before the scene with all the screaming monkey men, which is pretty funny. It's the one bump I've seen that's like the best ones from the golden years, on [as] or otherwise. It's also funny how they brought back the classic Absolution from 2000 clearly for nostalgia bait, and yet I haven't seen anyone talk about it. Granted, I'm probably not looking hard enough, since I haven't followed Toonami Faithful on Twitter for years. I think it's pretty cool and I didn't so much as sniff the block until '03 or so, with watching in earnest not coming until a decade later, but I sure wish they were doing more stuff with it. Even game reviews are hard to come by nowadays, though the lack of those is definitely more excusable than new bumps.

Personally, even with two bump sets alternating, I still find them to get a little grating. Maybe that's just me. More than anything, I just want the bumps to be current with each show, and I don't think that's too much to ask. Made in Abyss gives you a good idea of how they manage this: it took until Episode 10, corresponding with a major spike in perilous content, for them to change the bumps from the initial arc, which wasn't very representative of the show, and they only did so because of a packaging change. It would've been really awkward for them to show clips of Reg and Riko being all lovey-dovey and fighting with each other, and then cut to a scene where Reg is nursing the critically-injured Riko along with Nanachi. Funny thing is, once the rerun started, they were perfectly okay with showing clips from the episodes in the fourth layer even though those are oblique spoilers for those who haven't seen it. Makes you wonder. This has been a problem as far back as the first season of Food Wars! (so pre-pandemic), where they were still using clips from the first episode (before the MC goes to food school and the premise is fleshed out) during the second half of the season, though at least they gave us a taste (har-de-har) of the famed foodgasms. Funnily enough, I don't think the Lupin Part 6 bumps are that big of an issue, because I certainly wasn't expecting the second half of the show to abruptly shift from the Holmes plot. I mean, they introduced a character based off of Moriarty (maybe he grows up into Holmes's nemesis?) and it feels weird for them to not follow up on that. Maybe in Part 7? These days, my biggest nemesis is the "Explore" tab on Twitter, which occasionally raises my blood pressure with news of rising tensions. Good thing you use that website differently than most people. 🤠

Hah, good call. Definitely. There have been some days where I wonder whether or not *ahem* everyone's going to make it, much less myself. Makes me wonder how Poke has been faring nowadays.

Pessimistic as I may be, I wouldn't say I'm dooming. At the end of the day, I think Toonami's going to stay the course. It's just a matter of whether or not it has stuff I want to watch. And if they manage to get something like Ushio & Tora for November, that's some good cookin', so I'll tune in. Definitely agree with this, especially the bumps part. It'd be nice if they could go back to changing them every month rather than having one or two sets of bumps for each show's entire run. On the other hand, I do think there are some shows left in their rerun pool that could use some more love. They got HD tapes for Ghost in the Shell: Stand-Alone Complex that they've only used once (or nonce, in S1E6's case), and the first batch of FLCL sequels haven't been rerun since right after their initial airings. Put one of those down there along with The Promised Neverland S2, which seems likely to take up a slot in November assuming they don't cut anything.

