Anime going mainstream was certainly a mistake, but for dedicated fans, it now offers the chance to watch various adaptations well before their scheduled premieres, following a significant leak at Netflix and Crunchyroll.
Crunchyroll and Netflix appear to be in turmoil after several anime titles slated for the Winter 2024 season were leaked online. The first of a planned Mononoke trilogy, Mononoke the Movie: Phantom in the Rain, was among the leaked content. Although Netflix hadn’t officially announced acquiring the film, its dubbing agreement was publicly known through a SAG-AFTRA Signatory Database listing.
In addition to the film, twelve episodes of the upcoming Ranma 1/2 reboot by MAPPA, eight episodes of Production I.G’s Terminator Zero, and six episodes of Science Saru’s highly anticipated Dan Da Dan TV series were also leaked online.
Moreover, the first episode of Re:Zero’s third season was leaked in higher quality than Netflix’s shows, albeit with French subtitles.
The 90-minute premiere of Re:Zero Starting Life in Another World Season 3, featuring French subtitles, was slated to be shown by Crunchyroll on July 11 at the Japan Expo in Paris. However, the screening was canceled for reasons beyond Crunchyroll’s control.
The leaked episode features a “Japan Expo 2024” watermark in the upper left corner.
Earlier this year, in April, several titles from Crunchyroll’s Spring 2024 lineup were also leaked. These included KonoSuba: God’s Blessing on This Wonderful World! Season 3, Sound! Euphonium Season 3, As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I’ll Use My Appraisal Skill to Rise in the World, and more.
All of these titles were screened during the Puerto Rico Comic Con before their official release dates.
This particular leak seems unrelated to DAN DA DAN and Ranma 1/2. Although more episodes appeared online, they were of much lower quality and heavily timestamped.
The latest leak underscores a growing problem in anime production and distribution. We’ve seen how Japanese companies like Bandai Namco, Square Enix, SEGA, and Capcom have shifted their focus from developing games for domestic audiences to pursuing ESG hedge fund investments.
This shift has led to games featuring progressive, censored content, politically correct dialogue changes, and a strong emphasis on diversity and inclusivity.
Now, Japan’s anime and manga industry is facing similar challenges due to globalization. Crunchyroll, which has effectively monopolized anime distribution in Western regions, imposes censorship on controversial scenes.
Additionally, they often insert translations filled with Western slang, memes, and politicized rhetoric, altering the original content to remove gendered dialogue for example.
Blackstone recently invested $1.7 billion in purchasing the e-manga platform of Infocom. As a major global investment firm that strongly promotes ESG initiatives, Blackstone’s control over Japan’s largest e-manga platform allows it to restrict certain types of content, influencing what Japanese mangakas create in the future.
This is particularly concerning given that many modern anime “fans” in the West, who have recently joined the “trend,” are highly progressive and vocal. Their interests primarily revolve around popular “battle shounen” franchises such as One Piece, Bleach, and Dragon Ball.
Additionally, anime “fans” expressed outrage over the announcement of the heartfelt romcom “If My Wife Became an Elementary School Student” simply because of its title.
These supposed “fans” conflate fiction and reality, criticizing the “lolicon” trope that has been prominent in Japanese media as sexualizing minors while frequently complaining about “fan service” in shounen adaptations, which are typically aimed at teenage boys.
Western payment processors like VISA and MasterCard have also made it their mission to restrict Japanese businesses from dealing in erotic material that they deem problematic. These monopolistic processors label lolicon content as child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and have demanded several Japanese businesses remove such items from their platforms or risk losing their vendor licenses.
While many have resisted these demands, we are beginning to see instances of Japanese retailers complying, such as Toranoana and Denpasoft, which have both removed content deemed CSAM by VISA and MasterCard to retain their business.
These are the unfortunate effects of Western influence and globalization. Japan’s anime industry no longer primarily serves its domestic market but has become a major export amid the decline of the cartoon industry in the West.
Modern anime adaptations now avoid adult-centric content, such as nudity with visible nipples in adaptations of ecchi, with the medium as a whole now becoming more safe, sanitized and toned down so that a winder range of anime can appeal towards younger audiences, particularly in the West who are overly sensitive.
For instance, the character designer for Re:Zero’s third season explicitly stated that the censored designs of Liliana and Capella were made to make the adaptation more appealing to global audiences.
Crunchyroll dominates the Western distribution of Japanese anime. The company has routinely censored broadcasts and imposed translations that deviate significantly from the source material, often to push politicized messages or insert quirky Western slang that specifically caters to foreign audiences.
Netflix has recently become more involved as well, introducing a new wave of “fans” who bring and impose trans-centric headcanons into various adaptations.
For instance, the reboot of Ranma 1/2 now avoids showing visible nipples.while the series Shikanoko Nokonoko Koshitantan, a comedy featuring a girl with removable deer antlers is being pushed as trans because only biologically male deer have antlers.
Aside from the obvious fact that the series is comedic in nature, giving the character regular furry-like animal ears would make it difficult for readers and viewers to recognize her as a deer. Antlers are a defining characteristic of deer.
Additionally, many of the jokes and gags involving her detachable antlers would no longer be possible. If you still believe she is meant to be trans, consider ripping off the top of your head in solidarity.
It certainly doesn’t help that transgender advocates attempt to project themselves onto highly unsuitable examples, such as the retconning of Guilty Gear’s Bridget.
Originally, Bridget was a bounty hunter raised as a woman to avoid being killed due to a village superstition about the birth of twins. Bridget’s journey was about proving himself as a man, yet this fact has been altered.
Decades of lore have been discarded to pander to the vocal minority on Twitter, who view Bridget’s sudden retconning into a trans woman as “empowering” and “character development.”
Similarly, Ranma 1/2, which follows a teenage boy cursed to transform into a woman when splashed with cold water and back to a man with hot water, is a comedic romantic series filled with hijinks involving sexual harassment and groping, all while Ranma seeks a cure.
Despite this, some now consider it a “trans allegory” according to deranged freaks projecting their own sexuality upon everything.
I have fond memories of suddenly growing breasts and being fondled after being splashed with water. If you consider yourself transgender like Ranma, you could hypothetically go into the women’s bathroom, douse yourself with warm water to become a man, commit a crime, then splash cold water on yourself and walk out as a woman.
These individuals are not true fans but rather propagandists who cannot let others enjoy something without imposing their delusions. This is what happens when a niche community becomes a global phenomenon, it’s ultimately invaded by those who cannot respect cultural difference or more rather just wishes everything produced conforms to their sanitized Marvel-esk worldview.
The new wave of Western anime “fans” often project their views onto a medium that didn’t cater to them. Western distribution platforms like Crunchyroll and Netflix can’t even safeguard content, allowing various adaptations to leak months in advance and proving that anime going mainstream was nothing more than a mistake.
Ultimately, the real “winners” from this situation are anime fans who can now watch upcoming adaptations early, but the real loser is Japan as they are being increasingly influenced by Western ideologies as their anime industry and eventually manga becomes a global export.
