Toonami's Cooked....Long Live AXS TV

[KageRageX]

So...I guess the rumors of AXS's Anime.com hour IS indeed, true after all....as starting...THIS THURSDAY, the block will launch airing Thursdays at 10PM EST with a encore airing Saturdays at 12AM..directly when Toonami starts.

 

The block seems to be doing a weekly rotation of titles. So far, only Fate/Stay night: Unlimited Blade Works(what was initially rumored for this thing back in November) and....MY HERO ACADEMIA??? are confirmed for the block.....

Thoughts on these developments?

[Mr. Idea Box]

I choose to believe the 120+ episode count of My Hero Academia, coupled with the implied format of "two episodes each of one show per week", could result in Toonami still getting Season 7 if they could afford it.

But if AXS somehow outbid Adult Swim for the cable rights to that show? The knife has been twisted even further.

[Jman]

AXS doesn't have the biggest reach, right?  I mean, this block is following TNA Impact, which these days is pretty happily in its niche of being a farm league for the WWE (and they even have signed a talent-sharing agreement, primarily to get TNA wrestlers on NXT so those guys can work with more experienced wrestlers).  

Still, the fact that this block on this music channel got MHA is just more proof of how cooked Toonami is.  

[Sketch]

Dunno if it was money or spite from CR (maybe both) but this no name channel snatching the cable rights to MHA while AS sits in complacency is a real bad look. It might not be exclusive and obviously it’s not season 7 but it could keep Toonami from obtaining more MHA for at least a year if it’s an exclusive cable rights deal.

I hope the block on AXS TV doesn’t immediately get the boot. It has a rather desirable time slot (for the channel) right after TNA Wrestling at 10pm along with an encore opposite of Toonami. It’s only an hour and they aren’t promoting it so far but AXS is giving anime a better time slot than a network that has aired anime for decades. That should really be a wake up call for AS but it probably won’t be.

Maybe CR cut AXS a great deal on just the broadcast rights (no streaming or cable VOD) but there should be no reality where AXS can outbid AS for any anime much less MHA. I really don’t see how that’s possible unless CR showed favoritism in the dealings.

And the worst case scenario is that the AXS block is immediately pulled but the rights they obtained last a year or longer.

 

[Top Gun]

My first thought is that I didn't even think I got this channel, but apparently it's way the hell up amongst the 3 or 4 duplicates of each channel that Xfinity has on the lineup for whatever reason. My second thought is that I don't see this lasting for any particular length of time, and I also highly doubt that them broadcasting MHA episodes that Toonami aired all the way back in 2018 will have any effect on whether or not they air the next season.

[Sketch]

I dunno… it’s been months since the season ended and Toonami has had plenty of openings but there’s no sign of it coming. I don’t think CR sold exclusive broadcast rights to AXS but they very well could have.

[Toonamiguy321]

I mean, Toonami sucks a big one right now. And I cannot stress how much it sucks right now, but even then, i really doubt this block makes a dent in Toonami, if for no other reason, it’s not carried by most normal providers. For those that do have it, they can watch Fate rather than literal FLCL fecal matter, but I feel like those people wouldn’t be watching Toonami those weeks regardless. 
 

No idea what their measure of success will be. Fate and MHA are definitely better options for success than ItaZ and whatever other garbage Chiller aired. Hopefully people who have this and are fed up with the state of Toonami watch it instead, even if just in protest. 
 

It is interesting to see them get MHA, even if it is S1. That changes the perspective of CR wanting to hoard all their content, to perhaps them not wanting to work with Toonami specifically, an issue we couldn’t know about because no one else airs anime. Which is funny, and almost assuredly Demarco’s fault. 

[Top Gun]

9 minutes ago, Sketch said:

I dunno… it’s been months since the season ended and Toonami has had plenty of openings but there’s no sign of it coming. I don’t think CR sold exclusive broadcast rights to AXS but they very well could have.

I mean why would they bother selling exclusive rights to a network that even by zombie cable standards presumably has far fewer eyeballs on it than [as] does? That makes no sense from a business standpoint. But honestly CR blocking out [as] from show acquisitions makes little sense to me in general. The block isn't directly competing with CR's service in any real way now.

