New interviews: Anime set to invade UK TV with Anime Central

Paul

Paul

Ghost of Animes
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With Anime Central - the UK's first ever 100% dedicated anime TV channel - set to hit British airwaves in September, Anime UK News has turned its attention to the state of anime on UK TV.

In "<a href="http://www.animeuknews.net/article/45/anime-set-to-invade-uk-tv-is-anime-going-mainstream">Anime set to invade UK TV! Is anime going mainstream?</a>", Anime UK News reporter Nargis has put together a lengthy article about anime on UK TV that talks to fans and industry experts alike, featuring exclusive interviews with <a href="http://www.animecentral.com/">Anime Central</a>'s brand manager Mark Buchanan and <a href="http://www.beez.fr/index.php?&lng=en">Beez Entertainment</a>'s Andrew Partridge.

<i>Mark Buchanan:</i> "The diversity of anime out there is staggering and I truly believe that the ‘grown-up’ shows in our line up like GITS: SAC or Planetes rank up there with the best of American television. With such strong content available, I really wasn’t interested in doing a kids channel. The little folk are already well served with a decent amount of anime on other stations and I feel that it’s time for the big ‘uns to get a look in."

<i>Andrew @ Beez:</i> "We're one of the few companies who had titles in the last decade to have had shows like Cowboy Bebop, Escaflowne and Gundam Wing and I have to say, despite being "old" licenses - they are still strong sellers to this day! However - as with a lot of things it depends on the kind of exposure the channel gets as well as the focus of the channel as well!"

[Read more of "<a href="http://www.animeuknews.net/article/45/anime-set-to-invade-uk-tv-is-anime-going-mainstream">Anime set to invade UK TV! Is anime going mainstream?</a>"]
 
Anime UK News: Given the recent popularity of fan subs and video streaming sites like You Tube amongst anime fans, how does Anime Central plan to tempt fans away from their computer screens and back in front of their TV sets?

Mark Buchanan: The picture’s a lot better!
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Agreed :D
 
Great read and nice to hear the company official’s points of view. Tbh its nice to hear half that stuff. Its all long overdue. All I can say is anime is exploding in the UK. Its pleasing to watch :D
 
Hopefuly we will see a lot of anime shows on tv now. I have to say september is sure giong to be busy. Its a good thing that they are aiming this channel to adults rather children. I want it this way at least for now...
 
I'm not sure what it is about anime, I just can't take it seriously in a business sense (too much of a fan, I guess!) so the idea of people sitting in a boardroom wondering whether or not to air Planetes sounds like this wonderful surreal world!

Anyway, I'm so desperately hoping Anime Central is a success. As long as it's enough to survive, that's all we need. To see quality anime on TV aimed at older audiences is a great thing; I totally share Mark's views that the likes of SAC can stand up to the "best of American television".

Also, thanks to Darren for answering our questions. He's done well in getting across the common views of the more established anime fans.
 
The anime fan interview was a bit unfortunate, with him stating several falacies that are often used by people trying to excuse their downloading of licenced series via the fansub sites. The bits which really annoyed me:

Anime UK News: More anime will soon be on it's way to UK TV. With the rise in popularity of fan subs and video streaming websites, will you be persuaded to switch over to watching anime on TV?

Darren Richardson: Unfortunately I doubt I will switch over to anime on TV, although as a fan I am happy to see more series appearing on satellite and terrestrial TV but there are still way too many problems with the releases. Take Naruto for example, the UK edit is appalling, the violence stripped away and the dubbing is awful. The story is about a ninja’s personal growth through missions and battles, however with the cuts in certain scenes (blood and death mainly) the story begins to lose it’s meaning and becomes just another happy little series to please the masses. I in no way wish to sound elitist but anime is a hugely varied medium and series don’t appeal to everyone, I am not a fan of Evangelion (ducks to avoid bricks being thrown) but I love Bleach and Love Hina, I hate it when series are edited to suit the majority. In a way I feel it cheapens the medium as a whole.

Another huge problem with UK TV over online services is the release schedules, just looking at the UK magazines advertising the latest series I can already say I have seen them all online or bought them using R1 import websites so I find that the UK is very backward when it comes to available releases.
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The Naruto UK TV edit may be bad, but the DVD release is uncut. Given that Beez are cooperating with this project, and the time the channel operates (9pm-6am) we can safely assume that the anime will be shown uncut.

Anime UK News: Obviously anime is dubbed on UK TV, will this deter you from regularly tuning in?

Darren Richardson: This is another problem for me, the voices in the original releases are picked to best suit the characters personalities. For example Full Metal Panics lead character Sosuke Sagara has a rough voice in the original release designed to show that since a young age he has been fighting in wars all over the world, but in the dubbed version he sounds plain and boring, like he has spent his life working as an accountant. I am a huge fan of subbed anime, I find that the original Japanese dialogue adds to the experience of watching a series. Yes I will agree there are exceptions, for example the Studio Ghibli films are excellently re-dubbed and I am a huge fan of the UK version of Porco Russo and The Cat Returns.
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Not wanting to turn this into a whole dub vs sub debate, but that is the way I see this question. His example, Sousuke Sagara, is a bad one. Chris Patton in now way sounds boring, and in fact has won dub awards for that character. With the mutliple replays per night of the same series (9pm-12am, repeated 12am-3am and 3am-6am) it's my belief that eventually they will dedicate one of those three time-slots to subtitled versions of the anime that they show, so be sure to email AnimeCentral asking for it if you want it.
 
