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Ranking of Kings Staff Hold Weekly Watchalongs on WIT Studio's YouTube Channel

Wit Studio producer Youko Ueda and Ranking of Kings animation producer Maiko Okada have been holding weekly watchalongs for the Ranking of Kings anime on Wit Studio's YouTube channel. The streams generally involve a lot of cooing over Bojji and showing off the show's cute new merchandise. For their episode 4 stream, they brought on a special guest: Yi Wan, a Chinese animator who served as an animation director on the episode.

According to Wan, this was her second time working as an animation director; the last time was on Great Pretender. Working on Ranking of Kings was quite rough for her because she struggled with the amount of work that had to be done, but in the end, she said that she feels very proud of her accomplishments. She often commented on the animators who worked on specific parts of the episode in order to praise their work.

Wan also explained her journey as a foreign-born animator. She has lived in Japan for eight years, having moved to the country immediately after graduating university in China. She spent a year learning the Japanese language, and then spent time learning animation in Japan. However, instead of pursuing post-graduate education, she decided to look for work in Japan. Initially, she worked as a freelance animator, working with various different studios; Okada said that she was impressed with Wan's animation work on After the Rain, so she arranged for Wan to work on the Hello WeGo! short, and from there she became an animation director on Great Pretender.

The television anime of Sōsuke Tōka's Ranking of Kings (Ōsama Ranking) manga premiered on October 14. Funimation began streaming the anime with English subtitles on October 15, and it will also stream an English dub.

Source: Wit Studio's YouTube channel