[Toonamiguy321]

3 hours ago, Top Gun said:

I mean why would they bother selling exclusive rights to a network that even by zombie cable standards presumably has far fewer eyeballs on it than [as] does? That makes no sense from a business standpoint. But honestly CR blocking out [as] from show acquisitions makes little sense to me in general. The block isn't directly competing with CR's service in any real way now.

It’s not about the money, it’s about sending a message. 

[Jman]

I'm honestly curious if DeMarco seemingly burned these bridges, or if it's a case of Crunchyroll not wanting to work with their former owners for whatever reason.

[Sketch]

Look we all know DeMarco can be abrasive but why are we jumping to the conclusion that he specifically pissed off CR?

The one tweet when he vented about Witch from Mercury? The several times he said CR priced them out? Going around CR to get shows from the Japanese producers? Actually yes, all of those and potentially more. He has periodically pointed directly at CR to blame them for shows never coming to Toonami and one could argue that was stupid and unprofessional no matter how difficult CR has become to work with since Sony bought them. 

He should not have tried to throw them under the bus because his bosses are cheapskates that won’t pay competitive rates for anime.

CR is clearly willing to offer relatively new seasons to other platforms as we have seen with Netflix and Hulu. Netflix gets new Demon Slayer after a few months and Hulu gets MHA and others after a few months because they will pay up. So if AS would pay the same they would probably do business with Toonami despite DeMarco’s behavior. But they’re not about to cut them any of the sweet deals AS got from FUNimation.

AXS isn’t even a blip on the radar so CR just sees this as a way to get a bit more money out of old episodes and if it takes potential options away from Toonami and gives DeMarco the bird then all the better in their eyes. I do see that as petty on CRs part but no less petty than what DeMarco and AS have done. Obviously I would like CR to work with Toonami because they have a vast backlog. As much as I dislike what CR has become and do not think that AS should bow down to the empire to get some shows, I don’t think they are the only parties that are making the relationship unrepairable. I think everyone involved in the on going pissing contest should just grow up.

 

[[classic swim]]

Look, we all know Demarco can be a pussy bitch, but how soon will he waddle into the workplace bathroom just so Zaslav can hit him with a hammer and fartfuck dat rusty brown donut against his motherfucking will?

[Blatch]

The fact that this block is going to be promoting a Web3 (re: metaverse, NFTs, etc.) business makes me feel icky, but hey: it's anime on cable TV, so I'm gonna try to watch this. And the last time I made a point of watching AXS was when they were airing a Yes concert, which was a long time ago.

[naraku360]

11 hours ago, Top Gun said:

I mean why would they bother selling exclusive rights to a network that even by zombie cable standards presumably has far fewer eyeballs on it than [as] does? That makes no sense from a business standpoint. But honestly CR blocking out [as] from show acquisitions makes little sense to me in general. The block isn't directly competing with CR's service in any real way now.

Yeah, and Toonami has brought so many gems recently, like FLCL sequels nobody wanted and an adaption of Uzumaki that pissed off everyone!

[Jman]

51 minutes ago, naraku360 said:

Yeah, and Toonami has brought so many gems recently, like FLCL sequels nobody wanted and an adaption of Uzumaki that pissed off everyone!

One could argue DeMarco had to make more original materials, but the quality of such has been a complete disaster.  

[Toonamiguy321]

7 hours ago, Sketch said:

Look we all know DeMarco can be abrasive but why are we jumping to the conclusion that he specifically pissed off CR?

The one tweet when he vented about Witch from Mercury? The several times he said CR priced them out? Going around CR to get shows from the Japanese producers? Actually yes, all of those and potentially more. He has periodically pointed directly at CR to blame them for shows never coming to Toonami and one could argue that was stupid and unprofessional no matter how difficult CR has become to work with since Sony bought them. 

He should not have tried to throw them under the bus because his bosses are cheapskates that won’t pay competitive rates for anime.

If Demarco didn’t do it, then who did? He is an egotistical jackass who thinks Toonami, as well as himself, is way more relevant than it is, and someone at CR clearly took that personally and decided to humble him by borderline killing his precious block. 
 

