Golden anime One Piece Film 2016. Photo: Alami
Netflix is looking for a piece of action. More precisely, part of the action of One Piece. The streamer has just released a film adaptation of a popular Japanese comic and cartoon about a team of careless pirates looking for a mythical treasure. This treasure is «One Piece»: hence the name of the show.
Like other streamers, Netflix has become increasingly selective about the projects it supports. However, in the case of One Piece, the green light was obvious. Japanese cartoons and comics, known as 'anime' and 'manga', have become rare global successes in times of uncertainty in mainstream entertainment. For example, One Piece is a more profitable franchise than James Bond ($20.515 billion vs. $19.9 billion), and the even more obscure Fist of the North Star ($21.8 billion) is worth more than Transformers. » ($17.2 billion).
But anime, which usually features bright illustrations and characters with big, compassionate eyes, is not just a success. Over the past few years, it has become a full-fledged phenomenon. In the first six months of 2020, 100 million families worldwide watched at least one anime cartoon on Netflix, up 50% from 2019.
Sales of manga comics also skyrocketed. To get a feel for this demand, all you have to do is visit your local bookstore, where acres of shelf space have been cleared to make room for manga bestsellers like Assassination Classroom, Tokyo Ghoul, and Demon Slayer — A 23-volume story. set in early 20th century Japan and has sold 150 million copies worldwide.
But if the popularity of manga and anime is undeniable, the more difficult question is why these intertwined genres—an anime cartoon is usually an adaptation of the best-selling manga—are picking up steam right now. What has whetted our appetite for fast-paced, jocular, and often violent Japanese entertainment over the past five years?
“The big jump in popularity started when Netflix started adding anime to their site; like Demon Slayer, says Jess McCauley of TokyoToys Birmingham, a popular manga and play toy store. «This anime has greatly increased the number of anime viewers and in turn encouraged those people to pick up the manga books of their favorite series — often because scenes from the manga were cut from the anime.»
Demon Slayer series, 150 million books sold worldwide. Photo: Alami
In the case of younger readers and viewers, manga and anime seem more violent and less rewarding than Disney. Manga often has teen or older teen ratings, and while the violence is usually (and literally) cartoony for preteens and young teens, the books carry an exhilarating smell of the forbidden. There is no street credibility in Disney's Frozen. Knowing everything about Nezuko, the demon slayer's possessed heroine, earns a lot more reputation.
Netflix may have helped spread the word about the manga. But fans have also turned to dedicated streaming services like Crunchyroll and Hidive, which have posted impressive subscriber growth. In 2017, Crunchyroll had about a million paying subscribers. By 2021, that figure had risen to five million, and by February 2022, that figure had doubled to 10 million. By that time, Sony had acquired Crunchyroll and merged it with its distributor Funimation.
With Sony's support, Crunchyroll entered the film distribution business, bringing manga films to Western theaters. One notable success was Jujutsu Kaisen 0, about a teenager who is haunted by the ghost of an old girlfriend. It grossed £15 million in the US and £825,000 in the UK in March 2022.
«This is an amazing discovery,» David A. Gross of Franchise Entertainment Research told Reuters. “Reviews for this film and all Funimation/Crunchyroll films are exceptional. They didn't miss.»
«Movies based on the most popular anime series can now compete with major Hollywood films,» Miki Niina of Los Angeles-based anime distributor Eleven Arts told Cartoon Brew last year. “Ten years ago, that didn't happen often.”
The impact on the book industry was no less devastating. Manga sales in the US jumped 160 percent from 2020 to 2021, with 25 million books sold. A similar trajectory is being followed in the UK, where 434,000 manga were sold in 2012 and will rise to almost two million in 2022.
“It was really interesting—many people in the comic book distribution and bookstore business will tell you that manga doubles comic book sales every year,” said one well-known comic book artist. “This thing has come and it's huge… It's taken over the world. You see NBA players reading manga in the middle of matches. The whole world is like, “Well, if he’s cool and he succeeds, then I can.” It continues to grow.»
One Piece fan celebration in Santa Monica, California, August 2023 Photo: AFP < p>It should be remembered that anime has always had a fan base. In the 1990s and early 2000s, films like Akira and Ghost in the Shell attracted cult followings. But the mainstream usually avoided them — they were considered the prerogative of extreme nerds. No one took anime seriously.
With the advent of Demon Slayer and Crunchyroll, the situation has changed. These and other successes have changed perceptions. Netflix's acceptance of the genre is also significant. The company bases its decisions on raw data – and its belief in manga has been seen elsewhere.
“It was an incredibly important shift for anime because it removed some of the biases that people had. It's not that the exhibitors didn't want to believe in anime, it's just that they didn't have enough data to do so,» Crunchyroll's Adam Zener told Cartoon Brew.
He recalled when «it was very difficult to convince him cinema chains where anime fans came.» “I remember when we launched Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods, the forecasts in the network cinemas were not so high. We ended up making about $2.55 million and they were blown away.”
However, Netflix was ahead. Like Disney + invested billions in Star Wars and Marvel spin-offs that no one wanted, while its competitor was quietly building a massive library of anime. Live action One Piece will further solidify its status as a mainstream streamer with a better understanding of anime. With the Demon Slayer in its corner, Netflix is perfectly placed to take out the opposition.
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