C&C - Toonami Talkback [4/1]

[Sketch]

I am all for CN using Saturday PT for an action block and getting 9 pm back on the weekend. No premieres on Friday unless they want to lose big ratings to Disney. Weekday premieres work best for CN despite losing 9 pm.

3-5 pm is no better for comedy than action. Remember CN is NOT for us. Kids want MAD, Regular Show and Adventure Time in the early evening hours because they are not always home by 3 or 4. Action reruns lose to comedy reruns in the same slots. It is only natural that CN would air comedy in more important slots.

3 - 5 pm would suffice for more viewable reruns of Pokémon, Ben 10, Star Wars and DC series. I'm not saying 4 - 6 pm or 5 - 7 pm would not be more ideal but those shows are lower priorities to CN right now. The most you can hope for is that Boomerang starts airing more action series alla Nicktoons.

DC Nation could certainly expand if ratings warranted it. Likewise CN could disband DCN and use the shorts and live segments through a unified Saturday morning or evening block but DCN is specifically a hype machine for DC products. It does not have to be but that is what they are doing with it. That's a discussion for another thread though.

 

[KYO'NYUU IMOUTO]

"Leeching bastard, you've killed my Toonami!"

1. As I never get tired of saying, Toonami was more than anime.

Of course. The problem here is that's all anybody is brainstorming about here, hence why I was addressing why turning some potential Search for Toonami (damn, second Star Trek reference for this thread) into a sort of savior quest for the Japanese comic/animation fandom was a little hasty.

4. You say the "built-in fandom" already expects to get programming outside of TV. If that's true, the obvious question to ask is why so much of it is clamoring for Toonami right now. If you mean the built-in anime fandom that doesn't overlap with people who saw and liked Toonami, realize that (a) that's a rather limited group and (b) those people have largely been there all along and so don't count.

Not to boil you down to 'heresay', but is that not what the current definition of "tons of people clammoring..." boils down to? 'Ten thousand re-tweets' is easy, but it's not a defined and bankable figure to go on for a company in the business of making money in the safest way possible.

As for which fandom I'm referring to, it's the fandom in general. Why stay up when you can grab the home video or go through under-the-table means? Why not just stream it instead? Toonami worked ten years ago because the Earth was a far damn better place back then. Of course the numbers will speak for themselves as to when or if this Search for Toonami gets it's Katra re-instated, but right now we're at the point where the mantra ought to be "hope for the best, expect the worst [based on obvious cards going against it]."

What I take away from your post is "bringing back Toonami might not be such a good thing if they handle it wrong." But of course "if" is the key word there; this is a hefty assumption to make.

That's not quite what I was getting at. If anything, I don't think there is any manner in which Williams Street can handle the Search for Toonami that might lean towards being 'right' in relation towards Japanese animation. To re-use a line from my last post "Japanese animation is already in the red." This has been something we've been led to believe for years now and the industry certainly hasn't gotten better.

 

[Lighthammer]

I am all for CN using Saturday PT for an action block and getting 9 pm back on the weekend. No premieres on Friday unless they want to lose big ratings to Disney. Weekday premieres work best for CN despite losing 9 pm.

See --- in my ideal world, Cartoon Network and Adult Swim would play nice. Basically, I'd like see the lines blurred a bit where Toonami is concerned. A rigid "Toonami must end now because Adult Swim is beginning / ending" feels very counter productive to scheduling.

Now something that has to be acknowledge (and pointed out for those who don't know) --- [AS] and CN are two different legal entities and its understandable that, for spending and income purposes it might not be WHOLLY feasible, but ultimately I think it really is logistically plausible to simply say "Ok, from 7-9 is on Cartoon Network, they foot the bill and get the profits, from 9-12 is Adult Swim, they foot the bill and get the profits". Another possibility entirely (and maybe safer for the future) might be to separate Toonami into its own legal entity and give time from Cartoon Network, Adult Swim (and maybe Boomerang) to Toonami. That would really give them more maneuverability and magically some of these concerns about demographics goes away because Toonami will target who they feel they need to target. That being said, it would be nice if Adult Swim and Cartoon Network play nice with their properties.

3-5 pm is no better for comedy than action. Remember CN is NOT for us. Kids want MAD, Regular Show and Adventure Time in the early evening hours because they are not always home by 3 or 4. Action reruns lose to comedy reruns in the same slots. It is only natural that CN would air comedy in more important slots.