Sometimes I wonder if there is more to the breakdown between them over the early originals that were joint projects. Seems like once that deal went south, is around the same time CR started blockading their shows. The issue can’t be that they were shit, because believe it or not, CR has plenty of other original projects from the same time period that were worse. Did Demarco overplay his hand here and tank the deal? Guess we will never know. But what we do know is, Crunchyroll is not cooperative with Toonami and that does not seem to be improving. 
 

7 hours ago, Sketch said:

CR is clearly willing to offer relatively new seasons to other platforms as we have seen with Netflix and Hulu. Netflix gets new Demon Slayer after a few months and Hulu gets MHA and others after a few months because they will pay up. So if AS would pay the same they would probably do business with Toonami despite DeMarco’s behavior. But they’re not about to cut them any of the sweet deals AS got from FUNimation.

I find it hard to believe it’s a budget thing, especially when CR has such a vast catalog. Maybe the big shows are out of range at launch, but we don’t get ANYTHING from CR. They have to go through Toei to get 10 year old episodes of One Piece. We have not gotten a non sequel pickup from CR since Gridman in January 2021. Yet we were able to afford Demon Slayer last year. It’s not a budget thing, there is just no way. 
 

3 hours ago, Blatch said:

The fact that this block is going to be promoting a Web3 (re: metaverse, NFTs, etc.) business makes me feel icky, but hey: it's anime on cable TV, so I'm gonna try to watch this. And the last time I made a point of watching AXS was when they were airing a Yes concert, which was a long time ago.

If Toonami wants to start shilling NFTs in exchange for actually having a schedule again, I don’t care. Let dumb people get rug pulled while I enjoy their money being spent on anime. 

[PokeNirvash]

At this point, I don't care how much of a disaster this winds up being. I'll be in with this block 'til its fiery crash of an end, like the Three Fabulous Weeks of Chiller Ani-Wednesdays before it.

Here's hoping UBW is entertaining enough to continue on my own time like Is This a Zombie? was a decade ago.

[Jman]

While no one is really bullish on the music channel airing TNA to have a successful anime block (and apparently canceling New Japan Pro Wrestling coverage to air it), it is once again a prime example of DeMarco ain’t having no damn money.  He can’t snap his fingers and suddenly this appears - 

 

 

[OwlChemist81]

Tonight's the night for FATE's cable TV debut!!

[KageRageX]

I'm watching IMPACT! right now! Anyone else?

[PokeNirvash]

Heads up: I'm recording the block, and won't be watching 'til Friday night at the earliest. Any thoughts I have on Fate, I'll save for then.

[Greener223224]

I'm just gonna pull up a Perfectly Legal Streaming Website to watch Fate/UBW's dub on concurrent with the broadcast.

[Top Gun]

I'm not sure I'll bother watching this thing: I was never super-interested in the Fateverse to begin with, and from the myriad of nerd arguments I've seen about it, no one seems to agree on what to watch first. There was an ANN feature on the whole franchise a couple of months ago, and that at least recommended starting with the DEEN adaptation of the original Fate route, then watching Unlimited Blade Works. Either way apparently the first episode of UBW is a prologue that's common to all three routes, so maybe I'll at least give that a look.

That being said, the more I think about the setup for this block, the dumber it seems. So you're going to air one show one night, then repeat it a few nights later, okay...but then you're going to switch to a completely different show the following week, so that anyone following one of them will have to wait two weeks in-between episodes? That's incredibly fucking stupid. Just show an episode of each one per week like a normal-ass channel.

[Blatch]

Okay, just watched the premiere. I had a good time, but given the content of the first episode, I don't know if people are going to stick with this one. The character mentioned in the show blurb seemingly doesn't appear in it, unless he was the

Spoiler

dead guy that Rin helped save.

Also, nerdy side info, mostly for Poke: no content rating, no English credits (they sped-up and even cut off the JP credits, smooshing it with a promo for Anime.com), no subtitles for on-screen text (but I don't think this is the case of the show outright lacking it), and most interestingly of all, no content rating. However, Xfinity is showing TV-MA for the blanket. I'm going with TV-14 for this first episode; wonder if yours will differ.

