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Crunchyroll Originals Have Been A Disaster

Such was the case with Netflix's Saint Seiya. Their textbook focus on political correctness resulted in turning a man in pink armor into a woman.

Dude, the first thing I ever watched on Crunchyroll was Wandering Son, a drama about trans kids, because I knew it would never get a physical release here, and I've never seen anything quite like it in Western media.

Please do not presume to appoint yourself the spokesman for Western anime fans. Or even "A LOT" of them.

My general recommendation is people should consume what they like. Cartoon fans unhappy with how Americans shows are should watch anime. Anime fans unhappy at the lack of progressive politics in anime should just get into American cartoons. You want sexy women and are mad She-Ra made all the characters ugly? Watch Pretty Cure, or really any anime let's be honest. Mad at the lack of racial and LGBT representation in anime? Watch The Owl House or pretty much any cartoon since every cartoon has an LGBT character in it these days. Both mediums are right there and you can all stop being so angry all the time and just watch the mediums that pander to your tastes instead of holding out false hope that these entire industries suddenly change overnight.

The probability of failure for Crunchyroll and Netflix's original anime is so great that their brands have completely collapsed.
Unfortunately, I think we've reached a point where we need to back off, Ex-arm had reached the level of Musashi Gun-dou, it's hard to believe it's the 2020s.

liatris wrote:

Such was the case with Netflix's Saint Seiya. Their textbook focus on political correctness resulted in turning a man in pink armor into a woman.

Turning a man with feminine qualities into a woman is the opposite of 'political correctness.' Although I don't remember if they thought this was diversifying the characters or not, adding a woman to the line-up. It's closer to what happened to Zoisite in the original Sailor Moon; make the gay man with long hair a woman and you don't risk upsetting conservative viewers/parents.

As for the Wandering Son mention; that's not a Crunchyroll Original. It just streamed on the service as one of the first simulcasts.

Another poster brought up Wandering Son as an example of what drew them to CR as a service. I just said that I'm glad people watched it, since I also liked it. I don't know that it really makes for good evidence of anything in particular.

I think now we're also starting to veer off topic from the content of the article itself, so let's try to move back in the right direction.

Maybe the end result is that American streaming services had no idea how to do business in the Japanese anime industry or the anime community scene.

I agree that Crunchyroll has had some high-profile failures. Gibiate + Ex-Arm are legendary

From the results, I would have to say that the Japanese anime industry tolerates a more diverse environment than the American anime industry.

However, I don't think that a company in the entertainment industry should have it's success measured solely on it's success:failure ratio. The lesson that Hollywood learned long ago is that the majority of their movies do not make enough money to pay for the costs of making them. So how is Hollywood still in business? Because when they do get a hit, it's often so successful that it pays for the rest. I'd wager this "mining mentality" exists in the Japanese entertainment industry as well: make a ton of stuff knowing that most of it will probably fail, but then you get a success that makes the business profitable enough overall to continue. You can look at the obscene amount of anime that will never get a season two (despite available source material) as proof of this.

Netflix seems to be funding a lot of mediocre dreck, but to be fair I HATE 3DCG anime which seems to be what Netflix is focusing in on. However, I don't think that a company in the entertainment industry should have it's success measured solely on it's success:failure ratio.

Creating shows with strong women AND men (you know, like anime does all the time)

Consider the context here: it isn't that the High Guardian Spice bashers necessarily hated Steven Universe. Instead, they were trying to prevent a situation from forming where Steven Universe is all they are ever going to get to see.

Compare Cartoon Network today with 10-20 years ago. Do you honestly think that Samurai Jack, Ben 10 or (the original) Teen Titans, Batman: The Brave and the Bold etc. would get greenlit in this era?

And to be frank and earnest: if High Guardian Spice isn't good enough for Cartoon Network or the network that gave us 70 episodes of Mike Tyson Mysteries then what on earth makes it good enough for Crunchyroll?

Hollywood, and by default, American culture, had a very low tolerance to failure. If your movie fail to make any money, or in the worse case, cause the company to lose money, you're blacklisted. Period The only reason why Hollywood films are successful is because the quality standards of American entertaiment are the highest of all the world, and that's the reason why movie agents are so valued there. Their job is to make sure their clients wouldn't end participating in a bad movie that could kill their careers, because, if they also screw on that job, they would end being either sued or worse.

Malsang wrote:

Netflix seems to be funding a lot of mediocre dreck, but to be fair I HATE 3DCG anime which seems to be what Netflix is focusing in on. However, I don't think that a company in the entertainment industry should have it's success measured solely on it's success:failure ratio.

The 3DCG Netflix thing is actually a really interesting example of what you're talking about. Netflix is, first and foremost, a technology company. They view many of their decisions through that lens. They push 3DCG so hard, including investing heavily in the technology to produce the stuff more quickly and cheaply, because it solves a technical problem with anime. Hand drawn anime usually only gets broadcast at 720p (if that) because that's the biggest you can blow up a standard piece of paper before artifacts like squiggles become visible. Netflix sells different tiers of service based on what your maximum resolution is. So, it doesn't make sense for them to have their signature premium content look the same at all resolutions—that doesn't incentivize upgrading. So they either needed to give animators 24×33 pieces of paper to play with or switch to digital. Every cell being a poster would be an absolute nightmare to work with so they went digital. That also gives them the ability to lip flap in any language, upscale it later, or do other wonky things with it.

Netflix probably doesn't care if any of their first few years of anime are popular, critically acclaimed, or even profitable. They know that entering a new industry and establishing themselves there is difficult. So, they'll spend a few years ironing out the kinks in their production until they focus on establishing themselves. Hopefully, in a decade, they'll be great.

Malsang wrote:

Netflix seems to be funding a lot of mediocre dreck, but to be fair I HATE 3DCG anime which seems to be what Netflix is focusing in on. However, I don't think that a company in the entertainment industry should have it's success measured solely on it's success:failure ratio.

The 3DCG Netflix thing is actually a really interesting example of what you're talking about. Netflix is, first and foremost, a technology company. They view many of their decisions through that lens. They push 3DCG so hard, including investing heavily in the technology to produce the stuff more quickly and cheaply, because it solves a technical problem with anime. Hand drawn anime usually only gets broadcast at 720p (if that) because that's the biggest you can blow up a standard piece of paper before artifacts like squiggles become visible. Netflix sells different tiers of service based on what your maximum resolution is. So, it doesn't make sense for them to have their signature premium content look the same at all resolutions—that doesn't incentivize upgrading. So they either needed to give animators 24×33 pieces of paper to play with or switch to digital. Every cell being a poster would be an absolute nightmare to work with so they went digital. That also gives them the ability to lip flap in any language, upscale it later, or do other wonky things with it.

Netflix probably doesn't care if any of their first few years of anime are popular, critically acclaimed, or even profitable. They know that entering a new industry and establishing themselves there is difficult. So, they'll spend a few years ironing out the kinks in their production until they focus on establishing themselves. Hopefully, in a decade, they'll be great.