Something to point in the broad spectrum of things --- for me the main time play comes in from acknowledging that CST and MST does exist. 3PM EST is a horrible time almost exclusively because that translates into 2PM CST. There are *A LOT* of cartoon viewers in the CST time zone. MST certainly carries viewership too, but generally, not in the number scopes CST does based on demographics. This isn't wholly relevant to your arguments, but I felt this was a good thing to point out non-the-less.

That being said --- I think as a general rule we can agree from 3-5P has viewership problems for a slue of logistical reasons. Kids are getting home from school activities, etc. Idealistically, in my mind, I don't want to elicit a SOLID reason to make kids want to rush home. School activities are something they should enjoy.

3-5 is a stigma left over from Fox Kids and Kids WB when that was the time the networks gave them before they moved onto more adult orientated program. We don't necessarily need to dwell on that. This is a network for animation after all!

That being said, to me the more important aspect is when to start and what viewers you want to target when you do.

DC Nation could certainly expand if ratings warranted it. Likewise CN could disband DCN and use the shorts and live segments through a unified Saturday morning or evening block but DCN is specifically a hype machine for DC products. It does not have to be but that is what they are doing with it. That's a discussion for another thread though.

I'll take that one to another thread soonish --- I think this would be an interesting topic to really discuss in a much more broad sense.

 

[Hawkeye]

Why not just stream it instead?

Two reasons. First, (for me at least) watching on the tv on the couch beats sitting in a desk chair watching on a smaller computer screen.

Second, there is a community aspect to a defined set of episodes airing weekly (or daily). It provides distinct content to discuss with friends online and off. While people could just stream whatever they want to online, the community aspect of watching the same thing other friends are watching is lost. For instance, I'm sure a lot of Toonami related stuff is available to stream somewhere or other online, but a rebroadcast on television watched close to simultaneously nationwide is what really brought people together and kickstarted discussion.

 

[Sketch]

Well Jacob let me stop you right there because we don't need to talk about if this would necessarily benefit Adult Swim or even any anime companies. Adult Swim asked people if they wanted it back. Which means regardless of anything else they're willing to give it a shot.

I highly suggest making a stream on top of a broadcast but there is still value to broadcast. Here's the thing about the value of the broadcast though. People still do watch television as it airs believe it or not and we're talking about rather dedicated people. ASA already does reasonably for it's time slot. A little more life injected into that and some better promotion and they might have something there. Furthermore while this doesn't mean they couldn't just do a stream, free dubs are harder to get than free subs for the majority of shows. Which is why this has value beyond the sub-only streams and the 2 to 4 episode previews Hulu from FUNimation.

Yeah it's late and that's why I think 9PM is a better start time for Toonami on AS and comedy can have the early morning hours to catch the people coming home from parties and bars and such. Only Family Guy does particularly well in the first 2 hours and when they experiment with other comedy than The Boondocks or American Dad in the 11 hour it usually goes south. So I don't think it's entirely out of the question they could get those better time slots 9PM - 12AM and end earlier if the right deals are in place to make up for not using Family Guy at 10:30 PM. But I also think simply running their existing anime block in those hours and comedy in the early mornings on Saturday would actually improve the average for that night because where Saturday is really struggling is 9PM as it's very skippable and after 2AM when viewers are not interested in watching philosophical debates but would rather get some cheap laughs. 12AM-2AM generally does very well and arguably comedy would not do better in those hours due to people not being home to watch it. They use the dedication of anime fans to make those hours work right now. I think they could do the same with 9PM-10:30PM (everything before Family Guy) and also get 10:30-12AM even with their current line-up. They just have to believe more people will watch and right now they are determining if that is the case.

However, 12AM-2AM isn't exactly useless either. Premieres have done well there in recent years and any amount of TV exposure is good for the anime airing on ASA. It seems like FUNimation wants to stake their claim of those hours again because ultimately streaming doesn't pay the bills and TV airings even late at night can still do more than just streaming can.

See --- in my ideal world, Cartoon Network and Adult Swim would play nice. Basically, I'd like see the lines blurred a bit where Toonami is concerned. A rigid "Toonami must end now because Adult Swim is beginning / ending" feels very counter productive to scheduling.

Now something that has to be acknowledge (and pointed out for those who don't know) --- [AS] and CN are two different legal entities and its understandable that, for spending and income purposes it might not be WHOLLY feasible, but ultimately I think it really is logistically plausible to simply say "Ok, from 7-9 is on Cartoon Network, they foot the bill and get the profits, from 9-12 is Adult Swim, they foot the bill and get the profits". Another possibility entirely (and maybe safer for the future) might be to separate Toonami into its own legal entity and give time from Cartoon Network, Adult Swim (and maybe Boomerang) to Toonami. That would really give them more maneuverability and magically some of these concerns about demographics goes away because Toonami will target who they feel they need to target. That being said, it would be nice if Adult Swim and Cartoon Network play nice with their properties.

