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“That gloomy sea, and that Sinister lighthouse. Insidious mountains and looming cityscape. every inch of this place gets under my skin. Wait, that’s it. This town is driving me insane, winding me up. It’s making me spiral. Everywhere I look, spirals are taking over.”
– Shuichi Saito, Uzumaki (Ep. 01)
This Toonami Trending Rundown is for the month of September 2024. After first being announced in 2019, and going through four years of delays, this month that would culminate in the world premiere of Junji Ito’s Uzumaki.
For the night of September 7, #Toonami would trend in the U.S. alongside Demon Slayer. #Toonami would also trend on Tumblr alongside One Piece and My Hero Academia. On September 14, #Toonami trended in the United States and on Tumblr, with One Piece also trending on Tumblr. For the night of September 21, Toonami trended in the US on Twitter and on Tumblr, while Demon Slayer also trended in the USA. Finally, September 28th would see the premiere of Uzumaki, and as result of the buzz, both Uzumaki and Rick and Morty: The Anime would trend in the USA on Twitter, while Uzumaki also trended on Tumblr.
Meanwhile for Toonami Rewind, #ToonamiRewind would trend on both September 13 and 27. Sailor Moon would also trend on the 13th. Full trending statistics can be seen below.
The feature for September 14 was a new Toonami ID titled “Doppelganger.” You can check it out below.
On September 28, Toonami released a new Criminal Threats/Building You a Better Cartoon Show promo. You can check it out below.
The production for Uzumaki has not been easy, and has since seen significant delays from its original release date since the show’s announcement at Crunchyroll Expo 2019. First from 2020, then to October 2022 thanks to the pandemic, until Toonami just stopped giving out an ETA release date altogether. During SDCC 2023, Toonami creator and Uzumaki producer Jason DeMarco noted that the reason for these delays, among other things, is “Because it turns out it’s very, very hard to replicate Junji Ito’s lines faithfully, but that hasn’t stopped us from continuing to work on it.” It wasn’t until 2024 that we finally got the news that the show was ready to go.
While Uzumaki’s first episode aired without a hitch, episodes 2, 3, and 4 on the other hand, saw some recognizable hitches in regards to the animation quality. According to show producer Jason DeMarco in a now deleted Bluesky post, he mentioned that they were “screwed over” during the show’s production, which ultimately played a major role in the show’s delays and animation quality dip. Unfortunately, the choices given to the Uzumaki production team in the end were to either cancel the production and call it a total loss (and presumably see the show written off in a similar fashion to Coyote vs Acme), only release Episode 1 and leave the series incomplete, or to release the series despite its flaws. The latter of the three was ultimately the decision chosen.
Jason couldn’t point fingers to who was responsible for Uzumaki‘s production issues, though it surely wasn’t helped that this miniseries was produced during the ongoing upheaval with Warner Bros Discovery, with CEO David Zaslav infamously going on a cost cutting and tax write off spree to make up for WBD’s post-merger debts. And given that this series was announced at the now-defunct Crunchyroll Expo, its likely this series would have been available to stream on Crunchyroll as well, had Sony not burn bridges with WBD.
Oftentimes, if a show has such animation quality issues due to a rushed schedule, it tends to be smoothed out for the Blu-ray release and reruns. However, it is unknown if and when Production I.G and Cartoon Network plans on fixing these mistakes for a BD release, much less if we will have a Blu-ray release at all. Regardless of what happened and what happens going forward, Toonami, Adult Swim, Cartoon Network, and Warner Bros Discovery as a whole will no doubt need to get their acts together on this front, especially if Lazarus, Rooster Fighter, and other future Toonami originals are to be the smash hits fans are hoping will be.
Unfortunately, Uzumaki’s case is not unique in the anime world. From Attack on Titan, to Dragon Ball Super, to One Punch Man, to Zom 100, to anything made by Studio MAPPA, no small amount of anime titles in the modern era have seen frequent delays and are occasionally rushed out the door with animation flaws. A big reason for that is a shortage in manpower. From the high demand for anime productions from domestic and international licensors alike, to the low pay and grueling work conditions of its animators, production cast and crews, and manga artists (not to mention Japan’s declining birth and immigration rates), the anime industry has backed themselves into a corner with less and less people being able to get into the industry as a viable career path. It’s a big reason many anime series don’t go beyond 12-14 episodes a season nowadays. And it certainly played a role in the Great Anime Crash of 2008 and is playing a role in the current anime dark age we’re seeing today. For more on that, check out my Op-Ed “The 2020’s Anime and Streaming Service Bubble Burst.”
As previously mentioned, due to personal reasons, I’m unfortunately running a bit late on posting Trending Rundowns, so expect the editions for the rest of 2024 to be posted in the coming weeks. Apologies for the inconvenience. Until next time, stay gold as always.
Legend: The shows listed are ordered based on their appearance on the schedule. Show trends are listed in bold. The number next to the listed trend represents the highest it trended on the list (not counting the promoted trend), judging only by the images placed in the rundown. For the Twitter tweet counts, the listed number of tweets are also sorely based on the highest number shown based on the images on the rundown.
September 7-8, 2024 Toonami Trends
United States Trends:
- #Toonami [#10]
- #DemonSlayer [Trended with #Toonami]
Tweet Counts:
- #Toonami [3,008 tweets]
- #DemonSlayer [3,777 tweets]
- #OnePiece [35.6k tweets]
Tumblr Trends:
- #Toonami [#1]
- #one piece [#4]
- #my hero academia [Trended with #bnha]
- #boku no hero academia [Trended with #bnha]
- #bnha [#6]
September 13, 2024 Toonami Rewind Trends
United States Trends:
- #ToonamiRewind [#9]
- #SailorMoon [#27]
Tweet Counts:
- #SailorMoon [1,291 tweets]
September 14-15, 2024 Toonami Trends
United States Trends:
- #Toonami [#13]
Tweet Counts:
- #Toonami [2,137 tweets]
- #DemonSlayer [3.206 tweets]
- #MyHeroAcademia [10.1k tweets]
Tumblr Trends:
- #Toonami [#7]
- #one piece [#3]
September 21-22, 2024 Toonami Trends
United States Trends:
- #Toonami [#22]
- #DemonSlayer [Trended with #Toonami]
Tweet Counts:
- #Toonami [2,097 tweets]
- #DemonSlayer [2,136 tweets]
- #MyHeroAcademia [11.1k tweets]
Tumblr Trends:
- #Toonami [#6]
September 27, 2024 Toonami Rewind Trends
United States Trends:
- #ToonamiRewind [#23]
September 28-29, 2024 Toonami Trends
United States Trends:
- #Toonami [#13]
- #Uzumaki [#4]
- #RickAndMortyTheAnime [Trended with #Uzumaki]
Tweet Counts:
- #Toonami [3,627 tweets]
- #Uzumaki [3,790 tweets]
Tumblr Trends:
- #Toonami [#6]
- #uzumaki [#9]
If you wish to send me a tip for the work on the trending rundown, donations can be sent to PayPal.Me/DanielLimjoco.
Don’t Say You Weren’t Warned. Only Toonami on [adult swim] on Cartoon Network.