 

[Toonamiguy321]

So if you have been wondering, who signed off on a brand new cable anime block in 2025, apparently it’s this guy. And what does he want to do? Recreate the old Toonami experience. So this isn’t a repeat of Chiller where a bunch of people who know nothing mess with forces they don’t understand. This guy seems like a proper anime fan with his finger on the pulse of modern anime trends. So the complete opposite of Demarco. 
 

Also note the comments where most people don’t even realize Toonami still exists. 
 

If this block had better reach channel wise, this might actually be a threat to Toonami. https://x.com/Zagabond/status/1889913418980720805

2 hours ago, Top Gun said:

That being said, the more I think about the setup for this block, the dumber it seems. So you're going to air one show one night, then repeat it a few nights later, okay...but then you're going to switch to a completely different show the following week, so that anyone following one of them will have to wait two weeks in-between episodes? That's incredibly fucking stupid. Just show an episode of each one per week like a normal-ass channel.

I agree this is dumb and hope they consider changing it. I feel like the only reason they are doing this is to accommodate the occasional odd runtime episode of Fate. 

Edited February 14 by Toonamiguy321

[Sketch]

Finger on the pulse and it’s old Fate and MHA? Yeaaaaah nah. Arguably just as outdated as DeMarco’s picks tend to be at the time. I will give them credit that Fate is still relevant but getting UBW a decade late isn’t any better than Toonami getting Mob a few years late or potentially getting BE Kyoto soon. Don’t even get me started on MHA which Toonami already aired. Where’s Solo Leveling? Where’s JJK? Where’s Re:Zero? Maybe they will happen if this thing lasts but the starting lineup is basically old news. If they can get CR titles why not get something other than MHA which hasn’t been on cable before? JJK is right there and frankly pairs much better with Fate. Watch them get Demon Slayer next.

[Toonamiguy321]

59 minutes ago, Sketch said:

Finger on the pulse and it’s old Fate and MHA? Yeaaaaah nah. Arguably just as outdated as DeMarco’s picks tend to be at the time. I will give them credit that Fate is still relevant but getting UBW a decade late isn’t any better than Toonami getting Mob a few years late or potentially getting BE Kyoto soon. Don’t even get me started on MHA which Toonami already aired. Where’s Solo Leveling? Where’s JJK? Where’s Re:Zero? Maybe they will happen if this thing lasts but the starting lineup is basically old news. If they can get CR titles why not get something other than MHA which hasn’t been on cable before? JJK is right there and frankly pairs much better with Fate. Watch them get Demon Slayer next.

Settle your ass down, it’s the first week of a brand new block, they arent gonna roll out the entire world on week one. This is why new anime blocks never come up, “bro why don’t they have a gold standard schedule on night one? Dropped!” As of right now, this block has more acquired shows than Toonami has gotten in 2025. 

Plus, I wasn’t referring to the shows on the schedule. If you skim his profile, he is running an active list of the hottest anime, as well as points out how other metrics such as MAL are biased. I think it’s tied to his crypto thing, but he still knows all the shows on the list. Meanwhile, Demarco doesn’t know shit about anything besides the logs falling out of his ass everyone hates. 
 

It doesn’t even seem to matter that MHA has been on cable before, because zero people in that comment section are aware Toonami existed and aired things for the past 12 years.

My one concern for this block and its enthusiasm level is that it’s tied directly to crypto. On one hand, that could be a good thing if it prints its own funding and the block grows. On the other, it has the telltale sign of a soon to fail crypto project, where the comments are rife with people like “dude bro this is so FUCKIN lit $$$$$$ diamond hands dawg where by $dumbasscoin homies at?????” who are obviously grossly exaggerating their enthusiasm because they just sunk their rent money into this and need it to pay off. 
 

Ratings won’t be what decides the Fate/Stay Night: Unlimited Blade Works of this block, crypto value will. 