Yeah, okay. Now I have no idea why I said that. In a way, I have been holding the staff accountable for years, literal years now. (Crazy to think that we can now use this timeframe in regards to the modern version of Toonami!) I just haven't been too vocal about it. For years, the staff has shown an unwillingness to dive into the back catalogues of the companies they work with. I know I've been ragging on them to get lesser-known titles from Sentai, but even when Funi hadn't been bought out by Sony and their oldies were still available, rarely did they ever take from that well. They've also done about as well when it comes to simuldubs and other bleeding-edge shows. All the way back in 2016 I was really hoping they'd get Re:Zero, which turned out to be a big fat one. And then they didn't get any other isekai shows as the genre was increasing in popularity, instead opting to stick with SAO (which isn't really an isekai, but you understand this shtick). So when people are saying this block could get something like Call of the Night, I tend to roll my eyes at it. I think them getting Made in Abyss was a minor miracle, which is a reason why I haven't been too optimistic about Season 2 coming to the block. Then there was the whole matter of them saying they were going to get "non-action shows", which resulted in exactly two pick-ups: Food Wars! and Pop Team Epic, and the latter wasn't even their call; Kim Manning really wanted them to air it, back when she was calling the shots for CN or whatever. Now I assume that was the staff talking out of their ass to explain the pool of possible content decreasing. So that's not a good track record in recent history. But here's the thing: despite those issues being prevalent, Toonami has usually futzed their way into success. In other words, they've still put out interesting schedules featuring shows I want to watch. Among other shows, MiA was a godsend, Gridman was cool, I've finally come around on Lupin after not finishing the previous two series, and all of the recent co-productions were (or are, in HCC's seeming case) at least watchable. Now it looks like, outside of the co-pros, we might not even get that. And there's no one to blame other than whoever's programming things. I have no idea how much sway DeMarco has nowadays, but I bet his fingerprints, which preclude a lack of risk-taking (granted, right now it's primarily apathy toward Sentai), continue to dot what gets put on the block. And if so, I think that's unfortunate. If there were ever a time for some fresh talent to start running the show, it's now, because now is the time when making Toonami an attractive block actually counts. Besides, are we counting on more co-pros that will probably be no better than decent to save the block? Especially not when two of them are more FLCL sequels. 🥴 And as for YashaHime, it could be in the contract they signed that they get dibs on future seasons once Viz has them ready. Maybe WBD can veto that, but if that's the case, they didn't do it for S2.

If the only new thing we have for the last two months of the year is YashaHime, that would be galling. Even last year had Blade Runner: Black Lotus in addition to other premieres. Though it's not like I could blame the staff for this, and I would try not to anyway. And it's not like I'd watch the new Bleach series if Toonami shows it... or would I? 😳

Well, yeah, I knew what they were doing last night. But I figured it could be a precursor to cramming an extra slot in. So my DVR recording of Lupin may have been fucked up, though I have it set to record the last minute before and first one after each show, so maybe I got it up to the ending credits.

This could be something, or it could be a red herring and they're actually doing it to fit a bonus rerun at the end of the block... maybe Ghost in the Shell or something. I do like the idea of less ads on the block, but it makes me wonder how the bumps are going to work.

The thing that stood out to me in this premiere was the fact that it emphasized otaku interests, between the various figurines and cute girl fan art and one character was even playing a Bandori clone. It feels like this show is being made by younger talents than what we've been seeing, which is a nice change of pace. And it looks like we're in for some nice and trashy horror over the remaining episodes, plus some interesting historical allusions (which the show is likely making up, but you never know).

It would be especially fitting because Viz hardly has anything of their own right now. It's all titles related to older series they have, plus the very occasional bone thrown their way from Crunchyroll, like Jujutsu Kaisen. I feel like most people don't realize CR isn't putting it out on home video themselves.

Did you do some day drinking today or were you four drinks deep when DeMarco originally said that? So yeah, disappointing we get no Dawn of the Deep Soul before Halloween, but I was bullish on that idea. The Promised Neverland coming back is a wild swing, but given that they're down three originals due to the recent write-offs, it makes sense. The [as] website only has Season 2, so they'll probably start with the first four. I can totally see this being a prelude to a full rerun in November. As far as new stuff is concerned, I'm thinking it's Bleach: TYBW or bust. I can't see them putting on anything else outside of a possible Sentai catalogue pick, whether they'd have the money for it or not. And I don't think we're getting any movies unless they're DC, because that would take a good chunk out of the budget (which ties into a long-standing theory I have that Toonami only aired Children Who Chase Lost Voices because Sentai offered it for a really really good price, maybe even free).

Touhou Hifuu Club: The Sealed Esoteric History 2 Birdie Wing -Golf Girl's Story- 8 Lycoris Recoil 2 [beer me!]

AFAIK, Netflix has exclusively done union dubs for their anime since 2019. I'm not sure how things would work, but it probably wouldn't be an issue to lure in the necessary actors from the Texas-based talent pool.

Bleach: TYBW? At this point, I'm most curious about how much Toonami has left in the budget for the rest of the year, because we know they didn't have much to start with. It could be that they only have enough to get one more new show for the rest of the year. If it comes to that, hopefully it's Viz that comes through in the clutch and gives them a really good deal for more Bleach.