Something to point in the broad spectrum of things --- for me the main time play comes in from acknowledging that CST and MST does exist. 3PM EST is a horrible time almost exclusively because that translates into 2PM CST. There are *A LOT* of cartoon viewers in the CST time zone. MST certainly carries viewership too, but generally, not in the number scopes CST does based on demographics. This isn't wholly relevant to your arguments, but I felt this was a good thing to point out non-the-less.

That being said --- I think as a general rule we can agree from 3-5P has viewership problems for a slue of logistical reasons. Kids are getting home from school activities, etc. Idealistically, in my mind, I don't want to elicit a SOLID reason to make kids want to rush home. School activities are something they should enjoy.

3-5 is a stigma left over from Fox Kids and Kids WB when that was the time the networks gave them before they moved onto more adult orientated program. We don't necessarily need to dwell on that. This is a network for animation after all!

That being said, to me the more important aspect is when to start and what viewers you want to target when you do.

Toonami ending at 9PM isn't exactly counter productive unless action on Adult Swim started at 9 you see.

I'm not seeing how CN and AS do not "play nice" Brak and Zorak are back on CN and Toonami showed up on Adult Swim. That's plenty of evidence that they are willing to share but they will do so only when it seems like ratings or interest can be garnered. Star Wars the Clone Wars also has been shared due to it's adult draw. Potentially other shows could be but at the end of the day CN has plenty of time for their shows and AS has plenty of time for theirs. The only possible casualties there are the shows that blur the lines but they are handled on a case by case basis. I don't think the various cancelled shows of CN's recent past would have survived any better on Adult Swim. Not even Sym-Bionic Titan. ThunderCats maybe but mostly because of all the nostalgic value it has.

Honestly I don't trust CN with Toonami. Not until the current guys leave, I'm not looking to get them fired I just don't want them bringing back Toonami only to cancel it again and make it look worse to potential feature CN executives. I'm all for them establishing an action block that would lead into Toonami on ASA though.DC Nation deserves prime time and so do ThunderCats and The Clone Wars. Be that on Saturday or some other night that isn't Friday.

In a more ideal world Toonami would be an all ages block that could mix top American action cartoons with uncensored or lightly censored cartoons from other parts of the globe. But demographics are in place for advertising reasons and the Toonami name has much more value with adults now than kids. It could have value to kids again but I don't see CN's current guys making use the brand much less doing so well if perhaps no other reason. I certainly would not mind CN and AS sharing Toonami but if AS were to start their Toonami at 9PM... unless it cut off at 11PM I don't think it makes much sense to have a Toonami block that runs through CN time into AS time and the demographic issues it would ensue would be numerous. No I think if CN wanted to target Toonami at older audiences but on their time then they could simply take back the 9 hour and even the 10 hour on Saturday. Why complicate things with a split but if they did that it's a bit unlikely they'd allow TV-14 shows on it and that's the main value of airing Toonami on Adult Swim, less or no censorship.

You can't make a few hours a week of programming a separate entity. Adult Swim didn't get that until it was airing 6 days a week for 6 for 6 or 7 hours. They could make half of Boomerang Toonami sure but unless they got a bunch of new action shows that would get stagenate as all get out in a hurry to have Toonami for 6 hours a day. A block on Boomerang is plenty feasible for rerunning CN's action programming over the years and whatever Warner action series they have on hand still but that would require a lot more bumpers than one night of programming and without the potential benefit of having something to help pay for it.

3-5 is not a good time for the reasons you mentioned and that's why CN would give that to action. If they assume their best hope for ratings is with total viewers then they'll play action mid-day. As far as trying to get kids to watch action they do so entirely in the morning hours because they want to keep reruns of their top comedies in those easier to catch evening after school hours before prime time. They tend to run nothing of importance 2PM-4PM as it is. It's far from ideal but it might be the best you can hope for from CN. When you think about it, weekday mornings isn't an awful time to target action cartoons to young boys but I do wish action could get more visible slots at least one day a week and if Saturday morning is the best we can hope for that's rather disappointing.

Getting back to Toonami on Adult Swim. There is a great deal of potential there and for once they wont have to worry about skewing too old. I never thought they'd even consider it as ASA was always attempting to be "your big brother's Toonami" but often failed miserably at that due to lack of atmosphere in recent years as well as airing shows like Kekkaishi that probably would have been cancelled within weeks on Saturday Toonami like several other shounen anime.