[PokeNirvash]

7 hours ago, Blatch said:

Also, nerdy side info, mostly for Poke: no content rating, no English credits (they sped-up and even cut off the JP credits, smooshing it with a promo for Anime.com), no subtitles for on-screen text (but I don't think this is the case of the show outright lacking it), and most interestingly of all, no content rating. However, Xfinity is showing TV-MA for the blanket. I'm going with TV-14 for this first episode; wonder if yours will differ.

  Hide contents

Ignore this.

Dang, that sucks. I was getting TV-PG, no descriptors, on the AXS website for the blanket rating, so maybe the disagreement was why they left the rating out? TV-14 seems about right as a point of mutual agreement between the two, but all things considered, I might wind up giving this one personalized ratings, assuming what's officially a test-watch of the first episode holds me.

[KageRageX]

How was the block? I fell asleep and only caught like a second while I was sleep.

How did the bumpers and promos look?

I'll try to watch the encore tonight, but just in case I don't, how was it?

[Sketch]

Very minimalistic simple bumpers they didn’t even really plug the website. It had a clean look though.

If the goal is to drive people to anime.com there's like ZERO synergy for that besides including the URL in the logo. Meanwhile at anime.com you can't do anything that relates to the block. Seems like they might have a live chat eventually but it's currently locked. You'd think people pushing crypto and claiming to be building something in the anime fandom that they'd have more going on with their website and social interactions. You can hand wave the lineup due to the limitations of what they can license right away but having basically nothing on the website much less anything that correlates with the TV block, isn't a very solid start for this "movement" as Zag puts it.

But they couldn't have picked a better time to try to draw the Toonami audience away, that is if they were only airing on Saturdays.

Edited February 16 by Sketch

[naraku360]

On 2/13/2025 at 6:54 PM, Top Gun said:

I'm not sure I'll bother watching this thing: I was never super-interested in the Fateverse to begin with, and from the myriad of nerd arguments I've seen about it, no one seems to agree on what to watch first. There was an ANN feature on the whole franchise a couple of months ago, and that at least recommended starting with the DEEN adaptation of the original Fate route, then watching Unlimited Blade Works. Either way apparently the first episode of UBW is a prologue that's common to all three routes, so maybe I'll at least give that a look.

That being said, the more I think about the setup for this block, the dumber it seems. So you're going to air one show one night, then repeat it a few nights later, okay...but then you're going to switch to a completely different show the following week, so that anyone following one of them will have to wait two weeks in-between episodes? That's incredibly fucking stupid. Just show an episode of each one per week like a normal-ass channel.

Watch Fate/Zero first.

Then finish with Fate/Zero.

Problem solved.

[Sketch]

I guess week 4 is MHA eps 3 and 4. So they’re just gonna keep this every other week shit going even when Fate isn’t hour episodes.

[KageRageX]

???

Still better than Toonami's lineup, but PLEASE do better.

[Top Gun]

40 minutes ago, KageRageX said:

???

Still better than Toonami's lineup, but PLEASE do better.

I get the frustration over Toonami, but how is having all of two shows that are a decade old at this point and running them every other week for God knows what reason in any way better?

[Toonamiguy321]

3 hours ago, Top Gun said:

I get the frustration over Toonami, but how is having all of two shows that are a decade old at this point and running them every other week for God knows what reason in any way better?

And what exactly is Toonami offering? A single episode of the longest running Shonen, from 10 years ago. Block isn’t really in a position to throw any stones. AXS at least has the excuse that it’s new and still has to find its groove. 

[Top Gun]

21 minutes ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

And what exactly is Toonami offering? A single episode of the longest running Shonen, from 10 years ago. Block isn’t really in a position to throw any stones. AXS at least has the excuse that it’s new and still has to find its groove. 

At least there are multiple shows airing every week, albeit most of them reruns at the moment. Mashle kicked ass, and that's a show I probably never would have found on my own. (No idea why the hell we couldn't go right into season 2 though.) As moribund as things are now, Toonami still feels like something resembling a cohesive block of television, or at least much more so than airing a pair of anime series for an hour every other week.