Fudce said:
The anime fan interview was a bit unfortunate, with him stating several falacies that are often used by people trying to excuse their downloading of licenced series via the fansub sites.
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I disagree with you. I really don't think the general view he was putting across was anything to do with making an excuse for downloading anime. He's simply stating what the situation is, and is quite right. There are many thousands of people in this country who have no idea about the state of the industry and just find anime on youtube or those kind of sites and watch it, oblivious to all of this, (and have probably never bought an anime DVD in their life).
I do agree however, that the example of Naruto on TV was out of context considering we're talking about AnimeCentral and not Jetix.

Fudce said:
The Naruto UK TV edit may be bad, but the DVD release is uncut. Given that Beez are cooperating with this project, and the time the channel operates (9pm-6am) we can safely assume that the anime will be shown uncut.
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He was talking about the TV only, I don't see how the DVD releases have anything to do with what he was talking about.

Fudce said:
Not wanting to turn this into a whole dub vs sub debate, but that is the way I see this question. His example, Sousuke Sagara, is a bad one. Chris Patton in now way sounds boring, and in fact has won dub awards for that character. With the mutliple replays per night of the same series (9pm-12am, repeated 12am-3am and 3am-6am) it's my belief that eventually they will dedicate one of those three time-slots to subtitled versions of the anime that they show, so be sure to email AnimeCentral asking for it if you want it.
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English dubs will always be Americanised to some extent, you are either that way inclined or not, it's a matter of opinion. He made a perfectly valid point that English dubs don't always portray what the Japanese dub does.

Forgive me if this comes across in any way.. uh.. bad.. It's hard work making sense of all this stuff.
 
DaNiMe-sama said:
Fudce said:
The Naruto UK TV edit may be bad, but the DVD release is uncut. Given that Beez are cooperating with this project, and the time the channel operates (9pm-6am) we can safely assume that the anime will be shown uncut.
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He was talking about the TV only, I don't see how the DVD releases have anything to do with what he was talking about.
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I was refering to the DVD, as an available, uncut, english language version of Naruto. Yes, it has nothing to do with the anime being shown on Anime Central, but it shows that even with cut anime, there is an uncut version available. That doesn't remove the fact that there are uncut versions of every series that Anime Central are airing available, and due to the involvement of Beez, that is the version they are likely to use.

DaNiMe-sama said:
Fudce said:
Not wanting to turn this into a whole dub vs sub debate, but that is the way I see this question. His example, Sousuke Sagara, is a bad one. Chris Patton in now way sounds boring, and in fact has won dub awards for that character. With the mutliple replays per night of the same series (9pm-12am, repeated 12am-3am and 3am-6am) it's my belief that eventually they will dedicate one of those three time-slots to subtitled versions of the anime that they show, so be sure to email AnimeCentral asking for it if you want it.
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English dubs will always be Americanised to some extent, you are either that way inclined or not, it's a matter of opinion. He made a perfectly valid point that English dubs don't always portray what the Japanese dub does.
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If his point was that some anime dubs don't always portray what the Japanese dub does, then I withdraw my statement. However the way it is worded implies that he thinks that all anime dubs are like that, and he in fact draws attention to one dub in particular that is widely creditted as a very good dub. That is what I find wrong, and why I pointed out my opinion of an error. (key words, "my opinion")
 
Fudce said:
The anime fan interview was a bit unfortunate, with him stating several falacies that are often used by people trying to excuse their downloading of licenced series via the fansub sites.
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The point of the interview with Darren was to provide an honest perspective into the workings of a typical UK-based fan who uses the internet to get his fix. How would someone go about attracting the growing number of people who are using the net to get their anime? Whether or not you agree with his answers, they point out some strong failings of the "off-line" model that directly effects the enjoyment for a lot of people.

Fudce said:
However the way it is worded implies that he thinks that all anime dubs are like that, and he in fact draws attention to one dub in particular that is widely creditted as a very good dub. That is what I find wrong, and why I pointed out my opinion of an error. (key words, "my opinion")
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On this point, Darren clearly says:

Darren said:
"Yes I will agree there are exceptions, for example the Studio Ghibli films are excellently re-dubbed and I am a huge fan of the UK version of Porco Russo and The Cat Returns."
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Anyway Fudce, I know you're a big fan of English dubs, so I'm understanding of your sensitivity to his complaints, but Darren's opinions are as valid as yours. He is not in "error" or "wrong", it's simply a difference of opinion and taste. The fact he has responded so honestly gives us the opportunity to discuss these issues that prevent many hardcore anime fans from enjoying their anime "on the big screen".
 