As the Toonami audience is now the Adult Swim audience it makes a lot of sense to try it. ASA while not doing bad is still likely on the chopping block and Toonami might very well be able to save it even if they went about this with minimal effort. Because anime is much more popular with 18+ now in America than kids it seems to me like pushing new anime with the Toonami brand is much better suited for Adult Swim at this point and CN's own action programming can do without Toonami just fine.

 

[Lighthammer]

Well Jacob let me stop you right there because we don't need to talk about if this would necessarily benefit Adult Swim or even any anime companies. Adult Swim asked people if they wanted it back. Which means regardless of anything else they're willing to give it a shot.

I highly suggest making a stream on top of a broadcast but there is still value to broadcast. Here's the thing about the value of the broadcast though. People still do watch television as it airs believe it or not and we're talking about rather dedicated people. ASA already does reasonably for it's time slot. A little more life injected into that and some better promotion and they might have something there. Furthermore while this doesn't mean they couldn't just do a stream, free dubs are harder to get than free subs for the majority of shows. Which is why this has value beyond the sub-only streams and the 2 to 4 episode previews Hulu from FUNimation.

Something I've mentioned long, long ago is I firmly believe streaming is *NEVER* going to catch up to live TV until places like Hulu break down and add a "live stream" or invest heavily in cross promotions.

The biggest reason is: streaming has proven to be a destination activity or a companion activity. Rarely do people go and explore other things the streaming media outlet has to offer. They go and look for what interests THEM and usually don't explore.

A live stream would be a first step to trying to fix this and make things like Toonami more readily available to people without cable.

That would have been an awesome way to introduce streaming but oddly, the technology wasn't around to do it that way when Jet Stream first came out. I wonder if now if people would view that as "controlling their viewing" and not watch it out of spite now.

As the Toonami audience is now the Adult Swim audience it makes a lot of sense to try it. ASA while not doing bad is still likely on the chopping block and Toonami might very well be able to save it even if they went about this with minimal effort. Because anime is much more popular with 18+ now in America than kids it seems to me like pushing new anime with the Toonami brand is much better suited for Adult Swim at this point and CN's own action programming can do without Toonami just fine.

You know --- the way this all went down --- it seems to me that the people who want to bring back Toonami are *NOT* decision makers at CN, AS or even Turner. It seems like it was a campaign built up by a sect of people at CN/AS who wanted to try to prove Toonami still had value.

I don't think we'll ever get the full story on this, but I wouldn't be surprised if this stunt actually risked people's jobs trying to make the point.

 

[Action Bastard]

You know --- the way this all went down --- it seems to me that the people who want to bring back Toonami are *NOT* decision makers at CN, AS or even Turner. It seems like it was a campaign built up by a sect of people at CN/AS who wanted to try to prove Toonami still had value.

I don't think we'll ever get the full story on this, but I wouldn't be surprised if this stunt actually risked people's jobs trying to make the point.

That's absolutely not the case.

 

[Sketch]

Welcome to the board.

You say that is not the case.

Would you care to clarify why you feel that way?

I figure they had to get approval from Lazzo to do the stunt.

 

[chdr]

https://twitter.com/#!/adultswim/status/187653853339074560

"#BringBackToonami We've heard you. Thank you for your passion and interest - stay tuned."

Did we win?

 

[GWOtaku]

I won't say that until it's really done...say rather that we're advancing on the battlefield.

 

[soundmonkey44]

[Adult Swim]'s latest Tweet made me very VERY happy! I look foward to hearing more at their upfron later this year (hopefully *knocks on wood*)

But yes, if a miracle happens and Toonami does comeback, I just hope it will eventually be balanced out with a decent amount of new & classic anime & action content. Also think it would be a nice place to show re-runs of Thundercats, since CN can't seem to give it a decent time-slot or decent advertising.

 

[Raidon Makoto]

https://twitter.com/#!/adultswim/status/187653853339074560



Did we win?

I think we did.

And to everyone that told me that "blocks don't come back," I believe you all owe me one ingested hat.

 

[Rynnec]

Did we win?

I'd say that we're winning, but let's hold off on the victory celebrations and do what the tweet tells us and stay tuned.

Alright, a question I wanted to ask you guys: If Toonami does return, do you guys think AS will create more original action shows to go along with anime? More to the point, do you think AS should create their own action shows to go along with their anime aquisitions? I know that IGPX bombed, so they're reluctance to do so is justified, but still, times have changed, and I think having their own original action shows that they'd own would help spice things up. Of course, there's the problem of budget, action shows would require quite a bit of effort when it comes to animation and not just cheap flash, unlike comedy. Adn we all know that AS originals aren't anything to write home about on the budget department.