And I don't see how any offering on a niche cable channel has the luxury of "finding its groove" in the year 2025, given how few eyeballs are left on cable overall. You'd think the opposite would be true, that a new programming block would want to start things off with as big of a bang as possible to get viewers to tune in. That's what [as] did when it brought back the Toonami brand over a decade ago, kicking it off with multiple new premieres in short order. Or look at what SyFy did with Ani-Mondays back in the day: they blew everyone's faces off with the premiere of Solid State Society, then bangers like Noein and Macross Plus (and Tokko was there too for some reason). Maybe I'm wrong and this thing has some actual staying power, but right now it feels like someone's vanity project, and it wouldn't shock me if it swiftly goes the way of Chiller's weird little anime experiment.

[PokeNirvash]

Toonami may be in a rough spot right now, but as long as progamming doesn't pull any bullshit moves like [as] did back in the latter half of '08 when they shunted Geass and Moribito premieres off to the graveyard slot, I'd say there's hope for improvement no matter how dire things look otherwise.

AXS TV's block, meanwhile, is simply there, and I'm content with that, too.

[Toonamiguy321]

13 hours ago, Top Gun said:

At least there are multiple shows airing every week, albeit most of them reruns at the moment. Mashle kicked ass, and that's a show I probably never would have found on my own. (No idea why the hell we couldn't go right into season 2 though.) As moribund as things are now, Toonami still feels like something resembling a cohesive block of television, or at least much more so than airing a pair of anime series for an hour every other week.

And I don't see how any offering on a niche cable channel has the luxury of "finding its groove" in the year 2025, given how few eyeballs are left on cable overall. You'd think the opposite would be true, that a new programming block would want to start things off with as big of a bang as possible to get viewers to tune in. That's what [as] did when it brought back the Toonami brand over a decade ago, kicking it off with multiple new premieres in short order. Or look at what SyFy did with Ani-Mondays back in the day: they blew everyone's faces off with the premiere of Solid State Society, then bangers like Noein and Macross Plus (and Tokko was there too for some reason). Maybe I'm wrong and this thing has some actual staying power, but right now it feels like someone's vanity project, and it wouldn't shock me if it swiftly goes the way of Chiller's weird little anime experiment.

Had this block started in January, it would be competing with Mashle as well as the misguided hopes we had new stuff coming in a few weeks. Toonami would still have had the edge. If Mashle had rolled right into S2, Toonami would be the clear winner. But that’s not the case, instead we have two not so good blocks, but AXS has the edge because they are actually trying right now. 3 months into 2025, AXS has 2 anime license acquisitions, Toonami has 0. 
 

In April, even if we only get Lazarus, I think the needle will trend back to Toonami, but for now, Toonami isn’t in a place that allows being on a high horse. 
 

As for the future of AXS, it has two things going for it. One, the guy running it actually knows anime. Chiller’s biggest problem was it was clear no one working on it knew anime at all. Two, it’s not a complete slave to its cable ratings. No one expects this block to perform well ratings wise because this channel is so niche. The blocks purpose is to push the anime.com NFT collection. If people buy into that Ponzi scheme oops I mean investment opportunity, the block will continue on. So if you want to check on this block’s future, check its associated NFT valuations. If they go into the toilet, the block is done. 

[PokeNirvash]

Alrighty, finally got around to packing away the first UBW episode off the recording from my parents' DVR (which I am able to access online from the comfort of my own apartment). While a clear verdict won't be given 'til the week after next, I can safely share, based off of just the one episode by itself, that I am digging this, despite the hints at Shakugan no Shana levels of senseless loss of innocent bystander life, and will continue watching from here on. Probably gonna skip the My Hero also-rans, though, since there'll be little to differentiate it from the [as] broadcast and my grudge against Horikoshi for what he did to Midnight and a bunch of his other sexy lady characters is still lingering.

My personalized content rating for "Prologue" is TV-PGLV, on account of a single (uncensored!) use of "goddamn" from Rin, all the clashes between Archer and Lancer (and the former's few with Saber at the end) being bloodless, and the bloodiest moment outright being the aftermath of Shiro getting mortally wounded offscreen. Blatch's TV-14 sans descriptors is an equally acceptable rating given the above, but between my having no metric for AXS's arbitrary rating selections, the closest thing I have to a third-party metric being what I can remember of Ani-Mondays' ratings, and my own metrics coming first and foremost when it comes to personalizeds, I feel my rating works best for me personally. That's all there is to it.