Paul said:
Anyway Fudce, I know you're a big fan of English dubs, so I'm understanding of your sensitivity to his complaints, but Darren's opinions are as valid as yours. He is not in "error" or "wrong", it's simply a difference of opinion and taste. The fact he has responded so honestly gives us the opportunity to discuss these issues that prevent many hardcore anime fans from enjoying their anime "on the big screen".
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I think you've pretty much summed up my annoyance in that last paragraph. I get a little upset when people sound like they're critising the majority of dubs without reason. It's unfortunate that this is the honest view of a typical UK-based anime fan. I hope that they watch the channel regardless and learn that the dubbing in anime has improved greatly over what they expect.
 
A really interesting read, although i have to echo the sentiments of the interviewee in that i doubt i will actually watch a lot of anime on television.

I'm kinda confused though, do they actually showed subbed anime or not? Not that it matters particularly as i haven't got sky.
On a personal note i'm a sub man, but i understand that the network can't win, whichever way they go they'll be damned unless they replay each episode like Film4 did

Anyways i'm more worried about the editing state of affairs, whats it like? Subs and Dubs are a personal choice but i think cuts and edits are universally hated unless they're incredibly minor ones.
Seeing as they're apparently going for the "young adult/adult" market there is little excuse for keeping the edits in for rating reasons. At around 6pm i saw a "World's worst/scariest blah blah blah" episode where they televised not one but two deaths. One where a person was shot (they paused just when the police shot) and another where a stunt went wrong and the poor guy was buried alive.
Cutting out cousin relationships (i forget the proper term)/animated fictional death seems to be a tad petty compared to it no?
 
Liquid Skin said:
I'm kinda confused though, do they actually showed subbed anime or not?
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I haven't heard a definitive yes or no about this, but as I mentioned above, the structure of the channel will easily allow for both sub and dub versions of anime to be shown on the same night. If you want sub versions, be sure to email anime central and ask for them to be added.

Liquid Skin said:
Anyways i'm also worried about the editing state of affairs, whats it like?
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Considering they are airing 9pm+, it's safe to assume that there will be no editting or cutting.
 
Firstly I would like to thank Nargis aka Manga Girls for interviewing me for this. I loved the article and found it interesting to see how the industry plan to proceed with anime in the UK.

Morning all, yes it is I Darren the guy who was interviewed for this (hides from Fudce in fear of retribution).

Just like to say that I DO NOT hate dubs, as I stated I love the Ghibli ones, but some of them just don't feel right to me and I couldn't really care if someone won an award for sounding like someone else, Hell the Titanic movie won loads of awards and I'd really wish they'd sink every copy of that awful film with the actual ship as a tribute.

I stand by my comments as they are my opinion, personally I will always prefer Subs as thats how I started watching anime but I won't not watch dubbed anime, I recently finished watching FMP on dub as I couldn't get the subbed version and found it was a great series but having started watching the subbed version of it I found the voices off-putting.

Personally I have a HUGE dvd collection, there is nothing better than owning your fave series on dvd being able to watch them anytime you want and share them with mates but with the expense of buying non-boxsets (i.e. single dvd's with only 3-4 eps on them), it can cost a lot and I personally welcome any channel willing to bring more anime to the UK as long as this is not at the expense of the series themselves, nothing annoys me more than sitting down to watch something and seeing it cut to pieces to suit an audience it was never intended for.
 
First, huge gratz to Nargis and the AUKN news team for a damn fine bit of reporting ;)

Second gratz to McIcy for what I think was a very good portrayal of what I consider to be the more established anime fan.
Apologies if that sounds a bit elitist (a bad descriptive and one I don't like), but his views typify a lot of the sentiments I hear from the majority of the more "otaku" anime fans I know.
I myself am standing almost in the same spot as Darren (feels sympathy for the workmate grief, I work in the construction industry myself; ever tried explaining anime to a muscle-bound steelworker!?)
I watch huge amounts of fansub, and equally buy huge quantities of DVD's ;)

Will I watch AnimeCentral? Umm, possibly, but it'll be more to get the viewing figures up rather than from a desire to watch a series. I've already seen or own everything they are showing, and like McIcy I prefer sub to dub.
I understand where he's coming from on the sub/dub issue; after becoming used to watching sub's my own perception is that Japanese just sounds "right" when watching anime. I'm not saying the work the dub actors do is bad or wrong, far from it (I used to be firmly in the dub camp myself), it's just my personal preference when watching anime now.

Will Anime Central succeed in bringing over the diehard fansub fans?
I doubt it, and I think it would be a mistake to try.
People who watch a lot of fansub do so because they are normally exploring the anime medium for all its worth or to fulfil their specific genre needs, something a UK based channel will never be able to compete with.
(EDIT: I'm adding an extra line here to clarify my viewpoint: By all means try and win them over, just don't rely on them )

The biggest strength of Anime Central will be its ability to bring in new fans and create greater interest amongst the casual anime viewers.
When anime was on TV in the 80's & 90's it succeeded in creating a lot of casual interest in anime (before it went all tentacle monster on us), but failed to follow through.
I'm hoping Anime Central can yet again generate that general interest in anime, but succeed in the follow through and get people hooked. It's then site's like AUKN who take that person to the next level of anime fandom ;)
 
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