 

[KarlOlson]

I think there is the potential for AS to throw just enough money at certain projects to get the rights to them before they air in Japan and do a simulcast (no more than what a season of what their cheaper originals cost.) There are certainly some studio/director pairings that would be great bets, and this removes that worry about the show being old news by the time it hit TV. It would be a good move for a Toonami [as] block...

...after it proved itself with running the classic series with little to no edits, and after acquiring some shows that would fit the tone of a Toonami [as] block. Less shonens but not none, more seinen like Outlaw Star and Cowboy Bebop. IE: some touching moments, but likable, rogue-ish leads that charm the audience, and show lengths that are well under 52 episodes. Buy the 3rd Tenchi OVA and maybe GXP and see how those fly. Maybe try Desert Punk since since it's action packed and just a bit filthy, and again, has a likable jerk lead. See also if you can capture the magical girl nostalgia with Madoka. See how shows like GitS:SAC. FLCL and Bebop work in the Toonami packaging. Basically, there are some very smart moves to try first before putting too much on the line with original production. In fact, they should take a swing at a josei title (Paradise Kiss or Nana or Honey and Clover) or a hard-sci-fi title (Planetes, Moonlight Mile) in one of the later slots before taking a swing at originals again. Take the time to get a very concise idea of the kind of programming people are actually watching, and put money on that at that point.

 

[Sketch]

If they were to work out deals for simulcasts or co-pros, those would have to be granted better slots than midnight I would think. Depends on the level of success expected I suppose.

They should stick to shorter series for the most part because one night a week makes long series a bit of a chore to watch.

Start out with new content that is a safe bet and a few older series uncut or less censored in Tenchi's case. And then they can experiment more. Though actually Madoka is a series they should try sooner than later if they are going to do a little experimenting.

Would they put more anime comedies on within the Toonami label? I'm not so sure they would but it would be interesting to see but IMO anime comedy could have a place on AS other than within Toonami a block remembered for being action oriented.

 

[Angilasman]

But yes, if a miracle happens and Toonami does comeback, I just hope it will eventually be balanced out with a decent amount of new & classic anime & action content. Also think it would be a nice place to show re-runs of Thundercats, since CN can't seem to give it a decent time-slot or decent advertising.

Non-anime stuff was always a part of Toonami. If Toonami comes back as a part of Adult Swim it's very unlikely (unfeasible) we'll get original American action programming that's new (like old Toonami frequently had), but it's plausible that we could see things like reruns of the new Thundercats once it ends - and how about Sym-Bionic Titan!

 

[Soul]

Anime/Action Comedies? Sure! But just straight up comedies or even something slice of life or drama? Ehh. No way, it is Toonami and it is [adult swim] Action.

 

[Sketch]

Working with 6 hours makes a lot of opportunity for surprises but if more American series than The Clone Wars or maybe ThunderCats reruns sneak onto the line-up I would be very surprised. But I would welcome any American action series with adult appeal and Turner has a decent amount just laying around picking up dust.

And I would certainly like to see Adult Swim make an original action drama or work with Warner to get one. There is always the Supernatural anime and I have long wondered why that never aired on AS.

 

[bla2772]

do u think thell make a new tom sara proms and absolution or stick wit tom 3 sara2.0 and this absolution and promos

 

[MDawg]

I'd love to see them get the new Lupin the Third series. It's something that's the right mix for Toonami and Adult Swim given the subject matter. A remastered Outlaw Star (with Hot Springs episode) would be an awesome addition to the block and a nice bridging of old and new ways.

I'm not sure how I'd feel about CN shows on the block, but something like Samurai Jack, which CN owns outright would be an easy thing to toss in (and I guess Clone Wars if it must be there).

Original or co-produced or funded series are a tricky thing. All action shows that AS and Toonami have gotten into weren't really successes by any means, so it'd be a risky venture to say the least. A simulcast is really the only way such a thing would work given the self-entitled attitude of most anime fans which causes ratings death due to delays of any sort. Maybe they could air something like Venture Bros on the block as an experiment, I think that's as close to a US-produced comedy with action elements that would work.

A new action series is just such a huge prospect with funds that could be better-spent elsewhere considering the return on investment would lack toy sales and various other merchandise that comes with kids series (yes, it would be there, but face it, adults don't buy as much as kids would). Yes, you could have something involving WB and the DC library, but then you just bump up the costs associated with it just due to WB's inability to make a show that would be cost-effective for AS/Toonami.