Spoiler

Also, the reason why they cut the OP from the first episode? They didn't. The first episode came with no OP, entirely by design. It'll be next Thursday that we see whether or not "ideal white" gets the axe.

 

Edited February 20 by PokeNirvash

[Greener223224]

I honestly thought it was gonna be MHA episode 1 twice in a row. Congratulations for not being the absolute worst case scenario.

[Sketch]

They listed it for an hour under the title of ep 2 but did play trimmed down versions of eps 1 and 2. No OPs, no previews, no EDs, they kept at least one eye catch but no credit roll whatsoever. Pretty sure having no credits at all is a violation of some kind.

Over at the website they will premiere their own anime on February 27th with NFTs. Enter the Garden: Fractured Deflections. Visually, it does look better the FLCL Grunge and some of Uzumaki. Big 2000s Gonzo vibes.

 

[Top Gun]

Oh man, I forgot all about these dweebs still trying to push NFTs in 2025 until Toonamiguy mentioned it. All the more reason for me to blissfully ignore their block.

[Jman]

NFT’s are still a thing?  I thought the entire market was declared worthless a few months ago.

[_lost_username_]

On 2/10/2025 at 9:35 PM, KageRageX said:

So...I guess the rumors of AXS's Anime.com hour IS indeed, true after all....as starting...THIS THURSDAY, the block will launch airing Thursdays at 10PM EST with a encore airing Saturdays at 12AM..directly when Toonami starts.

 

The block seems to be doing a weekly rotation of titles. So far, only Fate/Stay night: Unlimited Blade Works(what was initially rumored for this thing back in November) and....MY HERO ACADEMIA??? are confirmed for the block.....

Thoughts on these developments?

Man, Thursday nights ... I think that used to be Adult Swim night back in 2001, right? 

Of course, the only anime they played was Cowboy Bebop at that time. I think there was Midnight Run still going on the other nights with Outlaw Star and Big O?

Anyway, probably not going to make much of a dent in things. Hardly anyone watches AXS and Adult Swim is swirling the drain along with other linear cable networks. I think if this happened on a a free TV channel like Comet TV or MeTV, it'd have more impact.

[Toonamiguy321]

40 minutes ago, Jman said:

NFT’s are still a thing?  I thought the entire market was declared worthless a few months ago.

Existing NFTs are mostly worthless, but anyone can start a NEW NFT collection that totally won’t go the same way as all the others and convince people to buy them and then cash out before they crash to nothing. 

[Top Gun]

10 minutes ago, Toonamiguy321 said:

Existing NFTs are mostly worthless, but anyone can start a NEW NFT collection that totally won’t go the same way as all the others and convince people to buy them and then cash out before they crash to nothing. 

So what I'm hearing is that it's the perfect time to launch Excited Boat Monkey Club!

[KageRageX]

I wonder if Azuki's original anime will air on the block at some point.

[Toonamiguy321]

2 hours ago, Top Gun said:

So what I'm hearing is that it's the perfect time to launch Excited Boat Monkey Club!

That sounds much better than apes that are unenthusiastic about large, personal watercraft. Where do I send my life savings? 

[PokeNirvash]

NFT or no NFT, an anime I haven't seen airing on an American television network I have secondhand access to at least is that. So yeah, it won't be 'til this experiment goes belly-up that I watch UBW elsewhere.

[Blatch]

The thing about NFTs is that, while the general public has largely moved on (assuming they ever really took to them in the first place), there's always going to be a niche market of hyper-whales who are willing to stake money on a proof of stake that may or may not pay off. It's like how some anime mobile games stay afloat, the difference being that rolling for SSRs is cut and dry, while NFTs are often a means to an end that the token collectors probably don't care about. So how many people who buy the Anime.com tokens do you think will actually watch the show it's promoting? If something like this didn't work out for Neopets, it probably ain't gonna for you, blud.

Spoiler

Besides, this is a way more effective marketing strategy: