Post
by Ajay » Sat Jan 06, 2018 3:07 pm
I shouldn't have posted anything, really... at least, not on a site like Twitter where you can't really push out all the details as you'd like. It's caused so much craziness. Definitely a big lesson as far as being responsible with my 'reach'.
Here's a rundown of what actually lead to that speculation (and yes, it's total speculation based on a few facts and trends):
- The Dragon Ball Super '100 Episodes' rumour wasn't just based on that placeholder on Toei's EU website. It was the number given out to the potential licensees long before Super came out. That doesn't necessarily mean anything, since Super is a runaway success and we're well beyond what was initially pitched, but it's also not worth totally throwing out the window.
- The current arc is scheduled to end in March. Anime is all cour-based, and April is the start of a new cour. That's the normal time that new series begin for that time of year. If Super were going anywhere, that's a perfectly reasonable time for it to vanish, especially with regards to the movie's production, too. Keep in mind that the last Blu-ray contains fewer episodes than normal. That's a pretty big red flag that something's up.
- While Kitaro has had many different series over the years, this particular anniversary project is celebrating the original run, which has always aired in one time slot. Initially, Wednesday late-afternoons, the exact spot Dragon Ball used to air in. When it came back in 2007, it aired in the same slot that had now moved to Sunday mornings, just as Dragon Ball does now. Although we have no idea if this is actually a TV series, that is Kitaro's slot, and it really doesn't have anywhere else to air. Monster Hunter at 8:30am isn't going anywhere, and of course neither is One Piece. Even if Monster Hunter were going off the air, Toei Animation aren't going to let it compete with a titan like PreCure that airs at the same time. Toei Company might have been silly with regards to their Sentai block clashing with their anime block, but Toei Animation won't let anything like that happen with two of their own shows. While Kitaro did recently have a crossover with Yokai Watch, a show that airs on TV Tokyo, it's highly unlikely that Fuji TV would be willing to let it go, and I don't see them opening up a new time slot.
- Super's schedule does appear to still be very messy. While I'm not allowed to share the full details for the sake of animators' protection from Toei's spooky eyes, it's still very far from the norm. Producing a movie while trying to keep a series like that afloat would be especially difficult. It'd be a smart move to put the series on hiatus until January 2019. You get to repeat 2015 again where you blow up interest with a new movie, and then ride that success into a brand new TV series. Realistically, you'd more than compensate for any loss of revenue - and keep in mind it's a different situation now that the series is currently making bank internationally. The revenue flow isn't going to hault the second Super ends.
- With adequate planning, they could begin planning Super 2.0 several months in advance of its theoretical debut in January 2019. This movie has begun production far earlier than the previous two movies, so it's perfectly possible for that to happen, particularly if they rely on a lot of freelancers and non-series-specific animators as they did with Battle of Gods. Bringing the series back with an improved (or ideally fixed) production would do wonders for not only the series reputation, but also their costs - remember that they're often paying double the staff (and external studios) just to get episodes finished on time.
- If you wanna head into total tinfoil hat territory, Toyotaro did say the manga would be ahead of anime again at some point. With the current pace, it doesn't seem like it's happening. If there's a break, then it becomes possible~! ...Okay, that's totally confirmation bias, but whatever. Worth keeping in mind, I guess?
So yeah, that's what lead to the speculation. As has been pointed out though, this all falls apart if the Kitaro thing isn't an anime. The situation's just a very weird mix of "this makes so much sense, but at the same time, it totally doesn't". Sure sounds like Toei Animation! ^.^