Toonami: Things Past and Yet to Come

Editorial by Chris

April 9, 2000

Almost anyone who has cable has seen Cartoon Network and has probably heard of its Toonami programming block. What is Toonami, though? Here I shall explain what Toonami is and where it is going. Toonami premiered on Cartoon Network in 1996. The basic theme of Toonami was that it contained shows outside of the normal Bugs Bunny and the like. The original lineup of Toonami included Sailor Moon, Robotech, Voltron, and Thundercats. With the exception of Sailor Moon, which hadn't been on for awhile, the two-hour block generated minimal fanfare. My personal gripe with Toonami was that they only showed the first 62 episodes of Robotech and not the Mospeada series. Also, they dropped Robotech twice to replace it with Reboot.

Later that year, Dragon Ball Z was added to the block and made it very popular. In the U.S., DBZ had originally aired on the Bohbot Kids Network (BKN) in 1995, but it was dropped. It was also heavily edited to fit in with BKN standards. However, that's a story for another day and someone on another website to explain. In 1999, CN added Ronin Warriors (released in Japan as Samurai Troopers). RW is a lame 80's samurai show with extremely dated animation that is nonetheless very popular.

At this point, the Toonami lineup included Sailor Moon, Ronin Warriors, Dragon Ball Z, and Reboot. Most were dated shows that were no longer running. Something needed to be added to spice things up. That is why their announcement at the end of 1999 came as a total shock. CN announced that starting in spring 2000 that Mobile Suit Gundam Wing was joining Toonami, and in the summer Tenchi Muyo would premiere. Anime fans greeted this announcement warily. CN assured fans by stating that both an edited and an uncut version would air daily. Anime history was made when Wing premiered on March 6, 2000, making it the first Gundam show to ever be aired in the U.S. in the entire twenty year history of the franchise. Within one week, both the edited and uncut versions of Wing became not only the highest rated programs on Toonami, but also on the entire network. The country loves Gundam and is scooping it up everywhere.

Some people think that CN should make a separate Toonami channel that would be all anime. Perhaps now we are seeing the test run for that. On April 8, 2000, CN showed a 24-hour Toonami marathon entitled "Toonami: Full Cycle." On this day they premiered new episodes of Dragon Ball Z, and also showed the DBZ movie Dead Zone (aka Return My Gohan). They also ran some Gundam Wing and Sailor Moon. My highlight of the evening was that they aired the two Batman animated features Mask of the Phantasm and Sub-Zero. Those two excellent features rarely are shown on TV.

So, what can we expect from Toonami in the future? Well, Gundam Wing will finish its first run in May. On June 5, 2000, Tenchi Muyo will premiere. CN will be showing both the Tenchi Universe show and the recent Tenchi in Tokyo. Perhaps they might even show some of the three movies (but never the OVA's). CN has said that Toonami will be expanding to three hours, and to Saturday morning as well (it'll be called Toonami: Rising Sun). So, all the current series and Tenchi makes two and a half hours. What will fill in this last half hour? Another surprise, or something from the dust closet? Who knows. What I do know is that Toonami will be staying with us for a very long time and is proving to be a good outlet for serious anime fans to find good programming. If you want to see more Toonami on CN or a Toonami channel, I encourage you to send positive letters to CN. They will listen if we demand things politely. That means no flame wars from you obsessed die hard fans and absolutely none of that crap about demanding subtitled versions to be aired. DON'T ASK CN FOR SUBS 'CUZ THEY SAID THEY WON'T SHOW 'EM. CN recently made the separate Boomerang channel to showcase classic cartoons, so a Toonami channel is not hard to envision.